vacation, the "lye dance", and homemade sugar scrub recipe

Luci and I had a wonderful vacation last week, making wedding favors for a friends wedding (80 cds certainly didn't sound like a lot before we procrastinated, lol), making bridesmaids candles, and stirring soap like nobodies business!! We even learned a new dance in the kitchen, called the "OMJ did i splash the lye" routine. Vinegar is your friend, my friends.

I'm really enjoying this DIY kick for soaps and beauty projects.. today I was looking for a recipe for Melt and Pour soap base from scratch, and everything I found had some strange chemical that I don't care to own. Dissappointing. My version of DIY should only use things i can pronounce, or easily cook up from the contents of my kitchen cupboards.

A common ingredient I found in my quest for DIY M&P was propelyne glycol. Sounds yummy, huh? Even though the FDA says its ok, I'm not going to store a jar of it next to my peanut butter.. but to be fair, Sodium chloride sounds gross too, but you can't live without it (salt). But to err on the side of caution, I'd rather not use something remotely connected to anti-freeze in my soaps. Makes me wonder what other delicious chemical cocktails I consume on a regular basis, and if I'll regret it down the road.

But on a more positive note, I made a sugar scrub that was absolutely wonderfully easy and feels Glorious on my skin and crave hot fluffy buttermilk pancakes:

2 tbs each of white sugar, brown sugar
1 tbs each of honey and olive oil
Splash of maple extract (optional, for fragrance)

Stir together, adjusting oil so it doesn't pool on top. If it does, add sugar.

Optional: adding a tiny splash of hand soap makes the end result less oily; I prefer it without soap