Carol M

I agree with palm oil; if you are trying to use stuff you can buy locally to start, you can get the palm oil at the health food store. It is sold under the name of Spectrum shortening; that's the only way I've even seen it in stores. It is pricey (around $10 for less than 3#), but at least you could try it out.

Maybe the bubbles aren't as much as a regular bar, but I am pleased with it. It will bubble more after you use it a little bit, it seems. I get more bubbles using this 50% coconut recipe and less salt than I did when I used a higher coconut percentage and more salt.

You're very welcome. Now, a box of salt is 16 oz, so I just dump in half box or so (guesstimate). Good luck to you both!

Yeah, to get bars to fit in boxes, I usually work with 32 oz oil batches in my mold. This makes the bars the right height for the boxes, even though the mold isn't completely full. I add in 8 oz uniodized table salt per batch. This is just a starting point; you may be okay adding more salt, but this is what I settled on.

It's my favorite way to make soap now. After I cut the bars and they cool completely, they are harder right away than my normal bars are after a couple weeks drying time.

After the cook, after adding FO and SL. If I'm going to do a swirl, I take out a cup or so before adding salt to the main batch (no salt in swirl part).

I do OHP and my soap is always fluid enough to pour (no water discount and add sugar and silk to lye water; sometimes SL at end of cook). I love adding salt to my bars, but I find if I keep it at about 25% of oil weight, it doesn't compromise the fluidity; otherwise, it can thicken it up too much and make it unmanageable. The main reason I love adding salt is it makes for such a hard bar, which is sometimes a problem with HP soaps. I use a 50% coconut recipe with butters totalling 10%, castor oil at 10%, and the rest palm or lard, and rice bran oil. Makes a very white soap (if the fo doesn't discolor) and sets off a swirl nicely. The sugar and castor oil help with lather, so I'm pleased with the bubbles I get. In my log mold, I keep an eye on it and turn it out after 2-3 hours and am able to slice it without crumbling.

That sounds good. I have about 5# of FBB that have been sitting in my garage since before Christmas that I have been needing to do something with, and I just got some Hydrovance in last week. Does the FBB still lather with that much oil? I hope so, because when I tried the suggested recipe on the KBB site, it was just too drying for me with the small amount of oil added that they recommended. Don't want to lose the bubbles, though. Thanks for sharing.

Nice, Grumpy! Bet they smell divine, too. I would never have guessed that mold is plastic; the glare from the lights in the first post looks like shiny metal. I would have gone to WM and passed over those entirely, thinking I was looking for a metal organizer.

Looks good, Val! Nothing to be ashamed of there. Like Sara said, it's very gratifying when you lather up that first bar. You'll be hooked then, for sure, if you aren't already.

Lotioncrafters used to have a recipe for non-greasy massage oil on their site.

I used to love those Party Lite votives; they did look so pretty when completely liquified in a pretty crystal holder. They had virtually no scent throw to speak of, though, so the only redeeming quality was the appearance.

If you do want to buy more of this, I think it is only like $2.50/# at MMS. I did pick up a pound with my last order, but haven't done anything with it yet; need to do some more research on it first.

I got one from Starrville that is extremely strong and yummy oob. I haven't poured it yet, though. It was my first order and I got what I consider to be very bad customer service, so I won't be ordering from there again, and was in no hurry to test it.

Yeah, GC rocks, and so does Circle E. My two favorite candle brands before I started making some of my own that I could actually smell:) . It's reassuring, though, to see that their wicks (zinc) mushroom just like ours, and they do soot, and have meltpool discoloration. It's funny that I used to put up with those things (never even pay much attention to them), but now they are totally unacceptable to me. I think to most "lay" people, the scent throw is everything and the clean-ness of the burn and wick "behavior" are way down the list. That doesn't stop me from striving to make the "perfect" candle, though. I love a bunch of their scents.

Like Gerrie said, sometimes you can get a good deal at Michael's. I've seen them there 3/$1 and I think once 4/$1, but it depends upon your location. They also sometimes have the dozen votive holders with white unscented votives for $4.99/dozen. This was just a couple of weeks ago, and will probably be repeated frequently, since "wedding season" is approaching. Don't guess you would have much use for the votives, though, unless you wanted to melt them down to make unscented tealights for tart burners, or maybe use them for firestarter wax.

Frosted Pink Cupcakes is exceedingly yummy! Just got a sample pack from them in today myself, so I haven't tried these yet. I love the Goddess oob, as well as the Strawberry Rhubarb. Can't really tell about the Tryst, Sweet Scarlet or Lapis Lazuli yet. Also, they have one of the best OMH oils anywhere and the Blackberry Vanilla Musk is very nice in hot process with no discoloration.

Fels Naptha is very difficult to locate now. The only place in our town that had it was the Winn-Dixie, and they closed down over a year ago, so I haven't seen any in a long time. It is probably still on some of those "country store" type websites, but they want a premium for it and you'd have shipping on top of that. It is very good laundry soap, though; you're right, it removes almost any stain. I may have to try to make a batch like you said and see how it does:)

I've had this happen with several different waxes. When you extinguish the candle and the meltpool hardens back up, it is discolored. Container palm wax seems to be especially bad for that. I'm thinking it is the heat reacting with the fragrance oils.

That is stunning soap. Great job!

Good idea, Brenda; I'm sure that's a perfect solution. I may just have to get me one of these. I enjoy my log mold that hubby made me, but I just love the look of soap made in a slab; you can do such neat things to the tops.

Beautiful soap and really neat-looking mold! Is the blade on the knife sharp enough that it cuts cleanly through the paper lining the mold? I was thinking that if the knife blade just kind of pushed the paper down instead of cutting through it, it could mess up the edges of the bars if the soap were still soft. Or I guess if you trim the edges anyway, that wouldn't really matter.

Can't go wrong imo with Old Fashioned Banana Pudding and Hummingbird.

Ooh, that looks delectable! Like softened premium strawberry ice cream. I can totally see that as a shower cream (in a transparent bottle, of course, so it shows through!). You should be proud:D

Not sure about the shower gel; might make it runny. You can add up to 1% additives, as well as 1% fragrance, and still maintain preservative in the lotion base. It also says you can heat the base up to 100 degrees for easier mixing without compromising the preservative.