Good Clean Fun: Lemon Verbena Soap

Since the success of my Coffee Soap endeavors, I have been itching to try out some more soap additives. Because I have an abundance of herbs, the obvious next step was to figure out how to incorporate them into my easy peasey melt-and-pour soap. Good news! It's simple! Just as simple as using coffee grounds.

Select a good, aromatic herb. Preferably one with some delightful medicinal qualities. I chose Lemon Verbena.  It's cleansing, bright, and is known to help boost the immune system. I don't know if you can get that big of a boost from soap, but hey. This stuff smells nice. If you want to know about other good herbs to use in melt and pour soap, this website has an amazing list. The possibilities are endless!!

Crush your herb while you are melting your soap according to the directions on the package. Once the soap is all nicely melted, give it a good stir to remove air bubbles. Mix your herb into the soap and pour into molds. I was loaned these cute molds from a friend. Love how they say "natural" and "homemade"!!

To get a more in-depth discussion of how to do a simple melt-and-pour soap, read my Coffee Soap tutorial. But seriously, I promise, making this soap really is as easy as melting, mixing, pouring, and waiting. Waiting is the hardest part!!

I was really impressed by the great suspension I got from the lemon verbena. I've read that many people have issues getting herbs and other light weight additives to mix evenly through out the soap. Guess I was lucky!!

I did add one tiny drop of lemon bergamont oil to enhance the lemony scent.  I really didn't need to! Lemon verbena has such a strong scent on its own. Perfect for soap making!!

I'll be passing these bars along as gifts. I'm having too much fun with this soap-ification not to share!! Have you made soap before?

Happy Tuesday!
-Carolyn

New Twitter Account & How To Make: Coffee Soap

Have you ever come across an idea for a project that will not get out of your head? It just gets in your brain, takes root, and keeps itching away until you actually give in and embark on the project. It used to happen to me a lot. Read: daily. But lately, as I have been distracted by a certain little babu, my brain hasn't had too much free space for craft obsessions.

But since thing have settled in to a sweet little rhythm, my brain has been able to latch on to something: soap making. I saw an article on PopSugar about how to make soap using up old coffee grounds.

And I thought, "Well, I like coffee."

It's really super duper easy to make some fast soap. You can do it in an afternoon! To some, the melt-and-pour method of soap making is cheating because it involves using a premade soap base. In my mind, it's the safest method for me to make soap in an apartment. No lye, no fumes. Safe for baby and me! Are you sold on this? Let's get to it!!

Supplies:

Meltable clear glycerin soap (got mine from Michael's)

Old coffee grounds

Vanilla scent (optional)

Microwavable glass bowl

Spoons

Mold (I used candy making molds: $2 at Michael's) 

  

Step 1: Cube your wax

Most clear glycerin comes with pre-scored lines to cut 1 oz sections. For my mold I needed about 5 oz, but I cubed up 6 just to be safe.

Step 2: Melt wax

Follow the directions on your wax package for microwave melting. Mine said to start with 30 seconds, then melt and stir at 10 second intervals. 

Step 3: Add scent and coffee grounds

Just like the title says, yo. Mix in the scent and how ever much of the grounds you want. I did about 2 tbs of grounds, and 5 ish drops of the scent. 

Step 4: Pour into molds

While doing this, stir the glycerin a bit between pours to keep it from solidifying. Just make sure you don't drop your spoon into the mixture. Because it is annoying when that happens. Not that I know from experience or anything.

Once you are all done pouring your soaps, you can let the excess soap harden and save it for another pour. That's the beauty of melt and pour: you can reuse it as many times as you want! I didn't save mine because it was kind of a grounds-y mess. 

 Step 5: Wait for the soap to harden, then pop them out!

It takes about 40ish minutes, depending on the depth of your mold. You can pop them in the freezer to speed the process, but I saw no need to do that. 

Look how beautiful they look!! The pictures doesn't really do the prettiness justice. It's so deep and transparently and yummy. The soap is so great to use. It's got a great lather, and the coffee grounds are delightfully exfoliating. And the smell? Heavennnnnn.

You can spray rubbing alcohol on the bottom of your soap while it's wet to get rid of the ugly bubbles, but I didn't. These were just my practice ones. And plus the bubble side will be down when it's on the soap dish. Nobody is going to be critical. 

I can't wait to make more soap! I have so many plans for fun herb mix-ins. Have you ever tried to make soap? Cold Process? Melt and Pour?

In other news, I made a Twitter account today! Follow me! I'll follow you back. @LastinLineShop