Beautiful Spring Swirls!

On Monday I had the privilege of teaching Dyanna who came all the way up from Arizona to learn cold process swirling. It's always interesting to share stories with people who are used to soaping in different climates-- my jaw dropped when she told me it's already 90 degrees down there and all she has to do to melt her oils is leave them in the garage over night!


We had a lot of fun, Dyanna had a great attitude and was a real pleasure to spend the time with. We made a six pound batch and used the ever so popular 18 bar birch mold (my favorite!) and a two pound wooden mold. I like to fill the birch mold up with only about 4 pounds of soap even though it holds six, just because it is easier for me to get the bars out with it slightly under-filled. She chose Sea Shore Cybilla fragrance (an amazing scent which unfortunately accelerates trace a little-- not the best to use for swirling because it cuts down your time to add detail, but perfect if you are taking a class where you have the opportunity to learn what to do in that situation!), green chrome oxide, yellow mica, and titanium dioxide for our triple-color swirl.

The soap turned out great; I love the colors and the scent she picked-- it's the perfect combo for this time of year. Thanks Dyanna! I hope you have fun trying out these new techniques at home!

Beeswax and Oatmeal Swirled Soap

Happy Monday! Last week I played with adding beeswax to a 2# cold process soap batch. I used Oatmeal Milk and Honey fragrance oil, titanium dioxide for whitening my oils, yellow oxide for a second color to swirl, slow cook oatmeal for a scrubby additive and white beeswax in addition to my oils.

Working with beeswax can be tricky business. It is known for accelerating trace and overheating the soap. You only need a little bit-- about 5% of your recipe. Too much beeswax makes a sticky, gummy bar that inhibits lather. Beeswax is an ester like fats and oils, which means it can be saponified and needs to be added to recipe and go through the lye calculator just like if you were adding an oil or butter. This is unlike adding the oatmeal, which is a secondary ingredient who's purpose is to exfoliate and does not contribute to the actual saponifying process.

I added the melted beeswax to my low temperature soap (around 90 degrees F) as it reached a very light trace. I noticed the wax begin to slightly solidify at first (beeswax has a much higher melting point than the oils--close to 140 degrees F), but continued stick blending and it evened out into a nice, smooth texture.

In the Soapmaker's Companion by Susan Miller Cavitch, she adds the beeswax right in with the other oils so that it can saponify along with them, which I think I might try next time to see how that reacts in comparison to the method I used of incorporating it after the oils and lye had been mixed.

So, what's the benefit of beeswax in soap? Mainly, it adds to the hardness of the bar and the smell of honey is very pleasant.

Here is the recipe I used:

8 oz Distilled Water
3.38 oz Sodium Hydroxide (lye)
8 oz Canola Oil
8 oz Palm Oil
6.8 oz Coconut Oil
1.2 oz White Beeswax
1.4 oz Oatmeal Milk and Honey Fragrance
1 teaspoon Titanium Dioxide
1/2 teaspoon Yellow Oxide
1.4 oz Oatmeal Milk and Honey Fragrance Oil
1/4 cup slow cook oatmeal. Instant oatmeal will actually cook in your soap with such high temps!

Other supplies:

Rubber spatula and reed for swirling
Assortment of Pyrex measuring dishes for oils, water, splitting the batch to swirl, portioning sodium hydroxide, etc.
Stirring utensils for mixing lye solution
Laser thermometer
2 pound wooden loaf mold lined with freezer paper
Stick blender
Digital Scale
Rubber Gloves
Safety Goggles

I like to lighten up my oils with titanium dioxide before adding in the lye solution because all the stirring to break down any clumps doesn't change the thickness of the oils. I have all the time in the world to make sure the color integration is just right without worrying about reaching trace too soon. (Trace is the word used for the critical point when your mixture of lye and oils begins to thicken up like pudding. This signals the time to add fragrance and then pour into your mold.)
I also added a little more titanium dioxide after mixing in the fragrance once the lye and oils were combined because Oatmeal Milk and Honey does discolor to a tan.

Above is my mold all lined and ready to go. Make sure to have your workspace organized and planned out so that all you have to do is grab and mix.


Voila! My poured soap with swirl pattern and oatmeal mixed in. The beeswax seemed scary at first as it changed texture, but with continuous mixing, it was super easy to handle-- even enough to create a lovely swirl pattern. Mmm, and it smells delicious!

The Menopause Mother's Day Gift

Keeping up with ideas for Mother's Day (which is in less than two weeks from now!), I've put a lot of thought into this oddball gift and have decided that my mother will actually appreciate rather than take offense to it. Yes, it's all about the "M" word.

Also known as the "change of life," menopause comes with mental and physical discomfort and fear, however, there are natural remedies that provide energy and strength.

There are some wonderful benefits to using essential oils in aiding the stresses of menopause. All you have to do is add in the essential oils to your batch of lotion, cream or even a carrier oil such as sweet almond to use as a massage rub and label it accordingly for easy access. Adding essential oil to bathwater is another easy way for mom to wind down the day. I did my research and played around with blends to make sure that they not only smell good (rather than super medicinal), but also provide relief in ways such as energizing, stimulating, calming, soothing, invigorating, and purifying.

Here are the combinations that I came up with:

Grapefruit and Orange Valencia: Energizing and Refreshing
Lavender and Ylang Ylang: Calming and Soothing
Tea Tree and Spearmint: Invigorating and Purifying
Lemongrass and Clary Sage: Stimulating and Balancing

Also try:

Peppermint: Cooling; great in a spritzer of water for a refreshing mist to relieve hot flashes
Basil: Anti-depressant
Cypress: Excessive sweating

Out of all the essential oils, Clary Sage seems to be the number one scent for women. In "The Essential Oils Book," Colleen Dodt swears by it. Its benefits include anti-depressant, anti-anxiety, uplifting, antispasmodic, anti-inflammatory, aphrodisiac, an aid to deeper sleep, and a benefit to the skin and hair care. Dodt says, "As a woman, I would not be without clary sage oil. Its distinct scent has helped me through premenstrual days with grace and ease, as it will through menopause, as well."

It is important to remember to treat essential oils with respect and use them wisely. Only a few drops goes a long way. In lotion and cream, I use only 1 to 2 ml of essential oil per pound of product, and about 5-10 drops of essential oil in the bath. To enhance your shampoo or conditioner, add 1 to 2 drops to 1/2 ounce of shampoo or conditioner.

There are many wonderful resources online with information about menopause and the healing power of aromatherapy. Click here for one of my favorite articles regarding menopause and essential oils. Any suggestions or tricks you've come up with? I'd love your input!

Blue Man Fragrance is Here!

What better way to celebrate the end of the week than to see some of our newest fragrances arrive at Otion!

Blue Man is a duplication of the popular men’s cologne, Aquolina Blue Sugar. The base note of Black Patchouli blends perfectly with Orange Peel, Sparkling Mandarin, Coriander Leaves, Star Anise and Venezuela Tonka. It’s surprisingly sweet and majorly masculine. Discolors to a light brown and does great in cold process.

I made a little melt-and-pour project for our display at Otion by cutting out little guys out of opaque soap with an exacto knife and embedding them in clear base with brilliant blue labcolor. The man in the middle sitting down worked the best because he's actually blue from pouring a blue layer down first before setting him in there.

When the heat from the clear base hit the man cut-out, it created this really whimsical swirl in the soap while it set up!

Below are the little guys waiting to get blue. Even after chopping a bit off his legs, I still couldn't get the little hat on the third one to fit in my mold.

This was really fun and opens the door to all sorts of cut-out ideas. Have fun and enjoy your weekend!

Love for the Customers

I'd like to take a moment today to just throw out a huge appreciation to our customers at Otion. You guys rock! I have discovered that everyone that shops here has the same thing in common-- you love what you're doing, and it shows. When I can get excited with you about how awesome it would be to shoot soap out of a PVC pipe mold with an air compressor, or that spray lotion works great as a base for your perfume product because it moisturizes at the same time, or my favorite-- introducing cold process soapmakers to the lifesaver that is a stick blender, I know that my job here is pretty darn fun.

Plus,your kids are great. No joke, on more than one occasion, we'll have a teeny tiny tot not old enough to spell "soap", take a seat at the Soap Bar and create a melt-and-pour soap so detailed and thoughtful that you would rather put it in a glass box than use it. They know exactly what they want; "This bird is going to be pink with purple sparkles, the sky is going to be blue, not that blue, the lighter blue, with white sparkles, the boat is going to be yellow, and the water is green and white shimmer with bright orange polka dots." ...I cannot even describe the look on their face when it comes out of the mold...

So thanks, and keep up the soap experiments because I can't wait to see what you come up with next.

Need some advice on your project but don't know who to ask? For a fantastic online forum where beginners and advanced soapers unite to solve soaping dilemmas and talk about the latest trends and techniques, visit Teach Soap and ask away!