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Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Maine is beautiful!

Maine is beautiful! The snow is gorgeous! I have walked more in the snow for enjoyment and exercise then I have in years.

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

1st soaps using PVC pipe for a mold


Check out my funny reaction as I unmolded the soap http://youtu.be/ei9CfYg1Erk

Friday, January 11, 2013

My 1st soap recipe!!!

I love YouTube. It has been a great tool to learn about soap making. There is so much to learn from using oils to wooden molds. I am working on mastering scenting my soaps and developing my own recipes. One of my favorite You Tubers is Kimberly of Essential Soaps. She gave a great tutorial on using the Soap Cal. It was just what I needed. I had attempted to do it myself but got no results. After watching her tutorial I was able to confidentially choose my oils based on the qualities I wanted to achieve in my soap.

 Last night I was able to create my 1st recipe using the oils I had available and the Soap Cal. I attempted to scent with 10x orange essential oil from Bramble Berry and Cinnamon spice.  I separating out a cup of my batch and added castor oil and cinnamon. Returned it to the batch and marbled the soap and poured it in a circular motion into the mold. I did the Cold Process Oven process method. The soap bake at 170 for 1 hour.  The heat was tuned off and the soap sat in the oven for 12 hours. I unmolded it and was happy about the look. The soap was smooth and firm. It has beautiful swirls of dark brown spice on a vanilla landscape. Yet the scent was a faint orgrane. I have yet to produce a good scent. I will continue this A-Maine-zing soaping adventure knowing that each batch brings me closer to my perfect batch.

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Guest size soap mold

I was excited to unmold my soap today. Yesterday I made a unscented soap with olive oil, palm oil, coconut oil and castor oil for a super fat. I used the crock pot method. I like using this method it evaporates the lye so that the soap is usable the next day. I used the guest bar size soap mold I purchased from Bramble berry. I did a video when I opened the box . This is the link to view it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRmab5Z7sMU

I like the 3 sides of the soap that formed from the mold. I do not like the exposed side. Simply because of the nature of the hot process method the soap was lumpy.

The texture was firm and comfortable. The soap had a great lather and left my hands feeling moisturized. I also find the size perfect for samples.

I will definitely used this guest size soap mold again. The next time I will do the cold process method to get a completely smooth bar.

Friday, January 4, 2013

Using oatmeal in soap making

Each morning I wake up with a vision and then I step into my reality. Vision this morning was a dream of  soap bars made of oatmeal, honey and spices. The reality was gooey textured, low scented soap bars.

I made two batches using different bases but the same additives.  Batch one I used soybean oil only. I hot processed the soap using a crock pot. The soap traced beautifully.  I added castor oil, spices:cinnamon & fresh grounded cloves, and grounded oatmeal. The color is beautiful but very soft. I put it into a small Glad container to set.

 Batch two was made with palm oil, coconut oil and olive oil. I used the hot process method in the crockpot. The soap came to a beautiful trace. I added the same additives as batch one. The soap was very light and smelled like uncooked cookie dough. I put this in a Glad container to set.

In the morning I was hoping that things would be different but no luck. The darker soap made with soybean oil had a great smell, but remained soft with a low lather. The soap made with palm oil, coconut oil and olive oil was much harder, has a nice lather but smells like uncooked cookie dough.

Feeling disappointed I went online to search about scented soaps. I found a video that talked about fragrance. I liked how it was explained and decided to watch her next video which was a tutorial of the soap calculator. It was just what I needed. I am inspired to try another batch of soap. This time I will use the soap calculator and calculate the kind of soap I want.

Thursday, January 3, 2013

It official!!!

Wow what started off as a blog to talk about Maine has birthed a new blog to talk about the wonderful world of handcrafted soap. I am too excited. I have become consumed with handcrafted soap and all aspects of it. I am grateful to God for allowing me to discover the joy of soap making at this period of my life. I have been a homemaker for the last 15years by choice to raise our children who are now freshman and sophomore in high school. They need me less for there physical needs now. I have more time to devote to my personal interest which is soap making. Thanks to the Internet I can read or watch information about soap any time of day.

When I think about the 1st time I discovered soap making as a hobby I was living in Maryland. A friend of mines moved from Baltimore to a farmland community in Pennsylvania. Her and her husband begin organic farming, canning, composting and soap making. They had a desire to live more naturally in all aspects of their life. When she shared with me that she was making her own soap, I just could not understand why she would want to labor to make soap when she could buy all the soap she wanted at a store. One day she gave me some of her homemade soap and a body butter. I loved it. I still have the jar she gave me that contained the body butter. Ive always had somewhat sensitive skin so I felt the difference immediately It was wonderful. I was smitten with using this on a regular basis. So she was generous and would give me soaps and butters when she made it. Since I did not know about the process I did not know why she could only do it when her children were sleeping.

My husband got a new job and we relocated from Maryland to Tennessee. I lost contact with my friend and started to use store bought soap again but I was drawn to glycerin bars at the store. I bought a couple of books on soap making and said that I should do this.

My kids were in a elementary school that only went up to the 4th grade. I was not comfortable with the assigned middle school which housed grades 4-8. So I began to home school them when they finished the third grade.  My goal was to home school them up to 8th grade and then send them to the local highschool.  Obviously homeschooling was very time consuming but also priceless. I put my soap making ideas on hold. I did start a new hobby of estate sale shopping. I loved it. We furnished our home with beautiful well made furniture, develop a wonderful collection of art books and collected a significant soap making book at one sale.

Well time moved on and so did we. We left Tennessee 6years later due to my husband's new promotion and moved way up to the state of Maine. I would have never imagined myself living in Maine. I grew up in Michigan so I am familiar with cold winters. Since I knew it was smaller state with a lot of parks and undeveloped land I expected it to be different and a adjustment. It is and it has been.

 I prepared myself for the move with prayer and trust in God. God has more than met our needs. We found a great community to live in, a great Church to attend. We have met some Amainzingly friendly people. I can honestly say that 99% of the people are nice.

Once the kids were settled in school I begin to pray about what I should do at this new season of my life. I noticed in my trips to town the galleries and art. I noticed a lot of crafters when attending the farmers market. During a time of prayer one day God reminded of my desire to make soap. That moment I begin to read thru the soap books I had collected over the years. I went to the library and checked out as many soap making books as I could. Then I begin to watch videos on YouTube that had any aspect of soap making. I knew what I was to do now. Make soap.

So that is my journey. My plan along with showing the soaps on this blog is to write about all things pertaining to handcrafted soap. From vendors to makers. I plan to ride this Amainezing journey for a long season. The fun of learning, soaping and sharing has just begun.