Perfume Lab: Mess is messy

So I've just wrapped up an experimental and messy perfume lab. Experimental because I'm still working on getting my solid perfumes the consistency I want. I've moved from just beeswax and carrier oil to beeswax, oil, and shea butter, and that's much better. So today I thought I'd try just oil and shea butter. This is not a bad idea in theory...In practice, they take forever to set and I get impatient and want to shake and poke them, and that just makes it all worse. I've got two chilling in my fridge right now to speed the process along. It'll be interesting to see how they are when they're ready, if the shea butter carries the scent as well as beeswax. If it does work well, I'll be investing in some cocoa butter too (I want to anyway, for lotion bars) and trying a mix with that in it.

Pictured: eternal cleanliness.

Messy because I made a regular beeswax/butter/oil mix and spilled it everywhere, so the tin I was using got waxed to the sideboard, and I couldn't move the tin without spilling more, so I've had to let it set on the sideboard. While that was happening, I starting cleaning up and discovered an amazing cheat for cleaning the kitchen:

Don't clean it. Just drop an entire bottle of pine essential oil all over it and it will smell clean forever and ever and ever. We'll ignore the fact that my kitchen (and the entire downstairs of my house) smells a bit like a bathroom. It smells like a clean bathroom. I don't use pine EO very often, so it's not a massive pain, but I know now I hardly have any left I'll find a million things I want to do with it.

Anyway... I've just been and cleaned up all the wax and oil and taken my shea butter perfumes out of the fridge. I'm pleased to announce they smell gorgeous! I think this is the way forward. I'm keen to experiment with different carrier oils as well - jojoba and fractionated coconut oil are high on my wish-list. I've got a new delivery of fragrance oil and empty bottles arriving sometime soon so further experimentations can begin in earnest! And without throwing oil all over the house maybe.