PURALI - Ambachtelijke zeep en meer...

I received my first ever blog award from Miranda of MirandArt. It is the Liebster Blog (Nicest Blog) award, which has been invented to give starting and relatively unknown blogs a spotlight.

She said she enjoys reading my blog and I think that is so sweet of her. I love sharing my soaping-life with others.

The rules for acception the award:

Say thank you to the giver and link back to their blog (just to be kind).
If you accept the award and want to pass it on, you make a message on your blog that includes the Liebster Blog picture and the instructions (which you are reading now).
Now give the award to 3-5 of your favourite blogs and in your message leave a link to each of their blogs.
Write a comment to the nominees that you have awarded the Liebster Blog award to them.

So for my nominees I have had a really difficult time as I love so many blogs. It was hard to decide who should be placed in the spotlight next.

So the award goes to:
Eenvoudig leven (a blog about how a family goes back to the basics of a simple life)
Jenora Soaps (a very nice soap blog from sunny Spain)
Lavarie (a very talented soaper from Germany)
Marina Soap (also a very nice soap blog from Germany)
Jabones: Alquimia de las plantas (such beautiful soaps)

Please visit these blogs, they are really lovely to read.

Het laatste pakketje van de kerstswap heb ik opgehaald. Het is gemaakt doos Corry aka Eucalypta.
Wat een leuke dingen zitten erin!

* A castille liquid handsoap which smells so nice. I have put it in the downstairs toilet, so all guests can try it.
* A christmas tree soap & bubble bath. The tree looks incredible with lots of glitter and very small soap stars. The bubble bath has such a nice smell that my husband joined me in the bath when I used it as he could not resist.
* Solid shampoo & conditioner. They look great, so I am looking forward to trying it very soon. At the moment I try to limit my hair washing as the baby is usually by my side in the bath.
* A lovely green winter soap. Looks great with pieces of transparent (not M&P) soap.

* A very, very nice scrub. Best one so far!
* A soywax candle. I have not tried it yet. Right now I am using the spicy one from Jane.

All in all a very nice package. Well worth the wait I think. Thanks Corry!

Now the snow is gone I really felt like making a summer soap. This goat milk soap has an uplifting citrus fragrance. Summer tangerines and sweet mandarines make this a happy mood soap.

The soap is made with lots of olive oil and has a superfatting with shea to leave skin lovely and soft.


The colours are so vibrant it brings an instant smile to my face. I can see myself sitting in the sun with my baby boy in a few months.

The last few days it has been a bit less pleasant in our house. My boy of 10 came downstairs in the middle of the night to say he threw up on his bed. I think I am not the only one who hates changing dirty bed sheets in the middle of the night, but at least the mess got contained to the bed.
He was sick all night and still felt bad the next day, poor thing.
Thankfully he is much better today, but it did not much good for my soaping efforts.
Yesterday I was soaping for valentines day, but the recipe I had was not enough, so I decided to double it. However, lazy as I am, I did so out of the top of my head and therefore forgot to double my palm oil. The consequence was that my beautiful inlays were all lye heavy. Thankfully I found out in time and could rebatch them, but it was a really stupid mistake.

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De laatste dagen is het hier wat minder goed in huis. Mijn zoontje van 10 kwam naar beneden midden in de nacht omdat hij zijn bed had onder gespuugd. Ik denk niet dat ik de enige ben, maar ik haat het om midden in de nacht een bed te moeten verschonen, maar gelukkig bleef de troep beperkt tot het bed. Hij is de hele nacht ziek geweest en voelde zich nog steeds ziek de volgende dag. Arme ding!
Gelukkig is hij nu weer een stuk opgeknapt, maar mijn plannen om te zepen werden behoorlijk om zeep geholpen, hihihi.
Gisteren wilde in wat zeep voor valentijnsdag maken, maar mijn recept was niet groot genoeg. Ik heb dus het recept (uit mijn hoofd) verdubbeld en.... vergeten de palmolie te verdubbelen. Dat maakt geen prettige zeep kan ik je zeggen. Vandaag dus maar een rebatch gedaan, maar het was wel een stomme fout.

Back to the topic of this post. Firstly I forgot to include the lovely necklace Jane made for the swap. I really like it, as these are my favourite colours.

The swap package of Eucalypta is not in my possesion yet. I probably venture over to Hilversum with the baby tomorrow to pick it up.
Therefore I will showcase my own swap items. My theme was foodies.


* Brown sugar and fig body lotion. My daughter picked the fragrance and it is lovely.
* Caramel frappuccino soap. CP soap with a mild coffeescrub and a shea M&P topping. Great to get those garlic hands smelling nice again.
* Lemon biscuit sugar scrub. Made from scratch with creamsoap. I just hope the sugar holds up, as there is quite some liquid in the soap.
* Pink sugar scrub. Made with foaming bath butter and 30% oils. One of my fav fragrances.
* Breakfast bubble bar. Made with butter milk, honey and oatmeal. Very nice in the bath.
* Lollipop bubble bar. Fragranced with a very sweet lollipop fragrance. Great for the kids.
* Chai tea lipbalm with lots of butters.
* 2 fragranced candles (cinnamon & pecan pie) and a holder.

Het vierde pakje is van Lyanne (Pure Soap). Ze maakt prachtige zeep, dus ik was erg benieuwd naar wat ze voor ons heeft gemaakt. Ik kan zeggen dat ze me niet teleur heeft gesteld ;-)

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The 4th package is of Lyanne (Pure Soap). She makes wonderfull soaps, so I was very curious to what she made for us. I can say she did not dissapoint me :-)

Everything looks very professional, so compliments for the packaging.
* My favourite is the soy wax. It smells really great and uplifting. She even included a wax holder for us.
* The scrub with shea and cocoa butter leaves my skin soft and moisturized.
* The massage candle looks great in the little tree cup. I will have to try it on my husband.
* Pine fragranced Bath jelly looks lovely. I never tried a bath jelly, as the ones at Lush really make my skin crawl. I hate people pocking their fingers in my bath jelly, blehhh.
* A cupcake soap with life like whipped cream. Yummy!

A big thank you to Lyanne!

Jane heeft voor de kerstswap een heel lief mandje gestuurd met allemaal leuke dingetjes erin. Alles ziet er heel verzorgd uit en je kunt zien dat ze het met liefde heeft gemaakt.

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Jane has send us a sweet basket with all these pretty things in it. Everything looks cared for and you can see she made it all with love.

* Soy wax tarts in a really nice spicy xmas fragrance. I love the smell of it in my house.
* Body lotion with a subtle fragrance. Personally I like big smells, but this is perfect if you want to lotion up before going out, but not have it compete with your expensive perfume.
* Salt & sugar scrub with foaming bath butter. It is a nice and firm scrub and not very oily, which is good I think. The fragrance is very subtle as well.
* Bubble bar which my son stole straight away. He is using it tomorrow in his bath.
* A spicy soap cake with again a lovely fragrance.

Thanks Jane! I love the fresh colours you used as well. It just screams ice and snow (although there is none left unfortunately).

Patrick, van Kaars en zo, heeft voor de swap een prachtige collectie producten gemaakt. We hebben de swap van de pakketten gedaan in zijn mooie winkel in Hilversum waar hij prachtige kaarsen en lekkere zeep verkoopt.

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Patrick of Kaars en zo, has made a beautiful collection of products for the swap. We did the swapping of the packages in his nice shop in Hilversum where he sells gorgeous candles and soaps.

Patrick choose a fragrance as his theme. It is a mixture of geranium, bergamot and some other notes.
I love geranium, so this is really up my alley.
* A rose soap cupcake with a little rosebud on top.
* A shampoo that smells divine.
* A firm sugarscrub in the same fragrance.
* A small bag of bath salt for a relaxing footbath.
* A solid bubble bath bar with lots of glycerine, so very moisturising in the bath.
* A gel candle that looks like a glass of wine. Very classy.

Tomorrow I will show the package I received from Jane.

Op 27 december hebben we de mega kerstswap afgerond. Het doel was om het volgende te maken:
* Vloeibaar product (shampoo, zeep/detergent, badbubbels, badolie etc)
* Vast zeepproduct in de vorm van een gebakje / cupcake (naar eigen keuze, MP/ WP/HP etc)
* Scrub
* bruisend (opgerold) product voor in bad voorzien van SLSa (of vergelijkbaar ingredient),
* een sfeermaker voor bij een heerlijke kerstavond in de badkamer. Denk aan bijvoorbeeld iets met geur, licht, etc
* iets naar eigen keuze (handgemaakt!) 
Ik zal de komende dagen elke dag een pakketje uit de swap op mijn blog zetten.

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On 27th December I took part in a mega X-mas swap. The goal was to make:
* Liquid product
* Solid soap in cake shape
* Fizzing (rolled up) product with SLSa or similar
* Scrub
* something to create a nice atmosphere in the bathroom
* something of your own choice (handmade)

I will post pics of one package a day on my blog.


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Bonsoap
Marleen came to the swap with her gorgeous little girl. She made a beautiful bag with lots of goodies.

* A showergel that has just the right consistence. This has taken a lot of trial and error, but she really nailed it!
* A christmas soap which looks good enough to eat. The pink "cream" is really cool and makes it look just yummy.
* Her solid bubble bath cup smells very orangy (which I totally love). The great thing about this is that you can just hold it under running water until you have enough bubbles in your bath. The left over bubble bath can be dried up and be used for the next bath.
* The scrub is a very gentle wash off lotion bar type. Very nice for your face and absolutely not drying.
* The shower smoothy unfortunately did not survive the dutch postal services, but it smells like strawberry sweets. My daughter really digs this one, hahaha.
* I have hung the soap chain on my book cupboard and it looks very classy.

Thanks Marleen!

Tomorrow I will show you the beautiful gift we received from Patrick of Kaars enzo.