Soaping in full swing again

I can't believe I haven't blogged for such a long time!! I hate to admit, but sometimes there are things more important than soap. And now I can't believe I had the nerve to even say that!! The  past few months were really busy for me. It all started off with three sales in two different cities. They went well and I had one returning customer who was looking for a particular rose soap she bought from me last year. Unfortunately I had none of those left, but she agreed to try a different one. The feeling of having a returning client is unexplainable...I felt so thrilled and satisfied. Following the sales we had cousins coming from different parts of the world. It's so great to be able to meet up with family and we had a blast talking about our childhood and going to the movies and also many many family potluck dinners. And while I was having a great time with my folks, my soap stock slowly started dwindling to a point where I had no more soaps to sell. Wake up!!!!!

Thankfully I got bitten by the soap bug all over again. YAY!!!

Rose: Scented with Geranium FO and
colored with Calamine and cocoa powder

Very Vanilla: Colored with Cocoa powder and Kaolin clay and
scented with Vanilla FO

Scented with Rosemary EO. This contains a mix of ground lentils
also known as Sunni Pindi (in a south Indian language...Telugu)

Peppermint, Eucalyptus and Bergamot EO's

Thin line colored with wheatgrass powder

Scented with Basil, Citronella and Lemongrass EO's
and colored with cocoa powder

I'm finding it hard to try out any new swirl techniques because of so many almost seize and volcano situations. But I still get a high every time I soap and the excitement at the time of unmolding and cutting up the soap to see the design....I feel like a little kid with a wrapped up gift in hand, waiting to open it up. :)

Have a great day people and happy soaping!!

It's hot in the soap kitchen! (picture heavy)

There have been no posts for sometime and that is only because many batches of soap were being whipped up in the kitchen. My candle making cousin and I are getting ready for a sale around 'Diwali', more popularly known as the 'festival of lights' outside India.

Each batch of soap ended up surprising me. When I expected everything to go smoothly, I ended up with some pretty rough looking soap. And when I kept the design very simple anticipating overheating, the soap didn't even gel. Before I get all whiny, I'll just shut my trap!!

Here are some pictures:

Scented with
cedarwood, frankincense and grapefruit EO's
Swirled with red sandalwood and wheatgrass powder
Happy Surprise!
EO blend worked beautifully!

Madder root experiment.
Scent blend: Palmarosa and Patchouli
Almost seize situation.
Embeds got wonky from banging the mold on the counter

Plain Eucalyptus soap
Colored with wheatgrass
Went as planned, just couldn't do away with the soda ash

Like the swirls, but had a very hard time with this soap.
Mold lining bent, so not a perfect round.
Scent blend: grapefruit and vanilla.
Brown colored soap seized halfway into pouring! Yikes!
Got some solid air pockets in some soaps.
A lovely scent blend though!!

Leftover special.
Made with soap scraps and leftover essential oils.
These soaps are just for me!!

Vanilliscious!
Scented with Vanilla fragrance oil.
Things didn't go too smoothly this time.
Controlled a slight volcano situation,
by smoothing out the soap with a spatula :D

Basil, lemongrass and citronella scent blend. Great blend!!
A dash of neem oil.
Seize-o-rama!!
Scoop, glop, smooth!!
Scoop, glop, smooth!!
Design turned out not quite like planned, but not totally off either. 

Never in my wildest dreams did I expect Orange EO to misbehave.
Scent blend: Orange, pimento berry.
Jazzed up ever so slightly with calendula petals.

Orange, cedarwood EO blend.
Cocoa powder and turmeric swirls.
I like it! 

Lemon-eucalyptus, lemongrass and rosemary.
First batch of soap that I remade!
(the earlier batch was a hot seller)

Rosemary and peppermint soap with a dancing cocoa line!

The superstar!!! B)

There is yet another batch of soap in the mold and I am waiting for it to cool off. Hope everyone is having a great week! 

~Nitya

Soooo purple!!

I'm back with the very last purple trial. After this soap batch, I decided to call myself a pro, coz I now know how to exactly work with alkanet. How much root, how much powder, what oils to infuse in, for how long, how much infused oil to use to always get a consistent purple that is just right for a lavender soap. Did you fall for all that?? I lied!! :P

After making the easy batch by adding alkanet powder directly to soap, I realized it was too scratchy to shower with. The next time around I infused alkanet powder in olive oil and used that in soap. I got too light a purple and after curing it faded some more and turned somewhat grey. Actually I can't describe the color. In some angles it appears grey and in some angles it appears purplish. Or it is just my mind playing games with my eyes.

So for this batch I infused the alkanet root in olive oil and used 10% of that oil along with the base oils.
Result:

Quite a dark purple there. Next time a little less
infused oil. 

I almost forgot to mention, there was a soap volcano again. I might just become a volcano soap specialist one of these days. For now I will stop the lavender soaps, as I still have to try out some pinks.

Ta ta!!

Spice up the Myrtle

Myrtle and spice and all things nice!! That's what I kept saying all the while I made this soap. The soap gremlins were not too nice to me though. Just before making this soap, I was thinking of how it had been a while since I had any soap disasters happening in the kitchen. And with the kind blessings of Mr. Murphy, we had a soap volcano.

Lessons learnt during this soaping session:
- Try to keep it cool in the kitchen. Use a fan.
- Clove can not just spice things up, it can heat them too...especially soap. I knew this, but wasn't prepared.

Right after pouring the soap into the mold, I was trying to get things a little organised and I saw it happen right before my eyes. The soap was slowly rising and bubbling. All I could do was go WHOA! WHOA! WHOA!! Like that was going to calm the soap down. Then I ran with the mold (Note to self and others: DON'T DO THAT!! The hot soap could bubble out and fall on you) to the dining table, under the fan and tried to stir and release the heat. That wasn't working, so I WHOAED my way to the kitchen, grabbed a big pot and WHOAED all the way back to the table just in time to get the soap into the pot, before it bubbled onto the table. After a few moments of stirring and singing a 'Please don't separate and ruin the mold' song, the baby calmed down. I carefully tucked it into a blanket to catch any leaks just in case it decides to wake up and get angry again and tucked myself in for the night too. Thankfully nothing happened. I guess, I am one good singer!! ;)

Rustic looking Myrtle soap

Scented with Myrtle and Cypress essential oils

This was my first soap volcano, but not the last. Will share about another adventure soon!!

Lavender again

Last time the lavender soap was made with Alkanet powder added directly to the soap at trace. I did get a purple, but not one I liked. Plus the soap is speckled quite a bit. 

This time around the alkanet powder was infused in castor oil for some days. This castor oil I used along with the base oils (about 3%). Outcome:

I whipped up some air into the soap

I like it a lot more than the previous lavender soap, but I'll try again. After a few weeks of curing, the color is more greyish than purple and there is a layer of soda ash. Grrr!! I cling wrap the soap after pouring it into the mold and when it is time to cut, there is absolutely no ash at all. But a few days later it magically forms on the top. I wish there is some way to avoid it altogether.

Have a great day everyone!!