Marie Browning's EMBED directions....

[dogmom1]

are different than the others i've read. in her book 300 handcrafted soaps she writes to pour a thin layer of clear soap and when the skin forms to carefully remove it and then add the item to be embedded, wait till that layer hardens and then pour the rest of the soap into the mold. she specifically says that in her testing spraying with alcohol didn't work.

has anyone used her method and if so does it work better for you? or did you try it and it didn't work at all?

thanks!

[Faerywren]

Out of principle I will not wait for a skin to form then remove it with a toothpick blah, blah, blah. Honestly, who has that kind of time?

I make embed soaps religiously on a large scale and have always sprayed with alcohol and never had any problems. She is the only person I've ever seen who didn't like to spritz with alcohol.

[candlemama]

I've made a few batches layering clear and white bases, as well as layering CP with some clear M&P. The one time I forgot to spray with alcohol, my layers fell apart on some on the bars. Alcohol has worked well for me so far. I haven't tried embeds yet, but I have let the layers cool and harden up before adding another.

[dogmom1]

thanks to you both! i'll just try it with the alcohol as it seems that's the way to go.

i have to admit that trying to pull the skin off with something pointed was not making me real happy!

ei

[Candybee]

Pulling off the skin layer of M&P sounds nuts to me. Like Fairywren said who's got the time or patience to do that?!! I don't do embeds very often but never had to do anything like that.

My trick is to pour a 1st layer, add the embeds, then wait a couple minutes for the soap to cool but not long enough to form a skin. Then slowly pour the rest of the base over the embeds to fill the soap mold. Never used alcohol doing it this way. The embeds then stay suspended in the middle of my soap. If one should come up I use a toothpick to hold it in place until the soap cools enough. Usually about 30 seconds or less.

[dogmom1]

thanks candybee! i'm glad to hear it works for you without alcohol. i'm going to try it sunday, have to work tomorrow.

and i'm really happy that no one does it the"peel off" way, it sounds difficult and time-consuming.

ei

Edited August 14, 2010 by dogmom1
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[Secret-Beauty]

Pulling off the skin layer of M&P sounds nuts to me. Like Fairywren said who's got the time or patience to do that?!! I don't do embeds very often but never had to do anything like that.

My trick is to pour a 1st layer, add the embeds, then wait a couple minutes for the soap to cool but not long enough to form a skin. Then slowly pour the rest of the base over the embeds to fill the soap mold. Never used alcohol doing it this way. The embeds then stay suspended in the middle of my soap. If one should come up I use a toothpick to hold it in place until the soap cools enough. Usually about 30 seconds or less.

Sounds nuts to me also. I am never peeling anything off.

[Ange647]

I do embeds in some soaps and alcohol works really well for me. Spray the embed before you put them in the soap and pour cooled soap on top and you should be fine.