Do it yourself Salt Scrubs

Salt scrubs are bathing luxuries that no one should be without! This morning I saw my lonely jar of Lemon Poppy Seed Salt Scrub sitting high up on the shelf and I had a little extra time so I went for it. I often forget to use it but each time I do I think "my skin feels so incredible why don't I use this more often!" Salt scrubs are made with oil and salt and you simply massage the scrub onto your skin and let warm steamy shower or bath water wash away the salt leaving behind soft velvety skin. The fresh inspiring aroma will linger on your skin long after you leave the shower.

Salt scrubs are super easy to make. Since I am producing a product that I want to repeat I measure everything. But here are my recommendations for someone wanting to whip one up for personal use: start with a little bit of oil. Safflower is my favorite, but sunflower oil works well and probably olive oil too. Then add salt until you have a paste like consistency. Then add a few drops of essential oil, but don't overdue it, and any herbs or botanicals for color and texture.

Or if you prefer you can purchase your bathing luxury from me. All my bathing essentials are created to inspire on three sensory levels. I want it to appeal to your eyes, nose, and skin. I call it the multi sensory approach to bathing. Salt scrubs exemplify this approach perfectly. The aroma just fills the shower and co-mingles with the feeling on you skin as you gently exfoliate and moisturize. And why is it important to me that the product please your eyes? Because the way it looks affects your sense of smell. I have made soaps where the aroma and color didn't go together and they just don't smell right. So in order for the scrub to really pamper you it needs to please your eyes. I add botanicals and clays to accomplish this, to give it color and texture.

Here's a few more salt scrub tips:

Use it on your hands - I LOVE the way my hands feel after I use salt scrub on them. I definitely don't need hand lotion after that. So keep a little jar of salt scrub by your sink for those days when you need to soften 'em up.

Use it on your feet - yeah you can really get some of that roughness off your heels! I like to sit in the bath and massage my feet with the salt scrub then let them soak for a while.

Use it in the bathtub - scrubs are great in the shower, but even better in the bath. The oil kind of disperses throughout the water and adds moisture to all your skin, and even your hair. In fact I love the way it softens my hair!

Dose of creativity ignites enthusiasm for the mundane

As my business has grown and I've moved from making small trial batches of soap here and there to larger batches on a regular basis the haunting question has been "will my creative brain be able to continue to make the same soaps over and over again?" So far I've been able to keep it interesting by bringing in seasonal soaps and by harnessing my creative efforts for becoming more efficient and cost effective.

Meanwhile one of the surprising regular customer questions I get is "what's new?" At first it felt like a lot of pressure to come up with something new all the time. But now I'm realizing the"pressure" to come up with new things is what keeps soapmaking fresh for me. Because the reality is there's always something that needs to be done. So it's hard to carve out time to let my creativity fly. It's easy to get lost in the routine and mundane, the litany of things that need to happen within my business and within my personal life. So this week when I felt like I needed to stretch ... to create something new ... it began as a moment of pressure. But it became a much needed spark in my energy field.

When I let myself indulge in the process of experimentation I felt my spirit start to ignite with enthusiasm and anticipation. I was looking for an essential oil to pair with lime and went through the whole cupboard and came up with basil. Yeah it sounds strange but I pulled the soap out of the mold today and it has this super fresh earthy scent. It's pretty different than anything I've ever made. Then I went to work on the color. Coloring soap is an art in itself, it doesn't quite look the same in the soap as it does in the small mixing container. And then I wanted to experiment with a different fixed oil so I decided to incorporate avocado oil in to the recipe. As I mixed the batch of soap and added the different ingredients at just the right time I felt my enthusiasm continue to build. Wallah it was in the mold the color looked superb, my kitchen was filled with the new aroma I had never smelled before. I was charged and ready for the next batch.

What was so fascinating to me was how creating something new and entirely different infused energy into my day. I started and finished the much needed batches of soap on my production schedule that day on a totally different note. So my soap artist tip for the day is ... keep being creative ... take a moment to do something entirely different and let the creative spark carry you through your routine.