I’ve always really enjoyed making a layered soap. It’s one of the first designs I learned as a new soap maker, and I love coming up with different color combinations. This cold snap we’ve had lately had me wanting to make something bright and cheerful that smelled of spring. So I made a rainbow layered soap using various clays, alkanet, and indigo. In the process of creating this soap, I came up with an essential oil blend that I absolutely love. I also put together a video on my whole process. If you’d like to see that or my new favorite essential oil blend, just keep reading. :) Continue reading
handmade
Rose Clay Feather Swirl with Hearts on Top
Last year, one of my friends requested a Valentine’s Day themed soap. We eventually decided on this simple rose clay feather swirl soap with hearts on top. I made the soap again this year but used a slightly different essential oil blend (actually my favorite blend ever). I also made a video on how I created this soap. If you’d like to watch the video or see the recipe, just keep reading. :) Continue reading
Dirty Fluid Pour Soap Challenge
In this month’s Great Cakes Soap Challenge, we had to create a batch of cold process soap using a method called the dirty fluid pour. The dirty fluid pour technique is actually a really cool method of pouring acrylic paint. Our guest teacher was Joanne Watkins of Nature’s Potions Handmade Soaps. Joanne came up with a way we could implement the dirty fluid pour with soap by using pipe connectors in a slab mold. I was determined to participate in these last two soap challenges, and I’m so glad I did. Joanne is an excellent teacher and this technique was a lot of fun. :) Continue reading
Chocolate Oatmeal Stout Beer Soap
I decided to make a beer soap for Fall using my favorite beer, a dark stout. I added oatmeal and cocoa powder to create my chocolate oatmeal stout beer soap. I also created a video showing how I prepared the beer, removing the carbonation and lowering the alcohol content. :) Continue reading
Intaglio Soap Carving
This month’s Great Cakes Soap Challenge involved learning a carving technique called intaglio (pronounced in-tal-yoh). Intaglio is defined as an engraving or incised figure in stone or other hard material. We had to apply this technique to bars of soap, carving a design into each bar. For my design, I decided to create a little landscape using various colors and carving small details into the tree and road. Carving away the top layer of soap to reveal the colors underneath was a lot of fun. :)
Kápia Méra 