More soap ball embeds...

I don't know about anyone else, but sometimes I really start to feel like I'm running out of ideas for Soapmaking.  How many different types of swirls can I do before everything starts to look the same?  By the time I got to this soap, I was in one of such slumps.

 

HARLEQUIN

 

Japanese Grapefruit and Citron leaf neatly crushed with Sparkling Mimosa with smoky note of Tobacco, Sugar Cane and Black Vanilla

 

 

I've been holding on to this oil for a while now unsure what to do with it.  It's "Dirty Mimosa" from the Sage.  I like using FO's from MMS when I'm looking for something very different from the popular scents that other soapers are carrying in their shops.  If only I had a nose for real scent blending...sigh. 

I play around a bit with it, but I'd LOVE to really, really understand how to create my own fragrance blends.  Sorry, back to this soap :0)

 

 

 As I was saying, I'm a bit in a design slump, so I decided to just go with an ITP swirls with more focus on the colors as opposed to the design.  The soap balls were  a last minute addition.  I saw my last bar of Seaberry on the rack and decided, why not add some soap scrap balls again. 

 

MINI BARS

 

The orange soap shreds didn't have much "pop" to them, so I decided to dip them into some gold and orange mica.  I really thought the base would discolor due to the vanilla in the fragrance description, but these have been curing for 2 weeks now and so far so good.  Fingers crossed.



Melt & Pour Soap from Scratch and more Color Mixing

A few days ago, I shared a video on Youtube chronicling my first attempt at making Melt & Pour Soap from scratch.  You can view my video making the MP base at the end of this post.  Also, you can view the original blog post and recipe from Cee here.

 

So, from my little project, I was able to make lots of cute embeds to use in my soap for this fall. 

 

MASQUERADE

 

 Fresh top notes of Orange, Pink Grapefruit and Tangerine with a heart of Strawberry, Apple, Pear and soft florals on a warm base of Sheer Musk

 

 

I've been using micas form Nurture Soap Supplies for most of my soaping.  There are still some favorites that I like to stick to though.  I love my 24K Gold from TKB and Crimson Red from Bramble Berry.  For the most part, I am very happy to say that the colors are quite stable in CP soap. 

 

 

However, I still prefer to mix my colors.  Adding a bit of oxides I find really helps ground some of these micas, particularly yellows & oranges.  Purple is my favorite color and I LOVE trying to fit  a bit of it in there whenever I can so, once again color blending really helps achieve different hues of the same color.  I have a not too stable purple neon from TKB that blended beautifully with my NSS mica.  I'll be posting that soap in an upcoming post.  Stay tuned!

 

 

 

 



Gearing up for Autumn...

I know summer is still here but for soap-makers, this is around the time that we usually start getting our fall line-ups together.  Before I jump into my fall soap batches, I wanted to share just a few summer soaps that I didn't blog about. 

 

SEABERRY

 

Scented with Awapuhi Seaberry.  This is a calming, "by the sea" type of scent with ozonic marine notes with the aroma of tropical flowers, citrus and tart berries on a mellow base of white musk.

 

 

I used three different shades of blue swirled into a white base.  The soap balls were made with shredded soap from every soap scrap I could find in varying shades of blue.  I really like how the balls resemble little blue planets

 

FLING

 

 A fresh and uplifting blend of Orange Zest, Lemon Pulp and Kiwi with a center of Bamboo & Blackcurrant on a warm woodsy base

 

I really don't know what this technique is called, but for a point of reference, I refer to it as a "traveling faux funnel" pour.  It's just like the faux funnel pour put I choose a different spot to pour every few passes.

 

One more,  I have to show this one because I just really, really like the scent! 

 

OASIS

 

 Fresh sliced Pineapple beautifully blended with the heady and intoxicating aroma of Jasmine

 

I honestly can't even talk about the swirling technique for this one, LOL.  For once, I didn't really plan the soap design.  I chose the colors and just sort of dropped them in.  What I have been doing though is playing around with color mixing.  I tend to use the same colors over and over again in my soaps, so I am trying to at least come up with different shades for those colors.  I though this combination was pretty, fun and tropical.

 

Now, I'm looking forward to fall.  I'll be back to share my creations as I finish them.  Thanks for reading :0)