I am sitting at my dad's lake house enjoying an overcast day. Weird, I know but I am one of the few people in this world who doesn't care for bright sunshiny days. Anyway, I am going to continue to share with you my soaping follies.
This beautiful mess was my first attempt at HP in the crock pot. I cooked it like The Soapmaking Handbook said to but you can see the results. It was Black Cherry from thechemistrystore.com. I didn't like the way that it came out so I put it back in the crock pot 2 days later and came up with this.
This looks like some kind of volcanic sludge monster leaving her spore behind. Again, went waaayyy too much on the Black Oxide. However, what I was able to do was create Very Cherry Kamikaze soap. I use Japanese Cherry Blossom from thechemistrystore.com and then added the Black Cherry balls to it. I was hoping on a bright orange with black balls but ended up with a soft barely there peach with black balls.
Then there is the ever popular soap morph. Some oils will change the color of your soap. Clove turns your soap a light tan, Vanilla will turn it brown and Patchouli can turn the soap an off-white color. What I didn't realize is that some fragrance oils can do the same thing. Strawberry Kiwi from Bath and Body Supply will turn soap a dark brown color while it cures. So what started out a s beautiful magenta, forest green and tan turned to mud red, dirty grey green and brown.
This is the before picture. I was too disgusted to take an after picture.
Now on to Crisp Ocean Breeze. This is a wonderful fragrance for men. I, of course, didn't use enough of it in my 4 lb batch so it only smells like an off vinegary scent but this is my year for experimentation. 2013 is when I will kick into high gear and get cracking on making all the soaps that went right.
This is just a mess! I soaped too hot (129 degrees) and didn't take the time to mix the colorant in well. And this was the result. Thankfully practice has yielded better results from me.
This is a simple Baby Rose (Bramble Berry) soap that I made. It was a really soft fragrance. My next batch was better scented. I will post that under the Pirates of the Caribbean inspired soaps. Next up is one that I will perfect next year for my Coffee Shoppe series. This one is Coffee Shoppe: Chocolate Almond Biscotti. The bar lost all color except for varying degrees of brown.
This was my best seller from October to December. It will go on my website in March as a permanent fixture.
This last pic is of my soap balls from the Juniper Breeze, Lilac and Hawaiian Tropic soap that I made 2 weeks ago. I would always see pics of soaps topped with beautiful soap balls and wonder how they were made. Well by lurking in other blogs I was able to pic up on using the scraps to make soap balls while the soap is still malleable. They look wonderful and I have no idea as to what I am going to use them in but I am sure to find inspiration somewhere. Lastly, I will post my pics of the Juniper Breeze, Lilac and Hawaiian Tropic soap that riced on me. Floral fragrances should be soaped at room temp and quickly.
Yes, those are sparkles on top.
Well, this is it for soaps until I have completed my Pirates of the Caribbean inspired soaps. If sales continue to pic up then I will be able to have them completed no later than the end of January. My next post will be on Milk baths and Oatmeal baths. Winter and allergy wonders, if you ask me. Take care and have a wonderful time celebrating the end of 2012 and ringing in 2013.
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