Have you ever been bitten by the soap bug?

So, have you ever been bitten by the soap bug?  

I KNOW how this happens, but I just can’t help it!

You know the one, where you go to create one particular kind of soap, really, just ONE that needs to be restocked, but then, well the soap bug hits and before you know it you have um, 5 different batches of soap?  No?  Really?  Come on, I know at least a few of you are laughing because you KNOW you’ve been bitten!

I had a manly shave soap that I wanted to re-introduce for Father’s Day.  I promise, that was the only one I was going to make.  Well, I KNOW how this happens, but I just can’t help it!  Correcting it is just not that easy.

I was getting out the supplies to make the base recipe I had developed for this goat milk soap.  Ingredients like pressed olive oil, organic coconut oil, unrefined organic shea butter, organic cocoa butter, lard, organic soy and of course goat milk and lye. (I was using the cold-process method for this round bar).

I had planned to split it and add 2 different additives:  Activated charcoal and French green clay and a manly blend of pure essential oils.  No problem, I have done this many times over the 13 years I’ve been making soap, but, well, it had been awhile since I’d made soap, it was a rainy day, and my teen daughter wanted some extra cash so she was watching her special-needs sister for the whole afternoon!

Then the thing that put me over the edge, was that when I got out the essential oils, I realized that I was out of one of the essential oils I use in that particular blend I had formulated.   OK, so here’s where things went really bad….I was off my plan.  You don’t ever do that do you?  You don’t ever get into trouble because you veered off your plan do you?  Here I thought it was just me  As soon as I realized I was out of one of the essential oils I needed, my mind went into full creative spin as I was looking thru the pure therapeutic essential oils I had on hand, smelling those deliciously wafting smells, thinking about entirely new blends (oops…off plan again) and wondering what essential oil I could substitute for the missing oil.

And THAT’s how it happened….all of a sudden I’m mixing, blending, stirring, grabbing my Black Rabbit Coffee Beans to reset my olfactory system in between and I am having so much fun that I just CAN’T stop at the shave soap!  I keep mixing and creating until I hear my timer go off that is warning me I only have an hour left to finish what I’m doing, get the shop cleaned up, and get back to relieve my daughter who is supervising.   I felt like the toddler having a blast and then hearing Mom call out the “time to go in a few minutes” warning!   I couldn’t totally be bummed though, it just brought me back to reality that yikes! The soap bug had struck…bitten…again.

Note:  Because I got so ahem…off-track…I wasn’t able to complete all these soaps that afternoon.  I use the old-fashioned cold-process soap method (using modern technology and science) to make our soaps, which takes much more time and then our soaps take an additional 4-6 weeks to completely cure into a long-lasting bar for you)

The good news is that I do have a few soaps restocked that needed to be, plus a couple new ones, but now I have a new problem….I need a name for the men’s goat milk shave soap!  Can you help?

**Update May 2018:  We named this soap Beard No More BUT recently the soap bug bit AGAIN when making a new batch and this newly tweaked soap became Forest Charcoal and Clay Goat Milk Soap (if you’re looking for it on our site ;))

This is the goat milk shave soap. It has a true handmade, rustic appearance.  The black is activated charcoal and the olive color is French green clay.  Made with 4 pure essential oils, the scent is a complex woodsy, sweet & spicy, fresh scent.  Help me think of a name!  Tell me what you think in the comments!  If we pick yours we’ll send you a bar once it’s ready to ship!

Pics from L to R (all goat milk soaps): Straining madder root: How we get the beautiful, rich red for the coconut-ginger-almond (aka Cherry-Almond), Bergamot-Citrus, Rose (not your Grandma’s rose…this is a light, modern heavenly rose scent!), Island Breeze (has a slight pineapple, slight floral, clean fresh scent)