Adventures With The Sage

Before I continue with the recipe, what is a meringue? A meringue is a dessert made from whipped egg whites and sugar. The majority of meringues are flavored with vanilla, almond, or coconut. Meringues are made in several different ways, depending on their final use, whether it is used in a main dish or a dessert.

Collect needed supplies:
Oil of your choice (I’m using Colorless Jojoba)
Extra Thick Shower Gel
Sugar
Fragrance Oil of your choice (I’m using Tahitian Vanilla Fragrance Oil)
Transfer Pipettes
Scale
Mixing Bowl
Mixing Spoon
Hand Mixer
Containers for the final product

Recipe in Percentages:
10% Colorless Jojoba
20% Extra Thick Shower Gel
70% sugar
Tahitian Vanilla Fragrance Oil, at preferred fragrance percentage.
Lemon Yellow Color, a few drops to color

Recipe in grams (Makes 200 grams or 7 ounces):
20 grams Colorless Jojoba
40 grams Extra Thick Shower Gel
140 grams sugar
1 mL Tahitian Vanilla Fragrance Oil
2 drops Lemon Yellow Color

Weigh the Colorless Jojoba and Extra Thick Shower Gel into a mixing bowl that can fit the beaters of the hand mixer. Beat the Colorless Jojoba and Extra Thick Shower Gel until you have a white foamy cream. Add the Tahitian Vanilla Fragrance Oil and Lemon Yellow Color and fold into the cream. Once everything in the bowl is completely mixed, stir in the sugar. After the sugar has been incorporated, fill your final product containers.

Allow to sit for 4 hours for the separation to occur. Once the separation has occurred, the scrub is ready to give away.

Instructions for use:
Open jar and gently mix layers together. Once layers have been mixed, apply to damp skin and scrub in a circular motion. Rinse off with warm water. Daily use is not recommended.

Enjoy!

Submit your photos and text for the guest written Embedded Melt & Pour Soap Challenge! Submissions will be accepted through October 18th at blog@thesage.com. The submissions will be released October 19th through October 23rd. Each guest writer will receive a $25 gift certificate.

Don’t forget to submit your blog or video posts to win the MMS Perfumer’s Kit. Remember, this kit is worth $280! Wow!

I chose Comfrey Leaves Extract and Horsetail Grass Extract for different results I wanted in the finished product. Comfrey Leaves Extract is great for moisturizing and nourishing hair as well as aiding the prevention of split ends. Horsetail Grass Extract is great for nourishing hair, aiding the prevention of split ends, and encouraging hair growth.

This split ends prevention serum is light-weight and feels great on your hair!

Collect needed supplies:
Cyclomethicone
Dimethicone
Conditioning Emulsifier
Wheat Protein
Horsetail Grass Extract
Comfrey Leave Extract
Water
Liquid Germall Plus
Scale
Transfer Pipettes
Beaker or Mixing Bowl
Immersion Blender
Microwave
Spoons
Containers for the finished product (I used the 2 oz PET Boston Round Bottle, Size 20 and the Treatment Pump Top Closure, Size 20.)
Fragrance Oil or Essential Oil if desired

Recipe in Percentages:
10% Cyclomethicone
8% Dimethicone
8% Conditioning Emulsifier Wax
67.5% Water
2% Wheat Protein
2% Horsetail Extract
2% Comfrey Leaves Extract
0.5% Liquid Germall Plus

Recipe in grams for 100 gram test batch:
10 grams Cyclomethicone
8 grams Dimethicone
8 grams Conditioning Emulsifier Wax
67.5 grams Water
2 grams Wheat Protein
2 grams Horsetail Extract
2 grams Comfrey Leaves Extract
0.5 grams Liquid Germall Plus

Weigh the Cyclomethicone, Dimethicone, Conditioning Emulsifier and water into the beaker and microwave in short bursts until the Conditioning Emulsifier can be completely melted and all the ingredients in the beaker can be blended together. At this point, the mixture looks like a clear hair gel. Stir the mixture occasionally and allow to cool until the temperature drops below 140 degrees Fahrenheit. Add the extracts, Wheat Protein, and Liquid Germall Plus and mix together. Pour into desired containers and allow to cool before using. The mixture will now be white in appearance.

Application Directions:

Wash hair normally and then towel dry hair. Pump the needed amount of serum onto your palms and lightly apply to all of your hair. Do not rinse. Style as usual.

Enjoy!

Submit your photos and text for the guest written Embedded Melt & Pour Soap Challenge! Submissions will be accepted through October 18th at blog@thesage.com. The submissions will be released October 19th through October 23rd. Each guest writer will receive a $25 gift certificate.

Collect needed supplies:

Brown Sugar
Oat Flour (I made this one myself in the food processor)
Liquid Glycerin
Colorless Jojoba Oil or Golden Jojoba Oil (I’m using Colorless Jojoba Oil)
Liquid Soap Base
Body Milk Base
Mokalata Fragrance Oil
Scale
2 Mixing Bowls or Heavy Zipper Style Bags
Jars for storing your finished product in
Transfer Pipettes

Recipe:

200 grams Brown Sugar
10 grams Oat Flour
2 grams Liquid Glycerin
21 grams Jojoba Oil
10 grams Liquid Soap Base
20 grams Body Milk Base
0.5 grams Mokalata Fragrance Oil

Use a blender or food processor to make the oat flour.

Weigh the Brown Sugar and Oat Flour into the mixing bowl or bag and mix until all lumps have been removed. Set aside. Weigh all liquid ingredients into the other bowl or bag. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients and stir until completely blended. Now you can fill your containers with the scrub.

I want to use this scrub right now!

Submit your photos and text for the guest written Embedded Melt & Pour Soap Challenge! Submissions will be accepted through October 18th at blog@thesage.com. The submissions will be released October 19th through October 23rd. Each guest writer will receive a $25 gift certificate.

Collect needed items:
1 batch of Okara
Rose Hydrosol
Honey
Chamomile Extract
Heavy Duty Paper Towel or Hand Towel
Scale
Container for mixing
Spoons

Recipe:
1 batch of Okara (My batch weighed 5.1 ounces after removing excess water)
0.20 ounces Rose Hydrosol
3.66 ounces Honey
0.12 ounces Chamomile Extract

After making Soy Milk, strain the Soy Milk and then place the okara onto the heavy duty paper or hand towel. Wrap the towel around the okara and gently twist to assist the draining of excess water. Place the barely damp okara into the mixing container and add the Rose Hydrosol, Honey and Chamomile Extract. Stir until all ingredients are incorporated. Once all ingredients are mixed, this mask now ready to use.

You can also use this mask as a body mask. Simply apply the mask and allow to sit for several minutes before washing off with cool water.

Enjoy!

I sat down and made a list of products that would help me achieve the desired effect of clean hands! I decided to start with the Glycerin Scrub Base and the Fine Pumice. I made a small test batch and realized that there wasn’t enough texture to help scrub my hands. I decided to add Fine Dead Sea Salt to the batch and see if that worked. Once I had mixed in the salt, I found the coarse scrubbing texture to be just right, but I wanted more help removing grease from my hands. That was when I remembered the conversation I had had with Tina about the properties of clay that can be useful for helping to remove impurities from the skin, like oil. After that thought, I had to find my Red Morocco Clay to add to the scrub. I added the clay, but because the pumice and salt had already been added, the clay did not mix well into the scrub. I set that test batch aside and started over again.

This time I added the Red Morocco Clay to the Glycerin Scrub Base and stirred before I added any other ingredients. Once the clay had been stirred in completely, I added the Fine Pumice and Fine Dead Sea Salt. This time the scrub was just what I wanted!

Collect needed supplies:
Glycerin Scrub Base
Fine Pumice
Fine Dead Sea Salt
Red Morocco Clay (or clay of your choice)
Fragrance or Essential Oil of your choice (I’m using Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil)
Transfer Pipettes
Measuring spoons
Container for mixing
Scale
Mixing spoon
Containers and caps of your choice

Recipe: (In grams)
150 grams Glycerin Scrub Base
4 grams Red Morocco Clay
50 grams Fine Pumice
50 grams Fine Dead Sea Salt
1 gram Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil
Makes 255 grams

Recipe: (In ounces)
5.30 ounces Glycerin Scrub Base
0.15 ounces Red Morocco Clay
1.75 ounces Fine Pumice
1.75 ounces Fine Dead Sea Salt
0.05 ounces Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil
Makes 9 ounces

Weigh the Glycerin Scrub Base and clay into your container for mixing and blend thoroughly until there are no more clumps of clay. Once the clay has been incorporated into the scrub base, add the pumice and salt to the mixture. Stir until there are no more pockets of dry ingredients. Add the Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil and stir.

After all ingredients are completely mixed, fill the containers of your choice. This is a great scrub to put in the Grand Oval Bottles, especially if it for the grease monkey with really dirty paws! (Pun intended.)

Enjoy this scrub!

Supplies and Ingredients
White Granulated Sugar
Grapeseed Oil
Lemon Sugar Fragrance Oil
Lemon USA Essential Oil
Spearmint Essential Oil
Container for mixing
Scale
Spoon
Transfer Pipettes
Containers and caps

Since Jordan wanted a Mint Lemonade Fragrance, I needed to blend a fragrance to match her desired scent. Her first idea was Lemon Sugar with a little Spearmint Essential Oil for the mint note. I made a test with 20 drops of Lemon Sugar and 1 drop of Spearmint in a Clear Glass Dram. After I let the blend sit for an hour, I smelled it and decided that we needed to add a sharp Lemon note, because the Lemon Sugar didn’t have the tang we wanted. I added 5 drops of Lemon USA, which is our sharper Lemon Essential Oil. That fixed my Lemon notes, but there was only one person on staff who could pick up a faint mint tone to the blend. I added 1 more drop of Spearmint. I still couldn’t smell mint so I started with a new Clear Glass Dram and added 20 drops of Lemon Sugar, 5 drops of Lemon USA, and 4 drops of Spearmint. The mint note was stronger and I could finally smell the mint. This blend was very polite and I thought it was very good. I still had to go back to the drawing board to see if 8 drops of Spearmint would overpower the Lemon or not. I got a new Clear Glass Dram and tested again! I added 20 drops of Lemon Sugar, 5 drops of Lemon USA, and 8 drops of Spearmint to this dram bottle and let it sit. Wow! This blend I think was the best! There was a great balance between the mint and lemon. We didn’t want the mint to overpower the lemon, which it can do easily.

Now I have a small dilemma. I need to fragrance a batch of sugar scrub, but I don’t want to sit here all day and count out drops of fragrance oil. This is when we converted the the drops to percentages.

Fragrance Blend in Percentages
60% Lemon Sugar Fragrance Oil
15% Lemon Essential Oil, USA
25% Spearmint Essential Oil

I needed to make 1 oz of the fragrance blend for scrub testing, so I usedthe percentages to calculate how much I needed to blend enough for 1 oz.

Fragrance Blend in Weight for 1 oz
0.60 ounces Lemon Sugar Fragrance Oil
0.15 ounces Lemon Essential Oil, USA
0.25 ounces Spearmint Essential Oil

During my testing several of the staff fell in love with this fragrance blend, so I was able to persuade the New Products team to come up with pricing for this yummy blend! I currently have a price of $4.50 for 1 fl oz of the Jordan’s Mint Lemonade blend. We will release this blend shortly, so if you can’t wait you can blend it yourself. If you want us to blend this for you, check our New Products section.

Now the fragrance has been blended, we can work on making the scrub. Jordan is planning on using Grapeseed Oil as the oil in her scrub, so we just need to mix a scrub that meets our requirements. We started with 8 ounces of Grapeseed Oil and then I started adding sugar and stirring until I had a very thick sugar scrub. I ended up using 16 ounces of sugar, which means that our sugar and oil ratio is 2:1. This ratio is one of the easiest ratios to work with on sugar scrubs.

The recipe and complete directions are below.

Scrub Recipe
8 oz Grapeseed Oil
16 oz White Granulated Sugar
.24 ounces of Mint Lemonade Blend (Using the fragrance oil at a 1% rate)

Weigh the oil into the mixing container. With recipes that you weigh like this, I like to add my fragrance oil to the fixed oils before I add the sugar. Now, add the sugar and stir thoroughly. Fill containers with mixed scrub. Stir the scrub mixture frequently while filling the jars to keep an evenly filled jar.

This recipe makes about 16 fluid ounces of sugar scrub. I used a 2 oz jar for my container and I filled 8 jars.

Next week is all about finishing up the Mother’s Day Gift Baskets!

This problem can be solved by making a Blooming Bath Oil. What is a Blooming Bath Oil? A Blooming Bath Oil is a bath oil that has an emulsifier mixed with the oil, so the oil mixes with the water instead of floating on the top of the tub! This bath oil will separate into layers, so you just need to shake it up before pouring into the tub. Think of a vinaigrette salad dressing, because the oil and vinegar must be mixed together before pouring over your salad. Who would want just oil on their salad when they were expecting the vinaigrette mixture? This is how a Blooming Bath Oil works, because you don’t want just oil in your tub.

Today we are going to make a Blooming Bath Oil with Sesame Oil and Polysorbate 20. I’m using the Sesame Oil because it is an oil that is light on the skin, yet rich in great nutrients for the skin. The Polysorbate 20 is going to be used because it not likely to foam very much.

Collect needed items:
Polysorbate 20 (You can use Polysorbate 80 if you desire)
Sesame Oil
Fragrance or Essential Oil of your choice (I’m going to use Rose Fragrance Oil)
Scale
Beaker or other container for mixing (optional)
Containers for finished product (I used the 2 oz Clear PET Oval Bottle, Size 20 and 20 mm Black Non Dispensing Caps)

Recipe
1 ounce of Polysorbate 20
4 ounces of Sesame Oil
.06 ounces Rose Fragrance Oil

Weigh all ingredients into mixing container, or if you wish, you can weigh directly into a bottle of your choice. Stir ingredients together if you measured into a mixing container or you can cap and shake the bottle if you filled a bottle.

Notes:
If you don’t want to use Sesame Oil but you want to use a light oil, I would recommend giving Rice Bran Oil a try.

These Blooming Bath Oils will be included in the Mother’s Day Gift Baskets!

Next week is all about fun with Melt & Pour soap! Swirls, toys, shapes and curls! Great fun for an afternoon with the kids or for some peaceful time by yourself.

Collect needed items:
Water
Hydrovance
Liquid Germall Plus
Hydrosol of your choice (I’m using Rose Hydrosol)
Fragrance or Essential Oil of your choice (optional, I’m using Bulgarian Lavender Essential Oil)
Clay of your choice (I’m using French Green Clay)
Scale
Transfer Pipette
Spoon
Mixing Bowl
Containers for finished product

Recipe:
35 grams of Water
5 grams of Hydrovance
0.5 gram of Liquid Germall Plus
10 grams of Rose Hydrosol
5 – 10 drops of Essential Oil if desired
49.5 grams of French Green Clay

Weigh liquid items into mixing bowl and stir briefly. Weigh clay either directly into liquids or into separate bowl to be added to liquids. Stir. At first the mixture will look like pancake or waffle batter with all the bubbles. Don’t worry! Walk away from the mixture for 5 to 10 minutes. If you keep wanting to check the mixture, then do something else like roll the laundry, run a load of dishes, check your e-mail, walk out to the mailbox, dance a crazy person around the house, etc.

Now come back to check and stir your mixture. There aren’t many lumps or bubbles as there were before. Clay needs time to absorb all of the water. Just ask any good mud pie maker about giving clay the necessary time to absorb water.

The mask is smooth and ready to put in jars.

Wait a minute! Yesterday I forgot to share how to fill the jars. Simply fill a disposable plastic pastry bag or a zipper-style storage bag with the mixture. Cut off the end of the bag and squeeze the bag to fill the containers. Warning, this method will need strong hands. You can use a rubber scraper on the outside of the bag to scape everything last bit out.

Notes:
You can use various essential oils or hydrosols for different users. For example, you can make a mask with Tea Tree Essential Oil and Peppermint Hydrosol for acne prone skin and you could also make a mask with Bulgarian Lavender Essential Oil and Rose Hydrosol for mature skin. You can make any blend you can think of. If you don’t want to use a hydrosol, then you can simply replace the hydrosol with water.

Next week is all about making the home air smell good. We are going to make room sprays and linen sprays! Don’t forget about the Monster Away Sprays for Kids!

Collect needed items:
Water
Hydrovance
Liquid Oil of your choice (I’m using Sunflower Oil)
Emulsifying Wax
Stearic Acid
Clay of Choice (I’m using Pink Kaolin)
Liquid Germall Plus
Fragrance or Essential Oil of your choice (I’m using Lemongrass Essential Oil)
Scale
Transfer Pipette
Mixing Spoon
Mixing Bowl
Containers for finished product

Recipe
56.34 grams Water
4.12 grams Hydrovance
9.39 grams Liquid Oil
3.47 grams Emulsifying Wax
2.07 grams Stearic Acid
23.46 grams of Clay of Choice
0.66 grams Liquid Germall Plus
0.05 grams of desired fragrance or essential oil

Weigh ingredients into your container except the clay, preservative and essential oil. Microwave for short bursts of time until the oils are melted. Mix ingredients together thoroughly and let cool until thickened. Add clay, preservative and essential oil, then stir. You may need a rubber scraper to scrape the sides of your container. Once everything is mixed together, fill your containers and then enjoy a relaxing time!

This clay mask is not as drying as most and will work well for most skin types. If you have extremely oily skin, try a different mask recipe, without additional oils. I’ll give a quick one tomorrow.

Next week is all about making the home air smell good. We are going to make room sprays and linen sprays! Don’t forget about the Monster Away Sprays for Kids!

Edit:
Whoops! I forgot to mention that this mask will be in the Mother’s Day Gift Baskets! Don’t forget to enter the drawing!