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We’ve Moved!

This weekend we officially opened our own website!  It is open to the public now but is still a work in progress.   We can now be found at texaspioneercreations.com in addition to our Facebook page.  My little blog here is making its transition over to the new site and we are working out the kinks for our followers.  Current followers will be subscribed to the new location but let me know if you have any problems with your updates from me!  Please check us out over at our little .com and have patience with me as I get our products loaded into the site, pictures loaded, and the shopping cart secured.   I will keep tweaking it and working on it behind the scenes; hopefully some of my trials will provide a good laugh for us all!  I greatly appreciate both those of you who have had the patience with me as I learn how to make a website and those who let me vent when I swore my computer was from the pits of you know where 🙂  Now for my last soap update on our WordPress.com location.

The sand soaps have been such a hit that I’m working on another tea sand soap.  I’d been debating between two tea blends and haven’t made up my mind.  Perhaps I’ll drag out my second cauldron and whip up both!  I only made a small batch of vanilla for a special request but it seems to be a bigger hit than expected again.  There will be more vanilla coming soon for those who had been interested; please email me if you want to preorder any of them.  Another soap that will be joining the full-time lineup will be our Sage & Citrus soaps.  It seems to be a huge hit for both the guys and gals- especially when we infuse it with our garden grown sage!  I will have more of that ready right around Halloween and currently have only a few bars left on hand.

We will be at Donna’s Market next weekend, October 13, for those who live in our area.  The address is 18315 Kenmark Lane, Cypress, TX 77433.  The market hours are from 8-2pm and we hope you’ll stop by to say hello!  We’re working hard to make sure everything is ready to see you there.  As much as I’ve wished, there is no magic wrapping fairy anymore than there is a housework fairy- darn it!  As for now, I must get back to wrapping soaps and then working on our new site.  Please send me any feedback you have (yes- I mean good, great, and even the bad) about our site and Facebook page.  After Donna’s Market, I should have the final results to post on the secret scents we’ve been working on.

Happy Washing!

Dorothy

Author’s Note:  I am reposting here my last blog from our WordPress.com site as everything is being finished up on the migration.  Thanks for stopping by!  – Dorothy

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Quickie

This week’s been a busy one here.  Everyone’s hopping, pots flying around, wild notes and calculations on soap math.  We’re getting ready for Donna’s Market and working on some new experiments.  Zombie fingers are coming along, a new scent is going thru trials, and I’m working on clearing the freshly cured soaps off the racks.  I know some soapers who absolutely LOVE wrapping their soaps and look forward to it with each batch.  I’m just too nit-picky with my own, I guess.  Takes me twice as long as I think it should but if I can get those racks empty, I can cook again next week- hooray!  I had a brainstorm about some holiday soaps that I really, really want to try out if there’s time.  Pumpkin thoughts are on my mind and peppermint infused soaps are in the works.  Now if I could just get that website finished….

For my beer soap lovers out there,  the next round of those should be ready to go home with you at Halloween.  We were able to find the scent again after our last supplier stopped carrying it- happy day!  I know Mr. Herbert will be dancing when he gets the news.  Hope that good news brightens up a day or two for my beer soap followers.  I danced for joy when I found the scent again but the kids just laughed at my dancing…..

I am closing down shop today around 2pm central time so that we can take a group of Cub Scouts out camping as promised.  I may get a signal out there in the woods where I can check emails but no promises.  Plan for us to return to business as usual on Monday and I will return your emails, calls, and posts then.  Don’t forget you can catch us on Facebook too while you’re hanging out there.  Hope everyone has as much fun this weekend as we’re planning!

Happy Washing!

Dorothy

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Zombies in the soap

I had planned a regular posting about some of the soaps that are curing right now but, as is normal around here, something came along that cracked me up.

This week I’m writing about the straight Olive Oil Castile soap that was made about three weeks ago. We used a blend of regular and pomace olive oils and avoided any scents or colorings this time to create a clean, gentle soap. (This was part of my inspiration from our brand new nephew Lex and my cute-baby-obsessed brain.) It is very mild, moisturizing, and is as well-loved by sensitive and mature skins as it is by the wee ones in our lives.

I had made a large batch this time in hopes that I might be able to stash some away for the holidays but was really, really unhappy with the texturing of the top when I unmolded it. Now, if you are a new reader, you may not know that I am one of those soapers who owns a block grater and is not afraid to use it. Luckily, this soap was still very young and I was able to chop it up quickly with my favorite big knife. Lots of little olive oil bits went back into the soaping pot for another round until they melted into submission. I remolded the entire batch and was very pleased once it came out the next morning. These were cut into large bars with a few sample scraps so I made them a home on the curing racks. Sure that I was once again the queen of my soapy domain, I lined up all my beautiful soap bars to cure. I admired their greenish gold tint and made myself swear I wouldn’t start putting any of them to use until they were fully cured, or maybe three weeks, or maybe just one for now…… I mentioned I can be impatient about waiting to quality control each batch, right?

I promise I behaved and left them alone until hubby came home that night. He was checking out everything I had cooked up that day and was intently staring at the olive oil soaps. Confidant I had totally rocked that batch, I waited to hear any questions, comments, or praise he might have. No worries, right? He floored me completely with his reply: “You know, this looks like zombie soap.” Huh?!?! It still makes me laugh but I had to agree once I heard him out.

Soapers can tell you how colors will morph some as they cure and certain oils will give you certain colors in your soap. This olive oil blend has a light green gold hue but as it was curing it made some slightly darker spots that had a brownish tinge too. Dunno how much your family is into zombies but this batch provided us a few giggles for about a week as it settled itself down. I am sad to say that I no longer see the zombie resemblance but now I have some inspiration for another batch of soap. If I can get it to work, we will add “Zombie Soap” to the silly soap line along with the “Cow Pattie” and “Mud Balls.” I’ll make a blog post about those another time; let me find some good pictures of them so I can put it in there, ok?

This batch of no-longer-zombie-looking soaps will be ready to go to new homes around September 25th. I hope to have some good pictures up soon of everything on the rack for all of us who enjoy staring at soap pics. If you are in the Houston area, you can catch us at Donna’s Market on October 13th. Please stop by and say hello, tell a good joke, or just have a chat! I shall sign off here for the week as the sky’s just opened up and the rain is pouring down. Time to go get dirty for an excuse to try out the new experiments!

Happy Washing!

Dorothy