I did a full handmill on this batch, Im very happy with it now! Origionally this batch seized on me and became rock hard immediatly so I had a ton of air pockets in it. I very slowly melted it down and as always it made my entire house smell heavenly. I let it sit overnight after I shredded it with a little more colorant and a tiny bit of water and started the handmilling process early in the morning. By about noon it was ready. I added more fragrance after I readied my mold and poured it in. I cut it this morning, its a hard, excellent soap. Im so happy with how it turned out, even if it isnt what I had imagined in my head before I started out. I added a few chunks of white soap that I had on hand for a bit more texture in the soap. My favorite thing about handmilling besides getting a superior soap is its ready right away! Im using a slice in the shower tonight! YUM!
I had a request for Banana Coconut scented soap. I did a test batch several weeks ago and it turned out just lovely!
The scent isnt a sunscreen banana coconut, it has undertones of more sweetness, there is definatly other fruity tones in there. This fragrance has been very popular since I began making bathbombs years ago. I planned on a light yellow base color with a white swirl. I wanted to have a whispy swirl on top but I wanted to have a marble type swirl inside. So I did an in the pot swirl but reserved some of the white for my top wispy swirls. It turned out beautifully! I cannot wait to cut it!
For the past few years Ive struggled to cut my soaps. At first I freehanded my first couple of batches- YIKES, that was scarey. A big log of soap, a sharp knife and me. Not a fantastic combonation! Soon I started using this mitre box and a handled blade. Ive been using that ever since, it works, not efficiantly and it was a bit of a pain but it was better than free handing it with a knife! I also used another type of cutter every now and then, it gives a crinkle look to the soap. I love this but it makes swirls look a little odd so I dont do it often. I also cant use my mitre box as a guide because it doesnt fit through the guide slots.
I recently got a new soap cutter. This thing is FABULOUS!! It uses musical wire to slice the soap. Each bar, exactly the same size as the other and the best thing is it cuts everything absolutly perfectly clean. With the blades there is drag and the soap always ends up with marks where the blade has to be pulled off from the soap. This cutter really rocks! I cant wait to get a few more batches through it!
This scent is so intoxicating, I am absolutly in love with it! Its not super masculine, its not heavey on the musk, its got a hint of sweetness from the Vanilla and an earthyness from the Sandlewood and somewhere it picks up these ‘clean’ notes that are just so appealing. Im usually a big fan of citrus and girly scents but there is definatly something about this that makes me weak kneed. It soaped nicely. I knew it would be a quick mover so I soaped as cooly as possible and I added my fragrance oil to my base oil and made sure it was well blended before adding in my lye water. It did move pretty darn quick! I wanted to do this in a tan on brown, since this discolors naturally. I quickly removed part of the batch and added some titanium dioxide got it all mixed up and by now it was very very thick. My end result wasnt whispy swirls that I love so much but chunky well defined and 3 dimensional swirls. It looks GREAT! Not what I had origionally envisioned but even better!
I had a special request for a strawberry soap. I had a couple oils in mind so I ordered two of them, the first came promptly and I wasnt impressed. I was looking for a sweet candyish strawberry, this was more a strawberry and champaign scent. Not bad, actually very nice but it wasnt want I wanted. The second oil came and it knocked my socks off! I prepared a batch of soap and knew before hand this oil may accelorate but didnt add my fragrance to my base oils prior to the lye water stage. My bad! As soon as the fragrance oil hit the lightly traced soap it became rock hard. I had to snap my handblender apart and dig it out with my hands. Soap on a stick! I thought that was just a myth, afterall I have soaped some very speedy florals and never had THIS! I scooped the soap out with my gloved hands and slammed it into the mold. I had this vision of a light pink base with a darker pink swirl and a white swirl. I managed to slam half the soap into the mold and poured over that some of the unscented I had pulled to the side earler (which was a darker pink) and then slammed the rest of the hard soap over that. The top was not pretty looking, and it was just entirely too hard to make a cool pattern of even a spikey top, it was just sort of jagged and ugly. I patted it down with my gloved hands a little more and it just wasnt doing the trick so I slipped my gloves off and sort of rolled my eyes and shook my head as I poured cold water over my hands and quickly smoothed the top of the raw soap with my bare hands. I very quickly got my hands under cold water again and did it again, and a third time, each time a very very fast swipe over the soap top. It worked. The top became smooth and shiney! I cut the log with my new soap cutter about 12 hours after I ‘poured’ the soap and it was REALLY hard. Unfortunatly it just has too many air pockets. I knew it would since it went so fast. Im going to handmill this and add a little extra strawberry fragrance too. It is just an awesome scent!