Disaster to report. First time experiencing soap on a stick and first time using Lavender EO in a soap. If it could go wrong it did! LOL
I just plopped the pudding batter in the mold, in the order that I would pour it for a spin swirl; but no amount of shaking and turning would move that mass of thick batter, so I just took a spatula and made a spiral swirl would in the mold. I made a somewhat decent top, put on some glitter and put my dividers in, and it wrapped in a towel till tomorrow morning.
The other thing I did differently was to lower my lye concentration to 30 instead of 29. I didn't think I over mixed. I was going just for emulsification, but I had a weird color distortion from my over head light that made it look like it wasn't emulsified. Once I suspect that, I turned the bowl and sure enough, it was the lighting that created a shadow of a different color.
I thought I'd be OK since the soap was pourable; but by the time I barely started mixing my colors, it had turned to pudding. Oh well, lesson learned. I should have had my under cabinets lights on, for starters.
I find it hard to believe that changing the Lye Concentration to 30 from 29 would make that much of a difference.
Do EO's trace faster? I'd sure like to know what happened. My recipe was the same (48% hard oils), same additives, room temperature oils and lye solution, etc.
I might try this again with a small box that I'll make with foam core board and use a slow tracing, well behaved FO. One consolation - the top of the soap looks pretty good! LOL