14 posts tagged “babble”

I'm just slammed! 

The shopping season hit with a vengeance, I'm a little worried about running out of stuff.  My parents are in town.  Man's parents are in town.  Boy's  birthday is today and I'm elbows deep in trying to bake and decorate a Bugaboo cake.  (Bugaboo is a creature from Jill Thompson's Scary Godmother universe.) 

<img src="http://www.jillthompsonart.com/images/cast_bugaboo.jpg">

And of course, I'm missing ingredients, so need to go to the store.  And I need to ship orders, deposit checks, find my coffee, retain my sanity, wrap giant presents, and prep the house for a horde of 5 year olds. (Gods help me.)

Hope all is well in y'all's world! 

Oh...and how freaking annoying is it that Vox can't translate basic 1995 html.  I mean, what the hell, people?

This week I've made more Lemongrass Sage (on sale, btw, at Soapyhollow.com), Fig, and Pearberry.  I've just now put a big batch of Sandalwood Vanilla into the molds.  I need to gear up for Xmas shopping, so sometime in the next week I'll probably do Three Kings soap (Frankincense, Myrrh and gold mica) and Babylonia (Frankincense, Rose of Sharon, Spikenard, Cedar, Myrhh, Hyssop, Cinnamon, Cassia, Calamus, Aloes, Sandalwood, and Styrax).  Although perhaps I'll drop the Three Kings and just do Babylonia.  I dunno.  I'm not a huge fan of just Frankincense and Myrrh by themselves.  The blend just seems too harsh.  Not enough mellow notes.  I think maybe I'll use the Babylonia EO blend and call it Wise Men or something. 

There are a ton of people who are imitating my Three Kings soap, except they're doing it with cheap fragrance oils, rather than using the actual essential oils and resins...and it seems to be cheapening the brand.  Since I'm one of the only people in the industry who's got the middle eastern connections for the oils I use in Babylonia, I'm tempted to just do that, since it can't be imitated.  At least, it can't be done cheaply.  There are no synthetic versions of a lot of those resins. 

I dunno.  Three Kings does sell well.  I can't decide if I want to do both or not.  The problem with doing Three Kings by itself is that if it doesn't sell out by January, I'm kinda stuck with it.  I'm sure the shelter would love to get it, as they seem to love when I give them boxes of soap, but my goodness, it's such an expensive soap to make that I hate to have to remainder any.  Whereas Babylonia I can sell after the holidays.  And I'm really starting to run out of space, so I may have to eliminate some product lines, just so I've got enough storage for everything. I just can't make up my mind...    

Forbidden Fruit is back in stock!  It's cured, trimmed and waiting to be adored.  Whoo!  (Pomegranate, apple and spices...yum!)

Spicy Mint is also restocked.  Yay.  Just in time for summer allergy season. ;)

Today I'm making Spiced Orange Tea, and if I have time, Fire and Ice.  But, considering that I'm wrangling repair guys for my stupid Maytag Neptune....gods what a waste of money that thing was...and due at a three year old's birthday party with Boy and toys...Fire and Ice may not make it into production until tomorrow.  Which is ok, that one is really more of a winter product anyway.  It never seems to sell well in the summer, and I really could use the shelf space for other stuff.  I'm running out of room to stock products as I keep adding to the line. 

Which reminds me, I need to go put the body butters on hiatus until Fall.  The temps here are starting to climb towards 100 degrees, and the butters will just melt into a gooey mess if I try to ship them.  Nobody wants a box of goo.  Well...almost nobody. Hee.

I've also gotten a ton of evaluation ingredients in from P&G, Dow, and Lambent, so gods and time willing, I'm going to try and perfect my liquid soap and I've been asked to help formulate a new mango butter moisturizer, so I'm pretty excited to go play with those.  It'd be really cool to have one of my formulations listed in the big chemistry database of cosmetic products, but in order to do that, I have to be able to replicate the recipe over and over, and I have to have measurements that are so precise that I'm a little worried my equipment isn't quite accurate enough...but I'm going to give it the old Girl Scout try.

I've figured out how to do discounts and coupons in my database, I think.  So, stay tuned for upcoming specials and seasonal sales.  Yay!  The only thing better than Soapy Hollow soap, is Soapy Hollow soap on sale. ;) 

Sorry I haven't been commenting much on f-blogs.  I'm reading most everything, but I'm doing it in spurts. . I pulled Boy out of preschool for the summer.  One, because I was really unhappy with where he was, and two, because kids deserve to have a summer break, even if it does cut into soapmaking and writing time. :)  So, we're going to the city pool every morning for his swimming lessons, then 3 or 4 times a week we go to our neighborhood pool, and once a week we have a field trip to a museum or a ranch or the Farmer's Market, or whatever.  I'm not neglecting his academics though.  Every day we have a new letter of the day, and he thinks up words that start with, or include, that letter, and I write the words in highlighter pen, and he practices his handwriting.  He's gotten so much better in just a couple of weeks of doing that.  Then, we either try to write a story with those words, or I try to find a mythology story that has some of those words.  About 3x a week, we break out the paints and he paints pictures of the stories or the words.  Yesterday, we read the Native American myth of how Spiderwoman sang the world into being, and he painted a really cool picture, then spent the rest of the day making up songs and telling me what he was creating with his song.  He's such a great kid. 

Plus all the normal day to day activities that all of us share; keeping the chaos at bay and feeding the masses that congregate at our tables.  But even when I'm too brain dead to comment, I am trying to keep  abreast.  So many of my friends do such amazing things that I'm often at a loss to say anything other than "Wow!"  Which hardly seems like an intelligent contribution. :)

So, they took the vast majority of cast type stuff off me today.  I'm still supposed to wear the funky walking boot if I'm going to spend much time on my feet, but I'm allowed 1 hour a day of tennis shoes.  Hooray!  (I know...who knew you could be excited about tennis shoes?)

So, this weekend, we're going to get a bunch of dirt and stuff, because next weekend, Paul of The Esoteric Science Resource Center has volunteered to come help us put in our new veggie gardens, and move the Killer Attack Rose of Evil Doom.  Seriously, that rose lives on human blood, so I've decided to put it out by the fence where idiots who climb around our fence to get to Boy's fishing spot will now have to contend with  KARED as well as the weeping willows.  (There's two perfectly good parks where they can fish, they don't need to climb into my yard where *I'm* liable if they fall in and drown.)

So, veggie garden...not sure what I'm going to plant this year.  The melons did incredibly well last year, so we're going to do those again.  The squash and zucchini did well at first, but the drought, and bad planning on location killed them before they really gave much fruit.  I also think I may plant Loofas.  They're easy to grow, which will make Boy happy, and I'm sure my friends and Soapy Hollow customers would love to have freshly harvested loofas.

I've never had much luck with tomatoes, usually the birds get them all, but I may try again.  I think it's too hot here for carrots, so I may do green beans and corn.  Corn will make the neighborhood association insane...which, ya know, is an added bonus.  Also, sunflowers.  Not so much as a crop, but as goodies for the songbirds.  Any other suggestions for a backyard that gets insane amounts of full sun for 14 hours a day?  

Soap stuff:  I can finally start making soap again, now that I'm off crutches.  Hooray!  Just in time too, I'm running out of some stuff.  The new website is almost finished, but I broke the checkout cart, and I can't really fix it until I go live, because it's an SSL authentication issue, and I can't set the certificate to the sandbox without buying an additional cert, and I don't want to do that.  So...I know the cart worked before I set up the security...I'll just have to pray that it still works *with* the security, I guess.  (And go live in the middle of the night, so I can fix any broken stuff before the next day.)  

I still need product pictures.  I am the suck at product pictures.  And you would be astounded, astounded, at what real photographers get paid.  I'm not saying they're not worth it...they are...but a product shoot would cost me double what the company made (gross sales, not even profit) last year...so, that's out.  I'm hoping that the sun will come out tomorrow so I can get some good natural light, and I'm going to try again.  I just don't seem to have any flair for "staging", ya know?  

Time to snuggle with Boy and read "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs", then I think adult snuggle time may be in the plans.  Yay for recovery!  Whoo!

Man, that took longer than expected.  Counting remaining product was a breeze, and counting packaging was really simple, but counting the essential oils...wow, that was harder than expected.  I finally had to calculate the weight of the bottles they were in, and weigh each one to get an accurate measure of what I had.  (With the exception of still sealed 5kg bottles...that was pretty easy.  Anyone need some orange oil?  I've got tons.)

Found a couple of cases where I thought I was out of something, so I ordered significant quantities, based on thinking that I used twice as much as I did, only to find the original bottle when I got to the back of the EO cabinets.  But it's all good, I think I may just plan on having some spring sales. 

So, inventory done.  Things that I'm running low on have been ordered.  Soap batch lists have been prioritized, and after I go pick up more essential oils at the warehouse tomorrow, soapmaking will begin anew.  I've not made soap in almost a month...I'm jonesing to get back to my pots. ;) 

So tomorrow I think I'll be making Sandalwood Vanilla with the new sandalwood I'm picking up.  Gods I hope it's good.  I thought I was going to have to eliminate sandalwood from my recipes, because the harvesting methods and the industry around creating it are horrific in India.  But I've found an Australian supplier that does renewable growing and harvesting methods, so I'm pretty excited to try it.  Real sandalwood is so much better than any synthetic I've tested...I just hope the Australian sandalwood is as good.

I was going to get super ambitious and try to get two or three batches done tomorrow, but I think I'll take my time and get back into the swing first.  Also, I have no idea how long it will take me to get out of the warehouse, and I have to fit the batch in between when I get back from there, and before I have to go get Boy. 

In other news, I'm still trying to come up with a redesign for Soapy Hollow.  I am, apparently, inspiration-less.  I got nada, nothing, bupkiss.  I do know that I'm going to rewrite all the text.  It's silly for me to memetically load the site to appear as though it's a big ol' business, when in fact, it's an artisan shop that creates whatever I feel like creating at the time.  I mean, obviously, I'm not going to sell off the big molds and quit taking business to business orders, but I also need to stop trying to compete with companies that have a much bigger budget and purchasing power than I do.  I can't compete on price with the Walmarts of the soap business, like Aveda....which used to be such a great company before they got bought out...so I'm just not going to try for that business level any more.  I'm happier dealing with individuals, and trying to make a product that means something to them, than I am creating thousands of bars for companies that rebrand what I do and sell it for three times what I sell them for.  It's silly for me to work that hard for  pennies, so I'm not going to do it anymore. 

But now, I'm off to catch up with everyone's journal, if I can.  Be sure to ping me if there's something you want me to know, and you think I might miss it. :)

Hugs to everyone!

Man...the holiday season tried to kill me. :)  Between business and travel and sick Man and sick Boy, it was quite a season.  I hope everyone had a great holiday; that much love and happiness was had, much grog was consumed and that Santa left present for everyone. 

Yesterday I found the xmas cards I was supposed to mail a month ago.  So...I suck.  At my current rate of speed, I think everyone will get xmas cards in June.  But that's cool, because as we've all learned from watching any iteration of the Dicken's Christmas story;  It's better to keep Christmas all through the year...and god bless us everyone, and all that. 

So, I have surgery on my feet scheduled in February, which means I'll be off my feet for a month or 6 weeks. (Well, I'll be on crutches for a few weeks...but I think managing giant vats of oils on crutches seems like a bad idea.)  I've got tons of stuff to do before then. 

I started doing end of year inventory, and have decided to radically simplify my life by just counting everything together, rather than by variety.  So, instead of counting, for example, 2 bars of Fire and Ice, and 10 bars of something else, I'm just going to count all the bars.  I mentioned this to a friend and she said "You have bars left?" and I said, well...not many, which is why counting them all together will be so much easier."

The whole business side of the business is still sort of baffling to me.  I've owned businesses before, but they were never inventory businesses, they were service businesses, and service businesses are a much, much easier type of accounting.  (I spent X, I charged Y, I owe taxes on the difference.)  Not so much with Soapy Hollow, where some materials transfer from year to year, like packaging and materials and stock.  And I don't even know how to figure out how to account for things like the essential oils.  I mean, I know how much it costs by the kilogram, by the ounce, even by the teaspoon....but when you've got 2.5 kilogram bottles, any amount I give is going to be a guess.  (I think there's about a third of the bottle left, sort of thing.) 

I just want to make soap.  I want someone else do deal with icky empire building part.  I mean, I want an empire, don't get me wrong...but damn....queens shouldn't have to count lotion bottles.  ;) 

It was easier when the company was first started, because I used pretty much everything I bought.  But this year, I started buying like a real manufacturing company, and in order to get that supply chain, I had to buy a large amount of a lot of stuff.  Some of which I now have to figure out how to count. 

I wish I understood accounting.  I have this insanely expensive software from Peachtree that will do everything I need.  It tracks all your items as you get them in stock, it tracks you use to manufacture items, it lets you know when stocks are low, it does these amazing reports at the end of the year...and I've had the box for over a year, and can't get it installed.  I have no idea what the software is asking me for.  It wants all this data, and it assumes I know how to do double entry accounting...a variety of math which bears no relation to reality...and so seriously, a year later, I've still never gotten it installed.  Huge, vast, massive waste of money, since Peachtree won't let you return software, and wants to charge a hefty service fee to help you install it. 

Anyway, I think I'm babbling to avoid facing the racks and racks of bags, boxes, bottles, paper, oils and soap that needs to be counted.  But it must be done, as I'm almost completely out of soap, and I have to get back to manufacturing...which I can't do until I count the materials. 

So, I'm gonna go count, and then read some journals...then count some more, then read some more journals, but if anything super important has happened:  You got married, were abducted by aliens, Elvis gave you a brand new Cadillac, you've joined a convent, you've raided a convent, you've abducted a nun, and were married by Evis on an alien Cadillac, please drop me a line here and point me towards the entry on your journal, so I'm sure not to miss it. :)

Finishing a few custom orders, then prepping for Turkey Day.  For the first time in almost 2 decades, I'm having a small Thanksgiving.  Just me, Man and Boy.  (And Dog.  And Cat1 and Cat2). 

So, my usual over the top menu has been trimmed down to something reasonable:

Squash Soup
Turkey with 2 stuffings (inside and outside)
Green Bean casserole...because apparently, it's the law. Who knew?
Home made bread (need to go start that now...gonna try the 24 hour clay baked style)
Baked Apples
Buttermilk Brulee Pie (Because Man specifically requested it.)

Been busy, busy, busy.  Plus, Dear Husband (LowKey on Vox), surprised me with a Birthday Computer!  Wheee!  But, because I'm a forgetful slacker, I have no idea what any of my passwords are to anything except my business stuff...so I've been having a hard time getting to my content sites on the new toy...which I admit, is getting lots of attention of late.   Eventually, I'll get it all figured out.  In the meantime, I still have my faithful companion Alien Head in my office...he knows all, sees all, and allows me to access the places where my friends are.  Blessed is the mighty Alienware, who is not at all being replaced, and shouldn't start getting all temperamental on me. 

Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!

Every once in a while, I do something so stupid, it beggars the imagination.  It doesn't happen often, but I'll admit, I know before I do it, it's a bad idea.  Thinking about doing it is a bad idea, and it always leads to me doing it.  It's a weakness.  I am ashamed.  Yes, I'm talking about buying hair color, and tinting one's own hair. 

See, I have a problem finding people to do my hair.  I have difficult hair.  There's a lot of it, and it's very curly if it's not fairly long.  When I say very curly, I mean I could do a good Carrot Top impression with the wrong haircut.  A veritable flock of hair, is my point.  And I found a colourist who is also a god at cutting hair, except that 1.) he works at a studio 300 miles away, 2.) it's a couple hundred dollars to walk in the door, 3.) while his cuts are absolute genius, it requires 45 minutes every day to make it look like he's cut it to look...and I didn't even own a blow drier, which suggests the likelihood of my actually spending almost an hour on my hair is slim to nothing. 

So, it's been about four months since I had my hair done, which meant I had 4 inch roots...a thing which I could no longer abide.  And thus, I colored my own hair.  It turned out a little dark, but I think the color is mostly even.  It's not right, but it'll do until I can either schedule a trip down to Austin, or find a nice flamboyant gay man in Dallas.  Yes, I know it's a stereotype, but every flaming gay man I've ever had do my hair has been a genius, and every straight person I've let near my hair has given me bangs.  I want swish with my snip...and if that's wrong, I don't want to be right.  For the record, a lot of my friends are gay, and almost none of them are swishy, so it's not that I think gay=swishy, it's that I think swishy=hair genius. I'm fully aware that it's probably an act, but to me...it shows a certain level of dedication to giving suburban moms that TV experience.

That said, if you know any swishy genius hair stylists in the Dallas area, I would be your best friend if you tell me about them.  ;)

More pumpkin soap.  That soap, just from preorders is almost completely sold out.  Whoo hoo!  I love making pumpkin soap, makes the house smell like pie.  Sweet, sweet, inedible pie.  Hee. 

The Joy To the World (or Galilee) soap turned out amazingly well.  I need to get it up on the site.  I suppose I better settle on a name.  Three Kings is doing ok in preorders, but not as well as last year.  Holding off on making more until after the drop ship date of the current batches.  I don't want to end up with a ton of Myrrh soap in January. :)

Also on the agenda, tackle the upstairs.  I got the kitchen and the living room spotless yesterday.  Now my goal is to clear out enough junk from the "game room", that I can set up my pilates stuff.  This will be the winter I don't gain weight.  That's my goal.  Now, I just need a good workout area that's close to my painkillers, and I'll be all set.  (Stupid fibromywhatsit.)  Man speaking of...I've been trying to find a good walking stick for those times when I have to be on my feet a lot, or if I'm doing a lot of up-down-up-down action...and there is almost nothing out there that isn't just ugly.  Walking sticks used to be a fashion item, you'd think I could find some groovy Victorian era stick once wielded by a cranky aristo, wouldn't you?  But no...everything looks like something grannies would use.  Bleh.