Welcome new subscribers, and an update for everyone!

Edited to add: As a note, if you are getting a message that you need to be “invited” to read the blog, that is because that’s the error the old blog gives to you. I cannot change that message The old blog is gone. No one will be invited to it because everything from there – and more – is on this blog. Please please please don’t write to me asking for access as this is an error message by Google. I cannot give you access as the old blog is gone. Read the rest of this post for more information…

Thank you for joining me over here on the new blog! I’ve been writing this one since early December now, and you’ll notice there are something like 500 plus posts you’ve never seen before if you were only going to the old blog. (And more being added every day from the Patreon feed.)

Everything from the old blog is over here going back to the very beginning 2008. Unfortunately, when I made the old blog private, it broke a lot of the links. So if you click on something and it says that you need an invite or aren’t allowed, that’s a link to the old blog. (You can tell as the URL will be swiftcraftymonkey.blogspot.ca). You aren’t being locked out of it – it’s just a broken link. If you have a title for the post, you can do a search for it by that name and you should be able to find it. And if you have a moment, if you could send me a quick note with the URL of the post that had the broken links, we can fix that up.

Summary: If you see this need to be invited to read a post, it doesn’t mean your subscription isn’t working. It means the link still goes to the old blog. 

Out of 3,335 posts on this blog, maybe 500 have the links fixed. It’s a huge process, and one that cascades, meaning if you pick post A to update, you have to update everything attached to post A, which could be literally dozens of links. I spent a few hours last night trying to update one post because of this effect, and it’s just so much work. We have hired a wonderful young man to do all these updates for all kinds of things, but I kinda sprung this on him the other day, so he’s swamped.

Please look up to the menu bar to see what used to be the “links to lists”, which are now called resources. A lot of those are updated now, so if you can’t find that post you wanted on panthenol, it’s probably updated in the ingredients or humectants list.

If you’re looking for the place to suggest a duplication, ask a question, or find the Lotioncrafter coupon for the month for $10 subscribers, I write a monthly “Welcome to (this month)”, which is always pinned to the right hand side of the blog.

When I’m looking for duplications, the only place I check is the duplication suggestion page, so it’s important that you comment is there.

And I guarantee I’ll answer the questions posed in the Q&A section, so those are a priority. Not that I won’t try for some of the other comments, but I’m so overloaded right now, I can’t promise anything.

I’m still working on the e-zine for July for the $10 subscribers. I started part two of surfactants, and realized what I wanted to write was going to be massive again, so I’ve had to keep breaking it down into smaller and smaller topics that I can really concentrate on and create something in-depth. When it’s released, there’ll be a post here with a coupon you can use in the shop for the blog to download it.

If you have questions, I have a contact me page you can see above. The form comes to me, but there is a large paragraph that is in bolded, purple, capital letters that I hope you read as that’s about tech support or questions about membership. If you fill out the form to write to me about this topic, I will ask you to write to the other address as I’m in the middle of so much work and it’s not my field of expertise. As well, there’s an FAQ about memberships and all kinds of things like that, too, that likely answers your questions.

And please join in the conversations! I have Disqus on this site as it’s a better system that the one offered by WordPress as it allows us to respond to specific comments and create threads. Everyone has something awesome to share or a great question to ask or a suggestion for something we could do or make or talk about or enjoy. All voices are welcome here!

I will ask you to find relevant posts on which to comment for a few reasons. One, if you ask a question about conditioners on a post about making bubble bath, it’ll get lost and people looking for more on conditioners will miss it.

Two, it’s nice to stay kind of on topic. On Facebook over the last month, people have been asking me about shampoo bars no matter what the topic, and it feels disrespectful when I’m sharing my experiences with the guild and sharing my feelings that someone ignores that in favour of the thing they think is important. This doesn’t mean a conversation about conditioners can’t meander into the realm of packaging, mixers, or fragrance oils as these are really fun ones, but that it feels a bit like interrupting a conversation when someone isn’t following the flow.

Three, if you ask it where we’re already talking about something similar, you’ll get many different answers and suggestions from the very active community we have going here!

Finally, if you liked getting notifications of new posts on the old blog, you can sign up for something similar here. You can sign up for daily or weekly digests (under the shop tab) so you know what’s happening over here. I generally post at least once a day – except now-ish as I’m working on the e-zine – but this digest can give you a quick summary of the posts with links to them.

Welcome to the new blog! We’re so happy you’re here!