Friday, August 04, 2017

Soapy Friday - The Story of Frankensoap

I'm convinced that if you think you've figured something out and get a little cocky, God says, "Here, hold my beer. Watch this!"

Well, do I have a doozy for you! Please, sit down and pour yourself a cup of coffee or tea...


So last week, I was pretty sure I had this whole lye concentration, oil, and water thing figured out and I was anxious to get back to my trials. I wanted to make my friend Mary a batch of Patchouli soap because I know she loves Patchouli.

Well to make a very long story short and after making a big-ol' hot mess (literally), I present to you the first batch of soap that I had to throw away...Frankensoap:

A big log of sticky gunk

Yuck!
Ultimately, what happened was instead of ordering and using Sodium Hydroxide, which is used to make HARD soap, I accidentally ordered Potassium Hydroxide, which is used to make LIQUID soap. Both containers look the same and I did not check the label.

I didn't realize this HUGE, HUGE, HUGE screw-up until after I had wrangled with this once cold-process, then hot-processed to save, rebatched and whipped soap into the mold. After cleaning up, I sat down on the couch and was wracking my brain to figure out what I had done wrong.

I scrolled through all my Pinterest pins and blogs and websites for info and something stood out...earlier I was reading about how to make shaving soap, which is made with both Sodium and Potassium Hydroxide, and I thought, "WAIT A MINUTE....did I? NOOOO!"

Yep, I used the wrong lye and ended up with a big log of sticky gunk. So, the moral of the story is...

Yes, a bitch indeed.

2 comments:

Mary said...

When reading this, I said OH NO!! How sad to have to discard all those beautiful ingredients. Your garbage can must smell heavenly!

Just the Right Size said...

LOL Mary, it happens to the best of us. Yes, the aroma coming from our garbage was a beautiful blend of sandlewood and patchouli. :-)

 

design + development by kelly christine studio