Thanks for all the warm welcomes everyone
I'm glad to find a bunch as obsessed, or possibly even more obsessed, of soap as I am.
I had wanted to like the little cupcakes too but for some reason the FO turned into a HORRIBLE scent and it started leaking out from the soaps. I was trying a CPOP method and think the hiccup happened there though the FO's may be to blame. Dunno.
So tonight I undertook another shot at this and took proper notes throughout the entire thing. It makes me realize how IMPORTANT noting things is. I wrote down everything I did step by step. I can say that so far it's nothing short of amazing!
Here's some pics (sorry if too many, I'm just excited at this whole photobucket thing I was taught yesterday evening)
This was final result. It turns out MORE water makes it more fluffy. I think this has to do with the fact that in lotion making higher percentages of oils make a thicker lotion. Higher water makes thinner. If you want it to whip up it needs to be thin enough to do this. I added water at different percentages, noted, then took samples and labeled them to see what happens to them at each stage as time goes on. This picture was at a level I was happy with so I stopped. I had actually removed some of the soap from this batch before taking this shot so that I could make this...
I added about a cup of sugar, just the regular store bought white sugar. It was tough on my hand mixer and kept crawling up the whips. Bit of a pain, but it was worth it. It has the consistency of, well, taffy. I'm really unable to explain it any other way. I scented this one with a sugar cookie FO, seemed appropriate with it being whipped and filled with sugar. It smelt edible. I let them both sit awhile then had to test em out. I put a little of both into some of those ziploc containers... I'm more of a basic CP kinda guy, but something seemed kind of fun using a whipped soap from leftover scraps of a monumental disaster. I've never used a sugar scrub either, but I could feel the sugar in there when I was testing it and I think it could do to have a little bit more sugar, though I don't think my little walmart hand mixer could handle mixing anymore into it. The whipped soap without sugar was creamy and felt exactly how it looked. They both lathered extremely well. After rinsing I was afraid because my skin felt a little tight and I thought perhaps these would be too drying, though I don't know how with all the oils I had added. After drying off my skin feels AWESOME.
I'm still a little worried about separation though so far nothing at all looks like it's separating. I used the borax/beeswax again, and this time I did the entire procedure like a lotion, with a water phase and a separate oil phase. I just put the re-batched soap into the oil phase of things and counted it as an oil while weighing. This came out FAR FAR FAR superior then my first attempt, I really can't stress that enough. This is a bit time consuming, though in the excitement of it I didn't even notice how much time had passed, kinda a normal soaper thing I think
I would def recommend that anyone try this. I have my 4 test samples sitting in separate containers, labeled and corresponding with my notes so that I can check them and note on them and see what happens.I'm going to have to tweak my recipe a little as I added more water AFTER I had already combined everything, including the emulsifier, so I will have to adjust the ratio to account for the added water when formulating this for future use. A preservative would definitely be needed with something like this, but other then that, this could be made completely naturally using your leftover soap bits, an EO, and oils and other ingredients you have laying around your workspace (well actually is Xanthan gum natural? Ok this could be very very very close to all natural
). I have more photos of the entire process at different stages when I remembered to snap a shot and I have notes if anyone is interested in playing around with the recipe and seeing what they can come up with, as long as you're willing to share results back with me
Hope this wasn't too long for everyone, I'm just really excited about it.
Login
Register
FAQ
Search
I love photo tutorial, I can relate words better! That looks like a fun experiment to do!
