The home of SwiftCraftyMonkey! Join Susan as she obsesses about cosmetic chemistry and other things (some possibly related to monkeys). Often strange, occasionally useful, and always worth a stop as a point of interest on your journey through the Intertron.
As you’re no doubt aware, it’s been a really hard month, and I’m so grateful that I’ve been able to escape from reality by writing. And that I was able to take time off work to be with my mom thanks to the kind support of my Patreon subscribers. My newest e-zine, It’s the Most … Read moreTake a look at my newest e-zine – It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year
I’m overwhelmed by the outpouring of kindness I’m seeing here and in various Facebook groups about my recent losses. Thank you so much for thinking about my tiny family in our hour of need. This last week has been harder than I thought thanks to the bureaucracy of death as we meet with this person … Read moreThank you so much for your kind thoughts…
Please don’t read my blog on Bloglovin’. I would prefer you come here to read it and interact with me and other readers. But Bloglovin’ wants you to read my work on their site so they can make money from it. They’re holding me hostage and won’t release information on my blog until I put … Read moreBloglovin’ is holding my blog hostage until I post this link to them…
My mother, Muriel, died yesterday from a possible blood clot related to lung cancer. (It was an infection from pseudomonas, according to the doctor. Not that it matters much…) There are no words for the extent of our grief. I have taken down my e-mail address so Raymond and I can have some time and … Read moreI ask for your patience yet again…
You’ve been awesome in sharing your thoughts about the facial cleansers you’ve been making, but I’d like to hear more from you. What do you think of the recipe you made? (Please specify which recipe you made or share if it’s your own version)What do you like?What don’t you like?Is there something you’d like to … Read moreNewbie Tuesday: Making facial cleansers – feedback
As we saw in yesterday’s post and Tuesday’s post, we can use all kinds of lovely botanical extracts to take our facial cleansers from great to mega-super-lovely-awesome! If you followed the shopping list for this series, you would have purchased rosemary and chamomile for oily skin, chamomile and green tea for normal skin, and chamomile … Read moreNewbie Tuesday on Friday: Using botanical extracts in your facial cleansers (part three)
I had to share this link to Dr Joe Schwarcz’s column on snail secretions in cosmetics as I’m seeing a lot about these products lately. My thoughts? Ewwww, really???
Let’s take a look at including some of those extracts about which I wrote yesterday in our cleanser recipes! You can modify any recipe you wish to include them: I’m using the one we modified on Tuesday with the aloe vera. If I wanted to create something for oily skin, my first thoughts are always … Read moreNewbie Tuesday on Thursday: Using botanical extracts in your facial cleansers (part two)
I’m a big fan of using powdered extracts to add some extra oomph to my facial cleansers. They tend to be inexpensive – for instance, $3 to $5 for 10 grams – and we only need a bit to go a long way. Let’s take a look at these botanical extracts and see how they … Read moreNewbie Tuesday on Wednesday: Adding botanical extracts to your facial cleansers (part one)
Adding aloe vera can take your facial cleanser from great to freakin’ awesome, so let’s take a look at why we might include this ingredient to a facial cleanser! For this series, I encouraged you to get aloe vera liquid. I generally add 10% of this wonderfui liquid to act as a film former, emollient, … Read moreNewbie Tuesday on Tuesday: Adding aloe vera to your facial cleanser