With Gratitude, my 200th Blog Post! (And a Give-Away!!)

It’s hard to believe I’ve written 200 posts on this blog but I have. I’m grateful for those of you who pop by and leave your comments, thanks for being out there and interested in whatever is coming out of Studio B at the moment. No doubt that it’s always going to be something different.

I’ve put together a little package as my way of saying thanks for being out there, thanks for reading and thanks for leaving comments.
First, a small vase. I call these “rose vases” because they are perfect for a little bouquet of whatever is in bloom. I’m not a big gardener but I like picking up a bouquet of flowers at the supermarket sometimes and bringing them home. This is the kind of vase I always reach for when I do that, add a few marbles in the bottom and trim all the stems on the flowers and pop them in one at a time. Before long you’ve got a lovely little bouquet for the kitchen counter, the office or the bathroom. It’s a great way to brighten up the place or greet guests, and of course a small vase with some lovely fresh blooms is always a lovely gift.

This is a painted vase that has been fired to thermo harden the glaze resulting in a dishwasher resistant finish. In other words, you can run it through the dishwasher but if you do it too often you’ll start to lose the texture on the vase. But really, I think most of us can hand wash a small vase with no trouble.
Secondly, a small dichroic glass pendant with a little millefiori flower at the lower edge. Add a simple chain or tie with the satin cord I’ll include and it will be a lovely and delicate accent for whatever you’ve chosen to wear.
Finally, three olive oil guest soaps complete the package. First, Lapis Clove is inspired by the stone Lapis and has gold leaf in it to mimic the gold flecks in the stone. The fragrance is a fresh crisp men’s spice combination of clove and eucalyptus (I created it as a men’s combination but I love it and would certainly use it myself!) Tangerine Splash has some orange rind in it to exfoliate your skin. The fragrance includes Tangerine, Orange, Bergamot, Nutmeg, Rosemary and lemongrass essential oils. The final bar is Jasmine Clementine with calendula petals in it. The fragrance includes Orange, tangerine, Mandarin Orange, Jasmine and Amber, a blend of essential and fragrance oils.
So thanks for dropping by and checking out the things I make and the words I write. I can tell you that there is no other life that I’d rather live than the life of an artist!

In order to qualify for the giveaway, please become a “follower” of my blog using the link at the right. Then leave a comment below and I’ll draw someone at random on November the 14th and announce the winner that day. Make sure I have a way to email you, so either have your email address in your profile info, provide a link to your address or (in a pinch) post it in your comment. Thanks so much for dropping by. Happy creating!
-Carmen Rose

Updates to the Website

If you go to the Soap Page of my website, (CarmenRoseStudio.com) you'll see that I've added photos of the soap I've made. Here are some of them:



And also with the Jewelry Page:



And check out my website for my portfolio, more photographs coming. Let me know what you think. Thanks.

This Good Day

I scored some wonderful veggies today at the Farmer's Market. Sometimes I think I buy them just for the pretty colors to put on my kitchen counter for the week. I decided to get beets from Bob and Lisa who had the booth next to me at market this week. They put extra in the bag before they handed it over. It's a fun feature of market that we pass our products around to each other, sometimes bartering and sometimes just being neighborly.
Dinner when cooking for color...
I've never cooked beets before, never had the urge, never found them anything of interest until I saw them at market today and decided to try them myself. Maybe it was the salesmanship, I don't know, but they made them sound delicious. They told me how to cook them and I followed the instructions mostly, except for the bacon. =) I thought it needed bacon. Hubby didn't like the greens but approved of the beets.
Fresh Basil and mayo are wonderful on good tomatoes and I purchased a loaf of wonderful bread at market and melted some fresh motz over it. Yummm...
I roasted a few heads of garlic and a number of jalapeños in olive oil for flavoring this and that over the next few months. I wonder if that will have the "depth of flavor" (a phrase used by Barefoot Contessa on The Food Network) that I hope, we'll see.
This spring I planted this little bird bath full of goodies and I must have been doing something right. The plants are growing and so are the golf balls. There are now 17 of them. We find them regularly since we live on a golf course. It's only natural since our home is located right on the curve of a 90 degree angle green so that the golfers are aiming directly for our house when they tee off. =)
It’s been a lovely day - in spite of the alarm going off at 5:00 am to get up for farmer’s market. It was a fun market day, the temperatures were perfection. I wore a jacket most of the morning, just can’t believe this is July! And it never did actually get hot, just perfection all day. Even though the vender on one side seemed very grumpy, the lovely couple on the other side of me made up for it by being good company. I borrowed two books on felting from another vender and flipped through them in between customers. Talk about inspiration! Yay!

This afternoon I saw that a friend of mine is having a sale in her lovely art supply store which is close by. So instead of catching a nap, I headed over to pick out a lovely collection of colors and canvas. Buying colors is such a delight and it's a treat to pet the puppy and Leslie is very cool!

And when I came home I still wasn’t ready to succumb to a nap so I pulled out a box of llama fuzz a friend had given me and tried out a very basic felting technique. It’s something I’ve been meaning to do but just haven’t gotten accomplished. The results are rather weird. I also dyed up some wool roving in a variety of colors, so once that color is properly set I’ll play with adding some color to the strange experiment and see what happens. I blame it on the books lent me by another vender, they had such inspiring photographs!

We’ve been working on another bathroom facelift this week. It takes time but the work is rewarding and I’m pleased with how it looks so far. We’ve hung a new light and med cabinet; I painted and installed a new vinyl tile floor. It’s cheap and fast and will hold us over until we’re ready to rip out and install some exotic glass or hand painted tile or something. Hubby put the baseboard back down and I have a little touch up painting to do. There are other details that need to be finished up and I’ll post photos when I get the chance.

We’ve had a lovely evening here and I’m grateful for these days that feel so right. This year has brought more than its share of grieving, and these days of grace are good for the spirit. I am grateful. It reminds me of a Fernando Ortega song called “This good day.” And if I could have found a youtube video of it that was decent, I would have included it.

Here is the chorus:

“This good day, it is a gift from You
The world is turning in its place because You made it to.
I lift my voice to sing a song of praise
On this good day."

My Soap Rocks

"Jasper" hand carved soap rocks... as you use them the carved edges disappear and they look more and more like river rocks.

Independence Day Soap

My Independence Day collection of soap.
"Old Glory" is pure and simple apple pie. Yes indeed, it just doesn't get any better than that!
Some fresh sweet apple, a hint of floral and sweet almond in a combination of goat's milk and olive oil soap.
"July 4th" soap featuring fireworks of red apple, blue spice in sweet vanilla goat's milk soap.
Lapis clove spice with a sweet French vanilla center that makes for a sweet and spicy “Shenandoah Moon.”

Soap Truffles (and living in the details)

I’ve just finished photographing these little soap truffles and I am so pleased with them! They are all natural soap with all natural herbs. No colorants, just pure natural soap. Now that’s just as good as it gets, that’s why I decided to call them soap truffles.

Top left is vanilla, and not just any vanilla either. Vanilla fragrance oils tend to have an overly sweet quality and sometimes they are downright horrible. However, real vanilla is an amazing and rich fragrance that is lovely and so I put in natural Madagascar bourbon vanilla bean paste. Yeah, the kind you’d put in some rich decadent desert recipe and it is yummy! It’s a very mild fragrance but it is so lush and exotic that the first inhale will have you! The longer this bar sets, the darker brown it will become.

Top right is peppermint rose, real honest to goodness essential oil of rose, peppermint and a bit of spearmint as well. And those little dried pink rosebuds are just perfect on there. Those little rosebuds will eventually start to discolor the soap to a dark brown or black so this is a bar to USE.

Bottom left is lavender! It’s a full tilt lavender addict bar with lots of rich fragrance and lavender blossoms in the top. Your skin will love the healing properties of lavender essential oil, the scent is wonderful and you can even use the side of the bar with the blossoms to exfoliate your skin. This is another bar to USE as the lavender blossoms will discolor the soap to brown.

The last bar is Lemongrass Sage and it’s a wonderful herby combination of Lemongrass, Sage and citrus with just a touch of patchouli. It’s topped off with calendula petals that will gradually color the soap a wonderful rich gold. Use the petal side for gentle exfoliation.

I intend for all the soap I make to be used rather than set out only for pretty. Using a lovely bar of artisan soap is an inexpensive way to pamper your skin and your senses each time you bathe or wash your hands. I like these little reminders to take good care of myself, to feed the spirit. This soap is all natural and free of SLS and SLES (additives that tweak lather and hardness which are irritants to some folk’s skin.) Each one is a fat two ounces. I sell these locally at the farmer’s market but if someone wants to place an order for a quantity of them (minimum order required) then contact me. I think they may go fast.

All soap that I make right now is considered “limited edition” which just means that I’m doin what I love by designing a new bar every time I enter my soap studio. And to me that’s what keeps it interesting. I saw an old friend a while back. He told me that if someone asks you what you do for a living you should be able to answer “exactly what I want” and if not, then you’re missing something. I loved that, there is certainly something about doing what you love that is food for the soul. I think he put his finger on one of the best kept secrets to happiness. Too many people out there working jobs they hate for the health insurance. Gah! Worse yet, too many people are working really hard to support a lifestyle and goals that come from obligations, “should's” and the expectations of others. Their days determined by external forces rather than purposeful (Purpose-Full) choices made. That breaks my heart every time I see it. (the ol heart breaks often.) Come on, this life is short! You are not guaranteed tomorrow, is this what you want to do if you knew this was your last week here? Oh wait, am I up on my soap box again?! O! Sorry. =)

I saw a video a while back that facinated me. The speaker was possibly one of the most hyperactive ADD adults I’ve ever seen and everything about him was distracting. But he made the most interesting point. The first time you do something, you’re an artist. The second time you are an engineer. And the third and fourth time you are a technician. If you know me, you’ll know I am no technician. I'm barely an engineer, I am fully and completely an artist. And it is for that reason that every bar of soap I make right now is a new experience, a fresh new discovery/creation. Everything is “limited edition” until further notice. It's what works for me.

Lovely fragrances to you all! And next time you are at your local farmer's market, buy a beautiful bar of artisan soap and USE it every chance you get! If you have special skin concerns talk with the person who made the soap, if they can't answer your questions then keep moving. Throw away every bottle of anti-bacterial soap you own and get back to the real thing. Life can be brutal. Use it to remember to be kind to yourself. It's the small things. Living is in the details.

Adventures in Soaping

I made soap this week. I’ve been making confetti soap, which is just cut up bits of colorful soaps enrobed in warm soap and it solidifies into a whole new chunk of soap. It all wears together as it is used and since each bit of confetti is a different color and fragrance combination, it makes a soap that is an ever changing treat for the senses as it is used. This is my favorite kind of soap to use because it's always different. Here are a few of my favorites:
This one is perhaps the prettiest one and it smells like a combination of honeysuckle mixed with lime... now you wouldn't think that would work, but it DOES!

This one smells like the flowering trees of Spring time. It's floral with a hint of sweet and almond. A lovely and fairly traditional combo.

This one smells like chocolate chip cookies and kind of looks like chocolate chip cookie dough. Yummm... Same idea, only in heart shaped molds:

This may be the strangest soap I’ve ever made. I call it “Fresh Green Grass” yep, as in yard. It’s a combination of some delightful evergreens and some exotic spices... and Chocolate… and again – you wouldn’t think that would work. Oh but it does! And I just think it is funny looking. Wish I had thought to make it with hemp soap but it didn’t occur to me until it was made. Everything around here has been covered in a fine layer of yellow pollen until the rains came, so I included some yellow jojoba beads dusted over the top for that fresh pollen look.
In the coming days I’ll be taking down my website and putting up something entirely different. I haven’t gotten past designing the front page though so it could take a while. I want to use it more as a portfolio and possibly have a few things available for sale, but not much really. Since I do work in a variety of media, putting together an organized presentation of what I’ve done and do on a regular basis can be a little complicated so I’ll just keep working at it until I’m ready to launch it on an unsuspecting world. Then who knows what will happen.

Gifts for Iraq

My family chose to give some of what we would have spent on each other to charity instead. All of us have what we need and more besides and with all that has happened in the last year it was a good choice. The charity I chose was Mennonite Central Committee where we were able to actually make kits that will go to relief work in Iraq. These kits include towels, soap, shampoo, brush and comb, toothpaste/brush, etc. Since I’m a soaper I wanted to make soap for all the kits we made so I went through my scraps and came up with a way to make fun things out of product that was nearly unusable for me. All my experiments, leftovers and bits of this and that went into this soap. I was pleased with how they turned out so I thought I’d share a few photos, plus they matched the towels. And that is always important to me when I'm making kits because I think people in crisis need beauty maybe more than anyone.



I was also ticked with the labels I made for these. I called it “PEACE SOAP” with the tag line “Pieces of this and that in a unified whole.” Now I’m not naive enough to believe that a cheesy sentiment on a bar of soap is going to do anything positive for the folks of Iraq, but maybe these kits can help individuals and maybe the aid worker who distributes these will be able to make connections with folks that can be positive and life giving.

I was surprised to find that I felt quite strongly about making these kits. I have been so angered and offended by the Bush Administration’s use of torture, rendition and Gitmo against the people of Iraq, not to mention the abuses of Blackwater and so much more. I have grieved and prayed over these things and felt the helplessness that comes from witnessing a horror and feeling unable to do anything to stop it (other than vote, and that was/is something!) So making these kits really started to touch a nerve in me. It’s nothing in view of the billions of dollars that are pumped into the death machine, but it’s my offering. And I dare to believe that hope and love are more powerful than all the weapons of warfare that this world can come up with.

Soap for Artists

I’ve made SOAP for ARTISTS! And I’m nearly giddy with delight over all these colors!! So my product line already had most of them, I just made up a number of new kinds to fill out the line and gave them all oil paint names. For example, my Jasmine Clementine is now Cadmium Yellow Lemon. And my Lapis Blue is now Ultramarine. Yeah! I love color! And I love making soap! So this is right up my alley! I think this is a perfect product line for the art supply shop around the corner from my studio!

So here are the color names: Naples Yellow, Cadmium Yellow Lemon, Japanese Yellow Orange, Cadmium Red, Crimson, Magenta, Permanent Violet, Ultramarine Blue, Cerulean Blue, Turquoise Blue, Armor Green, Chrome Green Medium, Chrome Green Light, Golden Ochre, Red Oxide, Mars Black, Vandyke Brown, Flesh, Titanium White

***Special Edition Benefit Soap Sale***

In between a bathroom renovation and everything else going on around here, I’ve continued to make some soap! A friend suggested making a special edition soap as a fund raiser for our adoption and as it turns out… I liked the idea so much I made three kinds. I’ve made these in 3 ounce bars ripple cut, so it’s about three times the size of my guest bars. So here are the Special Edition soaps that benefit our adoption fund:

The Colombian Flag bar is Raspberry Noir, Lapis Clove and Jasmine Clementine from my regular product line. So depending on where you smell – you get a different fragrance. I wasn’t sure if I’d like it, but as it turns out - I LOVE it!

Continuing in the colors of the Colombian flag, this Colombian Confetti is a mix of fragrances. Blueberry, cherry and white grape are rounded out with creamy cheesecake. It’s a rich fruity yummy fragrance treat that changes as the soap is used.



Finally, this one isn’t in Colombian colors, instead it is “Shenandoah Mystery.” This soap is inspired by the changing colors of leaves in this area in the fall. The soap is made up of tiny cubes of a variety of soaps and scents in a vanilla base. This bar will smell different depending on where you sniff and what scents have come to the surface with use.


For a limited time, make a donation of any size using the “donate” button on the side bar and request the kinds and quantity of these Special Edition soap bars that you’d like and I’ll ship them right away. There will be some variation from batch to batch.

In addition, we plan to move the studio some time this year (We are looking forward to MUCH more room!) and when that happens we'll be out of production for a while. Place your orders now to make sure you get yours before our moving date. :)

Enter to Win

I propose a lovely little contest. I’ll offer a combination of goodies, you post a comment in this blog and I will draw a name at random and post the winner's name. The you’ll have the chance to reply with your mailing address and I’ll send this gift package out to you or whoever you'd like me to send it to. Deal? I'll draw a name Friday, September 5th, so make sure you comment now and tell your friends!

Want to know what the prize is? Two bags of my brand new herbal spa soak, Lavender and Lemongrass. Plus five of my favorite guest soaps: Lavender Vanilla, Lemongrass Sage, Robin's Egg, Honeysuckle, and Sweet Almond. See my website for more information on each of those kinds if you'd like.

This Spa Soak is BRAND NEW - I haven't even added it to the website yet, but it's amazing! It comes with a little organza bag so the herbs don't end up in your drain. And I have four flavors at the moment: Lavender, Rose, Chamomile and Lemongrass (with Calendula petals.)

Introductions

I added three new soaps to the line today and here they are:

First, “Rose of Sharon” inspired by Song of Solomon 2 is a delicate blend of old world fragrances, rosebud with a touch of lily of the valley. It is a pink soap with yellow and pink inclusions.

“Café Angelica” is a hazelnut coffee fragrance that is yummy in layers of creamy taupe and browns.

I reworked Tangerine Splash is the simple addition of exfoliating orange rind.


“New Wine” is a light bubbly scent combining fig, white grape and the green scent of vineyard in Olive oil soap with added fresh raw local honey.

The New Gourmet Soaps and a Studio Announcement!

I am delighted to announce that we've added a new person to the crew here at Carmen Rose Studio. Welcome Jeni! Your help has already been a huge blessing!

Here is the new Mint Chocolate Torte that is a combination of Chocolate, Peppermint and Creme de Mint and I think it smells as good as it looks. This one has been pretty quick off the shelf already.
The Wildberry Torte is time consuming to make, but just looks so pretty when it's finished. First the torte is made, then each of the berries are made and arranged in the torte, then the glaze fills it all in.

I love the new Lemon Meringue, it looks richer and creamier than ever.
Key Lime Pie, always a favorite around here for the look, but especially for the smell!

This blueberry Cheesecake turned out nicely with a wildberry glaze running down the sides. I'd just like to try a bite of this one.
I had a little crust leftover from the Lemon Meringue and breathed a quick prayer on what to do with it. This is the idea that was instantly in my mind and I am very happy with how they turned out! So this is the New York Style Cheesecake ~ yum, Yum, YUMMM!

And it's all SOAP!

More information on the complete line of gourmet soaps can be found here.
And we've just made it possible to purchase these online!

Cupcakes

I made these cupcakes today and was really happy with how they turned out. They smell wonderful! People really have interesting reactions when they discover that it is soap and not real cake! Chocolate/Caramel, Chocolate/Mocha, Chocolate/ Butter cream, White Cake/cherry, White/wild berry, White/butter cream. They look good enough to eat!