As many of you know, I enjoy making soap. The feel of homemade soap on my skin is luxurious and it does more than just clean me and make me smell good. Did you know that while our skin needs to be cleansed, it also needs to keep its own oils to maintain good health, and that most commercial soaps wash away most of those good, essential oils?
Healthy skin receives a regular flow of something called sebum. Sebum is an oily substance secreted from our sebaceous (skin) glands. It helps to keep the skin from drying out and, basically, waterproofs our skin. We need this stuff to keep our skin healthy and to allow our skin to "breathe."
An excess of sebum causes natural bacteria formation and creates the odor associated with not bathing, and the oily hair associated with not shampooing. Between washings, sebum lubricates and softens our skin, trapping bacteria for us until we wash it away with soap.
Commercial soaps are bad, bad, bad for our skin. First, most commercial soaps have had the natural glycerin removed - an essential ingredient in maintaining our skin's good health. They take out all of that fabulous glycerin and use it in other products - mostly cosmetics. Their soap leaves a film on the skin that doesn't allow skin to breathe and it traps bacteria between the skin and that film. Don't be fooled by commercial companies, with great marketing and packaging, who tout their wondrous soaps for your skin. It isn't true. On the other hand, natural soaps have all of their glycerin intact and they don't add things such as damaging preservatives or low-grade coloring.
So what does this have to do with my friend? Well, be patient and let me tell you.
I am on a few soap messaging lists where I go to commiserate my bad batches and celebrate my great ones with others who love to make soap. We pose our questions there, we post pictures of our successes (and failures) and we learn from each other.
Recently, when I posted a photo of what I thought was going to be a very bad batch and was lamenting...as in what in the hell did I do wrong this time????...I got two things out of it. First, I learned that my batch of soap was fine - the vanilla turns the soap brown. Which I knew. But when I sliced it, it was only brown on the outer edges, not the inside. I learned that this is a process and, eventually, the entire bar would be brown. It was true! Live and learn. That batch is finally ready and I have some very small samples (I made a small batch because I changed my recipe and wanted to be sure it'd work). The fragrance, Vanilla Sandalwood, is heavenly. If anyone would like me to send them a free sample, please email me privately.
The second thing I got out of this message board is meeting Colleen. After my hysterics over my Vanilla Sandalwood and then the elation of finding out it was fine, she emailed me to say she saw that I live in the same city as she does and would I like to get together for coffee to talk SOAP. As always, I am cautious when any unknown (and even sometimes known) person contacts me out of the blue on the internet. We emailed back and forth a bit and I decided that meeting her would be fun.
We met at a local coffee shop, each of us bringing samples of our soaps. When Colleen first walked in, she knew I was the one she was looking for. She saw my soaps on the table and walked right up. We began talking and, after awhile, she said, "I gotta ask you. Are you eccentric?" I felt a rush of adrenalin as panic set in I and wondered what was it that I might have said in just those few minutes or, was it, perhaps, my attire, that gave it away? I swallowed hard and croaked a weak, "Yeah."
I studied her eyes and wondered if I was going to be relegated back to making soap by myself when she blurted out, "I knew it! We're all eccentric! Anyone who makes soap has to be a little crazy!" I relaxed, smiled and nodded in agreement as we continued on about our soaps, our recipes, fragrances, swirling soap, layering, and about the woman the next town over who is selling her own soaps, hand-over-fist, and they are exquisite! Before we knew it, two hours had passed and it wasn't enough time to talk SOAP.
About a week later, I went over to Colleen's house for what my husband called a "playdate." I brought all of my soapmaking supplies with me in a big box. Colleen said we could use her molds, her pots, thermometers and scale. Which was very kind, because soapmaking is messy. And the cleanup is no fun.
Upon my arrival, we went into her den and sat, cross-legged, on the floor, staring at her computer (which was also on the floor and which made me realize even more that she and I would become great friends) while we calculated our recipe in grams. We went back and forth a bit and each of us finally came up with a good mix of oils. The soap calculator provides information, based on what we want to put into our soap, as to how hard, bubbly, creamy and cleansing our bars will be.
We finished our calculations and, after saying hello to her seemingly catatonic dog, Brody, we left him upstairs, sitting against the wall and staring at the other wall, while we ventured into the basement. There we measured our oils and lye.
We returned upstairs and, I told my husband afterward, that was the most fun I'd had in a long time. We talked non-stop, sometimes talking at the same time and I could've sworn she must have been a part of my family in a previous life or something, because I felt like I had known her for years.
Getting old is no fun. It's hard to meet new people and even more difficult to find things to do. I'm not a jock, I can't knit, I can't dance (even though I love to), I can't swim. The only thing I think I can really do is cook well, write mediocre, and make soap so-so. But I'm getting better at the soap and it's great to have a friend to bounce ideas off of.
Colleen and I are getting together with her friend, Ann (another soap addict), one evening this week. We are going to try to swirl again - at least I am. The batch I tried to swirl at Colleen's house didn't swirl. It just laid on top of the soap. So I have all of these fabulously smelling rose-scented bars of soap that look like a train wreck. I'll use them anyway, but I'm going to get it right the next time we are together. I think there's a saying that goes something like, "Don't cry over unswirled soap...."
Meanwhile, if you'd like a small sample of my Vanilla Sandalwood, email me at: [email protected]
Copyright 2010 liamsgrandma
