Category Archives: Holiday

Valentine’s Love, Hugs, Kisses and Product 2015….

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DSCN1255Yay, February is here and that means we are that much more closer to Valentine’s Day.  At Pure GRACE Soap we love to celebrate love – whether it’s Valentine’s Day or just a random Tuesday….  With that in mind we have been working hard to create some special products we think our customers will love.

Strawberry Sugar Scrub… $9.50
Our Strawberry Scrub smells as good as it looks and contains real strawberries! Strawberries are extremely beneficial for the skin for many reasons including being an excellent skin cleaner, improving complexion, helping to tone skin and protection from UV light. They also exhibit fantastic anti aging properties, they help with the treatment of acne, diminish under-eye puffiness and help to repair damaged skin.

Sugar scrub is the most natural way to soften, exfoliate and to freshen up the skin. Sugars fine texture gently exfoliates the skin without leaving harmful residue that can clog the pores. Skin loving oils provide the moisturizing properties that prevents the skin from drying. Our custom recipes use only organic cane sugar and are our recommendation for the driest of skin.

Our sugar scrub is packaged in a heavy glass jar with lid. The scrub is labeled on the top with its name and on the bottom with its ingredients, weight and directions. Each scrub is tied with a pretty fabric tie.

DSCN1281Set of Three Coconut Bath Bombs… $5.00
This set of 3 bright white Coconut Bath Bombs smells like tropical heaven. The smell is bright and crisp like you just cracked open a fresh island coconut.

Take a moment for yourself and enjoy a long relaxing bath. Our bath bombs give your skin a tingly treat while the scent relaxes your cares and stresses away. Once the bomb dissolves you will be enveloped in delicious smelling oils and butters that will make your skin silky smooth and moisturized.

Set of Three Raspberry Bath Bombs… $5.00
This set of 3 Raspberry Bath Bombs not only smells like fresh picked raspberries but their eye catching pink color looks pretty too!

Each clear gift bag contains 3 extremely moisturizing bath bombs which are perfect for year round use but especially wonderful for dry and parched skin or for people with skin aliments. Each set is tied with a pretty fabric tie and labeled on the back of the bag.

DSCN1279Grab and Go Cake Batter Lotion Stick Mini and Two Strawberry Bath Bombs… $10.00
We created this gift set with the young lady in your life in mind.  The mini lotion stick is perfect for her purse or backpack and is scented with one of her favorite smells.  It will stay with her throughout her day and leave her skin smooth and moisturized – perfect for this harsh winter weather.

The two strawberry bath bombs will certainly make bath time that much more special.  Not only do they smell good enough to eat but will help to relax her cares away.

DSCN0988Valentine Gift Baskets… $varies
For our customers looking for a special gift basket we have developed a limited edition Chocolate Almond Soap made with real cocoa.  This bar of soap is handcrafted using a hot process method of soap making and smells divine!  It is only available in our Valentine Gift Baskets and comes paired with many of the other Valentine specials.

All of our Valentine Specials are limited in quantity.  Most are available online here and are are available locally at the Downtown Terre Haute Farmer’s Market on Saturday February 7, 2015 from 9a-1p.  Pre-ordering is available and recommended.  In addition to the specials if you attend the Farmer’s Market on Feb 7, 2015 and spend $30 or more on Pure GRACE Soap products you will earn a FREE GIFT!  Enjoy a custom set of three bath bombs scented in Raspberry, Coconut and Coco-berry.  Give them to your loved one or save them for yourself!! Quantities are limited and only available at the February Farmer’s Market.

Valentines Day is right around the corner…

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DSCN0713We heart Valentines!!  Too cheesy?  Maybe, but we really do like the day and taking time to celebrate our loved ones.  Here at Pure GRACE Soap we are working on a couple of new products to celebrate the day.

Look for Raspberry Bath Bombs and Strawberry Sugar Scrub at the February Farmers Market.  We also will have $10 gift sets which pair a half size cake batter lotion and a pair of bath bombs.  Tied with a Valentines fabric tie, these are perfect for that young lady in your life.

Crafting of a Different Kind…

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DSCN0070Today we are crafting of a different kind – the Christmas gift kind!  We are working on making homemade vanilla and planning on using this along with several other “homemade” gifts to give to our family and friends.  We routinely make vanilla for our own personal use.  We make ours in a  750ml size which typically lasts us around a year using it for all of our baking needs. Making homemade vanilla is extremely easy but does take some planning and a few months to “brew”. DSCN0328

In addition to homemade vanilla we also plan to make Limoncello (an Italian lemon liqueur), Boozy Cherry Sauce (do you see a theme here?), cinnamon sugar roasted almonds, graham cracker chocolate toffee and honey almond oat soap.

This recipe is similar to how we make our vanilla.

 

Homemade Vanilla Extract

Ingredients
3 to 5 vanilla beans
8 ounces alcohol such as vodka, bourbon, brandy, or rum
→ General Rule of Thumb: Use 3 to 5 vanilla beans per 8 ounces of alcohol and multiply accordingly if making more extract.

EquipmentDSCN0068
Cutting board and knife
Clean jar or bottle
New bottle(s) for packaging (optional)
Small funnel (optional)
Coffee filter (optional)

Instructions

  1. Split the vanilla beans: Split each vanilla bean in half lengthwise. If you like, you can leave an inch connected at the end of the bean for an attractive presentation. You can also chop the beans into smaller pieces if necessary to fit in your jar or bottle.
  2. Place the vanilla beans in a jar and cover with alcohol: Place the vanilla beans in a clean jar or bottle. Cover them with alcohol, making sure they are completely submerged. Cover the jar or bottle and give it a good shake.
  3. Infuse for at least one month: Store the jar or bottle of vanilla beans in a cool, dark place for at least one month, shaking it from time to time. Taste the extract and let it infuse longer if you want a stronger flavor.
  4. Strain it if you like: You may wish to remove the vanilla pods and decant the extract into a pretty bottle. The little flecks of seeds can be a nice touch, but if you want a clear extract you can strain them out using a coffee filter.
  5. Or leave the pods in the extract: You can also leave the beans in the alcohol and top off the bottle as you use the extract. Eventually all the flavor will be extracted from the original vanilla beans, so you can periodically add fresh beans as well as leftover pods that you’ve scraped for other recipes.

→ Uses for spent pods. You can also make good use of the spent vanilla pods by drying them and then making vanilla sugar or flavored salt.
Recipe courtesy of the kitchn
Find it here: http://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-homemade-vanilla-extract-cooking-lessons-from-the-kitchn-197785

Have you started your Holiday Shopping yet?

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Gardening Gift Basket

It’s October which means the holidays are right around the corner.  Closer than some of us might want them to be.  They like to sneak up on us when we least expect it and before we know it Halloween has past and our bellies are full of turkey and then we realize we have no gifts for anyone with mere weeks till the big day/s.

Well, have we got you covered!  We will have LOTS of gifting options for any upcoming holiday you are celebrating.  We have already started putting together some gift baskets.  You can expect to see many more as we get closer to the “season”.

Peppermint Chocolate Gift Basket

All of our gift baskets are also available as gift boxes which is great for those wanting to ship their gifts directly to the recipients. We can even add a hand written note if you like, just let us know.  You could effectively take care of everyone on your list with just one phone call….wait, does anyone phone call in orders anymore??  Maybe not as much as we used to but we also take orders via email, FB and you can even comment on the website and we’ll track you down to help you.

Just a little sneak peak of what to expect this season.  Our Gardeners gift basket contains Bug Be GONE Lotion Stick and Gardeners Soap along with gardening gloves, shovel and ceramic pot with attached saucer.

The Peppermint Chocolate gift basket contains Peppermint Bath Salts (enough for 3 baths), Cocoa Kisses Lotion Stick, a soft fabric sponge, handled pumice stone and square bottom wicker basket.

Both baskets are $25 each.  We at Pure GRACE Soap don’t like to have what everyone else has – we like to be individual and special and so are our gift baskets.  No two will be alike so if you see one you like you might want to grab it up.

Holiday scents, we are so excited…and our first GIVEAWAY…

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apple ciderSo we have been working on the holiday scents for several months.  We started in the beginning of summer thinking about what scents meant fall, winter and holiday to M. GRACE and myself.  We made lists and checked them twice.  We ultimately decided on seven different scents which we felt were most important to not only us, but that we thought you would like too.

So here goes…..
The first holiday soap is an Apple Cider soap and this might be my (Julie) favorite of all of them.  It literally smells like apple cider, in bar form.  This soap contains French Red Clay throughout which gives it a caramel color and dried apple peel on top.  We test all of the new soaps but I have to tell you, once I got to this one I kinda got stuck and haven’t yet moved on to some of the others – I like it that much.  I hope you do too.  This soap will be in stock all fall/winter season long.pumpkin spice 1

The second holiday soap is M. GRACE’s favorite – Pumpkin Spice.  The thing that really gets me excited about this soap is the inclusion of organic squash.  Squash is really great for your skin and body.  Squash helps to maintain healthy skin and prevents skin aging (its the Vitamin C in there that really does it).  Along with the organic squash this bar also contains pumpkin pie spice.  Why you ask?  Well, because it’s fall and pumpkin season and that’s what you put in pie so why not in your pumpkin soap?  The bar has a pretty two color swirl comprised of the dark color from the spice and the orange color of the squash.  It smells just like fall, comfort and warmth. This soap will be in stock all fall/winter season long.

holiday vanillaThe third holiday soap is a pretty versatile one which you might just wish was available all year long, we call it Holiday Vanilla, you might call it heaven.  This is a two colored bar with the bottom layer being brown and the top layer of the bar a natural color with added coffee grounds which not only look attractive but also provide excellent skin exfoliation.  The scent is a very true vanilla, none of that fake stuff here and the color contrast is very pleasing.  This soap will be in stock all fall/winter season long.

Wondering why I am mentioning which soaps will be in stock all fall/winter long??  Well because we have created some limited editions and guess what – they won’t be in stock all fall/winter long.  When they are gone, they are gone folks.spiced cream

Number four on our holiday countdown list – Spiced Cream Soap.   This is our lightest scented bar, hosting a creamy spiced smell.  The bar itself is a tri color swirl comprised of a dark spice color and scent, a caramel color and a natural color.  This bar is very dreamy.  This bar is a limited edition and once it runs out we will not make more until next year.

figgy soapSoap number five is Figgy Soap.  We struggled with what to name this bar but Figgy Pie just kept coming back to me – I really have never smelt a Figgy Pie, is it even a thing?  But if it was, it would smell alot like this soap.  So hence, we committed to Figgy Soap.  I like the smell of figs.  I grew up eating them off a tree in our backyard.  I would eat them until I couldn’t eat anymore.  I enjoy buying them now for my family and even just planted a fig tree earlier this summer in our yard.  So Figgy Soap excites me. Plus the coloring on this soap is really pretty.  It is a two toned bar with French Green Clay and Brazilian Purple Clay swirl.  Both are natural colorants which offer the skin lots of detox and purification properties while still moisturizing.  We have added mulling spices to the top just for decoration and because I think it makes this little bar of soap a little piece of art.  This bar is a limited edition and once it runs out we will not make more until next year.lump of coal

The sixth soap is just plain fun!  Titled Lump of Coal Soap, this bar smells a lot like gingerbread.  We made it especially for those folks who have been a tad bit naughty this holiday season.  It has a lovely black and brown swirl look to it.  The black is from activated charcoal which will help to dry out any oily skin while still moisturizing.  I know some people on my Christmas list who might be receiving this in their stocking…but I won’t name names. This bar is a limited edition and once it runs out we will not make more until next year.

Bar number seven is one I have wanted to work on for a long time, before we started the soap endeavor, actually.  It is a Peppermint Wool Felted Soap.  This bar of soap is made from Peppermint Essential Oils and Red Brazilian Clay.  It is then hand wool felted and instantly becomes the most attractive gift for the holidays.  Each one is unique in color and design. This bar is a limited edition and once it runs out we will not make more until next year.

Peppermint Wool Hand Felted Soap

So there you have it – our seven new scents for the holidays.  They will be released this weekend at the Farmer’s Market (Saturday September 27) or they are available for pre-order now.  All bars except for the Peppermint Wool Felted Soap will be available for $5 each.  The Peppermint Wool Felted Soap is $10 each.  We will also be bringing out holiday inspired sugar scrubs and lotions in early October so stay tuned.

So I promised you a GIVEAWAY in the title of this post – and who am I to disappoint??  We will be giving away two sets of two bars each of the new holiday collection to two lucky winners.  M. GRACE will announce the winners who will be selected by random draw on September 26, 2014.  You may choose to pick up your winner’s bounty at the Farmer’s Market this weekend or we will ship it to you if you are not local.  Best of luck!!

Here is what you want to to do enter.  Leave us a comment/reply on our soap product page about WHICH SOAP is your favorite and WHY.  If you haven’t had a chance to try any of our soaps yet – no problem,  tell us in the comments which one of the holiday scents you really want to try and why.  Link is here: http://puregracesoap.com/products/soap/

After you have finished leaving your comment go back to our Facebook page and leave a comment on the giveaway post telling us you left a comment on the website.  Link is here: https://www.facebook.com/puregracesoap

Want more chances to enter??  Who doesn’t??
Leave separate comments for us on ANY or ALL of the Pure GRACE Soap products you have tried.  Remember to go back and let us know on the FB posting.

AND, if you haven’t already LIKED us on Facebook make sure to do that for an additional entry.  Feel free to share this giveaway with your friends.  It is the holiday season and they might just gift you with some soap as a thank you!

Happy Birthday Celebration for M. GRACE…

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Happy Birthday M. GRACE

This was M. GRACE at her 7th birthday party. Come out on Aug 2 and celebrate her 8th birthday with us and take home some free laundry detergent!

M. GRACE will be turning 8 this week and to celebrate Pure GRACE will be giving away samples of LAVENDER LAUNDRY DETERGENT to everyone who comes in our booth this Saturday, August 2.  Come by and wish M. GRACE a happy day and try some detergent for free.  We hope to see you there!!!

The Downtown Farmers Market is open from 8a-noon every Saturday from June until October.  The market is located on 9th and Cherry Streets.  The Pure GRACE Soap booth is located on the Cherry Street side directly in front of Hulman Center.