Fun with Salt

Lately, I've been making Soleseife (German for salt water soap) or Brine Soap.  It's a pretty simple process that makes a really great bar of soap.  The ingredient are very basic:  Coconut Oil, Water, Sodium Hydroxide (lye) and Salt.  I also use fragrance or essential oils and colorants.  Sometimes I use other additives like coconut milk powder.  Here are a couple of examples made this week.

These bars are scented in Lime and have added coconut milk powder:

This isn't the best picture (I will take others after they cure), but they smell amazing.  These bars are scented in Black Raspberry Vanilla:

Because the brine water makes the soap harden quickly, they work very well in detailed soap molds.  Still, they are meant to be used (I'll make more).  Soleseife bars produce very nice thick lather.  I'm loving them. They will be available for purchase in 4 weeks.

Try Me Sets

I'm now offering sets of three guest/travel sized soaps in my Etsy shop.  Each set offers a variety of available scents.  Sectioned from our regular size soaps, they give the user look and feel of several soaps.  Check them out:

Candy Shop Confetti Soap

Before I sell my soap bars, I bevel the edges to make them smoother on the hands for the first couple of uses.  Bars that haven't been bevel can feel a little rough at first.  Of course, beveling all of these soap bars leaves me with lots of soap shavings.  Once my shavings container gets full, I make confetti soap.  Confetti soap is just a regular soap batch with added shavings.  Here is my latest batch of confetti soap.  It's scented in a fruity, candy type scent.  This batch will be ready to sell in 6 weeks.

Here is the full loaf on my multi-bar cutter:

And here it is once cut:

Last picture is the bars resting on the curing shelf:

Day of the Dead

I'm obsessed with Day of the Dead.  I just think the celebration and decorations are so beautiful.  I decided to work on a soap to honor Day of the Dead.  It's scented in Satsuma and smells amazing.  It's still a little soft, so it won't be listed for a while, but here is a preview.

Junkin!

I went "junkin'" this week and found a fun prop for my soaps.  It's a vintage, pressed glass soap and washcloth holder.  I snapped a few quick photos to show you, but the only round soap I have on hand is this boring tan one.  Booooo.  Guess I will have to make some fun round soaps so I can photograph them in my new vintage soap dish.

Until next time...

Let's Do This!

Welcome to my blog where I talk all things soap.  Well, probably other stuff as well, but mostly soap.  I'll share videos and lots of photos so you can get an inside look into the business of making and selling soap.  Let's start with a video of my soap studio.  I hope you enjoy!