Bad Soaping Day

[commoncenz]

Ok, my 19 yr old daughter has been asking me to make a batch of soap soon and let her "help". As I've said before, it's been about 8 years since I last soaped and I sure wouldn't have called myself an "artisan" or artist back then.

FFWD to today. I had the day off and was lounging in the recliner expecting to catch up on some TV shows, etc. My daughter comes in with my apron, my rubber gloves, goggles, etc. and a duplicate set of each for herself. No escape.

So, used to soaping by myself, I began the adventure by telling my daughter about all the safety precautions. Then explaining what each oil in my recipe should bring to the soap, etc. etc.

Anyhow, while doing my explaining, I grabbed the bottle of spring water and promptly weighed out the amount that my recipe called for and added my previously weighed lye (notice something here? I didn't .. not until I had melted my oils anyway). So, after discovering my mistake in phase 1, I remade my lye water using distilled water.

Skip ahead to mixing the lye water and fats. Stick blended to emulsion (so I thought). Added batter to my colors. Ready to swirl ... poured colors into uncolored batter in the mold ... grab my wooden skewer and give one to my daughter .. showing her the technique ... and

What's this? a fine layer of oil on top of my batter ...

Too far gone now .. I'll just have to see what happens ... cover my mold and insulate it ...and then it hits me ... the last of many flaws in my soaping technique today ... I forgot to add my fragrance oil.

It's amazing how one little added variable like trying to explain what you're doing can just throw you off isn't it? With all the mistakes I made today, I am still looking forward to seeing what I expect to be a pretty ugly, mess of a soap. :shock:

 

[snappyllama]

Welcome back to the addiction.

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

Why spring water?

 

[commoncenz]

Why spring water?

That, my friend, was the first mistake. We have very hard water where I live. So hard that we prefer to drink bottled water and I keep gallon jugs of spring water in the kitchen.

Apparently when unloading groceries I placed a jug of spring water in with my distilled water; which I always use for soaping. Now, on a normal day I would have probably noticed this when I grabbed the jug (two different colored labels). But, not today. Today I didn't catch it until I was looking at my lye water and wondering why it was staying so cloudy.

 

[Dana89]

Look on the bright side. You have a daughter who wants to hang out with you and learn something from you. At 19 that is awesome all by itself.

 

[skayc1]

why not spring water? My last batch was spring water I got from dollartree, I needed spring instead of distilled for a beta fish my sister gave me when she got married, so I was also out of distilled water & bought two jugs of spring water. I didn't notice a difference when I soaped with it.

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

why not spring water? My last batch was spring water I got from dollartree, I needed spring instead of distilled for a beta fish my sister gave me when she got married, so I was also out of distilled water & bought two jugs of spring water. I didn't notice a difference when I soaped with it.

Distilled water tends to be very much purified, whereas spring and mineral water actually have a lot of elements left in, which is their appeal, but is not so ideal for soaping use.

 

[commoncenz]

Look on the bright side. You have a daughter who wants to hang out with you and learn something from you. At 19 that is awesome all by itself.

Yes, it definitely was an awesome thing. And she learned how not to do a few things when it comes to soaping as I was not shy about telling her about her father's mistakes with this batch.

I also gave her the "soaping as a metaphor for life" talk. As in "See, I made a few mistakes. You might think there's no saving this batch because of those mistakes. Well ... here's what we're going to try ..."

At which point I took out my spatula, my Almond Cookie F.O. and my lemon essential oil ... added the oils for fragrance and began stirring the batter in the mold. When I was done, the batter was a medium brown color ... which I didn't mind with the Almond Cookie F.O. but would have hated with the "Day at the Beach" F.O. that was meant for that batch.

I told my daughter "It isn't the pretty batter I had envisioned, but it may just yet turn out to be something useful ... That's how it is in soaping sometimes and that's how it is in life sometimes."

She rolled her eyes at me and told me to let her know when it was time to check on it to see if was saved. LOL

 

[galaxyMLP]

I think it sounds like you did a great job salvaging that batch! Not a bad day at all!:smile:

 

[Jstar]

I've used all kinds of water..never had any issues....

Seriously, think about it..what kinds of liquids do we use besides water..Im sure there are more impurities in all the other liquids we use than there is in water..if not more, then at least the same amount

I used to be hung up on 'distilled only'..but after a couple of 'oops!' and then realizing how many other liquids I use..I finally saw the light so I happily soap with whatever liquid is within my reach at the time....

It may not be for everyone, and thats ok..I just wanted to pop in here and state that your soap will turn out just fine even with spring water..no need to toss it because of that.

 

[girlishcharm2004]

I was just going to mention that. We use so many different types of liquids in soap making. Distilled is used because it is theorized that the minerals create orange spots over time. However, I believe goats' milk contains minerals, too -- calcium, magnesium, iron...

It seems like it would only be a problem if you were selling and needed avoid orange spots as much as possible to lengthen shelf life.

 

[commoncenz]

Oh, I am FAR, FAR, FAR away from the day that I would even consider selling. It's just that I learned to make soap using distilled water and the reason I was given was because of "excess" minerals in other types of water. Yesterday when I used the spring water I noticed that the lye water stayed cloudy even after the lye had been dissolved. When I switched to the distilled, it went clear. To me that indicates that there is something in the Spring water that caused the lye water to be cloudy. If I can avoid an extra, unaccounted for ingredient, I'd rather do so.

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

Aye, I think if you are using something like a milk, the other minerals are also there but it's one of those things we have to live with to use milks. Using spring water rather than, say, plain tap water would seem to be adding in extra minerals for no real reason, unless your water has more minerals than spring water!

While I don't think it is a requirement in anyway to use distilled, I think that it would be better to use the (almost) free tap water rather than buying spring water to soap with. I have distilled water as my alpine water is pretty much spring water and I am trying to reduce soap scum

 

[topofmurrayhill]

For the shelf life and DOS-resistance on the soap under various conditions, it's probably disadvantageous to use spring water over distilled water, and as Craig points out one might often opt for tap water over spring water if going that route. However, there are so many variables that it can be difficult to say what the outcome will be in practice. Sometimes none, especially if it's not soap for sale.

When using alternative liquids, natural colorants and whatnot, you're not entirely without options if you don't mind using [gasp!] a chelating agent. As far as we know at the moment, sodium citrate works particularly well with BHT and EDTA works well with rosemary oleoresin extract.

 

[Cjchrissy]

Bad me, I only have ever used tap water, in saying that thought, I live in a remote town which pumps water from a lake which is less than a mile from me.

 

[Seawolfe]

I have used regular tap water for most of my bar soaps, with good results. But my liquid soaps were never clear until I started using distilled water. So now I use distilled water in my bar soaps too. I've not noticed a difference in my bar soaps yet, but it's early days, and certainly can't hurt.