Finally Soaping Again!

The house smells quite pleasantly of lavender and honey today...

I wrote this the other day on the 4th of July.  It was about 98◦ outside and our air conditioner was not working. The overhead fans were on inside, spreading the scent throughout the house. It was a balmy 80◦ inside, perfect for soapmaking, especially with that lovely scented breeze. My soapmaking attempt of the day? Yep...a lovely Lavender soap, with oatmeal and honey.

A little background for you, as this is my first post...I had a whole bunch written to bore you with, but figured you could look over at the 'About Me' section and see it over and over (lucky you!).  So, here we'll start with the fact that I was married recently (a year in October, yay!) to the love of my life, who has been waiting patiently for me to make my soap.  Here's a bit of the story...

My wonderful man lived in a far away city (at least 2 hours from where I was living...) and told me, quite nicely, that I was free to be unemployed while settling in to my new home. YIPPEE, I thought, I can start making lots and lots of soap and herbal bits (sooo much fun!) and sell them at craft fairs and on-line and show him how nice it will be to have a wife who makes soaps, and herbal salves, and all manner of odd and wonderful crafty things (whew! long sentence...).  Alas, almost a year has passed and my soapmaking has been little and far between. I have been playing with recipes here an there, but have been generally quite unproductive.

So, July 4th I decided to restore his faith in me (quite a wonderful husband, still hasn’t said a word about the non-existent soap and herb business...very patient) and I started off with a bit of hot process soapmaking in the crock-pot! I’ve been enamored lately of the look hot-process soapmaking creates (not mine of course, but I’ve seen pictures...) - very rustic and old fashioned looking to me. It's got that pretty 'medieval' feel to it (to me at least, as I picture it...not the mushy pile you read about in history books!).

Ok - yes, crock-pots aren’t exactly ‘medieval’ in style (back to the cottage in the forest here...), but I just love the look they produce right now, so we’ll see what happens. Mayhap my little cottage will have to get a magical crock-pot (don’t tell the villagers...our part of the forest does not have electricity yet).

So...I’ve played around with a few recipes I’ve seen here and there, came up with a list of favorite oils and ingredients, and ran them through a lye calculator found on the website for Majestic Mountain Sage (http://www.thesage.com/), a great site for both information and supplies. Using their Sunflower Oil, a bit of Coconut Oil, Olive Oil, Calendula tea and Lye, a sprinkling of Cocoa Butter and Beeswax, I melted and stirred and waited until trace (just like thick pudding...) and left everything in the crock-pot to do as it would.

I used a small crock-pot, after all, this was a test recipe. The crock-pot box noted it would hold 64 oz, so my recipe was around 32 oz, give or take. Do you think it fit? Only an inch left from the top! So, when the foamy gloop started curling around half the crock-pot, the top started rising up, and I opened it and stirred quickly (I don’t think you’re supposed to open it often, don’t want all that lovely heat to escape). About half an hour passed and I looked again, and stirred again, and so on for about two hours. When it started looking like a nice shiny Vaseline, I took it off the heat (yes! I got pictures!).

I stirred and stirred to distribute the heat. I took a small mushy bit and touched my tongue to it to test for lye. Disgusting and old-fashioned, but it works...luckily, or not, it just tasted like plain old soap. I even rolled some into a ball and tried to wash with it...lovely petite bubble formed. So, I added a Tablespoon or two of raw honey, and another for good measure, some oats I had chopped by hand (the magical electric chopper was nowhere to be found...) and stirred and folded and stirred. I added a Tablespoon or three of some heavenly smelling Lavender (just plain Lavendula officinalis) and stirred and folded and stirred some more.

Then I reached for a little jar of 24K Gold Mica dust...tapped it a bit into the pot...and I have to tell you it looked like a fairy exploded (that stuff comes out fast)!  So, I scooped up a bit and tossed some in the sink...then blew softly on the pot to distribute the dust a bit before stirring. Needless to say, the kitchen has a nice shimmery quality to it right now. It was very lovely in the afternoon light...and I don't think my husband noticed when he was getting the BBQ ready later that day...

I spooned the mixture into a wonderful little antique wooden box/drawer which I found in Jamestown, CA at a terrific little antique shop, smoothed the top a bit with my fingers and some wax paper, and set it in the sun for a bit to process just a tad longer. It looked so pretty, with a nice golden sheen on the top (no fairy parts left after the sad explosion...just kidding!). It has a soft lather and the longer it sits on the shelf, the more that soft honey feeling comes out in the lather (not the stickyness, just the softness...).  If all goes well, and this recipe works, I’ll be up and running in no time! I can’t wait!  I will, however, still need to work on packaging...

I'll have a few sample sizes for anyone interested...or at least the first five responders...just let me know and I'll send it off for your appraisal and testing.  Who can pass up free soap!  Can you see the golden sparks?