This project combines the beautiful swirls you can achieve easily with cold process soap and the ability to layer designs in melt & pour. You can print out these cute holiday creatures from this template on water soluble paper and layer them on your soap to give your finished soaps some whimsical character.
What You’ll Need:
7.5 oz. Coconut Oil
7.5 oz. Olive Oil
7.5 oz. Palm Oil
2.5 oz. Sweet Almond Oil
3.5 oz. Sodium Hydroxide
8.2 oz. Distilled Water
1 oz. Santa Spruce Fragrance Oil
1 Sheet Water Soluble Paper
18 oz. Clear Melt & Pour Soap Base
Free Winter Animal PDF Clipart
Click here to add everything you need for this project to your Bramble Berry shopping cart!
Part 1 – Melt & Pour Design
PREP: Print out the Holiday Animal Design on water soluble paper. If using an inkjet printer, print out the design a couple of days before you intend to make the soap. Then lightly spray the design with an aerosol hair spray to help prevent the colors from bleeding.
ONE: Cut and melt 18 oz. of Clear Melt and Pour Base. Pour a small amount (about 1 oz.) into each cavity. Spray with isopropyl alcohol and place 1 cut out animal design into each cavity after the soap has just formed a skin but before it has set-up. Pour a small amount of the clear soap (.5 oz) over the paper and then spray with alcohol.
TWO: Let the melt and pour harden for 5-6 minutes.
Part 2 – Cold Process Soap Swirl
If you’ve never made Cold Process soap before, stop here! I highly recommend checking out our FREE four part SoapQueen.tv series on Cold Process Soapmaking, especially the episode on lye safety. If you’d rather do some reading, Bramble Berry carries a wide range of books on the topic, including my newest book, Soap Crafting.
SAFETY FIRST: Suit up for safe handling practices! That means goggles, gloves and long sleeves. Make sure kids, pets, and other distractions and tripping hazards are out of the house or don’t have access to your soaping space. Always soap in a well-ventilated area.
COLOR PREP: Disperse 1 teaspoon of 1982 Blue into 1 tablespoon of liquid oil (we like Sweet Almond or Sunflower oils). Disperse two teaspoons of Super Pearly White in 2 tablespoons of liquid oil. Prepping your colors in the beginning will allow you to work quickly and give you more time to work with your soap. Use the mini mixer to get all those clumps worked out smoothly.
ONE: Slowly and carefully add the lye to the water, and stir until clear. Set aside to cool. If you’d like a harder bar of soap that lasts longer in the shower, you can add Sodium Lactate to the cooled lye water. Use 1 teaspoon of Sodium Lactate per pound of oils in the recipe.
TWO: Melt and combine the coconut, olive, palm and sweet almond oil in a large glass container. Once the lye water and the oils have cooled to 130°F or below (and are ideally within 10 degrees of each other), add the lye water to the oils and stick blend until thin trace.
THREE: Split off about about 1 ¼ cups of batter into a separate container and add 3 teaspoons of dispersed 1982 Blue and mix in with a wire whisk. In the original container, add 6 teaspoons of dispersed Super Pearly White and mix with a wire whisk.
FOUR: Add approximately half the fragrance to each container and stir in with a wire whisk.
FIVE: For the in-the-pot swirl, start by pouring the 1982 Blue colored soap into the Super Pearly White colored soap beginning on the outer edge of the soap container and spiraling in towards the center. Pour from a high point so that the soap penetrates the entire depth of the soap in the pot, which will create a swirl throughout the soap.
SIX: Slowly pour the batter in the mold, filling it to the top (about 2 – 3 oz. of batter). Generously spray with 99% rubbing alcohol and then unmold after 2 – 3 days. Allow to cure for 4 – 6 weeks. Enjoy!
Is there a way to use the water soluble paper without using melt and pour? Can it be used with just cold process soap?
Hi Courtney!
While I’m sure you could use water soluble paper with cold process, because cold process soap is not clear, you would not be able to see the design on the paper like you can with melt and pour. If you could tell me a little bit more about what kind of project you have in mind, I’d be happy to help! 🙂
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
I tried making soaps with water soluble paper, however two things happened (used inkjet printer and let the paper set for a week, sprayed with a bit of hairspray 1 day before)
1. if the image was not submerged in clear mp then it would start to bleed color
2. the clear mp top of soap after a while, on soaps that did not bleed would come apart from the white mp base.
Also, if I spray the clear mp w alcohol and place the image the colors would bleed, if I didn’t spray the front of the image (or top of clear mp) the soap would split
Any advice?
Thank you!
ps…
and the setting of the inkjet should be economy or best? thanks!
Hi Natalia!
I’m sorry to hear that the water soluble paper is giving you trouble! It sounds like you took the necessary steps (printing it out a few days before and spraying with hairspray). My best guess is that it may be the type of printer, or the setting as you mentioned. I’m guessing that the economy setting uses less ink, so that’s what I would recommend using. Having too much ink on the paper may be what is causing your paper to bleed.
I would recommend placing the paper face down on the clear melt and pour, pouring a little more clear on top, then spraying with alcohol. That way the alcohol is not coming into contact with the paper itself, but with the clear melt and pour.
I hope this helps, let me know if you have any more questions and I would be happy to help 🙂
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
I enjoy all the questions but I am not sure where I read the replies
I enjoy all the questions but I am not sure where I read the replies
Hi Annie!
You couldn’t see the replies because we have been out of the office, you should be able to see them now! 🙂
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
What a great idea, so many potential variations! Did you take any special precautions with insulating the soap? I recently made some mini M&P soaps as a topper for CP and they melted all over the top from the heat of the curing soap. Yikes.
Hi Jessie!
Oh no, I’m sorry that happened to you! We didn’t take any special precautions necessarily, but to help ensure your cold process doesn’t get too hot, you would want to make sure it wasn’t covered, on a heating pad, or in a particularly hot room. If you want to be extra careful, I would recommend giving your melt and pour plenty of time to harden. If you give this project a try, we would love to see how it turns out!
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
Thanks so much, I’ll try that.
What a cool idea! I like to combine M&P and CP sometimes. The water soluble paper is a great way to personalize the soap. Those little animals are so cute!
Hi Jenny!
Isn’t this project cute? I love it because there are so many possibilities for this project when it comes to customizing! If you give it a try, we would love for you to share on our Facebook page 🙂
https://www.facebook.com/BrambleBerry
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
I wonder what happens as the cold process soap layer cures and shrinks. Will the melt & pour also shrink the same amount or will this force the two layers to separate?
Hi Irene!
Although the cold process does shrink slightly as it cures, we found in our final bars that it was not enough to cause any separation. It was so slight in fact, that you can’t tell much at all 🙂
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
Hello,
I’m wondering if the two layers (m&p and CP) stick well to each other … anyone know if there’s a risk of them separating?
Hi Caroline!
We found in our final bars that the two layers stuck to each other really well. Some of this is probably due to the cold process being hot and melting somewhat to the melt and pour. I would say there is very little risk of them separating, we even tried to pull them apart and they were stuck together extremely well 🙂 If you give this project a try, we would love to see photos on our Facebook page!
https://www.facebook.com/BrambleBerry
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
Thanks for the reply, Amanda. Will definitely share pics with Bramble Berry if I do these.
And …. Happy New Year to you all at BB! Hope you and your colleagues all have a great 2014!
Hi Caroline!
I hope you had a great New Year year as well! Thanks for the kind words, I’m looking forward to seeing your soap! 🙂
-Amanda with Bramble Berry
Just to Presh~! And imagine what you could do with it for Valentines Day! Custom messages, Pictures, Family Photos, Business names for gifts etc. etc!
Hi Sindy!
I thought the same thing when I saw these! The possibilities are endless! If you give these a try, we would love to see a photo of your creation on our Facebook page :)!
https://www.facebook.com/BrambleBerry?filter=1
-Amanda with Bramble Berry