Embroidery & Soap Making

Basil was eager to get started on his work with the beauty products, but still needed time to think about how to go about it. Thus, Basil decided to watch Iris as she taught Caspian about embroidery. It would be good for Basil to know about these things as well since he often helped with the sewing.

Iris took one of the many dresses Caspian had been hard at work making over the last few days and gathered up some long dried grass. Iris wrapped the grass around the fish bone needle and began to carefully embroider flowers and vines along the bottom of the dress.

The greenish yellow grass stood out among the brown boar hide and was easily visible. However, the oversized needle and short lengths of grass made the whole process more complicated than it was in the modern world. The flowers ended up as much larger and only had an outline rather than being filled in due to the limitations Iris had to work with.

Still, Caspian and Basil were quite impressed with the end results and were eager to learn how to do so themselves. In order to avoid ruining otherwise perfectly suitable clothes, they first practiced on a spare scrap of beast hide.

When they got the hang of it, Iris taught them a few other designs using a mixture of sinew and long grass along the way. Most of the embroidery ideas were nature based with vines, tree branches, flowers, berries, and leaves being most common. Some of the dresses were embroidered along the sleeves or bottom only while others were covered in flowers.

When all of the premade dresses were finished being embroidered, the sun had already set. The three had easily lost track of time, but Ember had not. He had already fetched back some prey and Basil immediately went off to prepare some soup.

Iris yawned, feeling tired, and promised to teach Basil about beauty products the next day while Caspian worked on sewing some more of the basic dress designs. The day after, Iris would be sure to teach Caspian about how to make flowers and ribbons from cloth to decorate the dresses.

The next morning, Basil eagerly handed Iris some jerky as he pulled her out of bed, eager to work together to make new things. Iris rubbed the sleep from her eyes, not quite used to being in such a rush first thing in the morning. Caspian was already up and sewing while Ember had gone out to tend to the fields so Iris supposed it must not be too early in the day.

Iris headed to the kitchen with Basil and asked him about some herbs good for inflammation and sun burns that could be applied to the skin. Some things like aloe, Iris was familiar with, but others were foreign. Still, Iris trusted Basil as he was considering an expert in the field of medicine.

After pulling out all the herbs, Iris had Basil crush them into a powder with the mortar and pestle. From what Iris knew of lotions, they were made with animal fats, oils, milk, and / or honey back in ancient Egypt. Iris figured if such things were combined with herbs good for the skin then it should make a suitable option.

Luckily, Iris had plenty of animal fat since she always made her mates keep it so she could put it in a stone container for safe keeping. Milk was out of the question, but the herbal mixture was already wet enough from the aloe.

As Basil had yet to have a chance to go out and collect honey, this option was impossible. However, Basil had been working on a powdered sugar previously so Iris turned to him and asked

"Did you ever finish that sugar you were working on previously?"

Basil nodded enthusiastically as he responded

"Yep! However, the results were a bit unexpected. Unlike the sugarcane you mentioned previously, it was difficult to get enough liquid from the sweet roots and boiling it down ended up with relatively little left as most of the liquid was likely water based.

Cutting the sweet root thin and then drying it before grinding it into a powder worked quite well, though. I actually turned all of the sweet roots we currently have into a powdered form. I was planning to gather a large amount of sweet roots next time I go out, if you like it."

Iris smiled, happy to have such a smart and curious mate. Basil was clearly far better than your average witch doctor as he was the equivalent of an inventor and scientist in the beast world.

Iris eagerly tried the powdered sweet root. The texture was closer to powdered sugar than granulated sugar, but that wasn't necessarily an issue. The taste of the grassy bitterness had dulled a bit after being dried and more of the natural sweetness had been brought out. Iris found this sugar alternative quite suitable for baking and could happily use this in the future.

Basil nervously looked at Iris as she tried the sugar and asked

"What do you think?"

Iris smiled and gave Basil a kiss and she answered against his lips

"It's almost as delicious as you. You did quite well."

Iris patted Basil's head and he turned red. Iris found this look to be quite nice and thought it was nice she could return the favor to him.

Iris had Basil mix some animal fat in a bowl until it became smooth and pliable and then mixed in some sugar and the herbs. The result was a light green paste that spread easily. Iris took a small dab with a finger and rubbed it into her hands and across her elbows.

Iris's joints had become chapped during the cold season and were beginning to become a bit scaly. Iris found the texture of the mixture to be closer to an ointment than the smooth lotions from the modern world, but it wasn't bad. Iris turned to Basil and explained

"We'll need to make some small jars that can easily fit in ones hands to keep these in. It would be better if it was tall but not very wide and it'll need a special cap. If we make the lid a little thick and go from bigger to smaller around with the smaller end inside the bottle and fit tightly, it should keep the mixture fresher for longer.

This amount should be enough for maybe fifty small bottles? We can save forty-five to sell and gift five bottles to females in the tribe. If they like it, they'll want to buy more and will, hopefully, spread the word."

Basil got to work crafting the bottles according to Iris's instructions. As it was more complicated than normal containers, it took many adjustments before Basil got it right.

When the lotion was finished being packaged, Iris explained how to make the lye soap. As lye soap is just animal fat, lye, and water; it is relatively simple to make. To make lye you would require ashes from a hardwood based fire which would then be boiled with a soft water like rainwater. After boiling the mixture for a short while, you skim the liquid lye from the top.

The lye solution is then boiled and mixed with animal fat that has been rendered into a liquid form. For a solid soap bar, you want to boil the mixture to a cornmeal like consistency and then pour the mixture into a greased container. Rectangular is standard, but a mold could result in a more fun shape. Of course, for liquid lye soap, you'd stop at the point where you mix the animal fat and lye solution.

After Iris explained all this to Basil, she also explained the basics of making nicely scented soaps. Flowers, fruits, mints, and baking spices were ideal options for making the soap smell good. To make the soap thoroughly smell of the scent, boiling the aromatics with the soap mixture and then later straining it would be ideal. If you wanted to have whole petals in for looks, it was best to add them in last minute or even sprinkle them on top so they would not be destroyed during the cooking process.

Since Iris had spent an entire day working with Caspian on tailoring the day before, it was only fair to do the same with Basil today. Iris suggested to Basil

"Let's try a nice rosemary & mint soap, cinnamon & jujui berry soap, and a lavender & chamomile soap for today. Those should make for good scent combinations using what we have on hand and we can make both a liquid and solid bar form of each."

Basil didn't know much about aromatics and how to combine them so he was happy to take Iris's advice. Since Basil had just learned how to cook and was still developing a taste for spices, it made sense that he should also work on developing a nose for scents as well. Perhaps this would even allow Basil to become a better cook as well.

Basil and Iris ended up using most of the fat in the house to make many batches of liquid and bar soaps. The bar soaps were individually wrapped up in beast skins and tied with a ribbon made from several pieces of long grass. Meanwhile, the liquid soap went into similar bottle as the lotions and placed in a deep stone box that was padded with dry grass so they wouldn't move about too much.

Iris had Basil carve five lovely small stone boxes with flowers and vines carved into the sides. In these, Iris planned to put one bar of soap, one bottle of soap, one bottle of lotion, and a bone comb surrounded by grass. These would be gifted to Holly, Fawn, and the first three females to show up to the next feast night.

Iris felt this should serve two of her goals quite well. Firstly, the females in their tribe would smell better and Iris's nose could be less offended in the future. Secondly, if the females enjoyed the gifts they would brag about it and that would drum up business for Iris.

What Iris couldn't anticipate was that this would also lead to many of the half orc females in the tribe more easily gathering mates in the future. Having a more pleasant smell and being better groomed was one of many ways to increase ones beauty, after all.