Hi everyone! Hope you’re all doing well on the first Monday of the spring! As of this post, I have 4,301 posts on the blog, written over the last twelve years!* Yep, this is a massive blog with loads more information than you can imagine. I have formulas on here for everything except cold process soap, mascara, sunscreen, or insect repellent.
*This works out to an average of 358 posts a year, or a week short of a post a day. When I say this blog is massive, I’m not exaggerating!
Where can you find “recipes” on the blog?
You can find those in the formula directory (check out the link above in the menu where it says “formulas” or to the right hand side in the pinned posts section where it says “How to find formulas on the blog and the formula directory“).
Or do a search for the word “formula” or “formula” and the thing that interests you like “shampoo” or “lotion”.
Or click on the tag or category at the bottom of the summary of the post on the main page or at the bottom of the proper post that says “formula” or “formulas” to see loads of them.
We don’t call them “recipes” in cosmetic chemistry as recipes are for food. You may see some posts – many, I suspect – in which I refer to something as a “recipe” and I was wrong and that was a silly thing for me to do. I try to correct this when I see older posts, but considering the number of posts I’ve written there’s no way I’ll get even a portion of them. So you could even look up “recipe” and find loads of things.
You can do a search for a specific product that interests you, like “shampoo bar” or “body wash” or “leave in conditioner”, and you’ll find a lot of hits. The search bar is located to the upper right of every page on the blog, and you can use that to do searches.
If you’re new to formulating, check out the Beginners! Start here! section, where you’ll find loads of links.
I know some of you don’t like the theory or ingredient write up posts, but if you want to learn how to formulate and stop being dependent on other people’s recipes, then you’ll need to know these basics. I created this post to help you get started as a formulator. You can always find this link to the right hand side of the blog under “pinned posts”.
On messages and comments…
I’m doing my best, but there are just too many for me to answer, and I’m so grateful to those of you who share your thoughts and experiences with others in the comments section. I don’t want to be the only voice and the only person offering information, so thank you for being so awesome and helping others in this community.
If you’re going to ask a question, please share it on a relevant post: Don’t ask about shampoo bars on a post about facial moisturizers. Also, odds are pretty good I’ve written about that topic on other occasions, and finding a relevant post might lead you to the answer.
I’m also a firm believer in teaching you to fish, rather than giving you a fish. The best way to learn is to follow your snoot to see where you end up, and if I jump in to answer every question, you’ll never have that joy of self-discovery and linking things you already know to things you’re learning about now. Follow that goose!
Thank you, Will McPhail, for showing me myself in a cartoon!
I’m afraid I don’t have time to offer one-to-one help on formulating or duplicating posts by email or direct message on any social media. If you’d like to ask about either, please post them in the monthly duplicating post – always found in the pinned posts section to the right – or the monthly Q&A section as that’s where I check regularly.
If you want to email me, please use the “contact me” section of the blog. I answer messages in the order in which they’re received, so if you write to me more than once before I can respond, your message gets bumped back and the first one I’ll see will be the latest one.
I really love hearing from you and encourage you to write to share your thoughts, photos, ideas, questions, suggestions, and more because I feel inspired when you share what you love, but I might not get back to you as quickly as you’d like. Please be kind and understanding about this – I’m only one person providing all the content here and in the e-books, writing upwards of 50,000 words a month on top of all the formulating I do, and I don’t want to burn out and stop doing this thing I love so much.
What should we do next for Newbie Tuesday & Formulating Friday?
We’ll be starting the next Newbie Tuesday and Formulating Friday lotion making series in mid-April using Olivem 1000 as the emulsifier to create naturally compliant lotions.
This is the last section I had planned for the “school year” 2020 – 2021, but I will be continuing the concept of the Newbie Tuesday and Formulating Friday series once this emulsifier is done.
The question is this – what should we do next? There are literally dozens of other emulsifiers we could try. Do you want to do another one? Do you want to do more with cold emulsifiers as we approach the warmer months? Do you want to learn about something else?
The next series would start in late June/early July or we could move it to September? What are your thoughts?
This is what we’ve covered so far in Newbie Tuesday posts. You can find the links for all of these things in either the Beginners! Start here! section of the blog. We’ve also covered facial cleansers, facial scrubs, hydrating toners, and gelled serums.
Click for the home page for the last three emulsifiers for these series
Click here and scroll down to find the Ritamulse SCG, naturally compliant lotion series.
Okay, I think that’s it for today. I have a goose to follow and I really can’t run in these silly flip-flops…