Monthly Archives: May 2016

Cold Process Soap, soapmaking

Last Day of Vacation/Valencia Soap

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After a walk with Drew yesterday I made a valencia orange loaf of soap with a spoon swirl design.  This soap is primarily palm, coconut and olive oil with the addition of castor oil, sweet almond oil, shea butter and nettle extract, it has a superfat of 7%. I added bentonite clay to help hold the scent since I am using a citrus essential oil, it is said that citrus oils fade in cold process but this one has good reviews from soapers. I was also careful of the flash point.

I cut them this morning. The round soaps have pieces of loofah in them. Their scent is quite strong.

I am now at 20 bars made this last week, I think I am good until those are cured at least.

 

hair, handmade, recipe

Hair Conditioner Recipe

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Here we go, I’ve been reading up on this for a while a few things to get familiar with before you start should be cationic quaternary compound’s and PH.

I feel like I am ready to try making a batch of hair conditioner. I researched ingredients for a while then built some basic recipes around what I have on hand. Sketched out several recipes for General Use(Argan & Nettle), Moisturizing (Coconut & Avocado) , Dandruff(Tea Tree, Avocado & Nettle), Winter Hair (Carrot & Oat), Invigorating(Jojoba, Rosemary & Peppermint).

My first attempt is as follows, this was my ‘general use’ idea.

90.5% Distilled Water

3% BTMS-50

1% Panthenol

3% Nettle Extract

1% Argan Oil

1% Fragrance (I used green apple)

1% Optiphen

 

It was a little on the thin side, and very appley! If I were remaking this recipe right now I would make the following adjustments 0.5% fragrance and 4% BTMS-50.

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Lavender, Papercrafting

Handmade Paper

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I’ve wanted to try this for a while.

I’ve started collecting grocery store circulars and paper shopping bags. Something better to do than just throw them away.  The basics are that you cut it all up into small pieces and toss it into a blender with water and blend it until it is a pulp, then add it to a tub of shallow water and strain it using window screen, then transfer the strained part between two pieces of felt and press the water out. I used a picture frame, remove the back and glass and stretched across where the glass would be. it’s exactly the size of a standard piece of paper.

After I got a good idea of my technique, I had to improvise so I cut up some sheets of freezer paper and used those to dry the paper on since they can be reused.

I added some emerald gouache and some lavender flowers to see the result but I need a better technique for adding color next time. I can faintly see the difference between the regular paper and the ever so slightly tinged green paper. I love that the paper smells like lavender.

 

I am going to go pick some baby maple leaves and wildflowers this afternoon and press them dry for my next batch of paper.

For now I am thinking of ways to use this for my soaps. I’ll need to play around with it more for the right look.

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Cold Process Soap, soapmaking

Ginger Patchouli and Hawaiian Jasmine Soaps

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I made a divider for my soap mold and split the batch into two different soaps. On one side  I was expecting trouble with the Pikake or Hawaiian Jasmine scent I picked and while it didn’t thicken as fast as I expected it did rice and have to be blended out. I picked a pearly white mica and tossed in some of my rose gold mica which discolors in cold process but I wanted to see what I would end up with, I was hoping for a very soft pink or at least some gold sparkle but it seems to have completely disappeared.

 

On the other side of the divider I used a ginger and patchouli scent. The bottom layer is grey with activated charcoal and I added black tea. Then I blended cocoa powder for brown, Moroccan red clay blended with brick red oxide for red and drop swirled those into a plain batter and layered it over the grey layer. The top is a solid pearly white.