Welcome to the home of SwiftCraftyMonkey Formulating Inc.! Join Susan as she obsesses about cosmetic chemistry and other things (some possibly related to monkeys)! Here you’ll find over 5,000 posts and formulas written over the past 16 years for everything from lotions, creams, and body butters to hair care products to fancy facial products filled with actives and cosmeceuticals! Enjoy the site without distractions – no ads, pop ups, sponsored posts, affiliate links, “one weird tricks” – all supported by readers like you.
I bought this ingredient last year from Making Cosmetics, so I thought we should take a look at it before formulating with it in this week’s Formulating Fundamentals Friday on fatty alcohols and acids. This is a fatty alcohol, like cetyl alcohol or cetearyl alcohol, derived from lanolin. It’s used in the same way, as...
In Canine Cosmetology, part one, skin basics, I talked about the skin’s function, its layers, and how important its microbiology is. Today I’ll discuss the importance of products such as shampoos and their affects. How can we avoid disrupting a dog’s healthy skin microflora/microbiota? Let’s start with pH. On a dog, the pH measurement is...
As I’ve been as wandering around the ‘net over the last few weeks, I’ve noticed people aren’t bothering to measure the temperature of their products any more. A popular blogger makes lotions by telling you to put the heated water phase and heated oil phase in a double boiler, then tells you to remove it...
As I’ve been working through some comments on the blog – I am trying my hardest to get to them, but there’s so many and I’m trying so hard to put the finishing touches on a super long series – I’ve noticed a few things I thought I should share, enjoy, or question! I’ve noticed...
I am working hard to find time to do more than look at the comments as they come in, but it’s hard when I get to the fourth one and it inspires a post or even a series! Keep those great comments coming! In this post, Why did I buy that again? Stearamidopropyl dimethylamine (updated), ChampagneJ asked, Hi...