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 ! 

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  2 soaps side by side 

 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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