The Last Weekend

Coming up will be the last weekend I’m open in the soap room before Christmas.  We’ve been working hard to keep it stocked.

New tote bags plus restocking the goat feed totes.

Mom brought out some painted goose eggs that she hadn’t brought before, and she made more snowman goose egg ornaments.

painted goose eggs

I got around to making goat milk lotion.  I guess that’s another good way to use up my goat milk.

By the end of the weekend, I had made six different scents.

Goat’s milk lotion

Honestly, we are so full in the soap room that I can’t find a place to set my cup of coffee out there.

Heading out to the soap room with my cup of coffee to get to work.

And I’m already thinking about later this spring and even next Christmas season.

I Need Advice

With the changes in the world, I really want to get back to promoting and selling my products through my website.

infinity scarf

I keep expanding what I make, but that means I have to deal with shipping.  I can’t find a way to figure shipping that gives me control.

candles and wax melts

Paypal lets me create shipping based on dollar amount or weight.  But it doesn’t let me fluctuate between methods the way I need.

hats and ear band

Right now, my shipping is set for soap sales.

goats milk soap

I can upgrade my account at Weebly to use their shipping calculator, but I’m afraid I’m going to run into the same problem.

fine art print

My understanding is that Etsy no longer lets you charge shipping.  I thought about using Facebook, but I’m not sure how that works.

note cards

I can add shipping to the cost of the product, but I still can get weird combinations that means people could pay a lot more than they need to for me to ship their items if I have to jack up the price of everything.

feed sack totes

I really don’t want to do that.  I just got a lot of my inventory back from the consignment shop where I had to jack up the prices by twenty percent so they could have their cut.

goat’s milk lotion

It could also leave me stuck paying a large amount of postage and losing money on an order if I don’t add enough to items.

I try to keep my prices reasonable.  I haven’t raised the prices of my soaps since I started making them, and trust me the cost of supplies has gone up.

dish cloths, dryer balls, and coasters

I do allow for people to message me what they want, and then I can figure the price of shipping and send an invoice, which works well, but would most people be okay with that in our world of instant gratification?

hand knit llama wool rugs

What do you think?  Any ideas?

Winding Down

Milking is really winding down.  I’m just milking Cutie and Zinnia now.

Zinnie wondering what’s taking so long to let her in

I’m getting a little over a quart a day.  It’s not enough to make any big batches of cheese or anything, so I’m freezing pint bags for Snickers and me.

morning milking

I have also been making lotion.  I am fully stocked with eleven fragrances.

Crisp Apple Rose and Southern Peach are new scents.

So far, I’ve also made fifteen batches of soap this fall.  Crisp Apple Rose is a new soap scent too.  I really like it.

I don’t think I’ve shared the link to my website in ages, so if you are interested in trying our soaps or lotions, you can click HERE.