I realize that I have only posted about knitting things on here up to now. I do do other crafts, I swear. I just haven't done any of them lately (except for sewing some awesome striped cafe curtains for a friend that I didn't think to post about but now I sort of wonder...).
Anyway, if I haven't mentioned it before, I happen to live in a college town. It's a university town, really, so the school is quite large. While this is frustrating when, say, the dorms open and the whole town is flooded with people it is overall awesome. We get all the fun of school amenities (sporting events, nice libraries, mass-transit) without having to take classes. One of the amenities that I am most fond of is the school's "creative space" which is called The Workspace. For the record, it is where I also took the class on lace knitting and chemical dyeing I mentioned a couple of months ago. I have taken classes on chain maille jewelry, stained glass, and glass etching there also. I'm a big fan.
This past weekend I took a class at The Workspace about making natural soaps. That is "natural" as in "no glycerin," meaning they didn't just use those weird clear pellets available at most hobby stores. This was actually a blending of sodium hydroxide (lye) and hard and soft fats to provide moisture, then adding essential oils to make it smell nice. It was interesting in a very chemistry-heavy way, making an emulsifying mixture that will harden at proper temperatures and not react with skin. And yeah, while my education and job are both VERY humanities-focused, I do enjoy the Fun with Chemistry projects in my free time. ;-)
I would post pictures of my soap, but it's still waiting to be cut at the moment so it mostly looks like Cream of Wheat in a container at the moment. Expect to see some spa-inspired knitting projects to accompany the soap on here in the future, though, and perhaps my own adventures in non-controlled-environment (meaning "at home") soap-making.
I'm also taking a macrame class next month, so wait with eager anticipation for updates about knotted plant-hangers.
