Who is Frillie Lillie?

So I titled this blog post "Who is Frillie Lillie?" because some of you may have come into contact with my business through social media and lets be real, social media doesn't always give you a full glimpse of who or what something is. So who is Frillie Lillie? Well Frillie Lillie is an extension of me and who am I? Well am I, I am Charlise Mendheim, born and raised predominantly in Mt. Vernon, NY until I moved to the DC area in high school. I am the oldest child, a wife, aunt (Ti-Ti), and dog mom (love you Kiko). 

Why the name Frillie Lillie? Lillie is my late paternal grandmother. Anything I decide to do creatively, I attach her name to it as a way to pay homage to her, as she had such a huge impact on my life, and I really do feel like she passed her creative gene down to me. Then Frillie, well because I love all things fancy and frilly but I didn't think Frilly Lillie looked good.

Back in the early 2000's I began learning and understanding the importance of knowing what I was putting in my body. Now don't get me wrong I still eat crap I have no business eating, but I at least know I shouldn't be eating it and understand why I shouldn't be eating it. I also began thinking about the products I was using on my body, as well and started exclusively using Dove soap and body wash and buying shea butter from local businesses and chose to stop relaxing my hair. And at the time I thought what I was doing was best for me and my skin. 

But as my dad has drilled into my head since I was very young, when you know better you do better. So I eventually switched to Dr. Bronner's castile soap for a while, but I would always go back to Dove because Dr. Bronner's made my skin extremely dry. What I didn't know at the time was Dr. Bronner's is made with a high amount of coconut oil and coconut oil is considered a cleansing oil. So if used in high amounts it strips all the natural oils from your skin and in turn causes you to be dry a.k.a. ashy, and we don't do ashy over here. Fast forward and I was introduced to what most people call glycerin soap and it was cool until I came across cold processed soap and fell in love with how it made my skin feel.

After some time, my creative bug kicked in and I decided I wanted to learn about the process of making this cold processed soap that I loved so much. For months I watched videos and read books and articles endlessly, learning about the soap making process. Finally I built up enough knowledge and confidence and purchased my first soap kit from Brambleberry and made my first loaf of soap and I fell in love with the process immediately. 

When I decided to start Frillie Lillie my purpose was to create products that was better for you but also smelled and looked good. I come from a long line of women who love perfume and smelling good and I am no different. So here you'll find things that smell great but are also made with ingredients that are skin safe, skin nourishing and most importantly incredibly milder than most main stream products.

I can get a little wordy so I am going to end this blog post here but please stick around as in the future I'll share in depth details around the ingredients we use and why, as well as upcoming products and anything else I think may be interesting.

~Peace, 

Charlise M.