I pop in a couple times a day as well to see if anything is going on. I don't have a show scheduled until May but it is a big outdoors show that is very successful, it is 3 days and is alot of fun. It is a German Festival. I am getting ready for that while making product and TRYING to get pics for my website that is under construction (if I don't get the pics done it will remain that way). In a recent post I added that I finally made CP soap and was very excited about it. I am getting ready to make my 2nd batch next week (waiting on a fragrance) I make Clear glycerin and Goat's Milk based soaps and now adding some CP. I also make body butter, lotion bars (huge seller for me), lotion, lip balms, bath salts, salt scrubs, body/linen sprays, bath bombs and have just added a Muscle Relief Balm with EMU oil, I love it! Oh, I just added Loofah Scrub Bars! Some things I would like to try: Body Powder, Shampoo Bar(tried and flopped the 1st time but will try again), dish soap and anti-bacterial liquid soap. I am also going to dabble growing some herbs this spring. I sell on ebay as well and am constantly trying to clean out my shop. I have refrained from listing on ebay last several weeks so I could get caught up on other things. Michelle

I tried the candle warmers that everyone is so crazy about, and I don't like them for the same reason you stated- for some reason the scent seems to burn off, no matter what brand it is, even one of my own, and you are left with a bunch of weak smelling wax. Whether "rebatching" the wax would work or not, I don't know. Since it will already have some oil in it, it may not hold much more fragrance. The wax would have to be completely melted and then the fragrance oil stirred into it quite well- just like making a candle from scratch. Then the candle would need to set up and cure for about a week. Feasibly, you could have a brand new candle or you could have a flop. You may want to consider using fragrance oils in water on the candle warmer. I know people that do that. It is essentially the same as an electric or tea-light fragrance diffuser. The people I know just put the water in something glass and heat resistant (like a coffee cup) and add some fragrance oil, and let it heat on the warmer. Good luck and let us know how it turns out. Susan

Sorry for being late to the fair on this one. That's a fine mix of oils; my personal preference is 70-80% olive, and even that hardens up in a few days. Shortening's softer oils are partially hydrogenated, which hardens those up nicely and results in a more solid bar of soap. Plus that much coconut will harden almost anything! One question is how much water you used. My high olive soap, done CP, gets a pretty sharp water discount to set it up faster. Last night's batch was 24% water to oil weight and traced fast, set up fast, and is almost ready for unmolding this afternoon...but not quite. If you used more than (say) 35% water by oil weight, it's likely to be a little soft at first. No worries, it'll cure nice and hard in a few weeks. Re crayons: They're harmless, work fine, and I have no objection for home usage of the soap. Of course you couldn't sell the bars, but they won't hurt you a bit. Some colors may warp in high-pH environments, and the paraffin the crayon's made from won't saponify. That also helps add a bit of hardness to the soap.

We have a 4-year old 36" 4-door GE Monogram CD/FD refrigerator/freezer (ZFGB21HZSS). It is our first FD and I have mixed feelings about it... I like the depth, and that I can store things that are wide. No big issues so far, but some inconveniences. Like others have mentioned, the bottom freezer is a pain because you have to dig through everything to locate what you're looking for. If the ice tray gets a bit too full, pulling the freezer drawer will send some of the ice behind the drawer. We've had the water line for the (internal) water dispenser freeze a few times. When this happens, you need to bump up the fridge temp a bit and wait a day or two for it to thaw. I also dislike the "quick space shelf". Part of one of the shelves is split in half where you can either use it as a full shelf, or you can push back the front half-shelf to make room for taller objects below. When the split shelf is full of food, I invariably hit it with something I'm putting in the fridge and it retracts, dropping what was on that portion of the shelf onto the floor. All this said, we'll probably get a CD/FD for our next home, but something with more options for organization in the freezer like sliding shelves. We've been looking at SZ 42" FD's, but time will tell if that'll fit in our build budget.