Where to make soap/hazard to pets?

[atiz]

Agree with all the above. Boiling water can also be dangerous; you don't want to spill it on yourself or on the cat. But we get used to it. The lye fumes are really only bad for a few seconds. If you loosely cover the container after that, you won't even notice. If you have a vent hood in your kitchen, you can turn that on as well to help.
I tend to be pretty clumsy in general, so the less lye carrying for me, the better. That's why I do everything in the kitchen nowadays and it works fine. If you can boil a pot of pasta in there, you can probably make soap too!

 

[catFish]

I've learned that for me and my cat, she cannot be in the vicinity while I'm soaping. I've never allowed her around the lye/certain EO's, but in the beginning I was trying to wait until the absolute last minute to put her upstairs (as she's not a fan of being in one room while I'm in another). Then one day I turned my back for two seconds on a bit of mica dispersed in oil, and she started lapping it up. She hardly got any and it was pretty harmless, but that was reason enough for me to keep her away from every stage of the process.

It sounds like a lot of people have different perspectives, and I'm certainly not the most experienced person here -- but I guess it really comes down to knowing yourself and your animals. I can't multi-task to save my life, so it's either pay attention to the recipe or pay attention to the cat -- and she is very nosy, always sticking her head into anything that I'm fooling with (when she's not knocking it off the counter). So for me, really the only safe way to soap is if she's isolated from the process entirely.

I'd attach a picture of my cat with a tiny mica mustache -- it was pretty cute, once I determined that she was for sure ok -- but apparently in the day or two it stuck around I never took a pic.

 

[earlene]

I've learned that for me and my cat, she cannot be in the vicinity while I'm soaping. I've never allowed her around the lye/certain EO's, but in the beginning I was trying to wait until the absolute last minute to put her upstairs (as she's not a fan of being in one room while I'm in another). Then one day I turned my back for two seconds on a bit of mica dispersed in oil, and she started lapping it up. She hardly got any and it was pretty harmless, but that was reason enough for me to keep her away from every stage of the process.

It sounds like a lot of people have different perspectives, and I'm certainly not the most experienced person here -- but I guess it really comes down to knowing yourself and your animals. I can't multi-task to save my life, so it's either pay attention to the recipe or pay attention to the cat -- and she is very nosy, always sticking her head into anything that I'm fooling with (when she's not knocking it off the counter). So for me, really the only safe way to soap is if she's isolated from the process entirely.

I'd attach a picture of my cat with a tiny mica mustache -- it was pretty cute, once I determined that she was for sure ok -- but apparently in the day or two it stuck around I never took a pic.

CatFish, your kitty's face and my kitty's face look like they could litter mates. Yeah, I am in agreement with you regarding kitty in the soap making area. I am convinced she adopted me and my granddaughter because we needed her (I won't go into the details) and that she feels it is her responsibility to look after me, which thankfully she does between her long catnaps. But if she is not on the catio with the door closed (enclosed screened-in porch), or asleep upstairs, then she follows me everywhere and twines through my legs as I work in the kitchen. Not safe while soaping. At least she doesn't jump up on the workspaces while I cook or open containers (which she always acts like it is supposed to be a can of wet cat food, after all, why else would I be opening any container in the kitchen, if it wasn't so she could eat her favorite salmon in gravy?) But I don't know if she jumps up on the counters when I am not in the room. After all, I've seen her jump up onto the top of a 6-foot fence from the ground, and someone knocked over the stuff on the dresser one night & I'm pretty sure we don't have a ghost in the house.

I am fortunate that I have a catio for her, and I am fortunate that she tolerates a harness and leash (we have fairly large population of foxes in town, so I cannot let her outside to roam free unless I want to risk her life) and I am fortunate that she likes her backpack style cat carrier that I bought for when we travel. So I have a variety of options should I need to make soap while she is awake. But mostly I wait until she is sleeping or relaxing on the catio with the door to the house closed.

@Katie68121, perhaps you can invest in a cat carrier to put you kitty into while you make soap in the kitchen area. There are many options available at various prices. Here is the one my kitty really seems to love for travel.

We lived in a tiny house when Kitty Baby adopted us and we had a half-galley kitchen, only on one wall of the hallway from the living room to the bedroom, and very little working space. At least there was a tiny dining table that I was able to use when I made soap. And the bathroom had some space I could use when I needed to spread out. So I get it about not having a lot of space, especially when you share it with a dog and at least 2 cats. Keeping curious cats safe during your soap making is important, so I hope you find a solution that works for all of you.

 

[Catscankim]

My kitty has the same face too LOL