What Tools do you use for planning?
I think all of those things really help with the energy throughout the day.
Tutorials on soapmaking, bath fizzies, lotions and more
Filed Under: Business Musings
What Tools do you use for planning?
I think all of those things really help with the energy throughout the day.
Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap
Supplies:
1 lb Naturally Clear Soap Base
Sweet Treats Colorant Set
Delectable Desserts Fragrance Set
Soap Injector Tool
Checkered Heart Mold
Pyrex cup, 4 small mugs or cups
Spray bottle with rubbing alcohol, knife, cutting board
Directions:
1. Fill one cup half full with hot water.
2. Now melt 1 oz of soap base in a cup (15 seconds in the microwave). Stir in a few drops of Pink Frosting colorant, then a drop or 2 of White Icing colorant. Draw up some soap in your injector tool and very gently fill the checker indentations.
TIP: If you spray the mold with alcohol before you start filling the squares, the soap will flow into the corners much easier.
3. When done, squeeze excess soap back into mug, then draw up hot water to clean.
4. Repeat for other colors, using Buttercream Yellow and White Icing colors. Any pattern looks great – you can’t mess up!
5. Allow to harden. If you dripped onto any squares accidentally, use a toothpick or skewer to pick soap off. If the edges seem harsh, use your finger to smooth the soap lines back down.
6. Now melt 12 oz of clear soap base. Color with several drops of Buttercream Yellow. You don’t want to start with Bakery Beige because sugar cookies are a soft color. Add one drop of Bakery Beige to get a more tan tone. It’s better to be light in this case. Now add 1 teaspoon of Vanilla Frosting fragrance oil and stir well.
7. Let the soap cool to 120 degrees. Then spray your checkered soap with alcohol and pour in beige soap. Only fill half way so they’re more like real cookies. Allow soaps to harden overnight and pop out.
Put these in pretty treat bags and tie with ribbon. Your friends will LOVE this no-calorie surprise!
-Debbie, Soapylove
Filed Under: Bramble Berry News
Every year Bramble Berry adopts a Salvation Army families and buys Christmas gifts for them (our post from last year). This year we had 5 families with a total of 33 individuals. It was a big job – but fortunately much of the crew turned out to help! It’s a holiday tradition that we all love. The Bramble Berry team volunteers their time after work to help do the shopping. And, that’s a good thing because even with 20ish people help shop, it still took over 2 hours to find everything on the lists.
To the right is Amber passing out the shopping wish lists. She gets the names and ages ahead of time and makes up the ‘Wish Lists’ so everyone is clear on the sizes of the clothing and what toys the kids want. Her organization is key to making the shopping trip go smoothly. And to the left is Nicole (aka BrambleMomma on the Teach Soap forum) and her daughter finding the perfect gifts.
Here we are lined up at the register. The line was so long I couldn’t get all of us in one picture! Shoppers kept walking by our line and looking at us with a mixture of horror and pity. And then, quickly scurried off to find shorter lines. On the right, we are bagging, organizing and labeling all of Christmas gifts. Though we buy wrapping paper to include with the gifts, we don’t wrap any of the presents so that the parents can look everything over before the big day. We are extremely thankful to Fred Meyers for giving us our own cashier and for giving an extra 10% off of everything we bought so we could give even more presents.
Here I am swiping my credit card card; it’s one of my favorite moments of the entire year – surrounded by the incredible Bramble Berry team, living up to our value of being ‘Socially Responsible’ and making a positive impact on our local community. Alas, even with all the joy, someone has to clean up. Tim, the experienced cashier they gave us, sure had a lot of hangers to clean up after we were done.
It was good thing our warehouse crew is so very good at packing. They managed to get everything into Norm’s car – of course there wasn’t room for anyone else besides Norm after they were done. He also reported that everytime he stopped, no less than 3 toys would start singing or making some type of racket.
We were all extremely grateful that we were able to share some holiday cheer with those less fortunate than us. It such a blessing to be given the incredible opportunity to give back to our community. Thank you for shopping at Bramble Berry so we can continue to give back throughout the year to worthy non-profits. Happy Holidays!
Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap
Are you having guests over this Christmas? Sneak these Candy Cane Soaps into the guest bathroom for holiday ambiance. Just tell the little ones not to eat them, they look and smell like the real thing.
This project involves mixing melt and pour with glycerin to give it a softer, pliable texture. As soon as the soap is cool enough to handle, it’s cut into strips and molded into candy cane shapes. Timing is crucial for this project. Once you pour the soap into the mold, don’t walk away! The cooler and harder the soap, the more difficult it is to mold.
Once you start twisting and molding the candy canes, work quickly. We recommend having a soaping buddy for this process. If the slab of soap becomes too cold, it becomes very difficult to twist the soap without breaking.
SIX: Once all the candy canes have been twisted, melt 4 ounces of Clear Melt and Pour Soap Base using 10 second bursts. Mix in about 1/4 teaspoon of Fine Silver Rainbow EcoGlitter. Feel free to add more glitter if you prefer. Dip the candy canes in the sparkly soap. Then, you can either lay the soap flat on a silicone mold to dry, or create a “hanging contraption” as shown below to allow the soap to drip off. Allow the soap to fully cool and harden. Enjoy!
Filed Under: Bramble Berry News
Filed Under: Business Musings
I was heartened by the level of reader engagement on my post about scheduling yesterday. Thank you for reading and participating.
Filed Under: Business Musings
Morgane commented on the Brand Spankin’ New Items post:
I was thinking that if i had to manage my own company, the first thing that would scare me would be managing my time.
Anne-Marie, i would love to know what a day or even a week at BB look like?
I know i am curious! )
Thanks for sharing your passion with us.
Speaking at the Admistrative Professional’s Day in Bellingham
*in difficult months, travel can account to up to 50% and the perfectly planned month goes out the window!
There isn’t enough time in the day/month to do everything so my days start early and end late. That’s the only way I can fit it all in and, it’s the extra 20% that really makes a difference to how I feel about my schedule. If I am working out, eating right and spending time with family on a weekly basis, a 12 hour workday seems easy.No matter where I am or what I’m doing, I’m always hooked into my iPhone (and before that, my Treo).Last month, my cell phone used up 298,440 MB of data, I sent 910 text messages and received 843 text messages (and that doesn’t include Twitter). I check my email first thing in the morning and emails are the last thing I look at before going to sleep. It’s not pretty. It’s not romantic. And it’s not what my husband would prefer – but that’s what it takes for me to run my small business. You have to get up earlier, stay up later and work smarter than everybody else.I can count the number of movies on *one hand* that I’ve watched in the last decade without a laptop sitting on my lap. And, even with all of that, I love my life and feel lucky and blessed every day.
Business doesn’t come ‘naturally’ to anyone. Certain God-given abilities give people an edge (example: being able to sell anything to anyone) but financial literacy, appropriate human resources skills, marketing strategy, operations – all of that needs to be taught.
What if you don’t have the money to do tons of executive education?Get creative! Classes at the community college, attend evening (free or close to free) lectures, start a Business Book Club, start a Mastermind Group and explore these ideas with other people and go to the library monthly to read the business magazinesUltimately, how you schedule your day is up to you and what works for me won’t necessarily work for you. The next post I do will be about the 10% Planning that I spend my month on – what the planning looks like and why it’s important to do.Please ask questions – leave comments – I want this to be a helpful series for you and I can only make it helpful through your feedback.
Filed Under: Bramble Berry News
Filed Under: Business Musings
Seattle Wine Gal had an excellent blog post this week about measuring the ROI of Social Media. She wrote it primarily for wineries but the message applies to all businesses, not just those in the wine industry. When I read it, I thought: “Wow! I should totally write about that for our industry.” And, then, when I started a rough draft, I realized that Barbara had already said it and there was no need to reinvent the wheel. She graciously agreed to let me re-publish her post (thanks, B!). Are you on the fence about ‘social media’ (Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, LinkedIn and more)? Or are you tweeting away, wondering what good it does? Then this post is for you.
Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap
This Christmas kit came just in time for last minute Christmas presents, hostess gifts or stocking stuffers! For just $29.99, get everything you need to make 8 dazzling and personalized soaps! Grab your kit HERE and check out the easy instructions below!Printing your homemade stencils: Download the PDF file that comes with the kit or choose your own Christmas design. Print the design on sticker labels. Allow the ink to dry then use your craft knife to cut out the design or lay the paper design over contact paper. Keep in mind that you will be able to use both the cut out and the silhouette for your stencil.
ONE: Prepare your glitter. If you want a colored glitter check out the instructions on How to Color Glitter just by mixing in mica (yes, it’s really that simple).
TWO: Melt 3.5 ounces of clear melt and pour soap and mix in 1 ml of Sleigh Ride Fragrance Oil.
THREE: Stir in a couple drops of liquid colorant (either the red or blue) and pour the soap into 1 cavity of the Slim Rectangle Mold. We love the Slim Rectangle Mold because it holds 3.7 ounces and fits wonderfully into the palm of your hand. Allow the soap to cool for 3-4 hours.
Color Variation: Mix the red and blue together for a fun purple. Or combine the super green and Matte Yellow micas for a bright, lime green color. Don’t be afraid to get creative with this part!
FOUR: Remove of the backing and adhere the cut-out sticker to your soap. Spray the top of the soap with hair spray to make sure the glitter adheres to the soap.
FIVE: Sprinkle the soap with your colored (or plain) glitter and let dry for at least 5 minutes. Do one solid color or an array of colors.
SIX: Once the glitter has dried onto the soap, dump the extra glitter on the soap into a container to use for your other soaps. Then, carefully peel off the backing and ooh and ahh over the sparkles and clean lines. Give it another finishing spritz with hair spray to make sure the glitter really sticks.
What I love about this project and kit is that it can change with the seasons so easily. Make a heart silhouette and you have Valentine soap, make a bunny silhouette and you have Easter soap. Get creative. This technique will give you holiday after holiday of sophisticated-looking soaps.
Filed Under: Personal Ramblings
These candies soaps are a definite crowd pleaser. I love coordinating the colors for all occasions. These Cinnamon Soapy Candies (below) will probably go in some stockings this year (shhh…don’t tell anyone). Want to learn how to make these? Check out the video on Soap Queen TV (it’s FREE).
I made all of these candy soaps with Cinnamon Sugar Fragrance Oil and Vanilla Color Stabilizer. The Cinnamon Sugar smells just like a cinnamon sticky bun (with extra cinnamon) and sweet vanilla frosting (oozing down the sides…yummm). Because of the sweet vanilla notes, it will discolor to a beige or light brown. Thank goodness for Vanilla Color Stabilizer! Just use equal parts fragrance oil to stabilizer to prevent discoloration. For the red color above, I used clear soap base with equal parts Non-Bleeding Red and Red Jelly. And I used white soap base for the white swirls.
Filed Under: Business Musings
Do you have specific metrics that you use to figure out when it’s time to stop charging forward and just hunker down?
Another question we discussed was: Do your other responsibilities make you more conservative or less conservative?
At what point is your business not fun? If you’re not fulfilling the dreams you had for the business when do you cut back/pull the plug?
Filed Under: Bramble Berry News
It’s December 1st already! Where has this year gone? Well, like they say, time flies when you’re having fun! Here’s a look back on our past Christmas projects…
Between all of them, we hope that you find lots of Christmas and holiday inspiration for your holiday craft needs.
Filed Under: Personal Ramblings
In accordance with the Federal Trade Commission Guildlines Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising, here are my disclosure policies:
1. I often blog about raw materials that can be purchased at Bramble Berry, a for-profit organization I founded in 1998. I am the CEO of Bramble Berry.
2. If a product or service I blog about was given to me or purchased at a discount, I will disclose it. As a general practice, I purchase all the items I review on the blog.
3. I am the President of ELF Industrial, the Owner of Otion Soap and maintain the site TeachSoap.com
4. Blog commenters are not required to log in. Healthy discussion is encouraged; rude or disrespectful comments may be deleted.
5. At my discretion, I delete comments that are obvious spam, advertising or are rude. I reserve the right to edit comments. I delete all comments that are thinly veiled (or not) efforts to promote your products or services at my blog. I have removed the “no follow” designation from my comments so that you enjoy SEO credit for the link you share with your comment. I did this because I want my blog community to receive a boost from participating here. But if your comment, in my discretion, is opportunistic in nature, seeking to use the comment area as a free ad for your products, your comment will be deleted without notice to you. If you’d like to advertise, let me know and I can set you up through my paid sponsorship program.