The Great Soaping Disaster of March 2019

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Well it was bound to happen wasn't it - me saying recently how I wasn't very accident prone and how I keep a tidy workspace, don't drip my soap everywhere, etc.

WELL! Today I was making a 1/2 black and 1/2 white charcoal swirl soap and I put my stick blender into my pot (I keep the pot next to me that I warmed the oils in to rest the blender or spatulas and other items to keep things tidy) as usual. But then at one point I pulled the pot closer to my workspace from the stove top where it usually sits. There's a bump of about 3 mm from the stove top to the bench top - enough to upset my stick blender and send it sideways, which then 'dominoed' into the spatula sticking out of white batch that I'd already mixed, knocking that over and SPILLING MOST OF THE CONTENTS OVER THE COUNTER TOP!

I shouted an expletive, looked, shouted another expletive, looked again. My brain was churning thinking how I could get that soap up without wasting it, and also have enough time to work with my batter before it marched onwards into non-swirl zone.

I figured it out. My mixing 'bucket' is a triangle shape kinda - with three flat sides and rounded corners (good for pouring). It was empty of soap batter because I'd just halved it into the 'white' jug and the 'black' jug. It made a great scoop! I lay it flat and used the spatula to push most of the soap back into the container.

Managed to rescue most of it and get it back into the appropriate places for pouring. I finished my soap! It looks good! I wasted maybe half a cup of batter in the end. BUT my stick blender top got covered in soap batter. It's mostly sealed off from any possible contact with liquid, but some of the soap batter got into the top where the cord goes. I had to try and scoop it out and wash it a bit to get the residue off. It's sitting upside down now - to allow any excess water to get out. But we all know how well water and electricity go together huh? It might not be usable. We shall see.

But hey! I made soap!
IMG_0873.JPG

Here's my poor stick blender:
IMG_0874.JPG
 
@Marilyn Norgart - Yes - not sure that Roger will be too pleased with the counter top though. I always put that silicone mat down now because I discovered early on the soap batter takes the sheen off. Well the mat doesn't cover the part of the bench that got saturated today.
 
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Oh, so you are human after all!! Even tho that soap looks perfect and not like a catastrophic casualty!
Ikr

When most of us have a mishap we either end up with really fugly soap or we get lucky and it turns out cool but yours still looks like a regular, pretty KiwiMoose soap.

I hope Roger didn't mind too much?
 
@KiwiMoose - first - great new picture!

Second - you kill me with your "fails" - I should fail so bad!

Can you describe how you did that? It sounds like you layered the black and ivory in a pitcher and then??? Is the picture in #11 the soap in #1 cut?

I assume you worked at light trace? Need to know MORE! So I can make my half-a$$ed attempt at replication!
 
Your soap turned out nicely! We've all had soap disasters, I once had a full bucket of lye water spill, counter top, wall, floor, everything. I was so upset!
 
THAT is not a disaster. It is lovely! Fortunately my fails have been salvageable, but only after a lot of trimming. I've had a couple of real turds on the exterior but gorgeous inside!
 
THAT is not a disaster. It is lovely! Fortunately my fails have been salvageable, but only after a lot of trimming. I've had a couple of real turds on the exterior but gorgeous inside!

I really like your profile picture--I am busy making stars and moons when I do test bars but its going slow :) I only have one mold of each and want to make some soap with them before I decide if I want to buy more
 
I really like your profile picture--I am busy making stars and moons when I do test bars but its going slow :) I only have one mold of each and want to make some soap with them before I decide if I want to buy more

yes I am familiar with the too few molds scenario! Those column molds aren't cheap! Sorry. OT
 
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