Discover How Fun Soap Making Is For You!
by: Jen Hopkins
Soap making is a fun activity that people should try out. This gives you a chance to make soaps that you will have fun using when taking a bath. This activity requires creativity and innovation whenever you decide on a kind of soap to make. You can start enjoying taking a bath next time with colorful and fragrant soaps that you personally made.
This activity gives everyone the authority to be very creative. Especially with the different ways that you can make soap, you can have different ways to make your soaps. You can try out the handmilled process, cold process, hot process and the melt and pour method for maing your soaps.
Before you take a look into how soaps are made, you need to know the common ingredients found in soaps. Soaps are generally made from fats, whether from animals or vegetables. Lye, a caustic substance from wood and wood ashes is mixed with fats to undergo saponification. Other ingredients that may be added are dyes, pigments, fragrances and essential oils. By these, you will know how much soap varieties you can actually make.
The easiest method for making soap is the 'melt and pour' method. This process is very straightforward. Soap base is available in bars that you just have to melt. Once melted, you can add the additives one by one in the soap mixture. You have to pour this on the molds to let the soap harden. This is a very simple process that you can make on your own.
Probably the cold process of soap making is a hassle-free method that you can try. First, it is important to mix the lye into water. Once this is done, add the fat in this mixture until it forms an emulsion. The additives go in next so add whatever you want to in the mixture. Cure this in the mild for 3 days until t is hard enough to cut. Once the soaps are solid, you have to cure the soap for an additional 3 weeks before you can practically use it.
The hot process is a modified method for handmade soaps. Compared to the cold process, this requires heating of the ingredients. Both the lye-water and the oils must be heated prior and after adding them. Continuous stirring will mix the ingredients all together. The additives must be added in the soap before transferring into molds. The advantage of this is that the soaps that have hardened can immediately be used.
Rebatching soaps is an interesting method of making soaps. You have to grate old soaps that you want to recycle. Add in water to dissolve the soap previously made. Melt the soap and water mixture until it becomes liquid. Colorants and other additives go in the melted mixture. Once these have hardened in the molds, that's the time that you can actually use the soaps.
We all use soaps whenever we take a bath. It will really be very exciting if we can actually use a new type of soap each time. With soap making as a hobby, you are allowed to be very creative. This is indeed a great hobby to engage in so you can try this out and see how helpful this is.
| About The Author Jen Hopkins has worked in the skin care industry for years. She maintains websites about handmade soap recipes http://www.naturalsoapmakingsecrets.com, and soap making instructions http://www.naturalsoapmakingsecrets.com/soap-making-secrets/ If you want to contact her, you can use the contact form at one of her sites.
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