Here's a simple method for making your own silicone masks over a plaster lifecast or generic head form. Gel-10 has incredible stretch so a generic mask may fit many different people. We made this mask with about 2 hours of work and a 2 lb kit of silicone.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Reborn Supplies - 5 Must-Have Supplies to Reborn a Lifelike Baby Doll
Reborning a beautiful baby doll is a rewarding craft where you breathe new life into a common toy. If done right, you will have an amazing reborn baby doll that will make people everywhere do a double take with surprise (that's not a real baby?!). Just think how proud you will feel to show off an adorable, lifelike doll that you transformed yourself. Not to mention that many "reborners" make a nice profit selling their dolls to people they know and on auction sites like eBay.
If you found this article because you were searching for information about reborn supplies, odds are that you already know what a reborn baby doll is. But for those who would like a bit more information, here is a summary for you.
Reborn Baby Dolls are a special kind of craft doll. They are made by hand, but not from scratch. Reborners, as people who "reborn" dolls are known, typically buy a finished vinyl play doll (as opposed to a doll made from porcelain or plastic) and customize the doll step-by-step to make it look as lifelike as possible. Some advanced reborners actually sculpt the doll face themselves to make it look more like a typically smooshed-up newborn baby's face, but there are a few toy manufacturers who make dolls with very lifelike faces that you can buy. Dolls by Berenguer are the dolls that are most commonly reborn. And that will start our list of the 5 Must Have Supplies To Reborn A Lifelike Baby Doll!
1.A Berenguer baby doll
They have realistic faces, and are made from vinyl which most closely resembles human skin. Some of the more expensive Berenguer dolls are made from a silicone-vinyl blend which is even MORE lifelike.
2.Genesis heat set paints
The most important step in reborning a doll is redoing the skin tone to make it look more realistic. As you probably know, most human newborns don't have uniform orangey peach skin like a doll. Their skin is very translucent, there are visible blood vessels, there is a purple undertone, there is a lot of pink. The best paints to use are Genesis Heat Set Paints. These are the paints that have proven to last the longest on vinyl dolls.
3.Mohair in a human hair color (brunette, blonde etc).
Some reborners use wigs on their dolls, but as you can imagine these don't result in the most realistic-looking babies. If you are just dabbling and making your first doll to see what you think of the process, by all means, try a wig to make the process go faster. But if you are serious about making a reborn doll that will truly look like a real newborn, you have to put the time and effort into hand-rooting the hair. This is most typically done with mohair that you can buy from reborn supplies shops online.
4.Polyglass babydoll eyes
If your doll is the open-eyed variety, you absolutely need to replace the factory eyes with some beautiful doll eyes that look real and have dimension. However, while it might be tempting to use some sparkling light blue eyes in your dolls, darker doll eyes usually give a reborn doll a more realistic look. The choice is yours of course, but dark eyes=more convincing is the general consensus among experienced reborners.
5.Weighting Beads: plastic or glass.
Have you ever watched a TV show where a character picks up a large gift-wrapped present, or let's say, something like a boulder, and you can clearly tell by how easily the person picks up the item that it's actually empty inside (or in the case of the boulder, a hollow fake)? You can just tell when something isn't the right weight. It's the same with reborn dolls. You don't want to put all that time and effort into making your reborn baby doll look lifelike if, when you pick it up, it's still the same flimsy weight as a hollow play doll. It won't look right to others and it won't feel right either. So you need to be sure to add weight to your doll with weighted beads placed inside the doll body and optionally inside the legs and arms.
Reborning a baby doll takes many more supplies than this, but these are the 5 crucial reborn supplies that will give you the edge in making a strikingly realistic reborn baby. To learn more go to
Monday, November 28, 2011
10 Ways to Build Profit in Your Cleaning Business
You may have started your cleaning business to be your own boss, get out of the 9 to 5 rat race, or just because you enjoy cleaning and doing a good job for your customers. But your business will only succeed for a few months or possibly a few years if you are not making a profit. The cleaning industry can be highly competitive and most likely, your profit margins on any particular job, are not more than 10 to 20 percent. When prices of your supplies climb or when gas prices skyrocket, your profit and the success of your cleaning business can be in jeopardy.
So how do you get your profits back up? Following are several ways you can increase the money coming into your cleaning business.
1. Don't just sell your day-to-day cleaning services. When bidding a new job include routine carpet spotting, carpet cleaning, hard floor care, and window washing. Encourage your cleaning customer to have these services done on regular intervals, such as every 3 or 6 months. This will help their building stay cleaner as well as bringing in more profits to your business. Just keep in mind that these are specialty services so you'll need to educate yourself on the proper procedures.
2. Don't just provide cleaning services. Also sell the items that your customers need regularly. Every building needs trash can liners, toilet paper, hand towels, and soap. Depending on the building they may also need facial tissue, urinal mats, and air fresheners. Offer to manage their supplies and then bill back the cost of the products to the customer, adding in a small profit of up to 15% for your company.
3. Bundle your services together in a package. You don't even have to provide a discount on services -- if your customer knows they can have one company do everything (carpet cleaning, window washing, floor stripping), they will save time and money by not having to go elsewhere.
4. Don't compete on price. Make sure that your customers know you are providing a quality and dependable service.
5. Develop strategic alliances with non-competing businesses who also sell to your niche clients. Partner up with ultrasonic blind cleaning companies, carpet cleaning companies, duct cleaning companies and fire restoration companies.
6. If you have a website trade links with other non-competing businesses. If you are selling products on your site you can develop an affiliate sales program where other businesses receive a commission when they refer paying customers to your site.
7. Consider hiring an independent salesperson to sell your services. Pay a commission on the services and products they sell. There might be a slight drop in the profit you realize on each sale, but overall your profits will grow.
8. Encourage repeat business and add-on services with your current customers. When sending out invoices include a flyer on the extra services that you offer.
9. Add more cleaning services. You can make a tidy profit off cleaning microwaves and refrigerators. You can also put these on a regular schedule, such as the first Friday of every month.
10. Do you have equipment and vehicles that you no longer use? Sell them or consider renting them out instead of having the items sit around collecting dust.
Copyright (c) 2007 The Janitorial Store
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Vapor Steam Cleaners for Cleaning Restaurants Without Using Detergents
Vapor steam cleaners are an essential part of a contractor's supplies for maintaining restaurant hygiene. Vapor steam cleaning machines generate very hot steam, which is applied to dirty surfaces to dissolve grime. This makes the cleaning process easier by allowing operators to easily remove grime, sugars, stains, molds, soap scum, ink, and sauce spills from stained and dirty surfaces.
Vapor steam cleaners have multiple advantages. High temperature helps loosen and dissolve tough dirt and grime. Some vapor steamers are equipped with a bacterial elimination system, removing more than 99 percent of germs and bacteria from the surface. Other types of vapor steam cleaners contain HEPA filters that help remove allergens including spores, pollen, pet hair, dander, and silicon dust from the surface.
Another reason for the popularity of vapor steamers is that these machines use low flow technology, which means they use little water. Vapor steam cleaners emit dry steam, which has just 5% water content, thereby reducing water consumption. Low flow machines are in great demand in commercial settings including restaurants, where stringent hygiene standards exist side-by-side with challenges such as water scarcity and expensive water disposal methods. The high water efficiency of these machines makes them eco-friendly as well and just right for use in drought prone areas.
Why Detergent Use Is Not Required
One of the major advantages of using commercial vapor steam cleaners is that they eliminate the need for detergents, as the power of steam is all that is needed. Standard detergents have the following drawbacks:
Toxicity: Detergents are usually composed of harsh chemicals and often contain bleach. These chemicals are harmful to the human body and may find their way into food. Toxic detergent residue in ovens, grills and stoves, for example, may be easily transferred to food. By eliminating detergents from the cleaning cycle, you pave the way for healthier cleaning procedures.
Corrosiveness: Bleach removes stains but it is highly corrosive. It damages metallic parts of steam cleaning machines and it is particularly harmful to surfaces such as chrome, metal, marble, and granite. The best steam cleaner usually has heavy-duty stainless steel parts that are corrosion resistant to help withstand the use of detergents if needed. However, it is safer to minimize detergent use. The best way to do this is by investing in powerful industrial steamer machines.
Dirt Magnet: Ironically, residual detergent attracts dirt due to its chemical composition. A soapy film left over on hard surfaces turns grimy within hours. By eliminating detergents from the wash process, you prevent the problem of recurring grime.
The hot steam generated by steam cleaning machines usually melts caked on dirt and other stains, which are then wiped off with detailing tools. While detergents are not required, additional cleaning power can be attained through the injection of green chemicals - safe alternatives to commercially available corrosive, toxic detergents.
Take note that even the best steam cleaning machine does not have the high pressure level of pressure washers, which is why it is not suitable for heavy degreasing. Many industrial steam cleaners have large detergent chambers meant specifically meant for extremely difficult cleaning tasks that require the addition of cleaning solutions, like green chemicals.
Best steam cleaners minimize detergent use and therefore make the restaurant cleaning procedure more eco-friendly, healthy, and customer friendly. Better yet, advanced antibacterial technologies found in today's top machines offer restaurants the ability to sanitize and disinfect surfaces to ensure the health and safety of diners.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Learn How to Make Soap, at Home, With a Master Soap Maker
You can learn how to make soap. Most commercial skin care products contain harsh, chemically manufactured, ingredients that can contribute to all kinds of skin problems including: dry skin, dry itchy skin, dry flaky skin, oily skin, acne, skin allergies, inflammation, redness, swelling, rashes and more. This is why so many people have decided to take matters into their own hands and learn how to make soap. The very best homemade skin care product, for a variety of skin problems, is natural goats milk soap. Why?
Goat milk soap contains mild and gentle, healthful, nourishing and natural ingredients. It contains natural vitamins A, B, C, D, E and K. Due to the moisture attracting properties of the milk, the beneficial medium chain fatty acids abundant in the milk and the combination of skin nourishing oils that compliment it, goat milk soap is a natural moisturizer. Goat milk provides anti-aging properties by aiding in the regeneration of collagen under the skin.
Goat milk is a buffer that leaves skin very close to its natural pH level. After using commercial skin care products, the skin takes, on average, approximately two hours to re-establish to its correct pH level. This explains the tight, itchy feeling so many people experience after bathing. Natural goat milk soap is extremely mild and gentle, cleanses thoroughly and leaves no oily after effects.
There are different methods to making goats milk soap including: cold process soap making, hot process soap making and re-batching. Before you begin, you should know the proper materials, ingredients and safety procedures to use. A good idea would be to find a master soap maker who can guide you with easy, step-by-step, instructions. There are different opportunities available for you.
Some instructors offer in person classes and there are, also, step-by-step, instructions found in a soap making DVD. Whether you are a beginner or veteran you can benefit from learning how to make soap from a well-known, experienced, master, soap maker. For all of those people who would love to learn, but can not make in person classes, or who would just prefer to learn at home, in the privacy of their very own kitchen, a master soap maker can come to you through a, step-by-step, instructional DVD!
You can learn the cold process soap making, hot process soap making and re-batch methods of making goats milk soap! You will, also, receive homemade soap recipes, a manual lye calculator, and find an abundance of soap making resources for materials and supplies! You will even receive a discount on a starter soap making kit, with the purchase of this DVD! You will have all the soap making information you will ever need, right at your fingertips.
Whether you are a beginner or a veteran, there are ways to improve and advance your soap making skills. Many people have become very successful in their own business with the help of a master soap maker! You can learn how to make and enjoy the benefits of goat milk soap while becoming a very successful soap maker too!
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Slicing "At Last" Soap
These bars will be cured and ready for sale in 4-6 weeks My ARTFIRE Studio www.artfire.com Great Resources for Recipes, Tips, Ingredients & Molds BRAMBLEBERRY www.brambleberry.com TEACH SOAP www.teachsoap.com MOLDS www.etsy.com WHOLESALE SUPPLIES PLUS www.wholesalesuppliesplus.com THE SOAP MAKING FORUM www.soapmakingforum.com
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |