A few months ago, during the darkest months of 2020, we started to explore all kinds of crafts. Partly to have something to do when it was pitch black and raining outside, but also to keep learning new things. In normal times we loved attending workshops and classes of all sorts. Now that has moved to online learning and books- yes I still adore real paper books!

Soap was one of the things that I wanted to try for many years but the process scared me a bit as you have to be very careful in some stages. Luckily, Joeri was on board too and he has much more experience with handling hot kitchen stuff, mixing scary products, and analyzing processes. So we teamed up and while he read all about the different processes and important considerations, I dove into the world of essential oils and mixing scents. Together we first tried melt and pour soap and later both the hot and cold process.

These two bars are specially made for the dogs, following a recipe from the book: Natural soap-making book for beginners by Kelly Cable. Only for the scent, the book suggested Geranium and Cedarwood essential oils, and we used a mix of a bit of YlangYlang + Geranium + Atlasceder + lavender.
We used silicone molds instead of a big one where you have to cut the soap and getting the soap out after 48 hours was still a bit tricky, so the surface of the bottom isn’t very smooth but it works. In the last stage, the soap has to cure for 4-6 weeks, which is about done now, so we can test this soap!

I’m pretty sure that I am much more enthusiastic about testing soap than my dogs… lol. Bath time is never their favorite, they just love the stinky smells of the woods 🙂

PS: the letters were pressed by hand about 24h after pouring the soap. I used my leather stamps for it. Not how it should be done, but good enough 🙂