Paperwork, Paperwork, will it ever end?

Paperwork, paperwork, seems like there's never an end to all the paperwork! I've been busily trying to catch up on my soap database. Keeping track of what goes into each batch, dates, photos and etc. really is time consuming! Maybe I should get that soap software? Maybe I'll hint for a birthday gift? It surely would save time and paperwork! At the very least every thing would be in one neat little program instead of a ton of word docs and excel sheets and a separate database....;)

Last night I was full of energy, it was about 8:30 pm and I had an idea-Let's make some soap! So my husband joined me in my shop-he to play on his computer (LOL) and me to get some recipes laid out and oils melting.

I had four molds set up to go, 1 with a new silicone liner to try, 2 with plastic food film wrap and 1 with a resin liner. I decided to do all milk soaps-I hate to waste a brand new container of buttermilk as the date on it has just passed. So I split it between goats milk and buttermilk. Lye at 1.5:1 for this recipe. Got all the hard oils in the big crockpot for all four recipes and got to work!

The first one I kept simple, plain soap with lemongrass EO, but I had been saving some extrusions to make some cool soap and decided to go ahead and use them! You will see the result after they dry enough to unmold and cut. Should be interesting!

My husband was brain storming and asked if I could do a "pancakes" soap. It clicked in my head and this soap is Maple Cornbread Milk Soap. Made with real maple syrup and cornmeal in it! Smells wonderful and looks pretty good too!

My third one I've been planning for a while, I wanted it to be purple, green, pink and white done lily-pad style. Well I got a big surprise! My purple iron oxide went brown! I thought that couldn't happen so was very surprised! The colors I got are brown, green, pink and white, still pretty but I'm still shaking my head over that one! I used several essential oils for the scents because I didn't want them to interfere with the pouring. I was also careful about the colorants sticking to things I knew would not seize up on me. These color results are still mind bending:

And last but not least, the reason I had my husband stick around, was to help me with this one. It is a three color mantra swirl. I didn't want the colors to be too bright, more of a light primary than a bold one. Maybe even pastel. I think it turned out beautiful! My husband poured the center and I did the sides, I did Rose Clay, Blue Iron Oxide, & Goldenrod Sugar for colorants; Frankincense, Jasmine, & Rosemary Essential Oils for scents. Here it is:

Once I unmold and cut I will post what they look like. We went to bed at 1:00 AM but it was a lot of fun making these. :)

Today I did paperwork, yes the dreaded paperwork......sigh. Maybe I need a secretary? Ha!  ;)