Disaster in the Soap Kitchen

I had all intentions of whipping up some nice soaps, but the Soap Gremlin (who us soap makers blame disasters on) came to visit me today. First I worked on melt and pour embeds and nothing terrible happened there. Really, how much trouble can I get into with embeds.

The first thing that happened was my never-ending water showing up on my counter. I was so messy at the sink today, that I thought I just kept splashing water up there, so I continued to wipe it up. Finally, after about a half an hour of constantly wiping the counter, I noticed there was a lot more on it and it moved further down. Here, when I made my sugar-water solution, I had a pin hole in my plastic container that so happened to be sitting in the vicinity of the lakes. So I transported it to other containers. No biggie. Amazing how the counter stayed dry after that.

Next incident was when I was changing containers on my titanium dioxide. I was pouring from one to the other when all of a sudden a big glob came splashing down covering my apron, now clean and dry counter and even made it on my ceramic tile wall. Now, if you have ever worked with titanium dioxide, you would know that it just doesn’t clean up lickety split. It smears as it covers your rag and is not a pretty site. Another mess I was forced to clean up.

Next, every batch of soap I made speeded up on me. It might be my warmer temps but do you think that stopped me. Heck no. I just kept on soaping and slamming the not so smooth soap into the molds. Well, the last one I had all the plans of cute little cupcakes with bears on them and a nice fresh Lilac scent. The lilac scent, being a floral, will accelerate. I didn’t think it would move that fast, but I should have since I was soaping warmer than usual. What was I thinking??? I smashed them into my cute little cupcake molds and after putting the rest of the batter into a piping bag, I needed Arnold Schwarzenegger to come help me pipe it out. I was using muscles I haven’t seen in a long time and it still would not come out. Finally I gave up on the piping bag and took the soap out of the molds and smashed it into my small decorative molds to use as samples. It is highly disappointing when this happens, but I could have save it all by 1. either waiting for cooler temps or 2. giving up after the first batch.

I have had days like this before and I can almost guarantee I will again. Soap Gremlin, if you are going to come visit me, at least you can bring me an Iced Coffee. 🙂