i started making soap again. i used to make and sell melt and pour a
long time ago, and it was super fun and easy, but i stopped for whatever reason and never really picked it up again until very recently. it may not look like it, but i have the WORST skin!! so for the past 5-7 years probably, i've been going to this small soap shop about an hour or so from my house that sells really nice cold process soap in tons of different scents. their soap was great for me - nice, gentle, and creamy - but it was kind of annoying to have to drive down there to the shop all the time and spend a lot of money on something i was sure i could make for myself if i tried. so ... i did.
i toyed around with hot and cold process soapmaking this time last year and found a really great recipe for a nice, moisturizing bar full of cocoa and shea butter. a super moisturizing bar like that made in the cold process tends to be soft (melts quickly in the shower), so you have to wait forever for it to harden up suitably. life started happening to me then, so i put aside my soaping stuff to deal with it, accidentally boxing up and putting away my curing bars with the rest of my supplies. when i came back to soaping THIS year, i found that those forgotten bars were amazing! i swear, after using that soap for only 4 days i felt more of a textural difference in my skin than i had in a lifetime of buying expensive bath products. i knew i had to make more: some for myself, and the rest for my shop. other people really need to try this soap!
but oops ... forgot it takes friggin months for it to cure! shit. i felt totally pumped that the soap came out so nicely, but wanted something to fill my need for immediate gratification. that's when i remembered melt and pour! you make it and it's done and ready to package and use about 8 hours later. i liked that.
i thought since the cold process bars were so creamy and dense, it would be a neat contrast to make the melt and pour bars clear and light. the melt and pour base i chose was a clear one that performs like cold process. originally, i wanted to use the ultra clear base so that the bars would have glasslike quality, but i ended up choosing the one that performs like cold process for several reasons: one, the bars should last longer, two, reviews stated that this soap is creamier, softer, and more moisturizing than the ultra clear base, and three (most important of all, in my opinion), the ingredients in this base are simple and few. if a customer asked me what exactly the ingredients in the ultra clear base were, i didn't feel confident that i could explain what they were or if/why/how they would benefit their skin.
my cold process soaps are all bakery scented, so when i was choosing my fragrances for the melt and pour soaps, i picked scents that were more ... bright and refreshing. how did i choose which fragrances exactly i wanted to use? well, i love color. and then of course, the soap had to smell delicious! so i picked a rainbow of the freshest, brightest smelling fruit fragrances (for the most part) and clear soap dyes and got to work.
soap fragrances, by row:
strawberry, watermelon, blood orange
meyer lemon, pineapple cilantro, spring mix (smells like lettuce!)
bamboo teak, raspberry lemonade, grape soda
mid summer's night, coconut, dirt
about two weeks later, after everything is done, cured, and wrapped, here are my final melt and pour bars! most of them are already wrapped up and boxed, waiting for labels. these are just the ones i kept out to be cut into samples, for personal use, and for etsy photos. i'm pretty excited about them! some of the bars aren't fruit scents because when i ordered, i received some free fragrance samples that i ended up loving so much i just included them in the lineup.
yay! now i'm off to design my wrappers and maybe spin some yarn.
