Mica Archives - Page 8 of 11

Pumpkin Puree Cold Process Soap

October 29, 2009 Filed Under: Cold Process Soap

Fun Fall Cold Process Soap

Treat (don’t trick) your skin this chilly fall season with a handmade, moisturizing and delicious smelling soap with real pumpkin puree. Pumpkin is full of antioxidants and vitamins A and C which can help keep your skin youthful and refreshed!

Ingredients
16 oz. Coconut Oil
16 oz. Palm Oil
16 oz. Olive Oil
2 oz. Castor Oil
15 oz. water
7.4 oz. lye
3 oz. pumpkin puree
3 oz. Pumpkin Spice Fragrance Oil
Titanium Dioxide
Copper Sparkle Mica

Tools

Freezer Paper
Mixing Spoons
Ladle or glass mug
3 large glass, plastic or stainless steal mixing bowls
(never use aluminum or a reactive material when mixing cold process soap)

Molds
2 Pound Wood Mold
Clear Plastic Loaf Mold
Or…
You can use a 5 pound wooden mold

Preparation: Make sure you have all of your ingredients with in reach (I even double checked our recipe on the iPhone Lye Application). Then line your mold with Freezer Paper (click here for instructions on lining your soap mold). Most importantly review lye safety guidelines.

Lye Safety Tips:

Always wear gloves & goggles (glasses are not enough, goggles)
Measure out distilled water & slowly pour and stir lye into water
Do not breathe in lye fumes; work in a well ventilated room
Keep small children and animals out and away from your soapmaking
Protect your workspace with newspaper or cardboard
Lye corrodes metal so remove jewelry before making soap
Lye in the eyes = trip to emergency room
Lye on your skin = flush with water (some soapmaker’s swear by vinegar instead of water).
Soap utensils are for soap. Food utensils are for food. Never the twain should meet.
Soap needs to cure, undisturbed, from either pets or small children
Soap molds need to be either lined with wax paper or be made from a flexible plastic.
Never make soap in a glass or aluminum mold.

ONE: Weigh and combine your Coconut Oil, Palm Oil, Olive Oil and Caster Oil. Make sure all of the oils are in liquid form so you might need to melt the coconut and palm oil in the microwave or on the stove.

TWO: To make your lye solution, add 7.4 ounces of lye to 15 ounces of distilled water (you can increase the water to 16.5 if you like a slower trace). Remember to always add the lye to the water- never add the water to the lye. Mix the lye water until the cloudiness clears and the temperature cools. The ideal temperature is between 125 and 135 degrees though some soapers soap all the way down to room temperature lye. I like 125 personally. Notice the water heats all the way up to 191 degrees when combined with the water and lye. Gloves and goggles stay on for the ENTIRE soapmaking process.THREE:Once your oils are combined and their temperature stabilized under 135 degrees and your lye water has reached 125-135 degrees, slowly pour the lye water into your oils stirring at all times. Then stick blend the oil and lye mixture (approximately 2-3 minutes). Turn the stick blender on and off, making sure to mix the entire mixture thoroughly (up down, side to side, around and around).FOUR: Once your mixture has reached light *trace, stick blend in 3 oz of pumpkin puree. Then separate the mixture into two different containers- 2/3 in one bowl and 1/3 in the other.*Trace looks like thin pudding where faint trailings of soap stay on the surface of your soap mixture when lightly drizzled from a few inches overhead.FIVE: Add up to a full Tablespoon of titanium dioxide to the container with 1/3 of the soap and mix with your stick blender. This will keep make a lovely light contrast color.

SIX: To the second container, add 1 Tablespoon of Copper Sparkle mica and use a stick blender to mix well. This will make a beautifully dark and rich pumpkin color.

SEVEN: Once the Copper Sparkle mica is fully incorporated, stir in 3 oz of Pumpkin Spice Fragrance Oil by hand. This fragrance slightly accelerates trace so be ready to pour once your fragrance is mixed in.

EIGHT: In your mold, pour in 6 ounces of the light colored soap followed by approximately 10 ounces of the darker colored soap. The pours do not have to be exactly 6 or 10 ounces – just eyeball it. Make sure you pour two layers of each soap base, alternating colors. Once your mold is filled to the top, swirl the soap with a spoon, spatula or chopstick. Repeat this step using the clear plastic mold. Your gloves and goggles stay on for the entire soapmaking process, even during the swirling part.

TIP: If you’re using a 5 pound mold, just alternate colors until you’ve filled the mold. Then swirl with a spoon. We made this recipe big so we could have fun and play with 2 different molds.

When you make this fun fall recipe, pop in and tell us how it goes! We love the final soap and hope you do too!

Mica Stability Tests

October 26, 2009 Filed Under: Bramble Berry News

This summer, I was lucky enough to meet Patti, one of our long time Bramble Berry customers and a very talented cold process soapmaker. She recently soaped up with some of our micas (including two new ones – the Matte Yellow and Super Green) and graciously agreed to share her results and thoughts with all of us. Thanks Patti!

Red Lip Safe Mica, Super Green Mica & Matte Yellow

Patti swirled some of the micas into the soap directly and then mixed a teensy bit of oil in with some of the micas and swirled on top so that the colors would stay true on top of the soap, no matter what happened.

It took two days to unmold the soap to make sure that all that extra oil up on top would absorb back into the soap. But in the meantime, Patti peeked at the mixing bowl and noticed a few things that gave a preview of what the final bars might look like.

In the bowl, the Super Green turned to a light gold color – sparkly and pretty but not green. But, the Matte Yellow stayed the same nice yellow color. Even though the oil hadn’t fully absorbed into the top, Patti just blotted at the top of the soap (leaving a lovely pattern), unmolded and cut.

The slices turned out wonderfully fall-like and beautiful on top.

It’s pretty clear which colors are which. The Red Mica turned orangey peach, the Matte Yellow stayed totally stable yellow and the Super Green went a lovely yellow and definitely did not stay a pretty green when reacted with the lye. Patti used a fragrance that discolors a bit which is why the soap looks a little darker than you might expect.

Thanks for letting us all in on your experiments, Patti!

Soap Queen TV: Holiday Soap Stamp Project

October 22, 2009 Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap

This video demonstrates a technique I shared with Mario Bosquez on Living today (a Martha Stewart Sirius radio program) . The whole crew loved it so much I thought I should share it with my Soap Queen TV viewers too!

I love this innovative and economical project. It’s a great way to make reusable seasonal designs out of plain soap molds – allowing you to change your designs without purchasing new molds.

Soap Queen TV: Holiday Stamp Soap from Soap Queen on Vimeo.

Here’s what you’ll need:
16 oz. Clear melt & pour soap
4 oz White melt & pour soap
Unmounted rubber stamps (the clear ones seem to work best)
Red-blue mica
Merlot mica
Liquid green oxide
Cranberry Fig fragrance
Melt & Pour tool kit
Basic Rectangle Mold

New at Bramble Berry

September 28, 2009 Filed Under: Bramble Berry News

Soapylove Colorants, Fragrances and Soap

Bright White Melt and Pour
Naturally Clear Melt and Pour
Candy Jar Fragrance Set
delectable Desserts Fragrance Set
Jewelry Box Soap Colorants
Sweet Treats Soap Colorants
Scalloped Heart Mold
Scalloped Rectangle Mold
Scalloped Round Mold

Fragrance Oils
Mandarin Myrrh Fragrance oil
Bay Rum Fragrance Oil
LoveSpell Type Fragrance Oil
Lavender and Herb Fragrance Oil
Patchouli Fragrance Oil
Summer Melon Spritzer Fragrance Oil
Vanilla Oak Fragrance Oil

Essential Oils
Balsm Peru Essential Oil
White Thyme Essential Oil

Soap Molds
Heavy Duty Molds

2 Piece Ice Sphere Mold (check out a fun tutorial here)

Pumpkin Soap Mold

Colorants
Chocolate Shimmer Mica (lip and eye approved)
Copper Penny Mica (lip and eye approved)
Deep Blue Mica (eye approved)
Lavender Mica (lip and eye approved)
Matte Yellow Mica (lip and eye approved)
Super Blue Mica (eye approved)
Super Green Mica (eye approved)

Red Jelly

Toxic Waste Dump Yellow

Yellow Jelly

We’ll have our popular ‘What’s New’ category updated on the Bramble Berry site soon enough but until then, I hope this helps you to not miss anything new and exciting that we’ve added in the last two months.

Bee & Honeycomb Soap Tutorial

September 10, 2009 Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap

Ingredients

Honey M&P Soap

Goat Milk M&P Soap

Heavy Metal Gold Mica

Raspberry Leaf

Oatmeal, Milk & Honey Fragrance

Bee & Honeycomb Soap Mold

Tools

Microwave safe container

Droppers

Spoon or stirring stick

Paint brush

Spray bottle of rubbing alcohol

I’m excited about this tutorial because it uses a concept that we’ve discussed before but don’t use often – brushing mica on to make detail work pop. It’s easy and adds a sophisticated flair to your soap.

One: Melt about 1-2 ounces of Honey melt and pour. You can use ‘plain’ melt and pour but in keeping with the theme of the project, I used Honey. Use a dropper to pour/drop the soap into the bee part of the design. Let cool for about 5-10 minutes.

Two: Melt about 12 ounces of Goat Milk melt and pour. Again, you can use regular white melt and pour but Honey & Goat Milk has such a great feel when working together. Add .25 – .50 ounces of fragrance and stir in the raspberry leaves. Continue to stir long enough for the raspberry leaves to stay mostly suspended in the soap (they will all float to the top if you don’t).

Four: Once the bee layer has cooled and hardened, spritz with rubbing alcohol and pour your goat milk soap into the hive part of the design. Tip: Make sure this soap has cooled to 120 degrees. Any hotter will melt the tiny bee part of the soap.

Five: Give the soap a final spritz of alcohol and allow to cool for 24 hours before removing soap from the mold.

Six: Brush the finished soap with a little H eavy Gold Mica. Be sparing – a little goes a long way!

Don’t you love how the brushing of mica really makes the bee detailing really pop?

Unique Uses for Mica

September 8, 2009 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Steve Satushek is a Bellingham resident that has traveled all over the world to find inspiration for his photography. He recently started painting. He visits our retail store, Otion, to purchase mica for his artwork. Big thanks to Kat over at Otion for alerting me to this super cool use of micas. I was blown away when I saw Steve’s work and I hope you’re equally inspired.

“Macre 2” is made of opalescent mica for a shell look.

“Planet C” is made of metallic and glittery mica.

I was so inspired by his artwork that I emailed Steve to ask if we could blog about him. Luckily he agreed. Here’s what I asked and his answers…

Anne-Marie: How long have you been practicing your craft? How did you get started?

Steve Satushek: I have been working with resin (several kinds of polyurethanes and epoxies) for the last 3 years but I only do this in the warm part of the year. I have a big workshop with giant doors that I open so I am almost working outside. I use a very good mask as the fumes can be nasty. I do my photography compositing work at my computer in the cold months with my nice heated floor under my feet. Professional photography has been my career for more than 20 years.

Anne-Marie: How did you stumble upon micas and oxides for your artwork?

Steve Satushek: Over the last several years my wife and family and I have been doing many outdoor art projects at our place outside of Bellingham. One of my missions is to bring artwork to our outdoor sanctuary in ways not usually done. We have many 3’x4′ weather-proof photos hanging on the side of our house (printed at Appplied D igital Imaging). On my website you may have found the spot called “installations” that shows some of these prints. I also wanted to make paintings, that could be outdoors, hence, the resins. The clear medium is used on big trucks and airliners so it should last a long time outside. UV rays will eventually take their toll, but part of my quest is to find out firsthand what the longevity will be- so far so good.

I started out using liquid acid stains on white cement and I love the look but there are limited colors. I used some powdered pigments on our cements columns that we made in our Mediterranean entryway. I had no idea how to apply the color so I painted on a sticky, milky, medium let it get tacky and then applied the pigment with a dry brush with a plastic bag to catch most of the powder. I had no idea if it would stay on, but it has held up very well for the last 5 years. It was just a progression of trying everything I could get my hands on from there. I am somewhat of a mad scientist always using products in ways they were never intended for. So when I call up the tech reps at some industrial company they probably are chuckling at my ideas while they are trying to figure out what I am doing.
Anne-Marie: I can relate to that, Steve. I’m always trying new things with soap and sometimes that means asking the weird questions. Thanks for letting us blog about you and good luck with all of your projects! You’re an inspiration!

Check out his Artist’s Statement and visit his website here. You can purchase some of his stock photos here and here. And, if you’re lucky enough to live in my neck of the woods, hopefully Steve will do a gallery show soon. When I hear of one, I’ll let you know!

Marbled Soap Tutorial

September 3, 2009 Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap

For this week’s Soap Queen tutorial I’m going to show you how to make these complicated looking marbled soaps – but they couldn’t be easier! I love this project because you can use up leftover soap scraps and it makes a fancy soap from a plain tray mold.

Timing is the most important aspect of this project, so just make sure you don’t have any distractions so you can closely pay attention to the temperature and consistency of your soap bases as you create your marble soap.

Ingredients
2 lbs Shaving M&P Soap
Energy Fragrance Oil
Guest Rectangle Slab Mold
Opalescent Green
Merlot Mica
Copper Sparkle
Luster Black
Heavy Metal Gold Mica

Tools
Microwave safe container
5 small bowls or mugs for soap
Spray bottle of rubbing alcohol
Stir stick or spoon

Soap Cutter or Knife

One: Chop up the shaving melt & pour soap base and place in a glass container. Melt in a microwave in short 30 second bursts – stirring in between each heating.

Two: Separate the soap into 5 different containers. If you don’t have enough heatsafe measuring cups, try using ceramic coffee mugs. The key is that the containers need to be able to be heated if your soap hardens up on you.

Three: Add your fragrance and a different color of mica to each container. Stir to combine.
Tip: Try spraying the top of the liquid soap with rubbing alcohol if the micas aren’t mixing in well.Four: Drizzle a little soap from one of your mugs into the mold and spritz with alcohol. Leave lots of ‘blank’ spaces. These are where the next colors will go. You’ll do many passes so less is more.

Five: Once the soap is cool but not solid, drizzle another color on top. Continue alternating between soap colors until you fill up the mold. Spritz with alcohol frequently. Be sure to keep stirring the other colors so that they don’t form a skin on top before you can pour them into the mold. And, don’t forget, keep that alcohol spray going generously.

Six: Give a final spritz of the rubbing alcohol to the soap and allow to cool for 24 hours before removing from the mold.

Seven: Once the soap is set-up, cut the marbled bars into individual rectangles using a knife or soap cutter.

Be sure to check back next Thursday for another great step-by-step Tutorial!

Pumpkin Shimmer Eyeshadow

August 20, 2009 Filed Under: Home Crafts

As the days begin to cool, I am eagerly looking forward to the autumn colors and crisp air. In anticipation of the fall splendor I wanted to share this recipe for a warm shimmery pumpkin orange eyeshadow and instructions on how to use it. Enjoy!

Pumpkin Shimmer Eyeshadow Recipe:

2 mini scoops Sericite
1 mini scoop Copper Mica
1 mini scoop Cappuccino Mica
1 mini scoop Peach Shimmer
1 mini scoop Bronze Mica

Directions: I used the mini .15cc pigment scoops sold here. But you can use any measurement as long as you keep the proportions the same.

It’s easy to make this color: place all of your measured powders in a container (like a lip balm pot) and mix well.

That’s it, you’re done! I did a show on Better TV last year and you can see how easy it is to mix. We did that, plus talked about 2 other projects – all in 3 minutes! You can watch that video here.

Contour Eyeshadow Directions:

For this look, I used the Pumpkin Shimmer eyeshadow blend along with the Light Brown and Dark Brown recipes from our Mineral Makeup Guide Book.

1. Apply Pumpkin Shimmer on center of lid to outer edge up to crease.

2. Apply Light Brown eyeshadow to inner lid and brow arch blending well.

3. Apply dark brown eyeshadow to outer edge of the eyelid and along crease. Also apply along the lower lash line but only 3/4 of the way across. Again, blend well.

4. Reapply a little more Pumpkin Shimmer to the center of the lid if you have blended it in and want a little more coppery goodness to show!

Making eye shadows is super easy. You can buy all the ingredients seperately or you can buy the comprehensive starter kit we’ve put together here. No matter how you look at it, making your own make up is affordable, easy and fast. You can create what you love, make it your own and have fun doing it!

If you’ve created any eye shadow recipes you’d like to share with the Soap Queen Community, post them here. I’d love to try them out myself this fall season.

New Micas at Bramble Berry

August 19, 2009 Filed Under: Bramble Berry News

We’ve added a whopping six new micas for your soaping pleasure. The colors are sooooo glorious. And, they’re ‘Surplus’ items (great deals, limited quantities) so get ’em while they’re here:

Matte Yellow (lip & eye shadow safe)

Super Green (eye shadow safe)

Emerald (eye shadow safe)

Super Blue (eye shadow safe)

Deep Blue (eye shadow safe)

Copper Penny (lip & eye shadow safe)

Lavender (lip & eye shadow safe)

Not pictured: Chocolate Shimmer (lip & eye shadow safe)

Totally Rad Soap Queen TV Episode!

August 6, 2009 Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap

This week I make these really cool retro soaps with an 80’s look. These are so fun and simple to make I keep thinking of different color combinations I want to try!

Episode 14: Geometric Soaps from Soap Queen on Vimeo.Here’s what you’ll need to make this soap:

Clear Melt & Pour base

Lemon cake fragrance (NEW!)

Vanilla color stabilizer

Liquid Green non-bleeding Colorant

Super Pearly White

Liquid Blue non-bleeding colorant

Apricot Blush mica

Aqua Pearl mica

Clear plastic loaf mold

molding clay

PS – Did you recognize the ‘totally rad’ for the ’80s throwback reference it was intended to be?

Fun Summer Lip Balm

August 4, 2009 Filed Under: Lip Products

Summer Lip Balm Recipe
2 tsp Coconut Oil
2 ½ tsp Beeswax
2 1/8 tsp Sweet Almond Oil
2/3 tsp Avocado Oil
25-30 drops of Coconut Flavor Oil
Microwave safe dish
Stir spoonMy Favorite Lip Balm Colorants
(I love mixing these)
Red Mica
Super Pearly White Mica
Copper Sparkle Mica
Rose Pearl Mica

Bath Bomb Surprise

June 17, 2009 Filed Under: Bath Fizzies

In honor of a fabulous employee!
Luke (pourer extraordinaire) created this project and we’re so lucky that he’s sharing it with all of us. Read his adorable tutorial below on how to make a Bath Bomb Surprise. There’s a short video at the bottom so you can watch to see the fizzy duck in action. Before I (badly) edited it down, it was over 2 minutes because the bath bomb kept fizzing for that long!

Ingredients
1 lb citric acid
2 lbs baking soda
Witch hazel (in spray bottle)
Rose Pearl Mica
Herbal essence Fragrance Oil
Hockey Puck Mold
12 Rubber duckies
Pigment scoop
Droppers

Directions (from Luke)

First, I used a large plastic bowl to mix the citric acid and baking soda together. I used a whisk for this step, and mixed for a good 5 minutes until I was sure the powder was properly blended.

Second, I used a pigment scoop to mix in a small amount of Rose Pearl Mica. I began with 3 heaping spoonfuls but continued to add a few more to darken the bath bombs (caution: bombs will darken after using witch hazel. Too much Mica tends to leave a ring around the tub. Easy to clean-up, but a possible annoyance). I blended this for another few minutes.

Third, I added .75 ounces of herbal essence fragrance oil, distributing evenly using the dropper. After adding the fragrance I used a mixing spoon to stir. Blend well for another minute or so. The concentration of herbal essence I used made a very potent bath bomb. In future bath bombs, I will likely use a fresher fragrance such as Champagne in lower quantities.

Fourth, I began to mix slowly while squirting witch hazel into the batch. When the batch began to thicken, I stirred and sifted using my fingers. After a few minutes, the batch began to thicken and clumped when squeezed which is the perfect consistency.

Fifth, Using the hockey puck mold, I took a handful of the batch and squished it to the bottom of the mold, packing it down. I placed the rubber ducky into the mold, and the packed around and above it until covered. I found when using the ducky, I added more of the bath bomb mix than I had intended, ending up with a tray of muffins. I packed these down with my hand, and set them aside.

Sixth, I checked on them an hour later. They were beginning to harden, and a few cracks began appearing on top. I decided to go for broke, and removed the bombs from the molds. They were still hard-packed, but I didn’t like their muffin shape. I decided to hand-pack them as if packing a snowball. After getting them into rough circles, I lightly spritzed the outside with witch hazel and smoothed them down. Satisfied with their shape, I let them sit out to dry overnight.

Voila! The bombs dried nicely, completely concealing the rubber duckies inside! A few had developed small cracks, but they weren’t deep and didn’t affect the ability of the bomb to stay together. The size of them allowed for a particularly long fizzy-period. The duckies from the first batch didn’t pop out of the bath bomb for over a minute and a half!

My girlfriend Erika did another small batch after me. She used twice the colorant (hence the warning of the ring around the tub). She managed to fit the duckies completely into the hockey puck mold while still completely concealing them. This allowed for a smaller, more durable bath bomb that still smelled just as fragrant. More of her batch tended to develop cracks, which may be attributed to the duckies expanding while the bombs were drying.

There you have it!
-Luke

Video Below (email subscribers – you need to click through to the blog to see it). In a large tub, the water would not discolor. Enjoy!

Karma Soaps & New Loaf Molds

March 25, 2009 Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap

We’re ecstatic! Our new 2.5-3 lb loaf molds are finally here! We couldn’t wait to try one out so we took a mold straight to our soaping lab and created an earthy and colorful Karma Goodness soap. See our instructions below to make your own “good karma”.

Here’s What You’ll Need
3 lb. Loaf Mold
3 lbs. Clear Melt and Pour
1.5 oz Karma Synergy Essential Oil Blend
Ultramarine Purple Oxide
Heavy Metal Gold Mica
Gold Sparkle Mica
Cellini Blue Mica
Microwave safe bowl (pyrex)

Layer 1: Melt 12 oz of clear melt and pour (30 second intervals in the microwave). Add fragrance oil and a pinch of ultramarine purple oxide. Pour soap into loaf mold.

Tip: Mix your micas or oxides with a little rubbing alcohol first to eliminate spots and speckles. Then add to soap base. Give it a final spritz to eliminate bubbles.

Layer 2: Melt 12 oz. of clear melt and pour. Add fragrance oil and a pinch of heavy metal gold mica. Spritz the first layer with rubbing alcohol (to make sure layers adhere) and pour your second layer. To achieve the texture in this layer, stir the soap in the mold until it cools (2-3 minutes), creating a chunky type layer. Give it a spritz with alcohol 2-3 times during the cooling process to eliminate bubbles.

Tip: Before pouring your second layer, make sure the melted soap has cooled to 120 degrees. If it’s any hotter it will melt the bottom layer of soap.
Layer 3: Melt 12 oz of clear melt and pour. Add fragrance oil, a pinch of Gold Sparkle Mica and stir. Spritz the textured layer before pouring the soap and spritz again with alcohol to eliminate bubbles after pouring.

Layer 4: Repeat step 3 using the Cellini blue mica. Remember to give the soap a final spritz to eliminate bubbles.
Final: Once the soap has cooled, turn your soap mold upside down and pull the edges away from the soap to break the air lock. Once the air lock is completely broken your soap loaf will fall out of the mold.

P.S. – I’m traveling today to sunny Arizona to go listen to Jim Collins (from Good to Great fame) speak. He’ll be talking about how to build a company to last the ages. I’m excited and will definitely be blogging as I can.

Soapy Plaid (Inspired By Soapy Love)

March 6, 2009 Filed Under: Melt & Pour Soap

Here’s our version…

Here’s What You’ll Need
White and Clear Melt and Pour Soap Bases
Brownie Pan Tray Mold
Shamrock Mold
Colorants (mica)
Fragrance Oil
Rubbing Alcohol
Microwave Safe Bowl (pyrex)
Knife, Paper and Pen

Step 1: First, we need to make 4 thin colored layers to cut our the plaid pattern. Melt just enough soap base to completely cover the bottom of the loaf mold (about 1/8″). Add your favorite fragrance oil and mica before pouring. Let the layer completely cool.

Step 2: Once the layer has cooled, remove this layer and cut into strips of random thicknesses. We found that cutting with a large butcher knife works the best. Cut them diagonally or straight across. Set the strips aside, we’ll use them later.

Step 3: Repeat steps 1 and 2 for all four colors you want in the plaid design. We used Gold Sparkle Mica, Opalescent Green Mica, Shamrock Green Mica and Blue-Green Mica.

Step 4: While waiting for the layers to set up, this is a good time to make the shamrocks (you might need to make 2 batches). We used White Melt and Pour with Green Chrome Oxide.

Hint: Oxides and micas mix into melt and pour a little easier if combined with a little rubbing alcohol first. This technique will eliminate spots and speckles. The tutorial on using oxides in melt and pour is here.

Step 5: Grab your brownie pan mold and trace the outside edges of the mold onto a piece of paper. This will allow you to make a blueprint of your plaid design on “dry land” before embedding them into the soap.Step 6: It’s time to start layering! The first layer will be the background layer. Pour just enough soap to completely cover the bottom of the mold (we chose a white background). Let cool completely.
Hint: Most soaps are built from top to bottom (upside down). When you flip them out of the mold then they are right side up. These soaps are just the opposite, the layers go from bottom to top. So the last layer you pour will be the top layer of your soap.Step 7: While the bottom layer cools, we can set up the plaid design before the embedding step. Set up your strips of soap on the piece of paper with the traced mold on it.Hint: The plaid design usually consists of two colors each. The colors are semi-random. The top layer should have some gaps so you can see though it to the bottom colors. (You will be left with quite a bit of scraps. Don’t worry, we have another soapy project coming up that will put these scraps to good use).

Step 8: Once you have a plaid layout that you like, and the background layer has cooled, you can finally start to piece your plaid design together layer by layer.

Step 9: Spray the background layer of soap with rubbing alcohol to ensure your layers stick together, then pour a thin layer of clear soap base. Generously spray your cut out pieces with alcohol and place them directly into the clear soap. Finish this layer off with another spritz of alcohol to eliminate any bubbles.

Hint: This layer should consist of two alternating colors. Make sure you have enough clear melt and pour to completely cover the plaid layers. And temperature matters! Keep the overpour temperature below 130 degrees as to not melt the layers.

Step 10: Once the layer has completely cooled, repeat step 9 with your other plaid pieces.

Hint: Again, consisting of two colors. But this time, laying them in the opposite direction of the first plaid layer.

Step 11: It’s time to add the shamrocks to the final layer. Pour a thin layer of Clear Melt and Pour, generously spritz your shamrocks with rubbing alcohol and place them in the clear soap. Give it a final spritz to eliminate bubbles. Let harden and cut into bars.
Hint: Remember to put the shamrocks in right side up!

Have a question about this blog post? Come join us at Bramble Berry’s Facebook page and we can help you out with any of your soapy questions!