The Truth About Soap: 

Have you ever read the ingredients list on your soap, how many of those words can you pronounce?  Most mass-produced soaps are made from chemical cleansers and include a product called sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS) or sodium laureth sulfate (SLES) to create the bubbles.  SLS and SLES can actually be irritating to the skin and can be harmful if ingested and they are actually the same foaming products that are used in products made to degrease engines!  In fact, that is how SLS and SLES work in common soap brands, they dissolve the oils on your skin and this is why many common soaps can cause your skin to dry out.  For more information on SLS and SLES visit the Natural Health Information Centre website at http://www.natural-health-information-centre.com/sodium-lauryl-sulfate.html.   

What makes our soap different?  Well first of all our handmade soaps DO NOT contain SLS or SLES or any of the other chemicals that you see on mass produced soap labels.  Our soaps are made the old fashioned way, which is by mixing a combination of lye (sodium hydroxide) and water with some type of fat that will undergo a chemical reaction and turn into soap.  When the chemical reaction is complete there is no lye left and all of the fats have been converted to a solid, which is our soap. 

We use high quality cosmetic grade oils and butters in our soaps.  The ingredients in our soaps are very easy to recognize (except for a few exotic oils).  What do we use?  Olive oil, soya oil, avocado oil, coconut oil, castor oil, sunflower oil, babassu butter, cocoa butter, kokum butter, shea butter and non-soaping additives like oatmeal, goat’s milk and silk protein. 

Is lye soap safe?  Lye soap has gotten a little bit of a bad rap, everyone remembers the soap their grandmother or great-grandmother used that was made with lye and as one customer told me, “could strip paint off the walls.”  While it is true that lye soap in the past could be caustic the lye soap that is made today, if made correctly, is much safer and gentler on your skin.  The main reason is that with modern technology each type of oil used in soaping can be tested to see exactly how much lye is necessary to be converted to soap down to tenths of a gram.  Also, with modern processing techniques batches of lye, as well as oils and butters are much more consistent than in the past.  The end result is a bar of soap that is very gentle on the skin; however, customers who are sensitive to fragrances may still have sensitivity problems if they choose a scented soap. 

All of our soaps are tested prior to sale and by tested I mean that we actually use them.  Our family uses the soap to bathe with and also to shave with, yes, you can shave with these soaps! 

*Please note that we also sell vegetable glycerin-based soaps, these are not the same as handmade lye soaps.  Our glycerine-based soaps are Silk & Shea, Oatmeal Scrub and Sweet Honey.  These are vegetable glycerine bases with additives such as silk protein, shea butter, ground oatmeal and functional honey added. 

What about our other products?  Our other products are also made with natural ingredients that are easily identifiable. 

Oatmeal Bath Bombs:  Ground oatmeal, baking soda, almond oil, witch hazel, water, citric acid and fragrance oil.

Lip Balm:  Shea butter, mango butter, beeswax, cocoa butter, flavor oil & some flavors also have cosmetic coloring added.

Soy Body Lotion:  Distilled water, soya oil, babassu butter, vegetable glycerin, fragrance & preservative*.

Coconut Milk Bath:  Powdered coconut milk, yogurt powder, powdered honey, powdered vanilla, buttermilk powder.

Oatmeal Milk Bath:  Oatmeal powder, yogurt powder, buttermilk powder, whole milk powder, powdered honey, powdered vanilla.

Cocoa Butter Bath Melts:  Cocoa butter, baking soda, citric acid.

Funky Foot Scrub:  Dead Sea salts, ground pumice, jojoba oil, fragrance, preservative*, powdered silica. 

Super Soft Body Butter:  Shea butter, aloe butter, mowrah butter, shea oil, fragrance.

Summer Shea Stick:  Shea butter, cocoa butter, fragrance.

Bath Salts:  Dead Sea salts, Epsom salts, essential oil.

*Our soy body lotion & funky foot scrubs are the only exceptions to our “no chemicals” rule.  Because of the water in the lotion formula it requires a preservative to keep any bacteria from growing in it, however, we use a preservative (trade name Optiphen) that is paraben-free and formaldehyde-free.