PRETTY SOAP DRAWER SCENTS

 
SO A FEW MONTHS AGO, I HEADED DOWN TO OUR LOCAL FARMER'S MARKET WITH MISSY FOR A LOVELY, CASUAL MOSEY AROUND THE STALLS. 
 
I was browsing away, and came across this amazing honey from bees just up the road from our house! So as I was talking to the stallholder, unbeknownst to me, Missy had gotten out of her pram and started playing with all these soaps at the stall next door...

So I finished my conversation, paid for the honey, and turned around to find an empty pram, and Little Miss standing on tippy toes with her hands full of soaps a few meters away!



Just as I saw her, she looked around and saw me, and one of those precious white soaps started to fall...

I did the whole 'Noooooooo' thing and made a dive for it, but missed, and the soap bounced across the path into a puddle.

As you can imagine, the stall holders weren't terribly impressed.




So I put Missy back in her pram, shoved the soap in a bag, paid the stall holders for the damage, and got out of the vicinity pretty quick smart!

Anyway, long story short, this Frangipani & Evening Primrose Soap, that I had no intentions of buying, smelled AMAZING. After I dusted the mud off, it perfumed our bathroom for months, and, unlike most strongly perfumed soaps, it didn't make our skin itch either.





- Plain art paper
- Washi tape
- String
- Scissors
- Normal sticky tape
- Sewing Machine




STEP 1: Trim Paper

I used art paper from one of Dan's sketchbooks because it was nice and thick, so the first thing I did was pull a few pieces out and trim them.




STEP 2: Sew Pattern

Use your sewing machine (un-threaded!) to punch a pretty pattern. I just used the pre-programmed stitches on my machine and chose a wavy pattern.

By the way, this is a job for that old blunt sewing needle you've been meaning to change for ages - the paper will blunt a new needle very quickly.

NB: You don't really have to do this step if you don't want to - it just patterns the paper and all those little holes will let the smell out while still protecting your clothes and linens from any oil in the soap.




STEP 3: Trim Paper Again

Look at that pretty perforated pattern! I trimmed the edges of my paper where I started and stopped sewing so they were neat and the perforations went right to the edge.




STEP 4: Wrap Soaps

Just like a Christmas Present! The photo below shows how I wrapped two soaps differently - one side will be smooth (the top side when we were sewing it) and the other will be beautifully textured from where the needle pushed through.




This photo isn't as clear as I would have liked, but the left soap is the bumpy one, and the right is smooth.




STEP 5: Wrap with Washi Tape

I just put one strip of tape around each. I found it best to wrap it around lengthways (like the above photo) to cover the ends and back where I sticky-taped the paper.




Here they are all wrapped up with Washi Tape.




STEP 6: Add String

Often when wrapping things with string, I prefer to simply tie a knot rather than a bow - like I did with these geometric prints. But a bow can be pretty too - as you can see on the yellow-ish floral ones in the photo at the top of the post. Whatever works for you!




And that's it! Finished! How easy was that!

Like I said, these were made for Easter presents, but I very nearly didn't give them away  - they were too pretty!