Bath Time

Last night I attended a Natural Bath & Beauty Products class, and learned how to make bath salts and melt-n-pour soaps. Theresa is a very animated, knowledgeable instructor, and I would love to take a more intensive, hands-on course from her. She approaches most of her soap recipes the same way my grandmother did her cooking -- the "pinch of this" and "handful of that" technique. Not much precision measuring going on here, but it always turns out just fine. However, when I start to make bath products for resale, I will certainly have to measure carefully and keep accurate records. Pictured here are an exfoliating facial bar made with an avocado-cucumber base, honey, and black walnut shells; and bath salts that include orange peel and chamomile. We also made a peppermint and honey body bar with an olive oil base, but I haven't brought that home yet because it was still too soft to unmold at the end of class. Next week we will be making a milk bath and a brown sugar scrub.

And tonight I'll be practicing my buttercream roses!

Crackin' Up

I haven't spent much time the past few days doing creative work, because I've been trying to finish some books that were due back at the library today. I am not ashamed to admit that I'm a huge Harry Potter fan, and I've been re-reading all the books so that everything will be fresh in my mind when The Deathly Hallows (Book 7) is finally out. I just returned Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire, and there were no copies of Order of the Phoenix at the library tonight, so I guess I'll be visiting another branch. Last night I was trying to finish up The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield, but --- sometimes I've just gotta bake! So, during all the breaks while baking sugar cookies, I worked on finishing my book.

Now, this baking experience was very satisfying, not because I used a great recipe (it was just a packaged mix), but because I managed to crack an egg one-handed. I've always been a two-handed egg-cracker, probably because I want the yolks to stay perfectly intact, especially when I expect my breakfast eggs to be cooked easy-over (no hard yolks for me!). But a couple of weeks ago, when Erin and Tara baked my cake for my cake decorating class, Erin was cracking eggs, one-handed, like a pro. She told me how to do it with 5 simple words. "You just squeeze it here." Sounded simple enough, and looked pretty simple, and it really is! Yes, I do get excited about the smallest things. I'm not sure where Erin learned how to do it, but since she and Tara watch even more of the Food Network than I do, it was probably from Giada or Rachel, or maybe Bobby.

Tonight I went to a class on how to make natural bath and beauty products. I'll share a photo tomorrow.

Market in the Park

Today we went to Mobile to run some errands, and we stopped by the Mobile Museum of Art for Market in the Park, where we met several artisans, listened to some free music, and admired some of the biggest blackberries I've ever seen. We had a nice chat with Theresa Collins-McPherson, who is a relaxation specialist and also sells handmade natural bath and beauty products, candles, and home fragrances. I'm signed up for one of her classes at the University of South Alabama, where she'll be teaching us how to make organic soap, bath salts, sugar scrubs and more. It was nice to meet the teacher and have an opportunity to ask a few questions before next week's class. We also met Mary Bower, who makes baskets from pine needles. She also weaves with marine rope and does a lot of embellishment with beads and colorful fibers. Beautiful!

I had not seen a gingko tree since I lived near Valley Forge a few years back, so I was pleased to see that some small gingkos had been planted at the museum. I love the way the veins of the gingko leaf radiate out from the stem, and have always seen some design possibilities with the unusual leaf shape. Maybe now I'll act on that inspiration.

We also went to the University of South Alabama library to see an art exhibit, which included some amazing batiks and watercolors by Jean Schulman and photographs by B.J. Ray. Definitely worth the trip!

While in Mobile we also stopped by B&B Pet Stop, which is my favorite pet store ever. They don't sell dogs and cats, but they do host a pet adoption event every Thursday afternoon, so I got to admire all the little kittens and puppies that were looking for new homes. Unfortunately, there's no more room at the inn -- we have all the dogs and cats we can handle now -- so I had to mightily resist temptation and be satisfied with buying 3 harlequin rasboras for my freshwater aquarium.