Experiment that almost worked

#snowdays #chamomileandsweetpatchouli #coldprocesssoap

Tuesday, February 25, 2015

The plan for today was simple. Alison was heading out early to take her daughter to Atlanta.  I was going to make soap.  Sounds easy doesn't it?

It was fine until we had two inches of snow land in our area overnight.  I know experienced snow people will be laughing at two inches. I've lived in PA; I get it - two inches is nothing.

However, here in N GA, we don't do snow very well. Even if it's a half inch, schools close, grocery stores are cleaned out, almost everyone stays home from work..... it's a mini vacation, and today was no exception.  Alison and her daughter stayed home, their trip to Atlanta will happen next week.

I decided to make soap, specifically a redo of the mystery pink soap from last week that didn't quite work the way it was supposed to.  When we couldn't pour the batter because it was too thick (thin is necessary for this design), we popped over to Plan B, dumped the batter, and swirled a fairly nice looking batch of soap.

My plan today was simple - try again! Can't get any simpler than that.

I chose a recipe that had the following oils:  Coconut, Palm, Olive, Sweet Almond, and Shea Butter. It is supposed to be very luxurious and skin nourishing all on its own, but I also added silk to give the bars extra sheen and smoothness.

The scents I blended are from +Natures Garden.  We have used Sweet Patchouli before and love it.  NG describes it as "an earthy blend of Patchouli and Green Grass intertwined with Fresh Lavender and hints of licorice with crisp notes of menthol softened by amber."   The second scent is Chamomile, described as "the wonderful aroma of freshly picked chamomile flowers with hints of fresh green herbs."  

Mixed together they smell divine!

Colorants are from +Rustic Escentuals - Pistachio, Icicle and Toffeelicious Mica

and from +Bramble Berry - 1982 Blue and Titanium Dioxide

Above you can see the colors after I had mixed them with a small amount of oil.  Since the Patchouli has a little vanilla, the base batter will turn a light beige.  This effectively gives me 5 colors - brown, white, green, blue and basic non colored batter.

I tried something different, straining the lye water as it's poured into the batter.

I poured the scents into the batter. OH! They smell so nice together.

I mixed up the batter to light trace then split batter into 5 sections.  I kept one non-colored, and then mixed the others with the mica colorants.

So far so good. I poured the batter into the corner, making concentric areas of color. Fingers crossed! (Well, figuratively crossed.  I needed them while I was pouring, so I couldn't literally cross them.)

Once the batter got this far out, it began to roll over the colors.  The first band was red, it is now under the white, not what I wanted!

Another Plan B! I started pouring from the other corner; I was not sure that it would help, but I was sure it couldn't hurt.

note on Wednesday after unmolding - I looked online last night and think that our 18 bar mold is too big for this design.  By the time the batter gets 3/4 across the bottom it's getting too hard.  Solution, buy 2 square silicone molds and make a double batch or insert divider in center and save money on molds!  

We are always learning, always!

I wanted the color circles to be even and round, not uneven and blobby looking.

Unfortunately, the batter was firming up, and the first few colors that I had poured were already at thick trace and weren't moving.

I needed the batter to be much looser for this design.

Since I was alone I can't show you the swirling. Starting in one corner of the mold, I pulled the skewer back and forth in a radiant design.  Imagine young children drawing the rays of the sun around a circle. In this case, the center circle was one corner of the mold (upper left in the photo below).  The center stays in the same corner at all times.

Ok, it's not that bad. It still isn't exactly what I'd planned, but maybe we'll try again, third time being the charm and all.

In go the sides and the grids, and soap is headed to the curing box for 24 hours.

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Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Another snow day!!!

I removed the mold from the curing box and you can plainly see all the colors, including the beige (un-colored) batter in lower R corner.

I like the colors and how they show in every aspect of the soap.

A Cardinal photo bombed this picture, can you see it?

Top L corner

Love the colors, wish we had smell-o-vision, it smells fantastic!

Chamomile and Patchouli will be cured April 8th