# April 2017 Challenge Entry Thread



## newbie (Apr 19, 2017)

It's time!

Please post at least one picture of one bar of your entry. Any info you wish to share regarding method, colorants, FO/EO is always appreciated. 

No comments please, just entries. If you wish to comment, please use the other thread.


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## mommycarlson (Apr 20, 2017)

I'll be first, this is scented with Hippie Chick from Rustic Escentuals.  I'm in Florida and am posting from my phone so hope this works!


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## dibbles (Apr 20, 2017)

I poured alternating colors into one corner of a loaf mold. The colors are Enchanted Forest, Celery Green mixed with some Enchanted Forest (Mad Micas), and Winter White from Nurture. Aching for spring here! The fragrance is Pheromone (Nurture) mixed with a bit of peppermint EO.


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## SunRiseArts (Apr 20, 2017)

I used a combination of rotating the slab and plastic fork on mine 

The pictures are not the best, I had to travel and cut it early, and my son took pictures and used a flash.  I have no way to retake the pics at the moment, so sorry about the rough edges and quality of pics.


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## artemis (Apr 20, 2017)

I was inspired by the example soap with the one horizontal stripe.  My stripe is an emded, cut from the loaf I didn't enter last time. The scent is Afternoon Tea from Nurture. The purple is also from Nurture. It was fun to work out in my mind how to bring a design "to life" and have it come out almost exactly as I hoped.


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## beardguy (Apr 20, 2017)

This is my entry, it's a simple lard soap using zebra stripes. I scented with eucalyptus eo. I like the sober and simple ''spring'' design.


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## Dahila (Apr 20, 2017)

..........


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## earlene (Apr 21, 2017)

My entry soap includes striped embeds from soap I made with The SF Giants in mind.  This is one of the BlackSmith Soaps I made for my brother.  The main body of the soap is 50% new soap batter mixed with 50% re-batched black soap (from last month's challenge).  No new color was added to this soap, but what started out as black soap in the pot turned brown when the FO Dragon's Blood entered the mix.


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## doriettefarm (Apr 21, 2017)

This was my attempt at a tilted tiger stripe using neon pigments from Nurture and WSP's Citrus Cilantro FO.  Does it remind anyone else of Fruit Stripe gum?


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## CaraBou (Apr 21, 2017)

*The End of the Ends*

I thought this was a great opportunity to utilize some ends. I see a lot more potential for them now. Thanks for the challenge, newbie!


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## KristaY (Apr 22, 2017)

I only had time for one attempt this month so it's a bit rustic but you can see what I was trying to attempt. I also used the opportunity to try out a new FO to see how it behaved. 

I decided to use a T&S mold so I could get more height for each layer then used single color shreds to create the stripes with a mica line to separate each. The FO is Aqua Pier 1 Type from EBB which moved so slow I had to stir about 10 min before pouring each color and still got break through in the pencil line.

Thanks for the challenge, newbie! It made me think outside my usual "stripe" box and it was loads of fun!


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## BlackDog (Apr 22, 2017)

Here's my entry, scented with Lavender EO. Some of my "stripes" went a little wonky on me but I'm still happy with the result.


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## Steve85569 (Apr 22, 2017)

Just made the second attempt. Black amber musk and Sandlewood FO's mixed. Pastel colors just because it's spring.
Used a 6" x 6" slab mold lined with freezer paper.

Stayed a bit more fluid than I would have liked for the attempted effect but I still like it.


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## toxikon (Apr 22, 2017)

Here is my entry! It's a rainbow unicorn soap. 

I made the horns with soap clay saved from a different batch. The colours are micas from Nurture. Scented with tropical fruit punch!


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## Misschief (Apr 23, 2017)

Finally! Soap! I call this one Precious Metals, coloured with micas (Aztec Gold, Silver Starlight, and Glitz & Glam), scented with equal amounts of lavender, peppermint, and lavender. 



SMF April Challenge - Stripes by Ev Skae, on Flickr



SMF April Challenge - Stripes by Ev Skae, on Flickr



SMF April Challenge - Stripes by Ev Skae, on Flickr


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## Soapprentice (Apr 24, 2017)

My challenge soap for this week is not what I planned. Due to a misbehaving FO, my ribbon pour turned to a layered soap. My first layer soap was an accident, stuff like this happen only in soaping. Though this is not what I planned for, I think I like it for its imperfections. This is my 50% Shea soap.


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## Omneya (Apr 24, 2017)

Here is mine. For the life of me I can't get stripes or I panic and put the hanger through it. Scented in French Lavender & Honey
Mixed 2 colors for the purple (Still not purple enough   and two colors for the honey looking color. Not perfect by any means, but it is what it is.


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## cherrycoke216 (Apr 24, 2017)

My inspiration photo is from a National Geographic article featuring Alex Cornell's photo of Antarctica iceberg.

www.travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/365-photos/flipped-iceberg-antarctica/

www.alexcornell.com/antarctica/

So i decided to do a iceberg camouflage theme using cold process soap and melt and pour soap. It's scented with tobacco and bay leaf FO. Maybe it's my mostly hard oil recipe, or FO, or the activated charcoal, or the combo of all, it just thicken up on me. The execution is not what I have in mind. I just keep plop, plop, and bang bang bang the mold!!!  :headbanging:

And I should use way more melt and pour than I thought. Anyway, just count the grayish blue as the sky color.


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## SheLion (Apr 24, 2017)

I've named this soap Purple Sunrise. Colored with Atomic Orange, Mimosa Yellow, and Purple Haze micas from Nurture. Fragrance is Nurture's Breath of God type, the re-formulated version.


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## SaltedFig (Apr 25, 2017)

I was inspired by a recent possible sighting of a Tasmanian Tiger on the mainland of Australia, the hope that these creatures that were wiped out decades ago may still exist somewhere. It’s the faintest of hopes, but as always hope inspires the question “What if … ?”

  This soap was to represent the unusual stripes of the Thyacine. It took me a very long time to work through the possible ways to represent these stripes, which increase in size as they travel down the back of this carnivorous marsupial.

The brown stripes will get darker over the next few weeks, and the green will gradually fade off to light cream, so the changing stripe size should show up a little better in a few weeks. They haven't been cleaned up yet. These are 200g bars, the little bit is an offcut end. Please excuse my terrible phone photography.

Made with mostly local EVOO and organic cocoa butter, organic avocado etc. It's a dual-lye soap, coloured with ground organic coffee, local vanilla extract, raw organic cacao powder and organic Manuka honey for the brown, hand-ground oats for the oatmilk in the cream and a herb infusion for the top red/orange tint. No EO's in this one.


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## sweetbean (Apr 25, 2017)

First batch of coffee infused soap. Loads of fun! Next I'll add ground up coffee for exfoliation.


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## makemineirish (Apr 27, 2017)

This is not really what I envisioned, but not bad for a first draft.  I rushed to get something finished for today and was a bit torn over even entering it.  I am well aware of everything wrong with it.  However, I still thought my idea was badass, even if the execution fell short.  I figured I would share anyways since I stayed up way too late so that I could cut it way too soon.

The colors were intended to be red, white, and black.  I went too fast, They merged into a marbled pink.   (I am not a pink person!)  Micas used were MM Black Oyster, Nurture Really Red, and TD.  The fragrance is Nurture's So White.  I have been playing with this idea to incorporate more design with accelerating FO's.  I'm not there yet.  The nighttime, cell phone, bush-league photography isn't doing me any favors.

Oh well,  I'll allocate my time better for next month.


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## newbie (Apr 27, 2017)

Entries are closed. I'm a bit behind the ball but will get the survey link up tonight and passwords out.


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## newbie (Apr 27, 2017)

Link to the survey:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/P9D9YBD


Passwords sent to your PM's. Thanks!


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## newbie (Apr 30, 2017)

If you haven't already, please get your votes in! Survey closes tonight.

Next month, we will be having a guest host, our fellow forum member Khaystack! He will be posting the technique, the video and rules for May, so be on the watch for a cool challenge, coming soon..............


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## newbie (May 1, 2017)

Results are in:

First place to SaltedFig
Second place to Mommycarlson
Third place to Carabou

Thank you all!!!


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## earlene (Jul 23, 2017)

earlene said:


> My entry soap includes striped embeds from soap I made with The SF Giants in mind.  This is one of the BlackSmith Soaps I made for my brother.  The main body of the soap is 50% new soap batter mixed with 50% re-batched black soap (from last month's challenge).  No new color was added to this soap, but what started out as black soap in the pot turned brown when the FO Dragon's Blood entered the mix.



My photo disappeared, so for continuity, I am reposting it in a new post.


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## CaraBou (Jul 23, 2017)

^^And I still really like it - it's a cool soap Earlene!


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