| I really enjoy spring. The flowers coming up, the birds singing, and the bright gentle rays of golden sun in the morning. I love mornings like that. Right now, the ground is covered with snow and what I truly miss is the brown earth. While I may not be able to see the dirt, I can make my own dirt soap. I just can’t wait to get dirty. š (Is it just me or is there irony in a Dirt Soap? Dirt = Dirty, Messy. Soap = Squeaky Clean) Excited for spring? Come join me as we bring a little bit of Earth into our own homes.
Collect needed items:
Recipe:
Heat your oils gently until liquid. Mix lye into six ounces of water. Slowly pour lye solution into oils in the soap bucket. Using an immersion blender, mix until trace in reached. Add fragrance and color. I added about a tablespoon of mixed color. Mix well. Pour soap into mold. Allow to sit for 24 hours. Remove from mold and cut. Stack the bars to allow the soap to cure. Longer curing time will result in a harder bar. Enjoy and thank for joining me in the test kitchen! Note: The premixed color was made by adding 2 oz of Brown Oxide to 16 oz Glycerin.
|
 Finished Soap  Lye Solution  Adding Lye Solution to Oils  Mixing Soap  Adding Fragrance and Color  Mixing Soap  Poured into Mold |
Your Earth FO is one of my favorites…!! especially to blend with other fragrances like Nag Champa, Spice Fig, and some other sweeter fragrances. It produces some wonderfully unexpected results.
I feel obliged to point out that your pics show that you are mixing your lye in glass containers and many soapers (myself included) see this as a potential problem. I know it works just fine most of the time but the glass can become etched by the lye over time (almost invisibly) and can shatter. It only takes one such accident to hurt you badly. Some people prefer stainless containers… I prefer HDPE/Rubbermaid pitchers for small batches and Stainless pots for larger batches.
Then again perhaps you are only using the glass container so we can see the process better.
Keep these great ideas coming!
Iām glad you enjoy our Earth Fragrance Oil.
We do show mixing in glass beakers that we purchase from a supplier of laboratory grade equipment. Our beakers are made from borosilicate glass, which can withstand thermal shock & chemical attack from acidic or alkaline solutions. We do recommend checking all containers for stress, injury or other potential problems. I have even had a plastic HDPE container begin to melt from a batch of soap! All containers have their weaknesses and as long as the user knows to check for potential problems in all containers that they use, we feel that any containers are fine to use. (As long as they are not aluminum! š ) One of the benefits of using the glass beakers is the ability to photograph at different angles instead of only over the shoulder of the soapmaker.
Here is an article that was written in May of 2010 about why jars break. This may help explain about the differences when a jar cracks or breaks. http://blog.thesage.com/2010/03/17/why-jars-break/
I hope this helps! Keep reading and commenting, we love having thought provoking ideas from our readers!
Andee