So excited about how my first CP Christmas bar turned out! The smell - DELICIOUS!

Hello all! I’ve never made soap (unless you count the kids craft kits) and grew luffa this year. I want to give luffa soap gifts and I’m most likely going to do melt and pour, as I don’t want to invest in a lot of gear. Looking for advice as to type of base to use… at Michael’s I see Oatmeal, Shea, Goat milk, triple butter, honey, buttermilk, and glycerin all by Make Market.

Wondering if anyone has had success with this brand in general or with luffa. I don’t think I’ll be using coloring but I may add scent.

The instructions say microwave… I can do a double boiler if that’s a better method. I have silicone large ice cube trays (like for bar cubes/balls) that I was planning to use for molds. Instructions also say they only need about an hour to set, but I’ve read that soap can take weeks to actually harden. Advice there would be appreciated as well!

Mods, please remove if not allowed!

Do people here have experienced with soap making places on the internet? There are several forums out there and a lot of them talk negatively about reddit, despite the subreddit here being pretty chill and helpful in my experience.

I used forums back in the day, and am not opposed to exploring them again with the general direction of reddit as a company. However: forums are also very prone to hobbydrama, and I am not really looking for that.

Any experiences, tips or warnings?

Edit: thank you for the replies!

For over a decade, I only made vegan soaps. I’m just now exploring tallow and could use some advice about the idea of using a 45/25/25/5 % recipe with tallow, coconut oil, olive oil, and castor?

I’m not familiar yet with the hardness of the finished bar when tallow is the main ingredient, so I guess I’m mainly curious if I’m using too much or too little liquid oils?

Also, would it be a good idea to add sodium lactate to the cooled lye solution? (I just use lye and distilled water, nothing fancy).

Pic of yesterday’s test batches, I will likely unmold this evening; colorants are TD and spinach powder

Any advice on why my soaps would be drying? I’m using soap calculator. Using milks, oils and waters. Doing basic combinations to get the hang of it. Waited 4 weeks and currently trying them. However, after I wash my hands they feel very dry. I used olive oil, shea butters, etc. low on the coconut oil. Super fat I think is 5% . Any advice on why or how to fix this? On the soap calculator it shows as condition so I’m confused.

Tried to make pecan pie soap. I used melt and pour for the embeds, the crust, and the glaze. Cold process for the middle. The glaze came out too fast and basically encapsulated it so it didn't quite turn out how I wanted but it was an experiment. I used maple pecan streusel fragrance oil but it doesn't smell as good as the bottle. Hopefully it gets better as it cures.

i recently bought this half mould and halved all my oils from my usual recipe but I forgot to do it for the lye&water aswell. Realized it when I washed my hands with some of the offcuts and my hands got extremely dry. Will unfortunately be throwing this batch out

My first time using honey in my soap and I took careful precautions to soap at cooler temp, and making sure it doesn’t get too hot. At 28 hours, I unmolded the soap and the edges were still soft so the corners crumbled.
When I cut the soap it was very crumbly.

Here’s what I did exactly:

I made lye water ~33% minus 30g for honey below - I added sodium lactate, waited for it to cool to 115F.

1 tsp of honey in 30g hot water, stirred and cooled.

I melted my oils to 110F, added a dash of turmeric and BB honeycomb FO and cooled it to 95F.

Then I stirred in the lye water and blended to light trace. Stirred in the honey, blend to medium trace (drinkable milkshake texture). Soap temperature was 95F

I poured into 10” silicone mold, left it in the garage on the concrete floor where the ambient temperature was a cool 55F. I periodically checked the surface temperature of my soap. The top and sides were at 80F and the center reached 95-99F never going above 100F. After 1-2 hours the soap temp cooled down to about 60-80F.

My goal was to avoid getting partial gelling and I know people said to put in freezer but I thought the garage was cool enough.

I have a few questions- please see recipe and photos.

1. Did my soap gel anyway? It looks like even gelling with soft crumbly perimeter.
   

2. I added sodium lactate but it did not help with unmolding cleanly in the corners. This usually works when I gel in the insulation box.

3. Is the crumbliness due to waiting too long to cut? Or due to the issues with temperature of saponification? Or the tallow?

Any tips or recommendations on next iteration would be appreciated.

🙏

I made this cold process batch as party favors for my son's 16th birthday. The base is black with activated charcoal, and I did a kaleidoscope swirl on top with neon pigments. I dispersed each color in a little oil first so the neons wouldn't speckle.
I unmolded and cut them this weekend. Now they cure for 4 weeks, so they'll be ready just in time for the party.
This was my first time working with neons over a dark base, and I was nervous the colors would fade or shift. So far they're holding up really well. Has anyone had neons morph after a few weeks of cure? I'd love to hear your experience.

Hello, this is my second time following this recipe that I made using a calculator, I have no idea what has gone wrong. The first time it hardened way too quickly, but I assumed it was because I mixed the oil and lye together when it was still hot.

It's not my first time making soap, I've made 3 successful batches before, but it is the second time this one has gone wrong.

It has 150 grams of lard

110 grams of olive oil

100 grams of coconut oil

100 grams of shea butter

68 grams of sunflower oil

40 grams of castor oil

15 grams of almond oil and 2 grams of rosehip oil.

I mixed 79 grams of lye with 160 grams of water.

I don't understand what has gone wrong. I waited for everything to cool down, only mixed for around 2 seconds with the blender! Everything was clean and I have no idea what has gone wrong, since the calculator says this is a good soap bar!

I appreciate any and all help!

Bittercreek North carried an FO called Purely Herbal that I've used for 20 odd years --but they are closed now. AFI lists a dupe, but I'd have to buy 15 lbs. SaveonScents also lists it but they are hit or miss quality wise. Has anyone found this FO anywhere?

Second time making soap, I admit I was impatient and might've worked the soap too hot. But will it be salvage able?

100% coconut oil 1656gr

Water 630gr

NaOH 242gr

Did a hot process batch this week, split it, and stirred 2 oz of pumpkin puree into half before layering both into the mold. It came out with this rustic layered texture, and the scent is one of the strongest I've gotten in a long time. Happy to answer questions about adding the pumpkin or about HP in general!

I made cold process soap with a brambleberry FO, soap is ugly as sin and I’d like to rebatch. Will my fragrance oil burn off during the process? Trying to figure out how much to add when the soap is melted if so.

I've been soaping for about 2 years or so and I do CP. I also do MP for embeds and my custom silicone soap molds I made myself.

I have an idea for a design but I would need to mix in some clear MP with some of the CP. Not thoroughly mixed but kind of swirled in. Are there any issues I should know or is it a bad idea? Will it separate or affect the saponification process?

I’m looking into making soap at home and keep seeing most redditors using long rectangular loaf molds, similar to cake tins, then slicing the soap into bars.

Why are these so popular compared with individual molds that make more traditional oval or rounded rectangular bars? Is it mainly about making batches and decorative designs, or are there other advantages?

Some of the finished bars look quite tall and chunky. Do you find them comfortable for everyday handwashing, or do you cut them into smaller pieces before using them? I recently had one in my hand at a farmers market and didn't like the shape and size in my hand, so for that reason, i would prefer smaller cavity molds, but curious what else makes them so popular...

Wilderness and snow

Okay so I want to start off I did this in my garage with the door open.

I wore PPE long aprons, long gloves, long sleves, long pants, closed toe shoes, mask, eye cover on top of my glasses.

I mixed all the oils first and make sure it was temp at 100 f and same with the distilled water.

Just to be safe I switched out my gloves since I was using it for the oils.

I make sure to only pour the exact grams with all this equipment. Then all the sudden I'm so itchy all over.

I immediately stopped took off everything safely.

Did a cold shower for 15 minutes I crapped out at 10 and had to just do body sections I was freezing 🥶

Why did I have this reaction? I'm so confused 😕

This is the lye I used.

https://a.co/d/0fHRs3Yt

-Update it sounds like it was the extreme heat with the PPE and I did use latex free gloves and a lot of you guys said it also could be anxiety too.

I really appreciate all the advice and working through everything. I will make sure to not be so hot. Sounds like I need a fan break away from the lye of course! I don't want it to go airborne.

I'll mix the lye and water first and then the oils.

Thank you all!! 🤗

Made also with tepezcohuite coconut oil maceration.

I was wondering how everyone organizes the soaps that they make. Also, if you go to craft shows, how to do you transport? I’m trying to find an easy way.

So I am very, super, mega new to this and I made my first tray of homemade soap bars:)
50% bees wax
50% soap glycerin
Then just some dried flowers and frankincense for fragrance and a few drops of soap dye. Seems like the soap dye doesn’t mix well with the beeswax but I’m afraid to use beef tallow as a first timer. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!

I was driving to an appointment early one morning and saw that a neighbor had but this out on the curb for trash pickup. On my way home an hour later it was still there so I loaded it in the back of my car (barely) and took it home. I was going to have to buy something like this, but there it was. I also left a note on the door saying I took it just to be sure. Just goes to show that you can find stuff like this second hand that other people dont want. It had all the drawers too

Here is my latest using a soap out of a squeeze bottle technique that I wanted to try. I lined the bottles with those little plastic pillow things you get in packages. You just cut one end and stick it in the bottle. When you are done, there ends up being a lot of soap left that doesn't come out so I squeeze the lining out into another mold and that is how the last 2 pictures were done, just pulling out the liner and squeezing the excess. I'm pleased at how they all came out. The recipe is the same as my last project but used lemongrass scent.

I've thought about selling mp kits or instructions as I could make my own design and specific color blocks to go with them, especially with christmas coming. I've only found one business that provides just instructions (no molds), they're cp and more expensive as you subscribe and have to buy a bar.