Latest stuff

Wow, so long since last posting. My soap making is sporadic since having two kids.  I squeeze it in when I can but it takes a lot of planning.  Try to get it in during naps.  Do a lot of prep work over the days prior so I can just make.  I pay closer attention to my lye since having kids.

Here’s what I have been doing lately.

The last time I made soap was 4/13/12.  So on 1/10/14 I started with a simple 100% olive oil castile soap.  Basics.  I did use some cocoa powder to color.  No fragrance.  I put it in my slab mold with the dividers.

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3/27/14: I made unfragranced soap used a rainbow of colors to make some colored embeds.  I did also make a loaf of Black Raspberry and Vanilla.

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Here’s the Black Raspberry and Vanilla.  I did stripes of white, pink, and purple.  Then I spoon swirled.  I CPOP’d and it heated up too much, thus lots of titanium dioxide crackling or glycerin rivers.

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Then I used the colored chunks to roll into multicolored balls and cut up some of the colored soap for embeds.

4/5/14: group shot

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Here are the colored soap balls in a white base.  No crackling this time because I didn’t CPOP and no overheating occurred.  It’s fragranced with Passionfruit, but it morphed and lost all of it’s tart goodness.  It’s still looks cute though.

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Then the colored chunks it put into a soap fragranced with Sweet Orange and Chili Pepper.

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Then one I put in jojoba beads for exfoliation in one fragranced with Ocean Breeze

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And a drop swirl for one fragranced with Viva La Juicy type.

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6/22/14: I tried my hand at a rainbow soap.  Unfortunately the Georgia Peach fragrance oil morphed and it looks better than it smells.  It’s still a fruity smell, but it isn’t the nice peach that I was looking for.  I do like how the rainbow turned out!

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8/31/14: I got a hankering to do soap cupcakes!  These are fragranced in Avobath type.

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Hot damn!  They are cute!  I do love piping.  I don’t know why I don’t do it for actual baked cupcakes and cakes.

I also made Root Beer fragranced soap.  It turns a very dark brown color so I kept some unfragranced to make it look like a foamy top.  The tan color will go very dark like the edges as it is exposed to the air.  Smells just like the soda.

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I used mottled orange soap balls and an orange mica line for Kumquat fragranced soap.

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I also made a simple, plain soap fragranced with Oatmeal Milk and Honey.  I didn’t take a photo of this one.

Latest soap tally

I'm looking over my soap notes.  I made my first cold process soap Nov 2009!  Since then I have used 117 pounds of oils/butters to make approximately 140 pounds of soap!!  WOW!

I have used over 45 different recipes.  I've used a variety of different kinds of molds.  Milk cartons, Pringles cans, plastic boxes, plastic cookie trays, silicone muffin and cupcake pans, silicone cake pans, rubber ice cube trays, wood molds, silicone lined wood molds.  I've used cow's milk, goat's milk, vegetable purees, honey, salt, beer, colloidal oatmeal as additives.  I've used a variety of colorants and fragrances.  I still have a nice collection of fragrance and essential oils and I want to get more! 

I've had a lot of fun making soap these 2 years and I plan on continuing to have more fun!

Making soap

Finally getting some soap made again!  It's so much fun!! 

Recently I've made several batches of soap.

Lily of the Valley
Clean Type
Passionfruit Papaya
Dream Type
Acai Berries and Satin
Lemongrass
Kazi Kazi
Acai and Mangosteen

I used different molds and colorants.  I'll have to take some photos and post them. Maybe I'll try making another video.  Hmmm…

I'm in the mood to soap!

Well, what shall I do for my next batch of soaping?  I have a bunch of fragrance oils and essential oils, colorants and glitters…

I love the smell of lemongrass, so refreshing. 
Lavender is always good.  Soothing.
Lily of the Valley…
or maybe a fruity scent…  Passionfruit Papaya
or Turkish Mocha

too many choices. 

It also doesn't help that I haven't picked a go to soap recipe either.  They all feel about the same to me, so I just need to pick one and stick with it. 

Finished castile soaps!

Here are my finished castile soaps!

I had some teddy bear embeds from before so I placed them on top of some of the soaps individual soaps.

 

Very cute! 

I also got to use my tank cutter for the soap log. 
 
That's always fun, and it makes really even and consistent cuts and does them super quickly!

So now these will sit around for a good and long cure.  I mean really really long.  People say a year is good.