Oh yes, I am a toiletries thief. And pens and pads of paper. All types of businesses give away pads and pens to advertise themselves, I think that is unquestionable. My DH disagrees with me in re toiletries. I travel with my own preferred toiletries (travel tip, if you are really tight for space and it's a short trip, squeeze your products into a little ziploc snack bag, one for shampoo, one for conditioner, etc ... that'll keep your ounces under limit!). But I do collect hotel toiletries. I have some fabulous ones from over the years. I have a little wooden box of soaps from Le Toiny in St Barts, these things that remind me of medicine bottles from a BnB outside Barcelona, a bar of soap in a shiny emerald green plastic box that says "Hermes". I love these mementos. One disappointment is that hotels used to have their names on the soaps and bottles. In the last few years, Four Seasons for example, has gone to a combo of milk soaps and verbena soaps, all from L'Occitane in most of their properties. Lucky them, I don't take those home anymore. And I do draw the line at one set. I don't put them in my luggage to have the maid replenish to put them in again. I caught 9yo DD doing that ... apple doesn't fall very far from the tree. At home, I use them for guests, and let the kids pick a favorite to use once in a while. Some of my stuff must be 15 years old by now (am thinking of a handmade soap from a Belizean spa). I guess they have become scalps of a sort. Same thing with the airline amenity kits. I love some of the bags they come in (BA used to give one cool b/w vintage photos). Oh and tote bags, too! They are all hard earned. When we moved I finally gave up several dozen amenity kits. They are actually very useful for shelters.

Froth is an indication that one is using enough soap to properly clean as well as keep soils/hard water minerals and muck suspended. This is why most every soap product from laundry to bath advertises or advertised "mounds of rich creamy suds". Pure soaps by design will create suds, quite allot of them, while detergents can be either low or high sudsing. Anyone brought up to do laundry with soap will tell you that if one does not see suds, then more soap was needed. When Ivory Snow was powdered soap, directions on the box recommended a 1 to 2 inch layer of creamy suds throug out the wash cycle as an indication one had added enough product. The problem with using soap in front loaders is even one inches of suds can cause problems, and you have very little control over how much soap to use. If you add too little in the drawer, you may not have a way to add more during the wash cycle. Add too much, then you have other problems. There is also the fact that even a one inch layer of froth may trigger a washing machine's internal "over sudsing" system to abort the wash cycle. The tumbling action of front loaders will cause even more froth to form, which not only will decrease cleaning results, but can damage the washing machine as well. Simply put soap softens water (by binding hard water minerals), and also cleans like all "detergents". Differnece is detergents are "built" with additives to soften water, while soap will do this by itself, but one must use much of the product depending upon water conditions. It is the binding of hard water minerals that causes soap crud which forms on everything washed in pure soap. Besides creating froth, which is bad for front loading washing machines; the first several rinses after laundering with soap must be either hot or at least warm water temperature to prevent soap and the muck it has released from becoming trapped in textiles when coming in contact with cold water. Soap is very difficult to rinse from laundry (just because the froth is gone, does not mean all soap has been rinsed from garments), indeed the fats and oils used to make soap will leave a residue on textiles that can build up over time, resulting in dingy, tattle-tale grey fabrics that can turn rancid smelling. Zote, is still widely used in Mexico and other parts of South America as bar laundry soaps have been for ages; to do laundry by hand in either a river bank, wash tub/sink or semi or totally automatic top loading washing machine. Personally wouldn't use soap in any of today's low water front loaders, with the exception of soap based products such as Persil's "Perwol". Do have bars of vintage Fel's soap, but use it more as a pre-treat than to do actual wash loads. C.dS

I don't know exactly HOW they were done, but my guess is that it's similar to the candy bar wrappers they talk aboout in the craft forum. As to the torn edges, it may be a type of paper cutting scissor or they may have used a natural paper & really torn the edge. Remember if you are ging to sell your soap it should be labeled with the ingredients. (If it's hand made from lye/oils it's NOT required that it be labeled, but it lets your customers know you are concerned about them. If it's melt & pour glycerin soap, it DOES have to be labeled, because by FDA guidelines that is NOT a true "soap" since it is made of multiple artificial ingredients) Okay, off my soapbox now. Best of luck with your soap! Hazel

While I don't squeegee the entire shower stall, we do squeegee the door and glass wall each time we shower. The shower door is always open and the exhaust fan runs for at least 30 minutes. I've attempted to keep a minimum of items on the grab bar shelves, but.... I have shampoo and conditioner, face wash, two kinds of body wash (alternate days) and shaving cream. On his shelf, DH has two kinds of shampoo (alternate days) and body wash. I bought the shelves from my nephew who owns a hardware store. I'm going to ask him if I can get shelves with some sort of anti-mildew property. If I can't, then I'll ask him if I can get replacement shelves. If I can, then I'll drill holes in the shelves. If it doesn't work, I'll replace them. Last time I cleaned the shelf, I wiped it down with dishwasher soap. I did not rinse the soap off. I hoped that leaving a thin film on the shelf would act as a mildew retardant. It didn't. Thanks for all the thoughts and suggestions.