White Flag Designs: Today I made soap

But not just ANY old soap, no... this is "real" soap, made with oils and lye and lots and lots of messes and mixing :) I failed to take any pics of the process, but I'll be sure to update this listing with pics of the results when I have them... as it's my first batch of cold process ever, there's no guarantee how it will end up- usable? garbage? the best soap ever made?

...Only time and saponification will tell, but so far everything seems to be going as it should. I mean, I HAVE spent the last 8 months or so reading and reading and reading about this. I'd hope that I'd be able to at least end up with usable, if not salable, soap on my first go round. It's a black bar, with swirls of red and gold throughout, or at least that's how it looked when I poured it into the mold.

Came up with a special new fragrance for it too- and as soon as supplies come in I'll be offering it in a solid scent in the Etsy shop, so you all can enjoy it before the soap is ready (assuming, of course, that the soap comes out awesome enough to sell, which it *may* not). A rich blend of scents: cracked coconuts and fresh limes dance amongst swirls of dark musky woods, hint of vanilla, and a sprinkle of powder. All I could think about when making this was Morocco. Which brought me to Tangier, which made me think Burroughs, then Kerouac, then- Desolation Angel was born.

Unfortunately I used up ALL of my coconut scent in the blend for the soap, and I was able to make just enough of it for the soap, but no more. I actually kinda lucked out that way, I guess- it could have ended up that I didn't have enough of this new fragrance to use in my soap, and then what would I have done? :) I was able to get a couple of drops out of the mixing container, and I made myself a sample size solid scent with this divine mixture, but no more shall be had until I get my scents back in stock. Which is a shame, because this tiny jar I have is very dilute and I fear it won't last me the 8+ days it's going to take for my stuff to get here. And the soap won't be ready for use for AT LEAST a month!! I don't know what I'll do in the meantime... this scent is amazing, and I don't usually say that about things that I make.

Anyway, time to go get some orders ready for shipping tomorrow- I'll be back to update this with pics when I can!!

Edit: Here's pics!! I couldn't wait, I had to cut into it a little early, and I took pics as I went. Man, I don't know how I'm going to deal with having to wait 4-6 weeks to use this stuff :( I'm no expert, but it looks pretty alright to me, and the scent survived the saponification process wonderfully... I could have poured it a bit sooner, I guess, to eliminate some of the bubbles I trapped, and I think next time I'll use activated charcoal for black rather than oxides, but overall I'm pretty happy with how it came out. Oh and I have to do more swirling on the next round, for sure. I thought I had overdone it- guess I was wrong!