April SMF Soap Challenge, Hanger Swirl Petra Style

[LisaAnne]

Mintle, very pretty!

Everyones soaps are beautiful!

 

[Serene]

I did not enter anything due to not being happy with my attempts. In the middle of it all I sliced my thumb while conditioning some polymer clay and ended up with 3 stitches. Since I am on pain meds the husband wont let me near Lye. Here are some of my failures. Between being too high on the pass across, forgetting to pour a color, no movement on the swirl, I have about 5 tries under my belt. Will keep trying after the thumb heals because I really loved this challenge! Thank you for putting this together.

Sere

 

[dibbles]

I did not enter anything due to not being happy with my attempts. In the middle of it all I sliced my thumb while conditioning some polymer clay and ended up with 3 stitches. Since I am on pain meds the husband wont let me near Lye. Here are some of my failures. Between being too high on the pass across, forgetting to pour a color, no movement on the swirl, I have about 5 tries under my belt. Will keep trying after the thumb heals because I really loved this challenge! Thank you for putting this together.

Sere

Your soaps are beautiful! Your husband is right. Lye and pain meds are probably not a good combination. I hope you heal quickly.

 

[Navaria]

I did not enter anything due to not being happy with my attempts. In the middle of it all I sliced my thumb while conditioning some polymer clay and ended up with 3 stitches. Since I am on pain meds the husband wont let me near Lye. Here are some of my failures. Between being too high on the pass across, forgetting to pour a color, no movement on the swirl, I have about 5 tries under my belt. Will keep trying after the thumb heals because I really loved this challenge! Thank you for putting this together.

Sere

They still look great! Sorry you're out of the soaping game for a bit, but I have to agree with your hubby. Not a good mix.

 

[Navaria]

Here's the last of my "also rans". It was a toss up but the glycerin rivers broke the lines too much in this one for my tastes.

 

[mintle]

My three other attempts!
First one - well this is a crippled butterfly! The trace accelerated because I used birch sap instead of water just to see what happens haha. I panicked and did not even insert my hanger.
Second one - I think I did some drunk swirling with the hanger and did not swipe horizontally correctly.
Third one - I like it a lot, really. But my husband told me to submit another one so this one stays outside entry thread.

 

[newbie]

Serene, you should still enter one of those. They may not be exactly what you wanted but they are beautiful and I can see the technique. You don't lose anything by entering!

I'm glad people are posting their non-entries. I really love seeing them all. Mintle, the one with no swirls at all cracked me up and the drunk one also made me laugh.

Teresa, I know you are feeling out of your depth but I think you earlier identified one of the things that may be tripping you up. You mentioned some posts ago that you were using new fragrances and colors because you like the adventure, which can be great but if you want to focus on the technique, it pays in spades to use an FO you have used a bunch and know well. It does feel boring in a way; I have to force myself to use a tried and true because I feel in some ways making a soap without a new fragrance when I have them lined up to try is a waste, but using your no acceleration go-to allows you to focus on the pour or the swirl or whatever and it decreases your chances of a miss on the trial. I don't think you are too new of a soaper to try these techniques. I think you are too experimental! If you dial back to one experimental aspect- the technique being the experiment-I think you would do perfectly well. I feel like you are going to make a joke about being too experiMENTAL, so I will just cut to the chase and make it now!

This was my other try. The color band was too wide because the soap thickened and it took a ton to get to the other side. It's fine but doesn't have that delicate feel I find in Petra's soaps.

 

[KristaY]

These are my less desirable attempts. The first one looks fine but the colors are too soft and muted. Believe it or not, the pic of the 2 bars is in focus, that's how blurred the colors got. It accelled just a tiny bit so when I swirled it was close to medium trace. That one is scented with BB's lavender chamomile huggies so the colors are apt.

In the 2nd, the batter stayed too fluid and my hangar was too skinny so I didn't get much movement in the swirl. That is scented with lavender and tea tree EO's. I also did an inverted stamp on the top which smoothed out some because of the thin trace. A bit of glitter added some pop to it.

These 2 just go to show what a big difference you can get with the swirl just by trace thickness. Both batters are the same recipe and the hangar is the same. First one swirled at about medium trace, 2nd one swirled at thin trace.

 

[Steve85569]

I'm going to enter another one of my failures just so I have an entry...

This challenge was quite challenging for me. It helped me learn a good deal of what I didn't and still don't know about this soap making thing.:cry:

 

[TeresaT]

Oh dear Teresa, please don't give up. Fragrances are a nightmare with soap. I suggest you make a batch of uncoloured soap, divide it into small mini bar sized amounts and test a batch of fragrances with it. That way you will know if you are dealing with an accelerating one before you start. It's the same with everyone. Anyway, the point of my message was that it happens to everyone so try not to be disheartened. I also find essential oils have less tendency to accelerate, unless they are the spicy ones like clove, so perhaps try an essential oil blend next time you are attempting something complicated to avoid issues. Oh and work yourself out a standard slow trace recipe that works for you that you like the feel of. I know all this sounds a lot of work, but will save you time in the long run. High olive and lard soaps trace fairly slowly.

Teresa, I know you are feeling out of your depth but I think you earlier identified one of the things that may be tripping you up. You mentioned some posts ago that you were using new fragrances and colors because you like the adventure, which can be great but if you want to focus on the technique, it pays in spades to use an FO you have used a bunch and know well. It does feel boring in a way; I have to force myself to use a tried and true because I feel in some ways making a soap without a new fragrance when I have them lined up to try is a waste, but using your no acceleration go-to allows you to focus on the pour or the swirl or whatever and it decreases your chances of a miss on the trial. I don't think you are too new of a soaper to try these techniques. I think you are too experimental! If you dial back to one experimental aspect- the technique being the experiment-I think you would do perfectly well. I feel like you are going to make a joke about being too experiMENTAL, so I will just cut to the chase and make it now! .

Thank you Saponista and Newbie. You are both absolutely right. I really need to NOT experiment when I'm doing challenges. The funny thing is, the practical side of me kept telling myself, "Self, make it unscented!" And did I listen? No the evil little experimenter took over. I've just bought all of these FOs and new oils I've gotta try them all out. Livin' on the edge!

I haven't really used much fragrance before (or a lot of color for that matter) and the times I have used FOs, I only made one notation about accelerating trace. I guess it didn't occur to me until that one (or maybe it had never happened before that one) to put something like that in my notes.

I've got a pretty good recipe that doesn't trace very fast, at least I don't think so; I've never done anything really fancy before this. It is lard/oo/co/shea/castor 40/35/10/10/5. I'll have to make an unscented batch tomorrow and try out my new neons with it. Its the recipe I used for the challenge but I replaced the shea butter with liquid oils for the challenge. (I did a different oil for each batch to test the oils.)

Yep. Way too much experimenting. BTW: Newbie, you had me laughing out loud with your experiMENTAL comment. That was hilarious! You totally beat me to it.

 

[Judiraz]

Some of my other tries

 

[KristaY]

Beautiful Judiraz! I especially love the colors and movement you got in the first one.

 

[Judiraz]

Thanks, that's the one I did before I read the rules.

 

[LisaAnne]

Rowen! Pretty
Everyone's are great.
My lye is cooling for my last try, to the freezer, cut while super soft, take a picture and enter.

 

[Rowan]

Good luck Lisa Anne .

I decided to leave my fifth attempt in the mould and enter my fourth attempt.

I finished the fifth batch at 2am yesterday (yep, addicted to soapmaking!), but the house was too cold for it to gel. Unfortunately I don't have much luck with CPOP. I can't turn the oven low enough to leave it on, and if I turn it off, it doesn't gel. I'm not sure it worked though, because the batter in one of the colours wasn't mixed quite enough. Still can't wait to cut it though

I really love everyone's entries. The depth of colours and patterns are amazing. I just wish I could see, touch and smell them!

 

[penelopejane]

Teresa, FYI The Perfect Man from NG accelerated a bit and coloured my uncoloured soap a pink/beige.

I know you have this one but don't know if you used it in the soap for this challenge.

 

[penelopejane]

I finished the fifth batch at 2am yesterday (yep, addicted to soapmaking!), but the house was too cold for it to gel. Unfortunately I don't have much luck with CPOP. I can't turn the oven low enough to leave it on, and if I turn it off, it doesn't gel. I'm not sure it worked though, because the batter in one of the colours wasn't mixed quite enough.

Rowan,
Do you put your soap in a cardboard box and wrap it in an blanket when you put it in the oven that is turned off?

 

[Rowan]

Rowan,
Do you put your soap in a cardboard box and wrap it in an blanket when you put it in the oven that is turned off?

No I don't but I think I'm having a seriously duh moment and OMG why didn't I think of that will definetely try this next time.

 

[Sonya-m]

OMG Rowan! I love everything about your entry. Your colour choice is beautiful - really appeals to me!

 

[dibbles]

Rowan, what an exquisite soap. Really beautiful.