What's Up Wednesday- Contest

Since I was preoccupied with my Son's wedding and the fact that nature slapped many of us with a prolonged power outage, I have extended the NAME MY SOAP CONTEST until August 4th! If your name is chosen you will win a bar of the soap that you just named and some samples of various other products!

For now the soap is just called number 77. The picture put up with the other posts was of Irish Rain, and NOT #77. My apologies about that, but, the description was accurate, except for the fact that this one does not have jojoba beads in it. It is colored with French Green Clay, Spirulina, and Nettle. The scent is (mainly) a mixture of lavender and grapefruit, with a hint of eucalyptus. While there are other essential oils tossed in there, these three are really the only notes that are easily sniffed out. It is a nice clean, fresh scent, with a bit of an after bite. It is a different one for sure, truly unique, and a great new scent! To enter, leave your suggestions in comments here or on my face book page; https://www.facebook.com/UniqueGarden 

For the small print; This prize is only open to contestants who have mailing addresses within the continental USA. I will hapily mail the prize anywhere if the winner agrees to pay for postage, so enter if you like, no matter where you live.
Besides that, all entries should be "G" rated, as this is a family company.
Any entry that is deemed to be inappropriate or vulgar will be deleted. You may submit up to 5 different names. If the winning name has been submitted more than once, only the first to submit it will win the prize(s).
No trademarked names will be used, and should not be submitted. In the event that none of the submitted names are chosen to be used, one winner will be randomly chosen from all of the entries submitted, and will win the prize(s). That should do it for all the details, much luck!

Make It Yourself Monday -Scent Pots, Air Freshener for The Home

So far this year, we've made throat lozenges, jar gifts, dog treats and even some great face masks. Now we are going to focus on something practical for the home. This something will save us money,  and will smell good while doing so! Most everyone uses some type of air freshener, and the gel fresheners at the grocery store can be quite costly, not to mention that they often have a limited choice of fragrance selection. So here is a simple, make-it-at-home, alternative for you to try!

First of all, you will need to gather some type of jars. Jelly jars or any other,  small, decorative jar will do. If you are not so concerned with aesthetics, recycled baby food jars (junior not newborn) will work just fine. This recipe is meant more for the  larger ones, but you could do the smaller ones too. If you do though, it will dry up a bit faster than the junior size. You will also need;


1 cup boiling water
1 cup cold water
4 packages of (Knox) gelatin
2 tablespoons of Everclear (or other 90 proof alcohol).*Since this is to prevent mold, you can eliminate it and use preservative if you happen to make your own bath and body products and have some on hand.

About 20 drops of fragrance oil or 6-10 drops of essential oil (s), you can use more/less if you desire, but this amount is average and should work well for most people. Depending upon how you choose to decorate, you may also want some colored tulle, and some matching, coordinating, or contrasting ribbon.


Begin by dissolving the 4 packs of gelatin in one cup of boiling water. Make sure that you stir it until it is completely dissolved. Once completely dissolved, add the cup of cold water, and the alcohol. If you are using essential oil(s), you should allow the mixture to cool off a bit before adding the fragrance, just  don't wait too long or the gelatin may begin to set. If you'd like, you can also add a few drops of food coloring to "pretty" it up a bit! Mix everything well, then pour it into your jars. Either have the jars on a cookie tray, or have them where they can stay so they can remain undisturbed while they set up.  


Once they are completely set, you can either set them out as they are, or you can further decorate them by covering the top with the tulle (which will allow them to breath and disburse scent), and adding a tied ribbon to the neck of the jar, which will hold the tulle in place. Now you that you have easily made several cute, smelly jars, why don't you wrap some up to share with friends!  These scent pots should last about six weeks or so before you have to make more. 

What's Happening Wednesday

Wednesday, hump day, so I have decided to dedicate Wednesdays to whatever is happening. This will not always be work related, rather, whatever I happen to be up to that day.

Today, as part of my new years' goals mandate, I have been working on organizing and executing my work, in particularly for my on-line shops. To that end, I finished a new pair of earrings the other day, as well as a pre-designed, mini scrapbook. I had not, however, taken the pictures to list them yet. Since both of these items need to go into my uniqueXpression shop, they would never make it there if I didn't get down to business and get those pictures. Soooooo, as of this posting, I have 3/4 of my task completed! The pictures are all taken (of course I allowed myself to get side-tracked and uploaded several holiday pictures and organized some folders) and I have completed the listing for the scrapbook, but the earrings listing is now pushed to the top of my Thursday to do list. I am so out of practice (and maybe a bit unfocused), it seemed to take me most of the day just to complete these few things, lol! Oh well, practice should make perfect, and I expect that I will soon be cranking out the on-line work again, I have confidence....deserved or not, I guess we will soon see!

Since the pictures are all done, even though they are not yet listed, I will share them with you.

These are 19g, sterling silver w/ ball, shepherds hooks, with a Swarovski crystal-studded chandelier. They have champaign and clear crystals and are about a 1 1/2" drop. They are quite lovely, and can be easily incorporated into a more dressy outfit or just used to dress up a casual look.

This is the front of the 8"x8", pre-designed scrap book that I did. The front has a picture frame, and it contains 24 more pages for pictures (for a minimum of 25 pictures, although the framework is set for additional ones). I made each page background either a winter or a Christmas theme, so it will be perfect for anyone who just wants to paste down their holiday and winter pictures and be done with it! Hmmm, maybe I should keep this! LOL Here are some more views of the earrings, as well as all of the individual page pictures of the scrapbook. I hope you enjoy them!

So what have you been up to this Wednesday? Comment and share, maybe you will inspire us all!