Bittersweet and the little soap company

sunshine on my shoulder

The aromatique Champ de Fleurs, or Field of Flowers. A softly scented floral savon and personal favorite. 

New Modern Vintage Lace spools and this little summer cotton frock in the background.

One of the finds... I plan to wear the vintage peasant blouse, tunic. 

I wasn't going to top on this subject and in fact had now idea that it would arise, but it has.

As a small shop owner I am often vulnerable in the fact that I have no control of who enters my shop. I bless my shop often with essential oils hoping to protect it from what I refer to as "riffraff", disreputable or undesirable people. That's what I call folks who steal! I will leave it at that. Well maybe...

It makes me sad and even angry that people do this. 

In case the riffraff is reading and I doubt it, but what the heck, anyway.

Riffraff, I have installed a camera that I can monitor from the privacy of my home. Did you know you could do that? 

Moving on...to more desirable subjects...

Spring has sprung or is springing!

Keep on spreading sunshine even when it's cloudy!

Enjoy caring and sharing days. 

With all good wishes,

Jill 00

 

  

 

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The apothecary shoppe is looking wild! I'm not going to share the untidiness, only the finished product, later. Muslin bags and crochet trims one of my favorite things. Stone rabbits with little pink ears, another favorite thing. 
Mountains of artisan soap are forming and I'm creating a unique display with the vintage walnut toddlers bed. I don't quite have it the way I want yet, but it's getting there. More than anything my mind is fixated on Spring and longer warmer days. 

Current spring shop colors, amber and indigo. Apothecary memorabilia love. Curious about the 70% alcohol. Interesting. The bottle, I'd say from the fifties, sixties. We've come along way baby!

Enjoy caring and sharing days.

With all good wishes,

Jill 00

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spring peeks...

balance

SPRING sprinkles

week of

It's the week of and our special summer event starts on Friday and runs into Saturday at the shops. I'm spinning and whipping up new aprons and summer shorts like you wouldn't believe. 

Not sure if I mentioned but I'd had a creative clog that seemed to hang on forever. I can happily say the clog has freed itself and is running smoothly once again. I was beginning to wander if the block would ever escape! Never had one last this long. We're talking months friends. 

So it feels great to have the yin and the yang in sync and balanced.

My to-do list is long, but I won't bore you with how long it is this morning. 

Elle and I are headed out for a summer morning walk. It's going to heat up again and we want to beat the heat. 

Along our walk Elle spotted sprinkler systems running full blast. I let her jump in and play. It's funny to watch her, she's like a little kid playing in the sprinklers. She grabs the water with her mouth but it's coming out so fast she can't catch it. Hilarius!

Don't you just love that little coral dress? She's a handmade vintage beauty that I purchased from Julies shop years ago. I had her displayed when my shop was on the square. I've never grown tired of seeing her. She's a timeless work of art, I believe. The white daisy number is also vintage. A sleeveless shift dress that I think would be marvy for a summer bride. 

She's in top-notch condition. Brand new and never been worn. Another treasure I picked up at my friends vintage boutique many years ago. 

I'm merchandising a white only table at the shop. It's a work in progress, but I made some white cotton pinnies to add to the crisp white vignette. 

That hat! A prototype for more sweets. Only I'm thinking autumn linen tones with velvet flowers. You'll have to wait to see those. I'm also pondering pillow thoughts. 

Planning the confection menu for this weekend. Some cucumber and dill sandwiches and petite cheesecake's I think. 

If you live near by we look forward to seeing you at the party. Two days of hot summer fun planned. I'm working on the favors and giveaways. 

Enjoy caring and sharing summer days. 

Warmly,

Jill 00

spring'y

I'm mildly obsessed with dried flowers. Some of you already know that though. A favorite dried flower is the star flower. I remember being fond of these flowers when I was a teen. The new shop has a variety of colors to choose from. A bouquet of the dried star flowers adds a touch of prairie charm to your decor.

  I'm also obsessed with anything faintly related to spring. Our winter seems to want to hang on. Since I'm such a fan of spring, I'm anxiously awaiting for her to show up. The bright yellow daffodils will have to suffice for the moment. I'm gazing out my kitchen window and can still see remnants of the white stuff. It's in the melting, muddy, dirty stage, not my favorite seasonal interlude. Soon, soon the grass will be green and the robins will sing. 

It's so much fun to have my shop in and amongst Julies vintage boutique. I get to go shopping and borrow pieces and use them for display. For example that little blue vase. You guessed it! I snatched it from Aggieal's Attic Vintage Boutique. By the way, Julie has two of them! Yesterday I created something from a vintage lamp skeleton. I'm going to take a picture when I get back to the shop. I think it turned out darling but then again, I'm biased. 

I dug into my box stash. I'm mildly obsessed with packaging too! Most of you know that also. Especially attracted to boxes of different sizes. When I was digging around I found these old dessert boxes. I purchased the stamp for one dollar at the craft store. Thinking the boxes will be great for soap packaging. 

I wrapped soap all day yesterday! Thinking, hoping I'm caught up a bit. However, if I'm not that's not a bad thing. I'm hearing the same comments from customers. "I love the way you package your soap." The packaging is an experiment, kinda. I'm studying, looking into what folks are attracted to. It seems that's an important aspect when you sell things.  The traditional muslin bag soap wrap is falling behind the colorful pretty paper wrappings.  

Speaking of soap... I'm behind on production. Summer soap manufacturing should have already kicked in. It's a couple weeks behind schedule. It will resume next week. I haven't even pondered flavors yet. That's the fun part!

I'm taking the day off. Not really off as in nothing to do. Julie will be running my shop today. I'm making pinnies! I really wanted to have some new spring aprons hanging from the mannies. 

I went to the fabric stores last night and scoured their selection of textiles. I'm sad to say, not much to choose from. After searching through two fabric stores, I only came home with a couple of prints. Is it a bad time of year to purchase fabric at the fabric store? Am I too picky? Nope... I don't think so. Have you priced fabric lately? My goodness sake! Thinking I'm going to need to purchase wholesale bolts now. I can't believe how much fabric costs now! It used to be an affordable luxury to sew and make your own clothing. Now it's simply a luxury. 

I haven't used the vintage 1967 pinnie pattern in awhile. Going to go through my pattern stash too. 

Enjoy caring and sharing, wishing for spring days. 

Warmly,

Jill00

Calm mode

I'm in calm mode. At least I'm making every attempt to capture it. The shop was hopping on Saturday! I sold out of several items. The sleeping shorts are selling as fast as I make them! Not to mention, it's difficult to not keep them for myself. I have several pairs! They are the most comfortable short I've ever worn! I can even sleep in them. 

It's grand opening week at the shop! This Saturday marks the official day. I wish the stars were lined up better with the weather. No rain, but unseasonably cool, cold  for this time of year. It is what it is! I'm going to put a smile on and take in the memories. 

I listed the new Bittersweet on the web shop. The Petite Easter Carton Soaps are a favorite! Then these... Made from my treasured stash of Liberty of London cloth. 

Sorry I did not list these on the web site. If you are interested in one drop me a request and I'll set you up. 

More things to share, but short on time. What we need is lots of soap!

Enjoy caring and sharing, wishing for, spring days.

Jill 00

hand-made Easter

I finished a round of special Easter hand-made items and dropped the special  Easter gifts off at the new shop. The little egg cartons are filled with petite spring soaps wrapped in colorful packaging. I don't have the mini egg carton soaps available on the web shop. I'm sorry. However, if you are interested in purchasing them drop me an email and I will forward you an invoice. They cost $18 each and shipping will be around $7 for one carton.

I'm posting from the shop today. It feels good to be doing that. I changed everything around at the shop. I'm finally getting things to look the way I want. 

I ordered some unique items to add to the hand-made essentials in the shop.

 These rain boots and some cute suede bibbed hats.

Gearing up for a busy week this week and busier week next with the grand opening of my new soap shop on water street!

Enjoy caring and sharing spring days.

Jill 00

Linen and Lavender

The new shop is taking on a spring-like appearance. Hand-made flower aprons and soap sacs, fresh new spring flavored savon is filling the soap table and shelves. It's been a three step process. 

Lennis brought my original wood soap rack from the studio to the shop. Now there's more room for all that soap! The rack was a gift from the local flower shop years ago when I was in this same location. I believe it was used for candle display back then. When the flower shop asked me if I wanted it I could hardly believe it. It's a perfect rack for hand-made soaps. 

This is my favorite spot in the shop. The window bench. I love the new Swiss dotted curtains. I ordered them from here. I ordered the pair extra long so that I could billow the sides. They're soft and romantic looking and fit in with my shop perfectly.

Linen tea towels,bunnie sacs and fresh fat lavender bundles line the old chippy farm table. 

The first day of spring is March 20! Easter follows the 31. It's early this year! It seems everything is early this new year to me!

I'm pondering thoughts of creating some Liberty of London fabric creations. I so wish there were some way I could magically transport myself to their beautiful manufacturing plant!

I updated the postcard invite. I also created tiny labels to fit over the old date. Julie and I discussed the time consuming cutting of the itsy-bitsy labels. I really don't see any alternative. I told her I'd help cut and paste. 

Things happen!

Enjoy caring and sharing spring days. 

Jill 00

 

A modern day apothecary shop

Spinning around this week preparing for our Grand Opening event. I think I'm going to change the venue from Wednesday to Saturday. Not sure what the heck I was thinking when I designed the invites. At any rate, I'm going to make a tiny splice in the card and change the date from March 20 to March 23. I guess the idea was to celebrate the arrival of spring on its proper day along with the celebration of the new shop among all the other idees that were floating at the time. 

Are you getting tired of shop pictures? Slowly but surely things are getting done. A little bit of this and a tad of that each day until Bittersweet is situated the way I wish it to be. 

I forgot how much work was involved in opening a shop! I'm also pondering thoughts of how much MORE work it would be had I not already been in business. Whew! I guess it's been a few years since the last rodeo. I'm older and wiser now, but slower!

In a month or two things will calm down and I'll be back in the swing of shop life. Present day and it's a bit hectic and fast paced. Not in a bad way, but rather a good way. After all a shop owners dream is to be busy. 

I'm finding that my hand-made list is quite fastidious compared to before. In I'm choosing only the best of the best Bittersweets to offer my patrons. Not that I didn't do that before. My taste is more refined compared to back then. It has even changed some. It's evolved...

We're out of Lavender & Pink Grapefruit at the shop. That means I need to get to wrapping! Thinking about hiring an intern to help out with packaging. 

Enjoy caring and sharing days. 

Jill 00

figuring it out

The Bittersweet Soap shop shelves and tables are embellished with spring hand-made. Rabbit saks, star flowers, moisture rich savon and lip balms are sure to be on the Easter bunnies basket list this season.

I love these bunny sacs! 

Chalkboard talk...

I discovered the only tool you will need to create neat, clean font on your chalkboard wall or board. I'm amazed how much easier it is to write with this handy inexpensive devise. If you have a chalkboard wall ditch the fancy pens and such and simply purchase one of these.  I promise you will love it!

Julie and I are preparing for the spring open house and grand opening of my shop. I designed a postcard for the event. I'm hoping the wording won't confuse anyone. It was a tad bit tricky getting the right message on the small postcard. What do you think?

The shop was hopping on Saturday. I pondered thoughts on how I was going to be at both locations. The studio and the new shop! Impossible right? I left a note at the studio entrance. 
 

Several friends, customers brought that note to the new shop on Saturday. 

The next few days will be spent making fresh Bittersweets. The list is long. 

An update on the new credit card reader. It seems the update fixed everything. If you have a reader and it's not working I would suggest checking to see if updates are needed. I also ordered an extra reader, just in case. 

Monday is always an errand day. I don't usually get much done on Mondays. I've hit on the Monday topic before on past posts. 

I'm going to make this for dinner. It's still winter like and over-cast and this sounds yummy. 

Enjoy caring and sharing soon to be spring days. 

Jill 00

Spring Up!

If you've visited our Facebook page then you've heard the news. Bittersweet Soap Company will be opening a new shop soon. The grand opening is planned for the first day of spring! I thought of no better day to launch. 

I'm so excited to have this wonderful opportunity. 

Lots of things to do before we open. I'm going to paint one of the shop walls with chalkboard paint. The other walls will be painted in a neutral hue.  The chalkboard wall will be used as a soap menu. Our customers will be able to easily read the menu along with pricing, etc. I'm also creating a chalkboard sign for the front shop window.

I thought it would be fun for my readers to follow along with the day to day progress of opening a retail shop. I'll toss in some idees and do's and dont's along the way. Things I've learned first hand about shop ownership.

For instance.... When you purchase a cash register never buy one that doesn't have a calculator built in. Trust me. You are going to need that calculator! The cash register I have at the studio does not have a calculator. The one I had at the old shop did. The one I'm in the market for will again!

Then there's pondering shop sign thoughts... If your shop resides in a historic district like mine is going to be, then your sign will need to be in compliance with city sign requirements. Then you will need to get the sign approved by the city. Same goes for any temporary banner. You must get a banner permit before placing the banner. They usually don't cost anything.

Since Bittersweet is not a start-up business we're able to skip the technicalities stuff. City license, Fictitious name, insurance, Tax number, Resale license, etc. Most insurance companies require a shop to have a hefty amount of coverage. Having said that... The cost to the merchant is reasonable I believe. 

 The excitement of opening a new shop never fades. I believe I'm more excited now than the last time I opened a shop! Little things like the notion of a chalkboard wall excite me!

Some of you also know.... My shop creation is launched on a limited budget. You may remember a past post covering the topic. Some of my favorite memories include lugging my sewing machine to the old shop and sitting in the new space making my curtains. That was ten years ago almost to the day!

Hopefully you will enjoy this shop adventure with me. Maybe you've been pondering thoughts of opening a shop.

Enjoy caring and sharing days.

Warmly,

Jill 00