It’s June! Flippin’ heck I love the summer. Mind you, while we basked in some wonderful weather during May, June seems to have other ideas and has been a little wet so far, to say the least!
Anyway, I wasn’t expecting the last week to be particularly productive as far as soapiness goes. Dean (my other, some would say ‘better’, half) was working away most of the week and it just happened to be half-term so both kids were off school and I wasn’t able to get into the office for any decent period of time.
On Monday night I made the most of Dean’s last night at home to make some soap. This is one I’ve not made since last year, and is one of my summer specials. Traeth Craig Du (Black Rock Sands) is an homage to our local(est) beach. Just 20 minutes from home, we spend long days there in the summer, building sand castles and playing in the waves. The base of the soap has ground apricot stones in it, for a mildly exfoliating, sandy texture, and the fragrance is a refreshing marine scent. Think seaweed, rock pools and a coastal breeze – summer in a soap. Last year I made 15 bars, this year I’m making 60, so I hope it sells! I’ve only got in the mould photos at this stage – which aren’t very exciting, but I’ll post some cut pics very soon.
Traeth Craig Du in the mould
By Tuesday I had sent off all the parcels in this year’s International Soap Swap, and a couple of recipients have already received theirs. In order to avoid spoilers we’ve agreed not to share any photographs until everyone has received their parcel, but as soon as I can, I will…
Dean arrived home on Friday night, to a hero’s welcome from the kids (I let them stay up a bit later especially). I was pretty pleased too, not least because it meant I got to spend the whole day in the office on Saturday, catching up on wrapping and labelling. Not the most exciting of days, but I needed to make up for lost time.
Last night brought more restocks – Clarity & Lemon Verbena Confetti:
Clarity & Lemon Verbena Confetti in the mould
In other news, and this IS exciting, we spent some time in the ‘soon-to-be-recogniseable-as-a’ garden today. We have some scaffolding boards arriving tomorrow to build three raised beds, and today we levelled some ground ready for Dean to build the beds this week. Because of the incline there a fair bit of levelling to be done, so we’ll probably have to create a tier or two. But this feels like real progress, and I may even have sowed or planted something in there by this time next week – woop!!
Garden progress
It doesn’t look like much here, but it took us hours of digging and carting soil to get just this patch of ground nice and level. Those retaining bricks are only temporary by the way!
A different angle…
Thanks for reading, back soon!
The Soap Mine 
I so want a bar of that soap with the apricot! Sounds nice!
Your garden is looking lovely! When does the planting season begin where you are?
Thanks! The garden has a long way to go yet, but progress is being made, and that’s what counts 😄. Seeds should have been sown a couple of months back, but there still time for plenty of salad stuff, and I might even still get away with some peas and beans too. SO EXCITED!!
You should still be able to plan peas and beets! I miss beets.
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