Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Greatcakes Soap Challenge 2016 - Tiger Stripe Technique Modified

December 2016 - Soap challenge - hosted by Amy Warden

Peppermint Candy Twist

Challenge Rules:

All soaps must be made by the Cold Process method.
The majority of our soap must feature the Tiger Stripe technique. (Amy will be looking for those fine lines)
We  have the option to manipulate the soap after we pour our soap into our log mold but it must still be apparent that there are stripes throughout the soap.
Our soap must be  2 colors or more and cut normally, in vertical slices.
We may submit a photo from (1) batch only with the  only editing being for lighting and color adjustments to best represent what the soap looks like in real life.

Oils Used:


Olive oil, Coconut oil, Palm oil, Sweet Almond oil, Castor oil.

Additives used:


Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal

Color Pallet:

White - Titanium Dioxide
Red -  A blend of Merlot Mica + Electric Bubble Gum
Purple -
Electric Bubble Gum and Pink Oxide (I was going for just a light pink and was surprised with the purple)

Essential Oil:

Peppermint

Tiger Stripe Technique:


I lined my log mold, prepared my lye solution and sat it  off to the side to cool.
I heated the oils while the lye solution was cooling, then I added my additives into my oils and mixed them in well.
When my Lye solution was about 85 degree F I started to soap.

I poured my Lye solution into my oils and brought it to emulsion.
Then I divided it out into 3 containers evenly (by eyeballing)
Added my colors into each container and stirred each container to light trace.
I then layered a line of each color down in the middle of the mold the full length of my mold, alternating between colors. When I reached the top, I poured the rest of my white soap batter on the top and evened it out.
Then I took a spoon and  I started manipulating the soap. I tried to only go down about 1/2 way into the mold with my spoon. I just took the spoon put it in the soap and twisted the spoon then put it in another spot and twisted it the opposite direction and continued in that pattern until I went along the whole mold (one side to the other side) and crossed my fingers that it didn't ruin my Tiger Stripe to much.  :)


This is my first time doing the  Tiger Stripe technique.
Since I manipulated it I feel that I should go and make the Basic  Tiger Stripe soon without any kind of manipulation at all.

Thanks Amy for another fun Challenge.




Wednesday, November 23, 2016

Embeds, Soap Balls in Cold Process Soap

Midnight Lemon Mojito Soap



I thought I would try out a new soap, something different than I've ever done before. Yes, I am always up for a great challenge and always wanting to try new things and continually learn, so here I done it again.
I 've heard so many great things about Activated Charcoal so I knew I wanted to give it a try, so I figured now is as good as a time as ever! Then I thought it might be nice to add a little gray color in there and give it a little swirl,,, So, I did !
I had just rolled some Midnight Mojito soap balls the day before so I thought why not add them as well.... OH, how fun it would be to try to create a soap with some Embeds!
Since Midnight Mojito is a Citrusy scent, I decided to add my lemon Deluxe blend to my Charcoal soap base.  Which I think is a great choice because it smells Oh so good !!!
You know now I just had to add a bit of glittery fun to the soap top, it now glistens so nicely.



I can't wait until these are cured and I can give them a try!

If you have used a soap with Activated Charcoal before, Please leave me a comment and let me know how you liked it and how it feels on the skin.

Thanks for stopping in and reading and commenting on my blog,

Greatcakes Soap Challenge Cosmic Wave Redemption 2016

Cosmic Wave Redemption

Soap Challenge Club- November 2016


 I was so excited to see that Amy is giving us another chance to do the cosmic wave all over again and make it work and see success. Boy do I ever need this!!! I have this burning desire to get this thing right, so yea I will practice until I get it for sure!
More great news is that since this isn't the competition anymore, there are no guidelines. This totally allows me to try something new, like filling  my Slab mold with the base soap and then creating the Cosmic Wave technique on just the top surface of my soap. Well we shall see how this goes !

So off to my soap studio I go.....

The first thing I did was line my slab mold with freezer paper.
Next, of course since I was only doing the cosmic wave on the surface of my soap top, I had to adjust the ratios of  my contrasting colors to use with my base color.


I decided to use the slow moving formula below for my soap:
Olive Oil   27%
Coconut Oil   30%
Palm Oil   33%
Sweet Almond Oil   10%

6% Super fat    30% Lye Concentrate

 I safety geared up with my gloves and my pretty Pink goggles then I added Silk to my distilled water and stirred it well to dissolve, then I measured out my lye and added it into my distilled water, stirred it until it was dissolved and clear and sat it off to the side to cool.

 I measured out and melted my solid oils, when they were melted I added in the liquid oils.
I then added Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal and my Essential oils into my soaping oils and stirred them in well.
When my Lye solution was 88 degree F, I stirred in some Sodium Lactate.


Time to get Soaping !!!

 I slowly poured my Lye down my stick blended into my oils, stirred it a little then gave it a few bursts until I reach just the lightest trace.
Divided my soap batter out for my 2 combination colors (Red in one cup, white in the other cup) poured them both into squeeze bottles. Then I colored my base soap Black with 2 TBS. Activated Charcoal.
I poured most of my Black base soap into my slab mold.
I then grabbed a long spouted container to layer my colors. I put about an 1/8 cup base soap in the bottom then took some red and squeezed zigzags over top of the black, poured in a little more black and then put white zigzags on top of the black and started pouring my top layer very slowly and as close to the surface of the soap as I could. When I ran out of color I would do the same method as explained to fill my container but altered colors here and there.
When I was finished with the pour I (CPOP), Preheated over to
170 degrees F. Put my soap into the oven for 15 minutes and then turned off the oven and turned the oven light on over night.
I ended up with tiny bubbles on the surface of my soap again so I had to plane it some.



What I will change next time I do this technique:

I will only fill my Slab mold half full of base soap and leave more soap for my contrasting colors so that there is a thicker layer of cosmic wave on the top surface. I also had very tiny bubbles on the top of my soap after (CPOP) so I did need to plane the top of my soap some, which took some of my detail off of the soap.
This technique would look much better if it doesn't need to be planed. The next time I do this technique, I will do it without oven processing and hopefully avoid the need to plane it at all. I just haven't found the sweet spot to (CPOP) in my oven as of yet.


Here is another batch of my practice Cosmic Wave soaps !


For this soap I used a 1 cup glass measuring cup and layered the colors in the cup and then poured into my slab mold. The cup was hard to get down low and maneuver in my small mold.


These ones I also ended up with tiny bubbles that I had to plane off  of the top surface of the soap.

I will continue this technique for sure, I am aiming for the really fine lines all over like Tatsiana creates in her cosmic wave soaps.

Thank you Amy for doing a Redemption for this challenge. I sure have had a really hard time with this one for sure. You have helped clarify the technique for me to better understand. 

Thank you all for stopping by and reading my blog ! 

Friday, November 11, 2016

Clyde Slide Attempt

My First Clyde Slide Attempt

One of my all time favorite soap makers, would have to be Clyde Yosheda !
I love his style, how he goes over his color pallets and his unique soaping methods and etc. Yes, I watch all of his videos on YOU TUBE !!!
I have always wanted to try his Clyde slide so I thought I would give it a whirl.

Here it is.....



 Below: Picture of soap top with a little bit of Gold Sparkle Mica.


I used recipe/formula consisting of:
Olive Oil, Palm Oil, Coconut Oil, and Sweet Almond Oil.

When my oils were emulsified, I divided my batter into containers to be colored.

My main pot was my White soap base.
Contrasting colors were:
color #1 - Forest green mica with just a touch of  titanium dioxide
color #2 - Purple mica with titanium dioxide
color #2 - Dark Purple created by mixing Purple mica with just the smallest touch of Blue ultramarine colorant.

Scent: I added Blackberry Sage from Brambleberry, which is an Awesome scent!
By this point my soap batter had thickened a little much (medium trace).
So, I had to pour my contrasting colors in layers into the main pot quickly but I really like the affect it gave.
I will be trying this one again in the near future, with a light trace.

Have you made the Clyde Slide before, If so I would love to hear your experiences if you would like to share.

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Thank you for visiting & reading my blog.


Monday, October 10, 2016

Greatcakes Soap Challenge 2016, Wood Grain Soap Technique

Wood Grain Soap Technique

October 2016 Great Cakes Soap Challenge Entry 


 The goal of this months soap challenge was to get our soap to look like a natural wood grain pattern. 
We could chose to enter into the All Natural or the Synthetic category.
I always make all natural soaps so I decided to do a soap for the Synthetic category so I could play with some new colorants.

I used 36 oz. of oils    Superfat at 6%
The method I chose to create the wood grain effect was achieved by putting different colors of soap batter in squeeze bottles and then I put a line of soap batter down and then I went over that line with the next color, and then the next color and continued until all of my soap batter was gone.

The oils I used are: Tallow 33%, Olive oil 33%, Coconut oil 30%, and 
Castor oil 4%.
I melted my oils and stick blended my soap batter to an emulsion. I added a bit of Kaolin Clay, pulsed a bit with my stick blender just to incorporate the clay. Next, I divided the soap evenly into separate containers and mixed in the color/colors. I then mixed in the Fragrance blend and then poured it into 5 different squeeze bottles and then I started designing my soap in my 9 bar Birch wood mold.

Before I got a quarter of the way done, my soap batter really thickened up on me (I am thinking due to the Rosewood/Vanilla F.O.???) I was able to work right through it though, the layers just wasn't able to spread out very well on their own. I gave the mold some shakes and jiggles a little here and there. Ok, maybe a lot! :) When I was done, I gave it some good taps so hopefully I wouldn't have any air bubbles. 
I then thought it may pop a little if I CPOP, so I put it in the pre-heated 170 degree F oven for about 1 hour.
The next day I had some really nice hard soap, with an Awesome scent!
I was worried that I may get some soda ash on top but luckily I did not!  

The colors that I used:
Color #1- Soap batter with no color (Added: .5 oz. Rosewood/Vanilla F.O. from Bramble Berry)

Color #2- Soap batter with Regular Cocoa Powder
  
Color #3- Soap batter with Special Dark Cocoa Powder
  
Color #4- Soap batter with Regular Cocoa Powder + Orange color (created by mixing some Electric Bubble Gum with Fizzy Lemonade and just a touch of Blue Ultramarine) Electric Bubble Gum, Fizzy Lemonade and the
Blue Ultramarine is from Bramble Berry.

 Color #5- Soap batter with Regular Cocoa Powder with just a touch of
Electric Bubble Gum and Fizzy Lemonade. 

Scent: I used .05 oz Patchouli, .3 Sweet Orange, .35 oz. Lavender Essential oil with .7 Rosewood/Vanilla Fragrance oil.  Smells amazing, such a wonderful blend, I will be using it again for sure.


I loved working with the Bramble Berry colors they are so amazing and I was able to create many different colors with them.
I really enjoyed this challenge it was really fun, Thanks again Amy for a great challenge!!!

Friday, September 16, 2016

Greatcakes Soap Challenge 2016, Piped Soap Cupcakes

Great Cakes Soap Challenge Club Entry– September, Piping

Chocolate Orange Soap Cupcakes

Piped with: Russian ball tip
Colors used: Cocoa Powder for the base and the soap frosting. I used Titanium dioxide for the white and Electric Bubble Gum/Fizzy Lemonade for the Peach color.

Oils used: Extra Virgin Olive oil, Coconut oil, Cocoa Butter, Shea Butter and Castor oil

I Melted the (Coconut oil, Cocoa Butter)
When oil & butter was melted, I added the Liquid oils and the Shea Butter.
Mixed my Lye solution until it was clear, then I poured the   Lye solution  into my oils and stired with a spatula for a few minutes. I then began stick blending/pulsing   the soap batter to light trace.
I then divided my soap batter into containers to add color.
I used 3 tsp. of Cocoa Powder to color my base.
For the frosting, I colored my white with a little bit of Titanium Dioxide . The Peach color was a mix of  Electric Bubble Gum/Fizzy Lemonade.

After my colors were mixed up, I poured the base color into the silicone Cupcake liners and set them off to the side.
I left the frosting colors a lone and kept going back to check on them here and there, gave them a stirring and repeated that until they were all ready to pipe. (It took about an hour for this recipe) I think next time a will stick blend pulse them a little longer before letting them sit.
When my batter was thick enough I added 1 oz. Orange Essential oil stirred it in well with spatula. I then started spooning the colors (white, orange/make 4 rows) in lines on to some plastic wrap. I then folded the plastic wrap around the soap frosting (twisted the end closed) and slide it into my piping bag. Then I began to pipe!
The recipe was great without any ricing or anything.

My thoughts:
  Piping was a lot of fun and definitely a learning curve for me, if you are feeling adventurous give it a try !!! :)
The Russian tips will be nice after I get the hang of them.
Thank you Amy for giving me the opportunity to participate in this challenge.  I had lots of fun with this process and will be practicing more with the Piping technique for sure.