Homemade Vanilla Stabilizer?

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According to my physical therapist and surgeon, I am about 3-4 weeks ahead of where they expect a patient to be after just 3 weeks. I'm doing everything I can to heal faster but I am still about a month at the minimum, from returning to normal activities.

Thanks. It's healing fast. I was overwhelmed when I saw that someone asked about me here. I miss making soap and cosmetic stuff. Next week I'm going to set up at our county
4-H fair. It's going to be my "technically" grand opening. Since my soaps are 60% lard, I should do very well. I'm also going to donate 50% of my profits to one of the local 4-H scholarship programs.
You will love your new knee. I had knee replacement surgery on my left knee 11 years ago, on my right knee 9 years ago. Both are still doing great. Good luck on your 4-H fair.
 
I had knee replacement surgery and so I haven't been as active as I was before the surgery.

Thanks for asking. I was feeling a bit guilty about not keeping up with all the things going on here.
No need to feel guilty! Glad you are healing up faster than expected. Good luck with the county fair!!
 
Best of luck with your grand opening, Todd.
You will love your new knee. I had knee replacement surgery on my left knee 11 years ago, on my right knee 9 years ago. Both are still doing great. Good luck on your 4-H fair.
No need to feel guilty! Glad you are healing up faster than expected. Good luck with the county fair!!
Thanks everyone. I'm healing very fast but just not as fast as I want lol.

I have been selling quite a lot of soap but it has all been word of mouth type sales. The fair will be my first public set up. I choose our county fair because it is where a lot of people will know me and I them. I was a 10 year member and then another 20 years with my children. Plus me and my dad do the livestock and baked goods auction. So I am banking on my notoriety help with sales. I will let everyone know how the fair goes.

In the mean time, I have adjusted my notification settings because I wasn't getting them. Switched to a new phone and forgot to make sure that the notifications were on. So if you tag me or ask me a question I will know and can respond.
 
Best of luck with your sales. And your new knee. I've had both of mine done and my only gripe is that I have to wear knee pads if I am going to be on my knees very long...like in gardening. But I can take that over the constant pain prior to the operations.
I need to come back to this thread again. I had decided that I was just going to embrace the brown until I did my summer binge soaping to get rid of all my oils that were in the garage. Now I wish I had used the ZCS as 7 batches of brown soap is sort of boring since I used all of my scents with vanilla in them. LOL
Let us know how things went for your first sales...and how the knee is progressing
 
I didn’t realize that vanillin would discolor lotions! I thought it was the lye or the saponification process that causing the browning reaction (the Maillard reaction of the soaping world, lol). This is good to know, thank you!

Vanillin can discolour lotion bars? 🙀

Did anyone figure out a stabilizer recipe or found an effective commercial product that works for lotion bars?😧

I have VS from Bitter Creek North but it's meant for CP soap... Could it be used successfully in lotion bars!

Other than the FO and micas, my lotion bars contain white beeswax, mango butter, cacao butter and grape seed oil

Did anyone figure out a stabilizer recipe or found an effective commercial product that works for lotion bars?😧

thanks!
 
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Thank you for posting this! Have always been wary of vanilla color stabilizer because was so unsure of the toxicity levels for humans/fish/environment.
 
I've seen several conflicting posts on Sodium Thiosulfate. Are we to get the anhydrous (Sodium hyposulfite) or the pentahydrate. Is the anhydrous safe to use for CPOP? Thank you in advance!
 
The degree of hydration doesn't matter for the effect, you can use whatever is easiest to obtain for you. It only makes a difference for weighing:

3 oz Na₂S₂O₃·5 H₂O = 1.9 oz Na₂S₂O₃ (anhydrous)
 
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