Ha! You are funny Miss Pam. ;-)

Aw, thanks Debbie. Hopefully next year. :) And yes, mine have been dry nearly all year long. Frustrating...

Time gets away from me too. For years now I have wanted to make special stockings for everyone, but every year Christmas comes and we have the same old store-bought-tattered stockings to hang. :)

I know! The wrapping paper I have will probably still be here for my grandchildren. :)

The most wondrous hold indeed. I popped over to your blog... it is lovely and makes me quite homesick. :)

That is awesome! :) We used to dip a finger in the wax until it was nice and fat. Then we would slide our "fake finger" off and drop it back in to re-melt.

If you decide to try them, go with the #6/0 size square braid wick. After a bunch of research and a bit of experimentation, we found this size works the best with mini candles made of bees wax. :)

It really was.... and quick, because they are so small. :)

Hello Rebecca, Well, it is really not much of a recipe at all... I call it "herb garden" because I just throw pretty much whatever herbs I have from the gardens into it. :) I think it is true that the herbs loose most, if not all, of their medicinal qualities (and certainly all of their scent) in the saponification process, but the end result is kinda cool looking. I infuse all of the dried herbs in the olive oil that I will be using in the recipe, and then just strain them all out. I do add a bit (like 1/4 teaspoon-ish per 3 or 4 lb batch) of dried and powdered comfrey at light trace for more of an herb-y look. I would think you could use other herbs for the powdered bit, but comfrey tends to keep its color a little better than some. All of my soaps are for our use and gifts, so I don't mind if one batch has a slightly different look that another. :) Have you seen this e-book? http://www.brambleberry.com/E-Book-Infusing-Herbs-Spices-Teas-Clays-P5040.aspx . I found it very helpful in the beginning of mixing herbs and soaps. I have never re-batched or hand-milled soap, but I would think the results would be quite nice. If you have any questions or you need the exact recipe I used, just email! :) Blessings, Alice

Ha! And this from the person who just built her own dining room table!? ;)

Yes! We just did that with the vanilla honey. It is totally amazing!

Ha! Yeah, I decided to finally get off the couch, turn off the soaps and put away the bon-bons. ;-)

That is wonderful, Gail! I have sent you an email with the soap details... :)

That was a major concern for me also, but the pond is located in the pasture with the barn. This field has a gate that the little ones cannot unlatch. No one is allowed into the fenced area without permission or adult supervision anyway, so I am feeling pretty good about the safety issue. :)

We actually rubber-banded it in bunches of 6, and then just placed them over the rope (3 on each side). I did add a few clothespins between the higher up ones (as spacers) to keep them from slipping down and being too close to the other bunches. I am trying for as much air circulation as possible in this humid climate of ours. :)