Adventures With The Sage

Collect needed supplies:
Liquid Soap of your choice Shower Gel & Liquid Hand Soap in One, Extra Thick Shower Gel, Bubble Bath, or Paraben Free Body Wash (I’m using the Shower Gel & Liquid Hand Soap in One)
Premixed colors from January 12, 2009
Fragrance Oil of your choice (I am using Blowing Bubbles Fragrance Oil)
Scale
Small Transfer Pipette
Mixing Bowls
Spoons
Containers for storing finished colors (I’m sending out samples in the 10 mL Lip Balm Jars)

Recipe in ounces:
6 ounces Shower Gel & Liquid Hand Soap in One
0.01 ounces Blowing Bubbles Fragrance Oil
3 to 12 drops of Premixed Colors

Mix the Shower Gel & Liquid Hand Soap in One and Blowing Bubbles Fragrance Oil together. Once mixed, divided into 6 smaller mixing containers for adding the color. This will give you red, yellow, blue, green, purple, and orange bathtub paints.

Red:
3 drops of Purple Raspberry Premixed Color

Blue:
3 drops of Grape Premixed Color

Yellow (if you desire, but I wouldn’t recommend it):
3 drops of Lemon Yellow Premixed Color

Green:
1 drop Grape Premixed Color
2 drops Lemon Yellow Premixed Color

Orange:
1 drop Purple Raspberry Premixed Color
2 drops Lemon Yellow Premixed Color

Purple:
10 drops Purple Raspberry Premixed Color
1 drop Grape Premixed Color

Add color and mix thoroughly. Pour into final containers for use. A great gift to any splashing bather.

Submit your photos and text for the guest written Embedded Melt & Pour Soap Challenge! Submissions will be accepted through October 18th at blog@thesage.com. The submissions will be released October 19th through October 23rd. Each guest writer will receive a $25 gift certificate. I have already received one entry! Don’t miss out on your chance!

Don’t forget to submit your blog or video posts to win the MMS Perfumer’s Kit. Remember, this kit is worth $280! Wow!

Collect needed supplies:
Salt of your choice (I used Fine Dead Sea Salt)
Orange Color Spray Bottle (Made on September 18th)
Lemon Sugar type Fragrance Oil
Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
Small Clear Gusseted Bags
Small Transfer Pipettes
Scale
Heavy Duty Plastic Zip Bags
Ribbon (I used yarn)
Black Permanent Marker

Fragrance Blend:
1 part Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
3 parts Lemon Sugar type Fragrance Oil

Recipe in ounces:
24 ounces Fine Dead Sea Salt
0.03 ounces Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
0.09 ounces Lemon Sugar type Fragrance Oil

Weigh the salt into the heavy duty plastic zip bag. Add the fragrance oil and then knead until there are no more clumps. Gently spray the salt two to six times with the color and mix. Repeat until the salt is the color you desire. I used about 50 sprays of color. Fill the gusseted bags and tie closed.

Enjoy!

Submit your photos and text for the guest written Embedded Melt & Pour Soap Challenge! Submissions will be accepted through October 18th at blog@thesage.com. The submissions will be released October 19th through October 23rd. Each guest writer will receive a $25 gift certificate.

Don’t forget to submit your blog or video posts to win the MMS Perfumer’s Kit. Remember, this kit is worth $280! Wow!

Collect needed supplies:
Baking Soda
Citric Acid
Cornstarch
Lemon Yellow Dry Color
Purple Raspberry Dry Color
Lemon Sugar type Fragrance Oil
Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
Small spray bottle
.15 cc scoops
Small Clear Gusseted Bags
Small Transfer Pipettes
Scale
Mixing Bowl or heavy duty plastic zip bags
Ribbon (I used yarn)
Black Permanent Marker
Water

Fragrance Blend:
1 part Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
3 parts Lemon Sugar type Fragrance Oil

Recipe in ounces:
12 ounces Baking Soda
6 ounces Citric Acid
2 ounces Cornstarch
0.03 ounces Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
0.09 ounces Lemon Sugar type Fragrance Oil

Recipe in grams:
320 grams Baking Soda
170 grams Citric Acid
57 grams Cornstarch
0.8 grams Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
2.5 grams Lemon Sugar Fragrance Oil

Color Spray:
0.15 cc Purple Raspberry Dry Color
0.15 cc Lemon Yellow Dry Color
Water to top off the spray bottle

Weigh the dry ingredients into the mixing bowl or bag and mix gently. Add the fragrance oils and mix well to break up all the clumps. Set aside while mixing color spray. Add dry color to the empty spray bottle and top off with water. Cap the bottle and shake until mixed. Don’t worry that the bottle looks like it is filled with a red color. It will be orange when you spray.

Gently spray the dry ingredients with the color spray about two to four times and then mix. Repeat until the dry ingredients all have a light orange color. I used 45 sprays of color. Set the mixture aside while you prepare the gusseted bags.

Draw a face for your pumpkin on the lower third of the bag. Triangle eyes, crooked teeth, big smiles, crazy eyes, small noses, you name it. Fill your bag with the bath fizzies and tie closed with a ribbon. These adorable bags of bath fizzies are now ready to give away! Can’t you just see a cute little stack of bath fizzy pumpkins sitting on the bathroom counter that are ready to be used?

Notes:
This fragrance blend has some spice notes with sweetness. As one of the guys on staff described this blend, “It has a tad bit of chocolate and caramel swirl with Atomic Fireballs and Jolly Ranchers!” Whatever they say, this fragrance blend is delicious, since everyone agreed that it smelled like candy. Just what I was aiming for!

If you want a darker orange color, double or triple the dry colors when adding to the bottle and then top off with water. This will make the color stronger.

Change to color to green and you could have Frankenstein. You can also make the Magic Color Bath Fizzies and make ghosts! Let your imagination run wild and play with various Halloween creatures!

Submit your photos and text for the guest written Embedded Melt & Pour Soap Challenge! Submissions will be accepted through October 18th at blog@thesage.com. The submissions will be released October 19th through October 23rd. Each guest writer will receive a $25 gift certificate.

Don’t forget to submit your blog or video posts to win the MMS Perfumer’s Kit. Remember, this kit is worth $280! Wow!

What is a souffle? A light, fluffy baked dish made with egg yolks and beaten egg whites combined with various other ingredients and served as a main dish or sweetened as a dessert. This lotion is definitely light and as a bonus, calorie free!

Collect needed items:
Stearic Acid
Emulsifying Wax
Liquid Glycerin
Golden Jojoba Oil
Avocado Butter
Kukui Oil
Vitamin E Acetate
White Cocoa Butter
Water
Silk Powder
Germaben II
Fragrance Oil of your choice (I’m using Blackberry Sage Fragrance Oil)
Purple Raspberry Liquid Color from January 12 2009 (Optional)
Transfer Pipettes
Scale
Microwave Safe Container
Immersion Blender
Microwave
Containers for the finished lotion

Recipe:
9 grams Stearic Acid
22 grams Emulsifying Wax
9 grams Liquid Glycerin
46 grams Golden Jojoba Oil
20 grams Avocado Butter
15 grams Kukui Oil
5 grams Vitamin E Acetate
10 grams White Cocoa Butter
813 grams distilled water
2 grams Silk Powder
9.45 grams Germaben II
5.5 millimeters Blackberry Sage Fragrance Oil
Purple Raspberry Color

Weigh all ingredients except Germaben II and Blackberry Sage Fragrance Oil into the microwave safe container. Heat in the microwave using short time bursts until everything is melted. Blend using the immersion blender. Add Germaben II and Blackberry Sage Fragrance Oil once the temperature drops below 140 degrees Fahrenheit. Blend until completely mixed. I like to add the color at this point to help me determine if I have mixed all of the ingredients together. Pour the mixed lotion into the containers.

Since this is a fluid lotion, I filled the 1 oz LDPE bottles for this post and then capped the bottles with the Black Disk Tops to match as samples to go out in orders. Fill what ever size bottles you desire.

Enjoy!

I sat down and made a list of products that would help me achieve the desired effect of clean hands! I decided to start with the Glycerin Scrub Base and the Fine Pumice. I made a small test batch and realized that there wasn’t enough texture to help scrub my hands. I decided to add Fine Dead Sea Salt to the batch and see if that worked. Once I had mixed in the salt, I found the coarse scrubbing texture to be just right, but I wanted more help removing grease from my hands. That was when I remembered the conversation I had had with Tina about the properties of clay that can be useful for helping to remove impurities from the skin, like oil. After that thought, I had to find my Red Morocco Clay to add to the scrub. I added the clay, but because the pumice and salt had already been added, the clay did not mix well into the scrub. I set that test batch aside and started over again.

This time I added the Red Morocco Clay to the Glycerin Scrub Base and stirred before I added any other ingredients. Once the clay had been stirred in completely, I added the Fine Pumice and Fine Dead Sea Salt. This time the scrub was just what I wanted!

Collect needed supplies:
Glycerin Scrub Base
Fine Pumice
Fine Dead Sea Salt
Red Morocco Clay (or clay of your choice)
Fragrance or Essential Oil of your choice (I’m using Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil)
Transfer Pipettes
Measuring spoons
Container for mixing
Scale
Mixing spoon
Containers and caps of your choice

Recipe: (In grams)
150 grams Glycerin Scrub Base
4 grams Red Morocco Clay
50 grams Fine Pumice
50 grams Fine Dead Sea Salt
1 gram Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil
Makes 255 grams

Recipe: (In ounces)
5.30 ounces Glycerin Scrub Base
0.15 ounces Red Morocco Clay
1.75 ounces Fine Pumice
1.75 ounces Fine Dead Sea Salt
0.05 ounces Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil
Makes 9 ounces

Weigh the Glycerin Scrub Base and clay into your container for mixing and blend thoroughly until there are no more clumps of clay. Once the clay has been incorporated into the scrub base, add the pumice and salt to the mixture. Stir until there are no more pockets of dry ingredients. Add the Eastern Amber Fragrance Oil and stir.

After all ingredients are completely mixed, fill the containers of your choice. This is a great scrub to put in the Grand Oval Bottles, especially if it for the grease monkey with really dirty paws! (Pun intended.)

Enjoy this scrub!

Once these mishaps have occurred, there is very little we can do to fix the soaps unless we decide that these soaps are not mishaps, but soaps with artistic license. Look at these soaps and decide for yourself. Are these soap mishaps or soaps with artistic license?

You will need:

Curls and Cutouts
Translucent Melt and Pour Soap, Scented
Soap Molds
Alcohol Spray (70% or 91% Rubbing Alcohol)

Place your mold on a flat surface. Fill your mold with your curls and cutouts. Arrange them until you are satisfied. Remember, you are looking at your soap from the bottem. Spray your curls and cutouts with alcohol so bubbles do not form on them inside your soap.

Slowly pour your cooled melt and pour soap into the mold. You will want to do it gently otherwise your carefully arranged pattern will move and you may not like the result.  Once you have filled the mold, allow the soap to cool. Now you have an incredibly classy soap. You can use it for everything from bridal showers to birthday parties!

Note: You will want to be cautious because if your melt and pour soap is too hot it will melt your curls and cutouts and make them swirl. It is an interesting effect but one you may not want.

Don’t miss Melt and Pour Mishaps, Pouring Techniques and Scientific Analysis next week!

You will need:

Melt and Pour Soap of your choice (Transparent, White and Olive)
A Baking pan or Flat Mold
Parchment, Waxed Paper or Silicon Spray
Miniature Cookie Cutters
Knife
Container for melting soap
Lavender Fields Color
Cinnamon Bear Fragrance Oil
Tooth Pick

Line your baking sheet or mold with parchment, waxed paper, or a silicon spray for easy removal. Melt the soap designated for your cutouts. Color and scent as desired. Remember, do not use a dye as it will bleed through your finished bar of soap. In this example, I used the fragrance Cinnamon Bear and the pigment Lavender Fields. Pour the soap on your baking sheet and allow to cool. Pour in enough soap to create the thickness you want your cutouts to be. Once cool and firm, you can use miniature cookie cutters, a knife, or a toothpick to create and cutout your designs. It is recommended that you cut your designs when your soap is firm.

If your soap cutouts are extremely thin, they will curl. Should you desire that effect, pour your soap so you have a small thin sheet. If you do not want it to curl, pour your soap sheet so it is thicker.

If you don’t want the trouble of trying to keep to two cookie cutter sets separate, you can trace your design on paper or directly on the surface of your soap with a knife or toothpick. Then you can cut it out. TADA! Now you are already to put your cutouts in a bar of soap.

Don’t miss the blog tomorrow for how to place curls and cutouts in soap.

Soap Curls. Wow! Where should I begin? Soap curls are fun, elegant and most of all, simple! They are used as adornments in bars of soap. They can also be used as quick one time-use soap like the soap petals made yesterday. They are adorable!

You will need:

Vegetable peeler
Pre-poured bar of melt and pour soap

Make your soap. You will need to select a mold that will give you a bar the height of your desired curls. Color and fragrance soap as desired. Allow to firm completely. Look at your beautiful soap! Now we are ready to make our curls.

Hold your bar of soap in one hand. Run the vegetable peeler along a flat side of your bar of soap. The soap will begin to curl. The thinner you peel your soap, the more it will curl. Do not put excessive pressure on the peeler. You do not want to injure yourself.

If you want to show more color, you can stripe or swirl your soap curls bar of soap. You can make event specific curls by the colors you use. You can make orange curls for Halloween, green for Saint Patricks, or blue for the Fourth of July. Just make sure you use a pigment for coloring your soap. Dyes will migrate through your finished soap. Have fun! Your imagination is the limit!

Don’t miss making soap cutouts tomorrow and how to place curls and cutouts on Thursday and Friday of this week.

Collect needed supplies for making soap petals.

Supplies for both methods:
Silk Flower Petals
Transparent Melt & Pour Soap
Spoon
Transfer Pipette
Container for melting soap and dipping petals (It is okay to have more than one container)
Fragrance Oil of your choice (I will be using Wedding Blossoms Fragrance Oil.)
Old newspaper, parchment or waxed paper to collect any possible drips of soap.

Supplies for the first method:
Tweezers
Metal Cooling Racks or Baking Sheets lined with parchment

Supplies for the second method:
Needle
Thread
Tray for dipping petals
Place to hang cooling petals

Melt the desired amount of soap and then add fragrance oil. I am going to melt one pound of Transparent Melt & Pour Soap and for a moderate scent level, I will add 7 mL of Wedding Blossoms Fragrance Oil.

First Method:
Drop several silk petals into the melted soap and stir until the petals are completely coated with the soap. Using the tweezers pull the petals out of the soap and gently shake them to allow excess soap to fall off your soap petal. Place on the cooling rack or baking sheet and allow to cool. Repeat until all petals have been removed from the melted soap. Add more petals to the soap and repeat until the melted soap is gone or you need to reheat the soap again.

Second Method:
Thread the needle with doubled thread for strength and stability while dipping the silk petals. Thread the petals onto the needle and thread. Leave adequate spacing for the petals to cool without sticking to each other. Once the petals have been threaded onto the thread, remove the needle from the thread. Make sure you have left enough room on the thread to hang the thread on place you have designated for hanging the threaded petals.

Once the petals have been threaded, dip the petals into the melted soap in the tray. If your tray is not big enough for you to dip all of the petals at once, dip all sections of petals until all petals are coated. Hang the thread horizontally to allow the petals to cool. Repeat with other strings. Once the petals have cooled, remove them from the thread.

It doesn’t matter what method of dipping petals you used, you have now reached the same point. The soap petals are completely cooled and ready to be packaged. How would you package them? There are so many different options, so here are just a few.

1) Package in a clear gusseted bag and tie with ribbon or raffia.
2) Place in a small shallow glass dish or basket and shrink film the basket.
3) Fill a small jar with petals for traveling.

Another way you can jazz up your soap petals is to add some Silver Mica or Ultrafine Iridescent Glitter to the soap before you dip your petals!

Note:
We also decided to make red petals and we scented one pound of Transparent Melt & Pour Soap and for a moderate scent level, we added 7 mL of Endless Love Fragrance Oil. However, the red petals would bleed excess dye every time we dipped them.

Have fun!