Soapmaking

I have seasonal aquagenic pruritus.  When I get out of the shower in the summer, spring, or fall, my arms and legs itch uncontrollably for 45 minutes.  It's incredibly painful and uncomfortable.  Through trial-and-error, I discovered that loofahs, exfoliating items, shaving, and rubbing with the towel while drying make it worse.  Certain body products also exacerbated the issue.  I decided to seek out more natural soaps in hopes of curbing the itching.  After purchasing some expensive but lovely soap via Etsy, I wondered how hard it would be to make my own.  The google machine indicated that a local shop was offering classes, and I signed up.

Soap is a salt, created by a chemical process called saponification.  Melt some butters and oils, add your lye to water, mix it all together with a stick blender, pour it into a mold, pull it out a day later, and then in 2-6 weeks, you have soap!

Actually, it's a bit more complicated than that.  Everything is measured very carefully by weight, and must be very exact measurements in order to ensure that you actually have soap at the end, not a puddle of oils or a lye-heavy, skin-burning product.  Each oil requires a specific amount of lye to break it down.  And lye seems really scary at first:  it's a very strong alkali that reacts with water (meaning your eyes and your skin).  Dangerous chemicals, exact measurements, and complicated methods?  A class seemed like the right place to start.

And boy was it incredibly informative.  Afterward, I was hooked.  I ordered oils, butters, essential oils, and picked up some lye at my local hardware store.  I decided to make soap favors for my wedding, meaning I would have something to do with all the lovely practice batches I was creating.

Several months into soapmaking, I've purchased a mold and liner, practiced coloring, swirling, splitting batches, and all kinds of fun stuff.  I've made body butters and chapsticks.  And I'm in the process of opening a company with a friend. 

I can cross soapmaking off the list, but I'll continue to practice it and share updates here.  After all, a good hippie doesn't have to be a dirty hippie.  In the meantime, here are some terrible-quality photos of the soap I've been making:

Spearmint.  Practicing my swirls.

Working on splitting the batch and more swirling.

This is actually a "failed" soap.  The color effect is what I wanted (even more so with more curing), but there are too many air bubbles.  Also, I discovered I really disliked this fragrance oil.

Soap curing.

Soap all ready for use!