Dear Fellow Soapmaker,
Does this sound familiar? You search far and wide for a great recipe
to test out. You scour local shops and the Internet hunting for
all of the necessary ingredients. Your excitement builds as you
gather exotic oils that promise to revitalize your skin from within
the special soap bars you are about to create.
You are finally ready to begin. You follow each step of the recipe
word for word, making sure to do exactly as the words written on
the page demand. You combine the oils with the lye solution and
begin to stir gently, slowly coaxing your new soap into existence.
It is ready for the mold! You pour the soap mixture into the mold
as the scents float up to meet your nose, teasing you with shades
of just how incredible your soap will be once it is finished. Once
in the mold, you carefully store it in a safe place to harden. An
hour, maybe two, has passed since you started making the soap but
you know it will all be worth it.
You let a day or two pass before checking on the soap. The anticipation
was maddening but you wanted to be sure that the soap had enough
time to harden properly. The last thing you want is to accidentally
destroy the soap in one of the final stages of the process. But
now, finally, it is time to remove the soap bars from the mold.
You glance at the picture on the recipe and can’t wait to
have your own creation in your hands. Your heart is racing as you
open the mold. Your smile fades and your stomach suddenly feels
empty. Instead of perfectly shaped bars of soap, all you find are
puddles of separated oil and mush languishing inside the mold. You
think of all of the days spent collecting the ingredients, all of
the money spent on equipment and oils, all of the hours spent creating
the “soap”, all of the time spent waiting for it to
be ready. All of it has been wasted.
If you are anything like me, you started reading and researching
soap making long before attempting a batch. Books are great and
if you subscribe to my newsletter, you know that I have found hundreds
of resources online. But we both know that it is one thing to read
about making soap in a book or on the Internet but it is totally
different to see the process in action. How much easier would it
be to make soap if you could actually see how it was done in real
life?
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