Tuesday, supposed to be full of grace, that's not what we would call it!

Tuesday June 17, 2014

June 17th is a special day for Alison, it's the day she was married to my husband's brother.  Being the romantic soul her husband is, they had designated Tuesday as Anniversary day and had made special plans for a lovely dinner in the NC mountains.  

Thankfully, thankfully, THANKFULLY!!! Alison wanted to stop by on the way north and unmold our first "duo" hanger swirl attempt.  

Here is why I was, and am so thankful she stopped by (all dressed up, and not in working clothes).  Since I knew Alison was going to be gone I decided to try another "duo" hanger swirl, by myself.

All was rocking along just fine. I chose colors - shades of pinks and purple for one side using The Vert as a fragrance,   

and shades of blue using Neroli Shea Blossom for the other side.

I put the divider into the mold, measured the scents, and mixed the colorants.  While the lye/water was cooling, I poured the oils and had them ready to go.  I was feeling pretty good about trying a double batch solo....little did I know what was about to happen.

My plan was to do one side at a time. 

Once the soap had emulsified, I divided the batter in two large measuring cups. In the pink batch I mixed in the Vert scent, then divided my soap into three plastic cups for the different colors, leaving some white in the bowl.  I started with a layer of white, 

then added light purple,

 bright pink,

then coral pink

 I had about half the batch in the mold and was preparing to begin the second layer.  I was thinking  that this just might be a great looking soap....

However....

Right about now I noticed the divider in the mold was sliding out of position due to pressure from the ever growing layered soap batter!  oh no, oh no, oh no!!!

Alison and her husband arrived almost simultaneously to my discovery!

When they walked in they found me holding up the divider and trying to finish the pink side with one hand......it wasn't working, not to mention how I  thought I could mix in fragrance, colors and layer the blue side with one hand holding up the pink batch!

Alison immediately knew what to do. She grabbed a pair of gloves and said, "Do you want me to hold the divider or do the blue batch.?"

"Do the blue batch!" I yelped.  

With half the mold partially filled and the batter sitting on the counter, she grabbed the Neroli Shea Blossom fragrance and in two blinks it slipped out of her hand and hit the floor, in a mushroom cloud of glass and fragrance oil, oh no, no, no.  Alison had never jumped backward and up at the same time so quickly!  I was still holding up the divider against the sliding pink batch while Alison (remember she is dressed up) grabbed paper towels and sopped up the fragrance.  Then she grabbed the broom, then she mopped and got the floor clear enough for her to stand next to me.

Oh, why couldn't we have been running the video camera today?

(Can you imagine what my kitchen smells like??? HEAVENLY that's what!)

We quickly decided on a substitute scent Wisteria and Lilac, she mixed in the scent, divided the batter, added the colors, and Alison began pouring the blue side.  After she got the first layer of white in, I let go of the divider - mistake. It started slipping again, and some of the pink color oozed into the blue side!  

             (if you look closely you can see the pink that had oozed to the left of the divider)

Eventually with Alison pouring soap into the blue side the pressure equalized and the slipping divider stopped moving.  I took over on the blue side so Alison wouldn't  have soap all over her outfit.  I concentrated on finishing up the layering process  on the blue side, then I switched back to the top of the pink soap to finish it up. 

I was happily swirling the tops of both sides, getting all creative when out of the blue......

  

Swirling is such fun, I was having a ball.

Then Alison quietly mentioned that I might want to actually hanger swirl the soap before I finished the top!!!  As I said, she saved the day.  Of course I hadn't hanger swirled the blue side or the pink side either, so I went back and did that. Completely messing up all the previous swirling.

That is what the blue side looked like after the hanger swirl, notice all the pretty swirls were gone.

After all the hanger swirling was completed I added a bit of the leftover colors and swirled both sides. 

The blue side didn't swirl so well,

 and just looks blue, 

the pink side did fine and, as you can see by the pictures, looks nice.  

And yes the divider wound up on a crazy wonky angle - but who cares at this point) 

We then went on to cut the hanger swirl from the day before.  These are really pretty.  We hope to attempt at least 4 or 5 hanger swirl soaps before we choose which one to send into the challenge.

This is what the soap we made on Tuesday looks like, we were excited to see how it turned out.  

This is what the side of the mold looked like when we pulled the paper liner off.

This is what the blue side looked like when it was cut into bars.

(if you are really observant you might notice a slightly pink area on the corner of the bar to the left, oozing pink soap caused this!)

And the pink side, both sides are nice, not sure if either of these will be our "challenge" soap selection, but they look and smell really nice no matter what.

Final shot pink soap is scented with the Vert and the blue soap is scented with Wisteria and Lilac. 

Cure date is July 29.