The MLC Craft Club met for the fourth time on September 8th, 2023. We gathered in our staff lounge kitchen to make soap. This is a very quick and easy craft, suitable for groups of all ages.
I bought all of my ingredients at my nearby craft store. They are common ingredients that should be available at yours. Here is your soap-making list:
The instructions for melting the soap base should be included on the package. I pre-sliced the soap and put it in individual plastic cups. This allowed attendees to each grab their own and head to the microwave after a brief overview of how the process would work. If you want your program to be more contained, you could heat up the soap ahead of time in a large batch and then pour it into individual cups or bowls for your patrons. The soap base heats and cools relatively quickly, so this may not be feasible unless you are able to bring the soap to the program space in a short amount of time. Attendees at MLC first heated the base in the microwave for 30 seconds and then in short 10 second bursts until it was melted.
From there, we added in drops of essential oils--I provided lavender, tangerine lychee, and green tea/cucumber--and colorant to get the smell and color that we wanted. Some participants added in lavender or lemon balm pieces to their soap. This didn’t always have the desired effect, because the pieces tended to settle to the bottom. I think this could be fixed by waiting for the soap to cool and thicken slightly before adding in the blooms. I highly recommend starting light with both the color and the essential oils--just add a few drops--and then slowly adding more so you don’t overwhelm your soap with scent or super dark colors.
Once the color and scent are to the person’s preference, pour the melted soap into a mold. Create a layered effect by pouring a small amount of soap into the mold, waiting for it to cool slightly in the mold, and then adding a few drops of color to the next pour. The graphic above shows the soap that I made this way. Create a marbled effect by adding a few drops of colorant, pouring the soap in the mold, and then adding more colorant and pouring the soap in immediately instead of layering. MLC has acquired large loaf soap molds, round molds, geometric molds, and rectangular molds. The rectangular molds set the fastest and most consistently. The round and geometric molds stay warm in the center longer, so they need more time before popping the soap out of the mold.
We didn’t watch a Creativebug video this time, but there are several classes on the platform that you can use in conjunction with MLC's new soapmaking kits. A series on bath and body products would be a fun idea; it has the potential to have good attendance around the holidays when patrons might want to create homemade gifts for their friends and family. MLC staff participating in our test program suggested letting patrons create their own blends of essential oils before creating their soap or other craft. This way they would get a better grasp of which scents worked well together before adding them into their soap, thus avoiding potential disappointment.
Overall, this Craft Club was a big success! Our soap may have turned out a little different than we expected, but it smells good and works great. Make sure to share your soap creations with MLC once you check out our kit!
CreativeBug classes:
- Make Soap Three Ways taught by Arina from BellaCreme
- Handmade Soap taught by Lindsey Stone
- Bath Bombs from CBTV Live
- Make Natural Perfume taught by Arina from BellaCrema
No comments:
Post a Comment