Sunday Soap

The drying racks are back in business. The sewing room smells so good. Nothing smells better than freshly made soap.

I made three types of soap this week and every one of them gave me a fit.

First I made this coconut milk soap. The new beachy type fragrance oil riced on me, which means it made the batter clump up. I beat it out the best I could but it's going to have to be tested carefully to make sure all that lye got mixed in.

Because it was so clumpy, I didn't think the colors would work out but they don't look too bad after all. The top is a muddy mess but I guess you can't have everything.

I was so aggravated about the ricing disaster that I just had to give it another go. I had a Halloween soap in mind.

This is a pumpkin oil bar that behaved better than the first one but it thickened up too quickly as well. This time it was my fault because I chose a recipe that I knew was too thick to swirl colors. Oh, well.  It's pretty clear that I'm out of practice with this cold process thing. It's been six weeks since I made any lye soap and it certainly shows.

The next day I made some sea salt bars with kelp and sea clay.

 It sounds crazy but you add an entire cup of sea salt to the batter. If this don't take your skin off, nothing will.

People swear by this type of soap. They say it's actually mild and creamy. I'm pretty curious about it but as always-it will be a good six weeks before I know if any of them worked out at all.