I've been experimenting with making some other bath products lately. I'm using a small amount in my experiments so that I don't end up wasting too much if things don't work out. However, things do seem to be working out, so I may be making more if I decide to participate in an upcoming craft fair. I definitely want to sell this stuff eventually. After all, I've bought bottles and jars along with the shower gel base and foaming bath butter base.
Anyway, I ordered two pounds of Bramble Berry's foaming bath butter base a while back to give it a try. I also had to get a stick blender because they come in very handy for projects like these. I had to use half the base in order to have enough to work with. You have to be very careful when melting it because you will -- I assume -- ruin it if it gets over 140 degrees.
My first try in working with it wasn't that successful because I didn't get it hot enough. It started thickening up as I was blending it and adding the oil, colorant and fragrance. I had to hurry and spoon it into some jars I had. (I have since bought proper cosmetic jars for the foaming bath butter.) I used some from one of the jars I reserved for myself and found it was too thick and didn't have enough fragrance.
So, I took this bath butter out of the jars, melted it down and tried again. This time, I got it hot enough to work with. (You are supposed to be able to pour it in the jars -- not spoon it in. It then firms up into a nice, fluffy butter.) I added more Jojoba oil, more fragrance and more colorant. (The color was supposed to be a tan color, but it's more of a putty color. Oh well.) The fragrance I used was Sweetcake's version of Chocolovers. I also added some Jojoba meal for light exfoliation. I put some of the butter in my own jar and the rest in one of the cosmetic jars I bought.
I bathed with the result and I give it two thumbs up! It left my skin very soft and scented with the yummy Chocolovers scent. I plan to try and sell the other jar. When I make the rest of the Bramble Berry bath butter, I think I will scent it with White Tea and Ginger and leave it its natural white color. I also bought a pail of bath butter from The Chemistry Store to try out. Apparently you don't have to melt this butter. When I try it out, I will post about how it goes.
I have been also experimenting with making shower gel. I purchased the deluxe shower gel base from Sweetcakes along with some plastic bottles and Polysorbate 20. When adding the fragrance, you have to use Polysorbate 20 so that the fragrance will mix properly with the shower gel and not ruin the consistency of it.
I used a bottle I had that once held some liquid soap to hold the shower gel I made for myself to test. I used Sweetcake's adorable Petite Cherie fragrance and some pink colorant. Some fragrances will either thicken the shower gel (in those cases you add a little more Polysorbate 20 as a thinner) or it will thin the gel (in which case you add a little more shower gel base). The Petite Cherie thinned it a little, so I added some shower gel base. It turned out really nice. I used it to shower with and wash my hair. I've also used it as a bubble bath. It works great for all those purposes. I plan to make a bunch of bottles of this shower gel with different fragrances.
As I've said, I make soap as a hobby. Right now, I am trying to master melt-and-pour soap. I've learned a lot over the past year and a half or so, but there are a lot of different things yet to master. After that, I will work on mastering hand-milled soap. Then finally, I will learn about making cold process soaps. But that is quite a way off.
Last night, I made some facial soap for myself. I have oily skin, so I wanted a nice, gentle, non-drying soap with some mild exfoliation. I used the Stephenson Natural melt-and-pour base, which doesn't have added foaming agents. I used about a pound of the base and to that I added the following: 1 tsp Tea Tree essential oil, 1 tsp Tangerine EO, 1 tsp Lavender EO, 1 tsp Jojoba oil and 1 TBSP of Jojoba meal. This yielded three bars. It has a mild, clean smell and isn't medicinal smelling like I was afraid it would be. I tried the soap and it left my face feeling soft and clean. It lathered up very nicely as well. I will have to use it for a while to find out how good it is on my oily skin, but so far so good.
So, I signed up for this Vox account and didn't know quite what to do with it. I already have my own general purpose blog on my own domain using Movable Type. Then I thought I could use this little blog to focus on a subject that I love that would probably bore most people reading my regular blog. So I decided to write about my hobby of making soap, and bath products. (I hope to perhaps parlay my hobby into a small business in the future.) While these subjects may be of little interest to most people, maybe a small amount of like-minded people would enjoy reading my opinions and experiences regarding this stuff.
I notice that Vox also lets you post audio, video, and books. This means the usual, "what I'm reading" or "what I'm listening to". I will include my current faves even though they are not related to the subject of this blog.
