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Herbs
Essential oils
Fun FAQS
DID YOU KNOW? - FYI:
These bars are made with an all glycerin soap base which is part of the regular lye soap making process. Glycerin’s main job is to pull and keep moisture close to itself which is why it is so moisturizing to the skin. However, due to its draw to moisture it can not be left sitting in water because it will absorb it and turn the whole bar gelatinous. Please remove to a soap dish or from direct constant contact with water.
IMPORTANT REMINDER !
No products on this site are made with synthetic fragrance oils.
Trying to keep the products as natural as possible, I chose to create them with the addition of beneficial pure essential “oils”- which are potent plant based extractions from leaves, stems, roots or flowers of the plant or tree (that must be used appropriately, !! not to be used by those who are pregnant - as a precaution !! ).
Test soap on inside wrist if prone to sensitivity and wait 24 hours before full use. Please note that responsibility lies with the customer in regards to product use.
HOW ABOUT THIS ...did you know?
The vast majority of leading soap brands contain "sodium tallowate", derived from animal fats, a potential cause of clogged pores and breakouts. Most also strip their bars of glycerin which is a key ingredient that helps keep your skin from feeling dried out.
Saponification is the process by which fats (oils) and an alkali are combined together causing a chemical reaction that results in soap. Glycerin is a by-product of this reaction which many mass commercial soap manufacturers siphon off and sell as a product to be sold and used in lotions or skin creams. Without glycerin in the soap, skin tends to feel dry and itchy after use. It is a natural humectant - draws water to the skin and holds moisture in the outer layer of skin to maintain the skin's natural balance of moisture. Check the commercial bars available and look for the tallow (sodium tallowate) and the order in which it is listed (the higher the percentage, the closer to the beginning of the list) and there is no guarantee that the animal fats being used are of excellent quality. So, do you think you are using soap? Check labels to see if the word "soap" is even mentioned. Most are in reality more "detergent" bars.
DID YOU KNOW? About some of these generic terms worth mentioning...
Additives - ingredients added to a soap batch, such as superfatting oils,essential oils, colorants and botanicals or herbs, to name a few, that add a specific quality or property
Aroma - the scent of an essential or fragrance oil, botanical/plant or fat/oil
Detergents - cleansers in which petroleum derivatives have been substituted for animal fats or vegetable oils (soap can not be labelled detergents and detergents CAN NOT be labelled soap)
Essential oils - oils distilled directly from plant petals, leaves, berries, flowers, twigs, bark, stems, wood, spices, roots, fruits or rinds
Fragrance oils - synthetic oils produced to have the same aroma as essential oils or to replicate those things which are not plant derived
Melt and pour - a method of creating handmade soap by melting a purchased unscented soap base and adding botanicals, oils and other additives in personalized combinations
Saponification - the chemical process that occurs when fats/oils (acids) are combined with lye (an alkali) in liquid form to create a thick, creamy soap
Superfatting - adding extra oils and fats to create a richer, milder soap
DID YOU KNOW?
We don't really know when soap was "invented" there are many myths and suppositions.
The Ebers papyrus (Egypt, 1550 BC) reveals that the ancient Egyptians mixed animal and vegetable oils with alkaline salts to produce a soap-like substance. The Celts made their soap from animal fat and plant ashes and they named the product saipo, from which the word soap is derived. (Although the "Roman" story attributes to creating the word "soap" also).
The first evidence of the use of soap can be traced to around 2800 B.C. Soap was invented by Babylonians and also used in Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt, ancient Greece and by the Romans.
One of my favorite "myths" is the story of soap being discovered around 1000BC in Rome (or was it in Greece?, they question...) that women rinsing clothes in the river at the base of a hill where animal sacrifices had taken place, noticed that the clothes were coming clean when they came in contact with the soapy clay oozing down the hill into the water. It was later ascertained that this substance had formed when the rendered animal fat soaked down through the wood ashes (which forms lye) and into the soil.
So will we ever really know?
However, in ancient times soap was not used for personal hygiene. Instead it was used for medicinal purposes, such as, for example, treatment of skin diseases or for cleaning cooking utensils.
DID YOU KNOW? how soap works...?
Soap is a surface active agent, or surfactant, according to the Essential Chemical Industry, help to reduce the surface tension of the water so it can spread and wet the surface and speed up the cleaning process. Soap molecules are long and thin with one end being hydrophilic and the other hydrophobic.
The long hydrocarbon chain is non-polar and hydrophobic (repelled by water). The "salt" end of the soap molecule is ionic and hydrophilic (water soluble). This means that while oil (which attracts dirt) doesn't naturally mix with water, soap can suspend oil/dirt in such a way that it can be removed.
Soap and water don't kill germs; they work by mechanically removing them from your hands. In fact, if your hands are visibly dirty or have food on them, soap and water are more effective than the alcohol-based "hand sanitizers" because the proteins and fats in food tend to reduce alcohol's germ-killing power.