I have finally finished the 10 (technically now have 11) different types of soaps I wanted to make before opening my soap business! I made my 11th one today ~ a Christmas one. I can't wait to cut it. It's green with some brown swirls and white snowflake micas on the top - I made it thinking of Christmas trees with snow on them in the outdoors. Next on the soap making list is a spiced apple cider one that I will use red and white swirls. 

I also got word that my application was accepted to do the bazaar the first weekend of November! I am going to be promoting it like crazy, because I don't think there is an online presence yet. :(

We also started the RCIA class. Emily came along of course, and that was a little interesting, but I think it will be okay. I'm so glad they are understanding and allow the little one there. If not, I'd probably have to postpone the class to another year as I don't have a sitter every week at 7pm for 6 months. That's just not do-able at her age and our situation.

We also got our first rosaries. My friend Allison has a business making them, and Jesse and I each got one! :D So excited. I just need to make time to do the rosary. It will be SO much easier when I know the words... I think.

Soap, Jobs, and Food!

We have been very busy here! I've been making a ton of soap. I think I now have about 200 bars of soap on the curing rack with plans to make another 60-100 in the next few weeks. I'm getting ready to open my business at the end of October. I have signed up for a holiday bazaar at a local catholic church. I also may see if I can come one morning to my mom's work after people get off their morning shift and have a little table set up for people to purchase my soap. I can't wait to see how sales turn out. Will I have enough, will no one purchase, and will people like the soap? So many unknowns, but I am going to try either way! Heck, if it's not super successful, everyone gets this soap for Christmas ;).

Jesse is in the middle of deciding what to do with his career. He either plans to go into a sales position at his current company or go back into the field. We shall see what he will do. We are praying about it and trying to figure out the best thing for him and the family.

Emily has started solids. She wasn't a complete fan. She did like cheddar cheese and has surprisingly eaten a little bit of carrots in a baby jar. We shall keep trying foods with her. :) She is definitely going to start crawling or pulling herself to a standing position soon! She is definitely trying to go all over the place. She cries more if someone other than me holds her. She definitely loves attention.

Soap Business Coming Along

I am really coming along with my soap business. I can't believe it! I really felt like it was just another nice dream, but I really am going to have my own small business making and selling soaps. I am so excited. I was not aware however, how time consuming it would be! I read once that making the actual soap should only be 10% of your time. The other 90% is working on the business, marketing, etc. I wish making soap was 100% of the time, but it is a business so I have to sell it too!

I have my Washington state business license and a reseller's permit. I've applied for a city of Tacoma business license and a home based business permit. I got samples of packaging materials, picked out what I want to use, and ordered them. I have worked on my Etsy listings so I can open my shop when I am ready. I need to get insurance, make lots more soap, and take lots of good photos for the listings. I still have a lot to do, but I am making so much progress. I am pretty proud of myself for sticking to this. It's scary opening a business and putting money into it. It's risky since the market is completive. I want to do it though, so I am putting 100% into it. 

It's late and time for bed. Good night! :)

Soap and a Prayer

Last August I started making soaps as I thought it sounded like fun and eventually I wanted to start a soap making business. You can't really open a business unless you know how to make the soap, and it's quite a process making them, so you can't be too impatient. I allow my soap to cure for 6 weeks so it takes a while for me to even test the finished product. I make all my soap with lye so I also have to test it when I unmold it to make sure the ph is in a good range. I haven't had a bad ph batch yet, so that's good!

Lately I have been stocking up supplies and things for opening a business. I have now made 3 loafs of soap and plan to make more. It's not the easiest thing when you have a little one to take care of. I can do a lot of the soap making, like getting the oils ready and things like that while watching Emily. Once I have to pull out the lye I make sure there is someone else watching Emily. I've made soap when my grandma is over playing with her, which is perfect! 

On Monday I made my first big step and am finally committing to my goal of opening my own soap making business and becoming a master soap maker! I applied for my WA business license and I have been waiting for their approval - approx. 5 business days, so I can go get a business license in my city. Once I get these things, I will get insurance which is the biggest cost of them all. Luckily the licenses are fairly cheap, especially because I am getting a 12k or less in revenues license. I can dream big, but I am going to assume I won't make 12k my first year haha. :) 

I am so excited because I have always hoped for years and years I would find a crafting passion that I could actually turn into a business, and now I finally am. I am jumping all in, because that's just what you have to do!

I'm also adding my faith into my business too, which is awesome because it's a big part of my life. I am calling my business "Soap and a Prayer!" I am still figuring out the logistics of incorporating my religion and everything into my business, along with figuring out how to package, design everything, and more. Either way, I am at the beginning of my journey and I'm excited for the new beginning.

It's Becoming Summer

Here's what we have been up to lately:

Swimming at the YMCA!

Trying out the high chair so she can be in the kitchen while mommy cooks/bakes/eats.

Strawberry picking!

Hiking trails around near our house

Flat Diaper Challenge Results

So about that flat diaper challenge. I did not make it the whole week handwashing diapers. :-/ I felt pretty bad, but on day 4 I had to stop. I never quit on anything, I really try to finish everything I start. But I couldn't get my cooking project done while doing this challenge, and we spent a lot of money on that. So my cooking project came first. On day 4 I had 30 dirty flats and no time to wash/dry, so she went into the fitteds and for my sanitary, and my husband's sanitary, I washed them in the W/D. Looking back at the weekend we had during the challenge, we were hardly home so I'm not even sure what we would have done if we would have ran out of clean diapers while out and about?

3 Months Old!

Cooking Project!

I got 40 pounds of ground beef from Zaycon Fresh on Tuesday. It's Wednesday night and I'm still working with it! :'( It's such a big project to do with a baby. 

So far used this much ground beef:

• 5 pounds for sloppy joes (Wednesday)
• 5 pounds for enchilada meat (Tuesday)
• 5 pounds for spaghetti sauce (Wednesday)
• 10 pounds for taco meat. (Tuesday)

I still need to do:

• 5 more pounds for spaghetti sauce
• 5 pounds of raw (need to package by the pound)
• 5 pounds of browned ground beef

The spaghetti sauce was BY FAR the most time consuming to do because I had to chop up 1 onion and 1 bell pepper per pound - so 5 of each. For the 5 pounds, I had to slice a pound of mushrooms and do 40 garlic cloves. I should really try to chop up more onions/peppers tonight, but I am exhausted and it's already after 9pm. I am really not looking forward to making another 5 pounds of it. I have to make to batches of 2.5 pounds because I don't have a pot big enough for 5 pounds. 

I am already committed to this, so I will deal with it. I have packaged everything in about 1 pound packages as that's about what we eat. We are going to have A TON of meals so I am not sad about that. 3 hard days of work for months of easy meals makes it not so bad at all! :)

Let's pray Emily will actually nap tomorrow for a good nap so I can finish this project up before Jesse gets home tomorrow. That would be a miracle! 

Day 3 - Flats and Handwashing Challenge

Today's question is open topic. I am going to choose this: What are your challenges?

Oh man am I having challenges, but I am not giving up! The last two days have been super rough especially since I am doing another big project - making freezer meals from 40lbs of ground beef. The beef was pick up only this week, so it really didn't make it fun for me. I've been working my butt off the last two days trying to do both of these things. By the time I get to my diapers, my almost 3 month old is fussy, wants to be held, and my husband gets home from a long day of work and wants to relax. Poor husband has helped me out a lot the last few days after work since the cooking project is taking so much of my time. I have been still cooking and needing to bag all my food when he is getting home. How do people other people do this with little babies?! 

Tonight I ran into an issue. Emily pees in her diaper SO much! I have 30 flats and when I went to do the last rinse on my first batch of dirty diapers, I had 1 flat diaper left! I am having to use her GMD fitteds until this batch of 9 diapers dry. I am still handwashing everything, but I just didn't get to them in time. I have washed 9 each day so far, and that is clearly not enough.

Tomorrow I am finishing the cooking project and will probably only have time to do another batch of 9 diapers. On Friday I have no plans so I plan to do all the diapers and actually dry them outside. So far I have only dried them inside because it's been raining, plus it's 9pm when I am putting them up to dry.

Also, my flats are drying super stiff! :( I think it's because they are drying indoors. I have to shake them all around to make them some what soft. I miss my soft flats from the dryer. :(

Day 2 - Flats and Handwashing Challenge

Today's question is: What is in your stash?

Just to let you all know first, I did not buy anything extra for this challenge, so I used what I had. I know some people are using receiving blankets and flour sack towels, but since I already owned a whole stash of flats, that is what we used. I also wasn't going to go out and buy anything since my stash meets the requirements. 

My diapers:

• 30 Green Mountain Diaper Organic Cloth-eez One-Size Flats - $75.00
• 2 Large Hemp Doublers $7.50

My covers:

• 3 Sloomb Wool Covers $144.00
• 1 Disana Wool Cover $29.00
• 1 Imse Vimse PUL cover $18.95 (was given this from a friend)

My accessories:

• Bucket with lid $4.00
• Plunger $1.50
• 1 snappi $4.35
• Rubber Gloves $2.00

The total comes to $286.30. If I was in a situation where I didn't have cloth diapers or much money, I would do the wool covers still, but use upcycled covers or much cheaper ones. I had already purchased these, so that's what I used. Also, my stash of 30 is probably a lot to use for this challenge, but I want to point out that I am planning to use them with our next baby, so I wanted to get a nice rotation of them, plus, newborns go through a TON of wet diapers! Emily has wet diapers every time I check her, even if it's been 5 mins since a change! 

I am trying to do wool full time, but when I started this challenge, Mother's Day was the day before and she got poo on 3 of her covers and I didn't have a chance to wash them until Monday so they were drying and I needed to add a PUL cover for just in case. :)

What is in your stash?


*I'll try to add photos later - I'm currently cooking 40lbs of ground beef and trying to hurry with that while baby sleeps!