Teach Soap

I'm new to soap making and LOVE this site. I tried a few recipes which have all been ok but not what I need. My youngest who is turning a year old Sunday Yay! has severe skin issues. It's one of the main reasons I wanted to start making my own soaps so we knew what was in them. But I haven't been able to make good one for him yet. Before I took on this hobby I bought a handmade castille oat from a vendor on etsy because store bought soaps were soo bad on his skin he would chaffe, breakout, and even bleed daily but she closed up shop and I really want to do this myself. He has both ezcema and severely dry skin. I tried a castille only recipe I found floating on web but well it was kind of greasy and didn't hydrate him enough he's still so dry which causes patches on his skin if rubbed those chaffe off still (I did use EVOO not OO I don't know if that matters) plus I was hoping for one that had a light scent to it but wouldn't irritate him. I know honey or oatmeal doesn't bother him. I've tried other handmade soaps with coconut, palm, sunflower, and castor oils in various combinations all came out good but broke him out. So I was hoping one of you experienced soap making gals would share a great recipe for me to use on my sensitive little tyke. Thanks for the help. Katie

Welcome!
Any recipe you find on the net run through a lye calculator as not all are accurate. You can make a castille soap with just olive, a small amount of long cooking type of oats (not instant) and about one tsp. of honey per lb. of soap. For 16 ozs. of olive oil, you will need 4 to 6 ozs. of water and 2 ozs. of lye for a 7% superfat. You can find the lye calc here. http://www.thesage.com/calcs/lyecalc2.php

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

Hiya KomfyKate

The grade of olive oil supposedly does make a difference -- the lower the grade of olive oil, the more unsaponifiable fatty acids are in it, which is a good thing Grade A and pomace grade (the lowest grade) olive oil are both common choices for soap. The EVOO might not have had enough extra fat after saponification for that necessary bit of moisture for your son's skin. (And it's pricey! Save it for the cooking )

SMR has a pretty in-depth explanation of OO soap .

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CP newbie who's turning into a soaping addict!

Hi KomfyKate

I understand the skin problems like you have discussed, as my daughter (now 34) had the same or similar thing when she was only a few months old. It was back in the "good old days" when we used cloth nappies only. Her rash started on the buttocks and grew to cover her whole body from top to toe. The plunket (child care nurse/adversers here in NZ) suggested that I needed to rinse the nappies more, so in addition to the usual 2 rinses I then did 4 and added baking soda to neutralise any acids that may have still remained. Her condition only got worse and after everything that had been tried my doctor sent her/us to see a skin specialist. He hit the roof when he found what I had been advised to do as he explained skin usually falls into 2 different types. Alkaline and Acidic. My daughters skin needed more acidity and the baking soda was only making a bad situation worse. He prescribed 3 different strengths of hydrocortisone ointment for different parts of her body and told me to pour vinegar into the final rinsing water of all her clothes and nappies. Within days her condition had all cleared up.

On another note I have been using my own soap now for about 6 months and have noticed that the scaly growths that had recently started growing on my skin in the last few years are now slowing disappearing, which I put down to the soap. Perhaps you may need to stay with one soap for a little longer to see if it is effective or not.

Good luck with your son.

Thank you so much Jenova that was informative. I got a 2g organic EVOO from a local farmers market sale for a great price and used it since I had it but your right it was high grade and probably didn't leave the extra moisturizing for my little guy. So I'll go with regular OO.

SoapBuddy: Thanks soo much for the recipe. Around how much oatmeal should it be though, around the same as the honey? I do't want to use to much and cause it to be lye heavy. Should I leave the oatmeal in "oats" or grind it in blender first? Also should I add it all at the beginning or should the oatmeal and honey be added at trace?

Thanks again. Katie

Busybee: Thanks for the info. His doctor prescribed 2 steriod creams for him and though they help they don't solve the problem. Not to mention they are really greasy and cause his clothes to stick to him he hates it. The castile oat soap I was buying actually worked great and cleared him up from the store bought issue, but then i tried my conconctions and he broke out with the noncastile soaps but my castile soap we tried first he didn't break out with he was just was dry. I try not to use lotion on him because again he breaks out BAD so I was looking for a new castille recipe that I coud make that would give him some protection and a nice little scent and not dry him out or break him out. On another note, as much as I try to be green though I'm not hardcore greenie, I work around 45 hour weeks and never went with the cloth diapers but each time I've potty trained I just got rid of diapers altogether and went with undies, and feel the pain you must have went through with those cloth diappies. Bless you mama. Thanks for sharing your experiences with me. Your right skin take awhile to heal once I find good recipe I'll stick with it. I think the honey will be great skin protectant and the oatmeal a softner. Though I'm not sure on that, chemistry isn't my forte, I'm actually into itsy bitsy bugs LOL.

For what it is worth this is my modified castille soap; olive oil 90%, cocoa butter 3%, castor oil 6%, beeswax 1%, water and lye.
I added the cocoa butter as a lubricant, castor oil for bubbles and beeswax to firm up the bar. I superfatted to 5%, could increase to 7% if his skin is extremely dry. If you run this thru soap calc it will give you the amt of lye and water, I went with 38% but would decrease that now. And I would say avoid all fragrance and color, they could act as a skin irritant. I made this for my grandson who had very sensitive skin. You could still add the oatmeal, finely ground, at 1tsp PPO and still add the honey that SB recommended. The conditioning number on this is 81 - norms are 44-69. Hope this helps.

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Susie
Sometimes A Mistake is so much fun, You just have to do it again!

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

I just wanted to mention one more thing about castille soap - it takes longer to cure than regular soap. You can use it after 4 weeks, but if you wait 4-6 months, it will be so much better! In early February I made a 100% olive oil soap and used goats milk in place of the water. I used it once a week after the 4 week cure was up and it was awful the first few weeks. It is much much nicer to use now. It actually lathers now and doesn't feel oily like it did at first. I use it as a facial bar and on my legs where I have ezcema.

I hope you find something that works for your little guy!

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Linda
I know the voices in my head aren't real, but they sure have some great ideas!

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

Soapbuddy, it still is very slick, but not too bad actually. I don't care for castille but this isn't slimy feeling so I will definitely make it again. I hadn't thought about the sugars in the GM helping it lather (not a lot of lather, but more than any other castille I've used). Good point!

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Linda
I know the voices in my head aren't real, but they sure have some great ideas!