I wasn’t sure how to proceed since Ayuko’s soap preferences aren’t very specific. She likes “mildness, softness of lather, soft fragrance, and moisturizing” soap. I had to ask about fragrances that she likes as well, and she responded, “I am not picky about fragrances. But I am not a big fan of food fragrance such as cheese cake, chocolate so on.. I like floral, herb, fruit fragrances. I will be happy with whatever soap you make. Because I’ve always wanted to try your soap~!!!” So, no pressure, right?

I started with my most moisturizing (non-goat’s milk) soap recipe – the one I use for the peppermint soap. It has a lot of hard, white oils and refined shea butter to make it as white as possible. Then I superfat it at 8% so that it won’t dry the skin or get too hard in the mold! I also used aloe vera juice for the lye solution – very soothing for dry skin. Then I found an essential oil blend that I’ve always wanted to try that smells like lemonade and the soap just took a life of its own. And since a video of the process is one of the requirements of the swap, you get to see what I made:

I’ll post the cutting video next so you can see how it turned out! (If you like what you see, I will have 10 bars available!)

For the girls:

South Seas Siren

South Seas Siren is a combination of a Michael Kors type fragrance which is comprised of white florals, warmed with delicate top notes of bergamot, apricot, peach, and plum, finished with a touch of exotic spice, velvety woods, and sensual skin musks with a tropical plumeria fragrance. Just like a siren – it’s completely irresistible! With just 11 of these available, you’ll want to get your hands on these as fast as possible!

For the guys:

Brazen Buccaneer

Brazen Buccaneer is a woodsy blend of bamboo, teak, rainforest, sandalwood and cedarwood. The depth of this fragrance is amazing! Completely earthy, very masculine and sexy. Even the pattern of colors will remind you of wood grain. Only 10 available – check ‘em out here!

After receiving a tip from Holly at Missouri River Soap that Target had heart-shaped silicone molds available in their dollar section (which really cost me $2.50!), I knew I had to make some bubble bath to match the South Seas Siren soap. Here’s a little video on how I made them (and the problems I encountered!):

South Seas Siren Bubble Bath Confections are available HERE. Only 6 available!

Hopefully these will help make your Valentines Day special!

Sweet Pea & Rhubarb Soap

Using a similar method, I decided to make strawberries instead of sweet peas on top:

With only six of these available, I might have to jack the price up or sell them to the highest bidder! It’s such a refreshing – and yes, sparkling fragrance! They’ll be ready at the end of February.

After Kendra finished making her soap, I was ready to start mine. I had picked out four different micas to create my latest favorite method: faux funnel pour soap.

Purple, green, orange, and pink micas in some oil

I had re-heated my oils using Kendra’s hot plate, and overshot the temp I was aiming for, so by the time my lye solution cooled to near 85, the oils were still around 95 degrees. It didn’t take much stick blending to get to a light trace.

Stick blending the soap, and dividing it into the four cups of color.

Kendra thought it was hilarious that I was weighing out the soap into each cup of color. They ended up not being all that equal anyway… I suppose I could loosen up a bit. Maybe.

Stirring up the micas and soap

Here are the various stages of pouring in the four different colors:

Adding pools of soap in alternating colors until the mold was full

Oh, and I also remembered to bring some cups for mini soaps:

Two mini soaps with swirled tops

These will end up in grab bags as soon as I’ve gathered enough of them!

By now you are probably ready to see the cut soap, aren’t you? Ok, no more waiting:

Groovy Guava Soap by Great Cakes Soapworks

The colors have lightened up some, but still look pretty great! The name Groovy Guava really doesn’t capture the full beauty of its fragrance, but it does describe the fun colors! After curing for four weeks, it will be available at Greatcakessoapworks.com starting February 16th.

Making soap with a friend sure was fun! Of course, we grabbed some lunch at Panera when we were done. I didn’t think to bring any towels or blankets to wrap around my soap while it sat in my van. Kendra scrounged around her car for a couple of her girls’ jackets and a small receiving blanket while we ate and chatted. I’d say chances are good we’ll do this again! We are at the very least inspired to try each others’ techniques. I’ve already planned out a gradient colored soap in my head…

Here is the fun part: We knew going into this project that we are opposites when it comes to our soapmaking styles. I am a precision soapmaker, measuring temperatures and weighing everything. Kendra prefers a more laid back approach. Aside from her accurate oil, lye, and fragrance measurements, everything else is fair game for creative license.

We are also used to completely different work spaces. I work out of my kitchen, and she has a dedicated workspace in the basement (without a sink, gasp!).

So, I brought my pot of oils already melted, my mold lined and ready, my infrared thermometer, and of course my camera! The fragrance blend I came up with for Kendra was very well suited for salt soap, so I prepped her for that idea a few days earlier.

Kendra mixed up my fragrance blend right away – a yummy fruity-floral blend that is going to need a name!

Kendra working on my fragrance blend

Then we made our lye solutions, and our first discovery. Kendra adds the lye directly from the bottle into the water, then stirs it up. There were surprisingly very few fumes. I felt more comfortable measuring the lye separately and then adding it to the water. Without a vent like I’m used to at home, the dry lye was flying around the air and we had to grab the ventilator mask. It also seemed like my lye solution was creating more fumes than Kendra’s.

Then Kendra used a coffee grinder to prep her European spa salts for the soap.

Grinding Spa Salts

She also pulled out some of the oils to mix with some green and blue micas which were carefully measured into the cups. Oh wait, I was the one who measured the micas. Never mind!

Getting the micas ready

When she thought her oils and lye solution were ready, we checked the temps just for fun (something she normally doesn’t do). She was a bit surprised to find out that they were around 100 degrees – warmer than she thought. Her goal in making the salt soap was to create graduated layers from green to blue.

Dividing the soap and adding salt

After mixing the green and blue soaps, Kendra poured a layer of green soap in the bottom of the mold. Then she added some of the blue soap to the green and poured again.

Mixing the green and blue soaps, and pouring a layer of blue-green soap over the first green layer.

Adding more blue, and pouring the top layer

Kendra’s signature tops are covered with a dusting of more beautiful micas and glitter.

Gradient tones of silver to darker grey mica and glitter.

After her soap was finished, she put it in the oven on low heat and was able to cut it just four hours after it was made!

Kendra's Salt Soap

Isn’t it gorgeous?? She posted this photo on Facebook and had every bar spoken for shortly after. And for good reason – it’s a work of art!

I’m going to stop here and give you all a rest. Tomorrow you’ll get to see the soap I made.

Update: Here’s Part 2

Soapmakers may find this video interesting as well since I will be showing how I make my Dead Sea Spa Bars, swirling the Dead Sea mud soap and white clay soap into the soap pot. I’ve condensed about four hours worth of work into less than 15 minutes. Enjoy!

(Email subscribers will need to click over to the blog post to see it.)

I had a friend come over to help shoot some video, so here’s a quick tutorial:

If you have any questions, please let me know! I’m planning to make more videos this year, so if you are interested, I would be thrilled if you subscribed to my YouTube channel, and I will do the same.

Textured Peppermint Soap

This is simply a cosmetic issue that I am willing to live with for now. It’s a small price to pay for the time saved in cutting 12 bars of soap at a time. However, I’ve also had issues with what looks like air pockets in the soap as well.

Nizzy, a fellow soapmaker, gave Erin a bit of advice which I thought I would follow. He commented, “From my own experience with the ‘raised bumps’ is from cutting too early. If I leave the logs for a couple of days to ‘settle’ The bumps don’t appear…Do a test cut on a log by cutting a couple of bars from the log over a few days and observe any changes.”

Of course, I had to do a little experiment! Unfortunately, I picked the wrong soap to start my experiment with. Here is a photo of two bars of Creamy Castile soap. The one on the left was cut just under 24 hours after pouring it into the mold. The one on the right was cut three days after the soap was made:

Creamy Castile soap - cut 2 days apart

Castile soap is a finicky sort of soap. It really, really does not like to wait in the mold! As you can see, the soap on the left has the bumpy, air-bubble look, but the one on the right is worse. The wire seemed to rip a layer of soap off as it cut. Not pretty!

I tried this experiment one more time with my Oatmeal, Milk & Honey soap. This is a new batch, made with a natural blend of essential oils with a honey almond scent, instead of the synthetic fragrance I have always used. I let the whole thing sit in the mold for 3 days before cutting – partly because I was too busy to get to it, and partly to see if the soap would be less bumpy when I finally cut it. The soap seems smoother – that is, if you can see with all that oatmeal in there!

Oatmeal, Milk & Honey soap, cut after a 3-day vacation in the mold

Both soaps are the same, cut at the same time. It’s not conclusive yet, but I think I will continue to let my soaps rest in the mold for a few days before cutting from now on. All except the Creamy Castile, that is!

Anyone else have bumpy soap issues? What have you done to resolve this?

The first batch was another shampoo bar tester, made with beer, aloe, seaweed, nettle, and silk. Thank goodness it wasn’t a very big batch, because it ended up all over the counter! This would be my LOW of the day. I had to seriously contemplate whether or not I wanted to continue making soap after this disaster:

This is the photo I took after I scraped all the soap up.

I had this great idea to use my PVC pipe to make round shampoo bars. Only I forgot that when I was making soap in my PVC mold previously, I had a plug of melt & pour soap in the bottom which held the rest of the soap inside. So, today after I poured the soap, I grabbed the pipe to move it just like I had done before, only this time….the soap all came out the bottom! I had to think fast! There was a plastic rubbermaid container that looked like it would hold everything, so I scooped it up with my enormous silicone spatula, and ended up with this:

Shampoo bar tester - I believe this is #4 now

I’ll tell you about the next two batches another time, because I want to tell you about the fourth batch which was amazing! I used the Winter Wonderland fragrance I had from last year because that soap sold like hotcakes. It’s a very complex fragrance. The supplier describes it this way: “A cool, fruity blend that begins with a strong (and irresistible) citrus accord of grapefruit, orange, bergamot, and lemon. The refreshing heart is composed of violet, cyclamen, bois de rose, muguet, pineapple, and a hint of gardenia. The base notes are citronella, sandalwood, jasmine, and musk.”

I got a wild hair to do a four-color swirl in the pot, coloring the soap with micas: mauve, fuchsia, cyan green, and golden green. The base color was white. Here’s what the pot looked like before I poured the soap into the mold:

Winter Wonderland soap pot

I got a little scared that the soap was too thin to pour into the mold without getting totally muddy, so I took my time getting a photo and waited about 5-10 minutes. By that time, it was at the perfect medium trace. After pouring, I had some color left to make a swirl on top:

Winter Wonderland soap in the mold

What a day!! I’m glad to be done. However, I still have a sink full of soap mess to clean up, so I guess I better go take care of that! Tomorrow should be a fun day…cutting soap and all. There’s a special delivery arriving tomorrow as well that I can’t wait to show you!