The first part of this tutorial was how to create glittery Ornament soaps. Now I’m going to show you how to add details with your own homemade soap paint. I wouldn’t recommend trying to paint over the glitter, you should choose one technique or the other.
Soap paint recipe:
2 parts Liquid Soap
1 partClear Melt & Pour Base
1 part Rubbing Alcohol
1 part Mica or Oxide
This recipe is in parts so you can make as much or as little as you like. We used 1/2 teaspoon to measure out our paint. So our recipe was 1/2 tsp. Clear M&P, Rubbing alcohol, and colorant and 1 tsp. liquid soap.
tools:
small heat proof container
paint brush
Step 1: Measure out the liquid soap and warm it up briefly in the microwave.
Step 2: Add the rubbing alcohol and colorant and stir to mix well.
Step 3: Add the melted clear melt & pour soap base and stir well.
Hint: If the soap starts to cool down and solidify you can pop it in the microwave to warm it up and make it paintable again. If it gets goopy, mix in a little more rubbing alcohol to help smooth it out.
Step 4: Carefully paint your soap ornament. If you paint an area where you don’t want paint, use the carving tool from our melt and pour tool kit to clean it off.
Another Hint: If the paint doesn’t want to stick to your soap, try dusting a little cornstarch over the soap before painting. This gives the soap something to grab onto.
Allow the paint to dry for a day before wrapping in plastic or hanging on your tree. It’s a heavy soap, so pick a sturdy branch. When guests come to visit over the holidays, let them pick their own useful soapy ornament to take home. They’ll think good thoughts about you every time they use their Christmas surprise.
I’ve been extremely interested about this technique and really appreciate you having a recipe on how to do this. I do have one question concerning this though. I’m extremely new to soap making so I apologize if this is a bit ignorant, but here goes. Using the mica or oxides in such a small quantity and what seems to be so concentrated, does that color/dye your skin or washcloth a bit when you use the bar of soap?
Not ignorant at all. The color won’t dye your skin but it does wash off on the first use when you use the bar of soap =)
Thank you for getting back to me! I’m glad to know that it won’t dye skin or anything. Can’t wait to go get some paint brush now!
what are you using for the liquid soap?
I believe any natural liquid soap will work but we used the Castille Liquid Soap from Brambleberry.com
Ooh Thanks Anne-Marie, saw your comment on my blog too! You made my day 🙂 Thanks for the inspiration, could not have done it without you!
Charles, Great hint – thanks for that.
And France, you did a FANTASTIC job on your tree ornaments. I really love how you did the bold color choices. It turned out swell.
I made these! I did!
http://acanuckinoz.blogspot.com/2010/12/merry-christmas.html
thought you'd like to see Anne-Marie! Thanks so much, always, for the inspiration (and right to plagiarise) you so generously provide (in many facets of life).
I love this! I just made the soap paint and it turned out great. I did a little titanium dioxide in the recipe and it really seemed to help with the coverage (which was a little light with some of the micas straight).
One, this SO explains why Bramble Berry discontinued it’s line of Soap Paints (which I was quite disappointed by, as I did not get a chance to try them before they disappeared).
Two, you have no idea how much fun I’m going to have on Sunday trying this out on a custom order I have in the queue. YAY! 🙂 (And it’s a big one, too. . .45 items!)
How fun. I think this would be easier for me especially on the very small details like eyes and such. Thanks for the recipe.
Ooh! This is so neat! I can’t wait to try your soap paint recipe!