Expanded Descriptions of Products--Soap

I'd like to introduce you to each of my products, and tell you a bit about them. They're all my "children", and I'm proud of each and every one of them.

Let's begin with the goat's milk soap. Made with lovely ingredients, it quite simply cleanses the skin without things like sulfates, which can be harsh and irritating to the skin.

Our soap's ingredients are: Coconut Oil, Palm Oil, Safflower Oil, Glycerin, Goat’s Milk, Purified Water, Sodium Hydroxide, Sorbitol, Sorbitan oleate, Oat protein, Titanium Dioxide, Mica and Fragrance. Now perhaps there are a couple of things you're not familiar with, so let's address them now.

Sodium Hydroxide you'll know by the more common term "lye". Lye is the ingredient that turns oils into soap in the process known as "saponification". Once the lye and the oils combine properly, there isn't any actual lye left that could irritate the skin. Both are transformed into an entirely new and different compound...soap. I say properly combined, because unless great care is taken, lye pockets can exist. Proper pH testing and good manufacturing processes, as well as quality control, prevent this type of product from ever reaching a customer, but it is important as a consumer, to know this, if you're buying hand-crafted items.

Next are Sorbitol and Sorbitan oleate. Sorbitol is a sugar-alcohol usually derived from corn, and used as an humectant, and aids in preventing moisture loss. Nothing nefarious, nothing complicated. Sorbitan oleate is an emulsifier derived from Sorbitol. It helps keep ingredients from separating. Both are considered safe for body products.

Titanium Dioxide and Mica may sound exotic, but they're simply colorants...natural colorants. Titanium Dioxide is white colorant made from a naturally-occurring white powder. Mica is a form of colorant made from natural minerals, and are considered safe for body products. We use these ingredients instead of artificial colorants.

We use fragrance oils instead of essential oils. Yes, we're radical like that. All of our fragrance oils are body-safe, and gives us a broader range of fragrances such as perfume-types. We'll be offering an independent evaluation of essential oils soon from a chemist known and loved by me...my step-son. I explained my own prejudice about the issue, and asked him to research and give his own general conclusions. I prefer fragrance oils in part, because I eschew the idea that "natural is superior" and "natural is safer". One dose of poison ivy or poison oak (a very natural occurrence) taught me that just because an item is natural, doesn't automatically make it safer than something that's been manufactured. Yes, this flies in the face of my stand on mica colorants vs artificial colorants, and I'm okay with that. I don't believe the general hype that essential oils are magical elixers that have holistic and lofty capabilities. In soaping, I'm not making medical claims...I'm creating lovely soaps with lovely fragrances, and doing so in a manner that's honest, legal, ethical, and above all, safe for your body.

As well as featuring soaps that contain goat's milk, we also at times, offer soaps that incorporate hemp oil, but it's generally a special request item. As with all our customized items, there is no upcharge or additional fee for hemp oil soaps.

It should be pointed out that this soap, while being hand-crafted, is not "home-made" or made from scratch by me. I tested dozens of soap bases prior to ever selling a bar, and discovered my current base. It's professionally manufactured with stringent quality standards, and is made by the leading manufacturer of luxury soap since 1967. I buy it in bulk, and craft it into colored, fragranced designs. One of the very easy ways to tell a made-from-scratch soap from a "melt-and-pour" soap such as mine, is sweat. It's a characteristic of glycerin soaps, that when exposed to the air, they can "sweat"...produce tiny beads of glycerine on the surface. This usually gets worse in warmer temperatures and humid conditions. It's not a flaw, just a characteristic. Cold or hot processed made-from-scratch soaps don't sweat. I know from experience that some hand-crafters try to pass melt-and-pour soaps off as made-from-scratch. It's kind of despicable, and wholly dishonest, and I don't pretend to understand or condone the practice...perhaps they feel the truth won't be accepted...perhaps they just want to lie. I'm very proud of the products I provide, and make no apologies for what my soap is. It's some of the best on the market.