It’s hard to believe it’s been nine years since we started making soap the old-fashioned way New Year’s Day 2013. We named our first soap “Thieves,” after its fragrance.

Soap making has come a long way since my great-grandparents’ day when they made it on the farm from the fat of animals they butchered. Their lye, made from running water through wood ashes, wasn’t an exact science, so the soap often turned out on the soft side.

And forget any fancy coloring or designs. It was tan.

We love our soap and quit using liquid soap. We make cold process, cold/oven process, and hot-process soap using the finest cosmetic-grade ingredients we can find.

Size and weight vary because each bar is individually hand cut. Bars weigh between 3.15 and 5 ounces. The soap you receive may not match the bar in the photo since each bar is unique. Soap loses weight as it dries, hardens and mellows, so it’s best to unwrap it at once and put it on the shelf to continue drying. The dryer (and harder) it gets, the longer it will last. Don’t put it in a soap dish that holds water or you’ll end up with mushy soap.

We also make shampoo bars, lip balm, lotion bars, hand-crocheted hot pads, and scrubbies in a variety of vivid colors.