Iris Soap

So my sister put in an order for soap scented with her favorite scent, The Perfect Man from Nature's Garden. She loves this scent and requested soap, as well as lotion, made with it. I thankfully remembered to add the cool down phase to the lotion, unlike my last debaucle.

She wanted to pay me for my trouble, but I don't sell, and she's my sister! I decided it would be a gift instead.

The fragrance did wind up discoloring more after several days (it remained a pinkish purple hue), but I loved how they turned out! A simple drop and then hanger swirl, the results were akin to iris petals and soft leaves. It was a very organic design.

Hanger Swirl, Petra style, Soap Making Forum, April smf challenge

So over at Soap Making Forum, four other ladies and I host monthly SMF soap challenges. These challenges are meant as a learning experience for all members who choose to join us. There are no prizes attached.
After studying Petras Seifen Kunst hanger swirl, I decided to host a challenge with her swirl. The resulting soap is this!

If interested, you can check out our SMF Soap Challenge Youtube channel here. My specific challenge for this soap was made in April.

Whipped Soap, Cold Process

So for the March SMF Soap Challenge, we had to make a whipped cold process soap. You use at least 50% hard oils and prewhip your oils until peaks form. A kitchen beater is required for this as opposed to a stick blender. This technique works well for fragrance oils that accelerate. Unfortunately for me, my first soaps broke upon cutting. I used 40% lye concentration for my first attempt, and because whipped soap has a tacky texture that seems to last longer than regular cold process soap, it requires longer in the mold. 40% lye with higher stearic content needs to be cut within 12 hours or less for me, or it tends to split. So I chalked this crumbled mess of a soap to those variables. I rebatched it, rewhipped it, and it floats!

Scented with Brambleberry Salty Mariner Fragrance Oil

For my second attempt I decided to use 33% lye concentration. Keeping in mind cpop is not recommended for whipped soap (if overheated it can cause deflating and the soap will no longer float), I assumed it could remain in the mold longer. More water helps with the brittle aspect of higher stearic soaps. For my challenge submission I used
33% lye concentration this time
55% Lard
18.13% Coconut oil
6.88% Castor oil
20% Sweet Almond oil
2% sodium citrate
1 TBS sugar ppo

Because of the texture, tackiness, and higher water, I let this sit for 36 hours with the hopes that it would harden up and come out of the mold cleanly. Unfortunately, this technique just doesn't like me very much and all of my bars fell apart, literally, again. I did get one good bar out of the batch and one I made in a separate individual round silicone mold. I'll go ahead and rebatch the ones that fell apart and keep this one lone soap all to myself.

Scented with Crafters Choice Mediterranean Fig

And a picture of it floating......

Soap Swirls in a Slab Mold

So I've been busy working on different swirls in my slab mold.
My first one was Green Irish Tweed by Oregon Trail Soapers Supply. It thickened up slightly more than I intended, but all in all I like the look of the soap.

I decided to cut a few bars open to see the pattern inside. It looked pretty neat as well.

The next one I did was Lavender Forest by Bramble Berry and a little Cedarwood essential oil to give it a deeper forest smell. I loved the progression of this swirl, and I think the final swirl took away some of the neatness of the middle step swirls. Live and learn. Knowing when enough is enough is a fine art with soaping swirls.

Next swirl is a bugger. I tried Bramble Berry's Summer Fling fragrance. It had some floral notes, so I decided to use 33% lye concentration instead my typical 40%. Well not only did it thicken, my swirl was quite less than stellar, and the ash that ensued was nothing short of amazing. Here it is in mold. Then is a pic of cut bars that I attempted to plane the tops off of. I also did a hot water bath to try and rid the ash. Two bars in the back are not cleaned up, and you can see how heavily ashed it was originally. I also made extra batter, and those three soaps are gray white with a very thick layer of ash (originally colored black with activated charcoal).  

Sigh. When making soap, as so many of you know, knocking out a disappointment can grate on the nerves. So being disappointed, I decided to have another go at swirling. I chose Fragrance Buddy's Patchouli Passion. I am not a member of the soap scent review board, so the only thing I knew about potential discoloration was there was 0% vanillin. Unfortunately it does go quite yellow on you, however, it behaved well for my 40% lye concentration. I like it in mold here. I can see two bird like creatures up top and a flower at the bottom.

Ebru Soap- Great Cakes Soapworks Soap Challenge, June

So after many early practices, and then once the contest rules were laid out many attempts, I finally decided on a soap challenge theme.

The Dragon

Scented with a blend of  Cedarwood, Juniper Berry, and Rosemary Essential Oils, and
Mysore Sandalwood Fragrance Oil by Oregon Trail Soapers Supply

Colorants by Nurture Soap

I wanted to try a new recipe. I used for this soap

23% Sweet Almond Oil
7% Castor Oil
10% Coconut Oil
20% Tallow
40% Lard
3% Superfat
with 40% Lye Concentration (1.5:1 water to lye ratio)
split between 1:1 water to lye and the remaining .5 water was replaced with 100% pure coconut milk
Tussah Silk, 2% Sodium Citrate, and 1 tablespoon sugar ppo was also included in this soap
A total of 14 colorants were used as well (listed in my process).

Fragrance was appx 38% Cedarwood, 38% Sandalwood, 16% Juniper Berry, and 7% Rosemary (more or less)
~~~
My inspiration is a wonderful etsy artist, Robert Wu. This work of his titled Rhythm was my main inspiration, but if you take time to visit his shop, you can see his Dragon, Peacock, and Phoenix (which I believe has been sold) works which also were an inspiration for this soap.

~~~
I began by stick blending a few bursts, added the coconut milk, then stick blended to emulsion. I added the fragrances, and then I split the batch into 9 squirt bottles (a small amount) and into 3 paper cups.

I poured the base, and then proceeded to color each bottle and cup. I am a scoop and dump color gal, so it took no time to color.

I then laid out my fire beneath.

Colors from top to bottom were-
Sunshine Yellow mixed with Maya Gold
Desert Sunset
Really Red
Orchid Purple
Activated Charcoal mixed with Dark Steel Gray

I then skewered top to bottom and bottom to top, alternating. I think had I used the blunt end of the skewer, it may have pulled the batter apart more like the inspiration photo.

Then I used the Activated Charcoal mixed with Dark Steel Gray to lay out the body. After laying down Teal beside it, I proceeded to skewer out spikes along the body and off the top of the head.

I then laid out alternating colors of Wisteria Purple, Teal, Klein Blue, and Mantis Green. I threw in there an AC/Steel line as well. I then pulled the skewer down as a comb would do for the wings.

Finally I dropped Raspberry Red, Red Vibrance, Really Red, Titanium Dioxide, and Sunshine Yellow in front of the mouth. I made French curls to emulate fire escaping.

I am happy enough with the outcome, and think I'll call this one DONE:-)

Thanks for looking, and thank you to Amy for hosting these fun and exciting challenges!

Petras Seifen Kunst Swirl Soap, Hanger Swirl Soap, Butterfly Swirl Soap

I have been studying for quite some time Petras Seifen Kunst hanger swirl. It's similar to the butterfly swirl, but unlike the butterfly swirl which benefits from a ts mold, her technique looks phenomenonal in a standard mold.
Petra has several YouTube videos showcasing her excellent work.

My first attempt turned out well enough. I used a discoloring fragrance oil, Almond Creme, by Aroma Haven Rustic Escentuals, and it did eventually hide the beauty of the swirls because of the discoloration. I didn't mind, for it was a practice of technique.

I made several more attempts, some failed and some turned out alright.

These aren't the best, but still turned out well enough.

I, along with other ladies, host a soap challenge on smf. For January, it was a black and white challenge. No colors allowed other than black and white. I chose to use Petra's hanger technique for the challenge. I was beyond pleased with the results.

I will be hosting our challenge in April utilizing Petra's hanger swirl, and I will share helpful hints I've learned from my successes and my fails.

I have to send a big thanks to Petra Feddeck for sharing her hanger swirl technique in video and on her blog! 

*I also want to apologize, if others have been making this technique long before her, she's the first I found making it and who also posted videos of it.

Lotion Based Cold Process Soap, How to Save a Lotion

So, I recently decided to make a lotion for my family and a separate batch for myself. I also set up to make a soap at the same time. 

This was made on February 14, 2016.

I separated out my cool down phase for both batches in matching containers (fragrance, preservative, and ipm), labeled, and in the soap station put my fragrance blend in the same styled container, unlabeled.

I made my family's lotion without incident. I set off making my lotion batch, but when it came time to add my cool down ingredients, I dumped in an oz of the soap's fragrance instead! 

After some math calculations, it would have taken 224 oz of lotion to turn 1 oz fragrance into the required .5% fragrance for making a lotion. So instead, I turned it into soap!

Note, this is soap with my own pre-made lotion base, these are not lotion bars

This is how I saved a botched batch of lotion.

My lotion:
23 grams ewax
9 grams stearic 
23 grams shea
68 grams sweet almond oil
311 grams water
Minus the optiphen, ipm, and lotion fragrance

Having such a high water content, I needed to add enough ingredients to make a soap that would fill a mold I had and would not be way too high in water.

I was also unsure how ewax would react in a soap.

I did the math (being used to oz, it was a trial and error trying to find the right amount of grams).

I decided on a recipe to fill my ts mold.

New recipe:
Sweet almond- 100 grams, had 64 so add 36
Castor- 60 grams
Coconut- 170 grams 
Lard- 530 grams
Shea- 52 grams, had 22 so add 30
Stearic- 9 grams already in the lotion base
Ewax- 23 grams already in the lotion base 

That equates in percentage
Sweet almond 10.59%
Castor 6.36%
Coconut 18.01%
Lard 56.14%
Shea 5.51%
Stearic .95%
Ewax 2.44%

I used a 3% superfat, 2 oz fragrance  (already had 1 oz, so added an additional oz), and full water plus a little more.

Lye, 131 grams needed
Water, needs 350 grams for full water.
*I had 311 grams already in the lotion portion.
*Doing a 1:1 lye ratio or 50% lye concentration, that shows I have to mix 131 grams water to 131 grams lye to dissolve.
*Using 131 grams water to dissolve the lye, adding the 311 grams water in the lotion base, this soap has a total of 432 grams water and will require a very long cure.

Sodium citrate 2% and sugar 1 TBS ppo added in water pre lye.

Fragrance blend used
Mysore Sandalwood Oregon Trail Soaper's Supplies
Rosewood Wholesale Supplies Plus
Vanilla Rosewood Brambleberry

Before beginning. You can see the white lotion base on the spatula.

All melted. See the water base lotion in there? It's the white spots floating about.

Knowing stearic can sieze cp soap, and not knowing what ewax brings to the table, I began by hand wisking the lye water into oils. It immediately turned to this.

When I added the fragrance oils, it immediately curdled. I am fairly sure it wasn't ricing but curdled. If you look at the pot, you can kind of see what I am talking about.

Because of the curdle, I decided to hit the batter briefly with a stick blender.

I split off a little of the base, colored the main batch in sea green by Nurture Soap Supplies. The pot super heated. I am unsure what happened. I soap by feel of the pot. I've never had a problem before. I took a digital temperature and it was at 160 deg F. Panicked, I enlisted someone to get a fresh trash bag into the trash can in case it volcanoed in the pot. It didn't, thankfully, and so I poured the sea green into the mold.

I dropped in the split base color, and being a curdled consistency it literally plopped in and splashed. I tried to hanger swirl it, but the soap texture just didn't allow for movement.

Here it is in the mold.

It cooled dramatically fast, so I decided to cpop it.

Here are some not so artistic pics of the cut bars. They aren't the prettiest bars, kind of looks like clouds in the sky, but one thing they are: my lotion based soap!

On a side note, it was zap free in the morning, so less than 12 hours later, I decided to cut with the worry the ewax (a wildcard) plus stearic may make for split bars had I cut too late. I realize the excessive water would help prevent this, but my higher stearic bars that use high tallow have split in the past when cutting over 12 hours after saponification.

Being so water logged, the lather 12 hours later was descent, non drying, and actually much better than I expected. I have measured the weights of 11 bars, not the 12th bar I washed with, and will document water loss. The bar I washed with will be continually used each week to document the lather.

Here is the lather about 12 hours after making it.

I have to send a huge thanks to snappyllama and DeeAnna from smf for helping me make this possible!