This week was a nice mix of reflecting on 2014 and planning for 2015. Tutorials were a big part of 2014 at Bramble Berry, as seen in the Top Ten Tutorials of 2014 post. The list includes fun melt and pour projects, bright red lipstick and the cheery Lemon Poppy Seed Cold Process Soap. With bright colors and a fresh crisp scent, the project is sure to make you smile.
Search Results for: whipped body butter
Queen of Hearts Cold Process
Inspired by the regal character from Alice in Wonderland, this Queen of Hearts Cold Process soap is full of eye-catching contrast. Created with melt and pour embeds, a cold process base and soap frosting, this sophisticated soap will make a fantastic Valentine’s gift (it will be here sooner than you think!). LoveSpell and Baby Rose fragrance oils create a rosy, warm and slightly juicy scent blend that is wonderfully feminine.
All About the Trace
There are a lot of terms thrown around when you’re learning how to make soap. The most tricky of them for a newbie to learn and recognize is ‘trace.’ All the books, blogs and videos say to stop stick blending when you’ve hit ‘trace’ and then, more confusingly, it may have been referred to as thin, medium or thick trace. What is trace? Simply put, trace is a point in the soap making process when oils and lye water have emulsified. Once the soap has reached thin trace, it will continue to thicken over time.
Mixing lye water and oils together starts the saponification process. Saponification occurs once the oil and lye molecules create new soap molecules. If you are a visual learner, this Soap Queen TV episode explains the saponification process visually. And for even more information, in Erica Pences’s online classes (here and here) she delves deep into trace and the uses of different types of trace. Once the lye and oils are saponified and the two will not separate, the soap has reached trace!
Immediately upon pouring lye water into oils, the mixture will begin to turn slightly cloudy and milky. With a few pulses and stirs of the stick blender, the entire mixture will turn a creamy consistency. This process happens fairly quickly. Before the age of stick blenders, it could take hours for soap to reach trace! In the photos below, you can see the lye water and oils are beginning to emulsify. Trace has not been achieved.
Notice the streaks of oil in the photos below? These mixtures have not reached trace, because they are not thoroughly mixed. Some of the oils have not yet started saponification, and the mixture is not completely emulsified. These mixtures need more stirring and stick blending to reach trace. If the soap was poured into the mold at this point, the soap would not properly set up. There may also be pockets of unsaponified oil and lye in your soap, which may cause skin irritation.
With a few more pulses and stirs with the stick blender, the soap will reach light trace. Light trace refers to soap batter with no oil streaks, and has the consistency of thin cake batter. The batter will be easy to pour, as shown below. Thin trace is an ideal time to add colorants and fragrances because the thin texture is easy to stir and blend. Light trace is perfect for swirled cold process designs, such as the Fall Sherbert Cold Process and the French Curl Cold Process soap.
Once the soap reaches light trace, medium trace soon follows. Medium trace can be recognized by a a thick cake batter or thin pudding consistency. Trailings of soap stay on the surface of your soap mixture when lightly drizzled from a few inches overhead. Medium trace is a great time to incorporate additives that need to suspend within the soap such as poppy seeds in the Lemon Poppy Seed Cold Process Tutorial.
Adding poppy seeds into medium trace soap keeps them evenly suspended throughout the batter.
In order to reach thick trace, excessive stick blending is usually required. Thick trace is the consistency of thick pudding and holds its shaped when poured. Thick trace is perfect for bottom layers, as it is able to support lighter soap on top. It’s also great for creating textured tops, as seen in the Christmas Tree Swirl Cold Process. An extremely thick trace is necessary for creating cold process soap frosting, as seen in the Whipped Cold Process Frosting on Soap Queen TV.
When making cold process soap, beware of false trace. False trace occurs when soap batter appears to be a thick consistency, but the oils and butters have not saponified. Perhaps the most common cause of false trace is using solid oils or butters at too cool of a temperature. If solid butters and fats are below their melting point, the oils and butters may re-solidify. When this occurs, the soap batter may begin to thicken due to the oils and butters cooling and solidifying, and not because saponifaction is taking place. To avoid false trace, ensure any hard oils or butters are thoroughly melted and do not cool during the soaping process.
Factors that can affect trace:
- Stick blenders bring soap to trace more quickly than stirring by hand. When mixing your water and oils, alternate between stirring and pulsing the stick blender in short bursts. Once the soap has reached a thin trace, do not continue stick blending unless you’d like to reach a medium or thick trace.
- Some fragrance oils can accelerate the soap batter, causing it to reach a thick trace more quickly. To avoid this, use a whisk to blend in fragrance oils rather than a stick blender. Mixing in a fragrance oil with a stick blender can cause even the most well behaved fragrance oil to accelerate trace. Read more in the Soap Behaving Badly post.
- Adding fragrances after colorants and other additives gives you more time to work with the soap before a medium or thick trace is reached.
- Some additives, such as clay, affect trace. This is why pre-mixing with water helps to slow water absorption when using clays. The water and oil absorbing properties of the clay can speed trace.
- The oils and butters used will affect how quickly the soap will reach trace, and how quickly it will turn into medium or thick trace. Soap made with a high percentage of hard oils and butters will reach trace more quickly than soap made with mostly liquid oils. For example, the Castile Cubes Cold Process are made with 100% olive oil. With no hard oils or butters, this soap could be stick blended for a long time before reaching medium trace!
- Temperature also plays a part in trace. When soaping at higher temperatures, medium and thick trace will be reached more quickly than when soaping with cooler temperatures. If your design requires a lot of swirls, soaping at room temperature is common.
- Water discounting results in faster trace. A water discount is the process of decreasing the amount of recommended water in a recipe. Water discounting results in a harder bar of soap, with a shorter cure time. But, when water is discounted the recipe will reach medium and thick trace faster. Because of this, water discounting is recommended for more advanced soapers.
- Adding cold additives, such as cold milk or cream, at the end of your soapmaking process can dramatically speed trace.
- Increasing the superfat in a recipe will result in a slower moving recipe. Superfat is the amount of oils and butters in the soap that did not go through saponification. Increasing the amount of free-floating oils will slow down trace, but it also leads to a softer bar of soap that is more likely to develop DOS. In our experience, a superfat of 5 percent produces a balanced bar that behaves well.
The best way to learn about trace is to make soap! It can take some practice to get a feel for what trace looks and feels like. When making soap, do you have any tips or tricks when it comes to trace?
12 Days of Christmas Project Roundup
With Thanksgiving behind us, the countdown to Christmas has officially begun. If you’re feeling a little behind in holiday gift preparation, don’t fret. There is still some time to create unique, handmade gifts for your family and friends. But don’t wait, it’s time to get crafting!
The 12 Days of Christmas series featured twelve easy to make projects that would make fantastic gifts. From melt and pour and wax tarts to lip scrub and nail polish, you are sure to find a gift option for everybody on your list. Looking for packaging inspiration? Check out the Packaging Inspiration video on Soap Queen TV, along with the #Make it Monday: Packaging photo gallery on Facebook.
Facebook Photo of the Week (Nov. 15th ~ Nov. 21st)
The 12 Days of Christmas promotion is officially over tomorrow. Hopefully you have lots of handmade gift ideas for the holidays! The promotion features easy to make projects, like the adorable Chocolate Mint Melt and Pour soaps. With a delectable mix of Dark Rich Chocolate Fragrance Oil and Moroccan Mint Fragrance Oil, this soap smells just like a classic holiday candy. The Moroccan Mint Fragrance Oil is 30% off until tomorrow at noon PST. No coupon necessary.
Facebook Photo of the Week (Oct. 18th ~ Oct. 24th)
The skies were cloudy and gray most of the week here in Bellingham, WA. Good thing there was plenty of vibrant colors and smells in the office! India was the inspiration for the Color, Spice and Everything Nice promotion, which has a variety of fun projects like this Vibrant Mendhi Cold Process Tutorial. A soapy pattern, colored with the new Radiant Plum Colorant, tops off layers of bright green and hot pink for a totally unique and cheerful soap.
Chatting with Zahida of Handmade in Florida
Zahida of Handmade in Florida creates stunning cold process soap featuring signature swirls and gorgeous colors. With numerous soap challenge wins under her belt, Zahida has popularized several soaping techniques including the “Butterfly Swirl.” Her passion for creating and eye for design shines through in her blog and YouTube videos.
Before diving into soap, Zahida worked in corporate management and was an active member of the aviation industry, serving on several boards including the Pass Bureau Association. Zahida took a break from the corporate world after the birth of her son, and began soaping shortly after. Read on to learn more about Zahida, her business, and what inspires her to create such gorgeous soap!
Handmade Holiday Gift Inspiration
If you are planning on giving handmade gifts for the holidays, now is the time to plan ahead and start creating. Handmade gifts are not only more personalized and unique, they cut down on holiday spending. In 2012, the average American spent an estimated $854 on presents for family and friends…wowza! This year is the year to not only save money, but show your loved ones how much you care with handmade gifts. Not to mention…crafting is fun!
Because cold process soap requires 4-6 weeks to fully cure, soap that is ready to use for the holidays needs to be made now. If you are looking to make a festive and traditional cold process soap, the Holiday Cookie Bar and Holly Berry Cold Process features cheery red and green.
Top left, clockwise: Holiday Cookie Bar Cold Process, Espresso Shot Cold Process, Lemon Poppy Seed Cold Process, Holly Berry Cold Process, Indigo Spoon Plop Cold Process, Black White and Gold All Over Cold Process
[Read more…]
Pumpkin Spice Latte Sugar Scrub
The celebration of all things pumpkin spice continues with a creamy and luxurious Pumpkin Spice Latte Sugar Scrub. Made with a combination of skin-loving coffee butter and Foaming Bath Whip, this scrub moisturizes skin without a greasy feeling. Finely ground walnut shells and sugar gently remove dead skin, and the combination of Pumpkin Spice and Turkish Mocha Fragrance Oil leaves a light, spicy scent.
If you are looking for more ways to use coffee butter, the Whipped Coffee Butter Tutorial creates a fluffy and intensely moisturizing body butter. If you prefer a lighter moisturizer, the Coffee Butter Foot Creme features a delicious blend of Dark Rich Chocolate Fragrance Oil and Peppermint Essential Oil.
Facebook Photo of the Week (Aug. 15th ~ Aug. 22nd)
This week on the blog was all about keeping your face smooth and refreshed, no matter what your skin type. The Fresh Face Skin Care Series included several skin-loving tutorials, including Lavender and Aloe Lotion. Made with moisturizing Sweet Almond Oil and lightly scented with Lavender 40/42 Essential Oil, it’s a lovely combination for dry skin. [Read more…]
Facebook Photo of the Week (Aug. 9th ~ Aug. 15th)
With the end of summer in sight (why yes, it has been raining here all week; thanks for asking), we are making the most out of the sun with recipes to keep skin hydrated. Summer means clothing like tank tops and shorts, which means more shaving. Not to worry, we’ve got you covered with the Sunday Night Spotlight: Foaming Bath Whip + Green Tea Shaving Cream Tutorial.
With moisturizing ingredients like Vitamin E Oil, Green Tea Seed Oil and Green Tea Extract, it leaves your skin feeling soothed and fresh. Foaming Bath Whip can also be used for other recipes, as seen in this Rose Clay Sugar Scrub.
Sunday Night Spotlight: Foaming Bath Whip + Green Tea Shaving Cream Tutorial
Light and creamy, Foaming Bath Whip is a product that can be used in many different projects. From scrubs, bath bombs and soapy frosting, this versatile whip adds a fluffy texture and moisture. The main ingredient is glycerin, which attracts moisture from the air and leaves your skin feeling hydrated.
Easy to customize, Foaming Bath Whip will accept up to 5% fragrance or essential oils. Simply pour the fragrance in, and use a hand mixer or stick blender to beat the Foaming Bath Whip to achieve a soufflé-like consistency. Very mild with a pH level of 5.5, this product is ideal for dry or sensitive skin. Looking for even more moisture and skin loving properties? Extracts and fixed oils can also be added to Foaming Bath Whip.
[Read more…]
Coconut Cream Pie Cold Process
If you’ve been dreaming of an exotic vacation, this is the soap for you. This Coconut Cream Cold Process tutorial is all the fun of a tropical beach getaway without the sand in your shoes!
Made with 100% coconut water instead of distilled water, and featuring our brand new Coconut Cream Fragrance Oil, it’s a unique soap that smells as good as it looks. The top is finished off with melt & pour soap frosting and cold process “coconut flakes” to make this a truly decadent dessert soap.
Speaking of sunshine, this week we’ve been showing you all kinds of tutorials to give your skin that radiant glow perfect for a summer get away. Check out the Beautiful Bronze Lip Tint, Bronze Goddess Nail Polish and Magical Bronze Shimmer Stick. As a bonus, a few of the ingredients in the tutorials are 20% off as part of this month’s web specials!
Facebook Photo of the Week (January 18th ~ January 24th)
Soaping is a hobby that requires practice and persistence, and when a project turns out beautifully it’s all worth it. But unfortunately mistakes happen, and sometimes soap doesn’t turn out as you’d expect. To help you diagnose any soapy issues, Soap Behaving Badly is a comprehensive overview of a wide variety of soaping mishaps caused by fragrance oils, including ricing, acceleration and seizing. It’s a must read for both beginners and advanced soapers! If you are interested in learning more about preventing soapy blunders, our Explaining and Preventing Soda Ash, Why Did My Soap Turn Brown? and How to Prevent Fading and Browning posts are there to help.
The aftermath of our soapy fragrance testing. Check out Soap Behaving Badly to see what happened to (and how to salvage) these poor bars.
But let’s focus on projects that were successful! This week we shared a super easy and refreshing Infused Aloe and Rose Water Toner recipe. If you’re looking for more of a challenge, we also shared our Striped Berry Champagne Cold Process Tutorial featuring ombre layers separated by thin lines of mica for definition. If you’re a fan of ombre, check out these other DIY projects:
Tired and hungry after all that ombre crafting? This Ombre Layered Cake Recipe is sure to pick you up! Speaking of sugary treats, this week we also shared this Brown Butter and Basil Shortbread Recipe, which is a fun spin on the traditional cookie. As for the the Facebook Photo of the Week, the whipped soapy frosting on top certainly looks good enough to eat!