Bella Sapone™ Handmade Soap

I decided to get with the season and start soaping some fall scents. I have soaped a cinnamon before, its hard to find a high quality cold process skin safe cinnamon so I stocked up when I found this, but this time I added apple fragrance oil and apples! Soaping with fruit can get tricky, the sugar in the fruit can seriously overheat the soap as it cures. I had a 5 pound batch and added in a little under an ounce of apple puree per pound of soap (not just per pound of oils) I added it in at medium trace so the lye water wouldnt burn the apples. Cinnamon fragrance oil gets pretty hot as it is so with the addition of the real fruit I knew I had better keep a very close eye on this batch. I poured it into a collapsable wooden mold and instead of placing it in my oven to cure I put it in my cold bathroom in the cold bath tub. I kept checking on it every 10 minutes or so and feeling the sides and moving it to a new cold spot. The wooden mold was getting hot and I was getting concerned. Then it got to be dinner time and I got preoccupied with making dinner and socializing with family that was over. A few hours later I realized I had left that overheating soap far too long. I raced in to check on it and it had cracked and was extreemly hot. I pulled out the nails that hold the sides up and removed the ends and felt the hours old soap, it was still very soft but it was shockingly hot. I pulled down the sides and the crack re-sealed itself! I have never see that happen before! The soap was far too soft to leave out of the mold like that so after letting it cool for a few moments I put the sides up but left the ends off and put a fan on the soap. It turned out perfectly! I cant wait until its perfectly cured so I can use it myself!

Posted by Shelley in Soaps & Latest Creations on September 12th, 2007 | Comments Off

I made a test batch of soap with the fragrance Strawberries and Champagne. I had ordered it ages ago as a sample looking for a nice sweet strawberry. This wasnt it, at all. This scent has just a hint of strawberry and has a significant ‘perfume’ smell. I didnt like it at all but one of my customers was crazy for it so I did a test batch. That batch showed slight acceleration, but nothing that would cause any problems even with swirling. It didnt discolor and the fragrance stayed true and very strong through cure. So I made a full batch of it about a month ago. My plan was for a light yellowish body with a light pink swirl. I also had a thought about working some ‘champagne’ bubbles into the soap. Usually air bubbles in soap is totally undesirable but with the fragrance of this soap I decided to give it a shot. I have never purposely tried to work bubbles into soap before so I didnt know how it would turn out. I hesitated and then said to heck with it and began with my stick blender working it up and down making sure to bring air into the soap. It was getting pretty thick so I worked as much in as I could and swirled in the pink soap and poured it into my mould. A month later now it looks great. When I cut it I decided I would have liked a few more bubbles in there but the affect is there. The scent is fabulous, this oil was not the expensive type I usually buy so my expectations weren’t very high at all. I was pleasantly surprised!

Posted by Shelley in Soaps & Latest Creations on August 24th, 2007 | No Comments

I did a test batch of soap with Blueberry fragrance oil several months ago and was happy with the results. No acceleration, no discoloration and the scent stayed sweet and true. So I soaped this a month ago. Much to my surprise it discolored- this was the same oil from the same company. I was puzzled. I used the same ratio of fragrance to soap as in my test batch. I had portioned my raw soap out into two different bowls, I added the fragrance to the majority of the soap along with some titanium dioxide- I was looking for something blueberry ice cream like. The second portion I added blueberry fibres and some purple and blue dye but no fragrance oil or titanium dioxide. Well now its a month later and suddenly the scent has faded. Im not sure whats going on with that! I am curious if the company didnt change their formulation. I need to do a few experiments on the cured soap to see if I can bring the scent back. Its a beautiful soap even with the discoloration. I do not want to rebatch it!

Posted by Shelley in Soaps & Latest Creations on August 23rd, 2007 | No Comments

Last time I soaped I made a few sample sized batches to test a couple new fragrance oils. Generally I spend the extra money and splurge on the really high quality oils that have been tested in cold process soap along with bath and body products. But there were a few that just sounded so yummy last time I was ordering some of my bath bomb fragrance oils. I ordered a few ounces of an oil called frosted cupcake. I wasnt sure if I would like it or not. I am not a big fan of ‘bakery’ smells. I just dont like that undertone many of them contain. I was pleasantly surprised with this oil! No funky undertone at all, it was more like a very light sweet scent, a little like my Laite Sucre. So I did a test batch with it. No color, no additives it is strictly plain soap with this fragrance oil in it. I expected some discoloring because of the vanilla notes Its been a month since I did this test so the discoloration should be at its fullest now and its just a slight beige color. I think it would look fantastic as a vanilla cupcake and make a whipped soap ‘frosting’ on top that isnt scented and that is whitened with some titanium dioxide! Im hoping to soap this soon. I need to get two other batches done first!

Posted by Shelley in Soaps & Latest Creations on August 4th, 2007 | No Comments

This is another of my untested fragrances. I couldn’t get it for ages and it just came available again! So I bought several ounces and decided to test a small batch with this oil. I was thinking it might not behave well, and would probably discolor really badly since it definitely has some fairly strong vanilla notes in it but it isn’t all that dark. I think I should be able to lighten the discoloration affects with titanium dioxide and some high quality soap dye. The fragrance stayed true for the most part. I think it has faded a little, but at this point it shouldn’t fade any further. I just have to be sure to add in some additional fragrance oil at trace and that should take care of the fading issue. Im looking forward to this being a nice pink soap with perhaps a ‘wispy’ top. I was also thinking of doing a tri color swirl- pink, blue and yellow. That could be very fun and cute! I have a number of pink soaps but very few that have blue in it, so Im leaning towards the tri swirl.

Posted by Shelley in Soaps & Latest Creations on August 1st, 2007 | No Comments

Luxury Handmade Soap

Apple Cinnamon Soap

Strawberries and Champagne Soap

Blueberry Soap

Frosted Cupcake hand made soap sample batch

Cotton candy hand made soap test batch