Soap and Snow

Oh, No! Snow!

 Winter struck again this week and then the snow promptly melted.

The idea for the soap I call “Wandugu” has been percolating in my head for weeks. I have a friend whose brother is at the end of his wits with skin irritations, so I set about to formulate a recipe for him.

Wandugu materials

I suspect he’s simply sensitive to the chemicals common in petro-chemical cleansers, but decided to add the extra emollients of African Shea butter and Grapeseed oil in case he just has extra dry skin.  Also, this soap contains only plant-based scent to avoid any possibility he might be allergic to the tiny amount of synthetics in fragrance oil. By the way, Wandugu means “brother,” in Kenyan.

First Attempt

The first batch of Wandugu failed and went into the crock pot for re-batching.

Second Try--Looks good

 Re-batching of the first Wandugu: After the gray and white were melted and stirred together in the crock pot, it looked pretty boring, so I added alkanet and indigo powders thinking I’d come up with a dark blue. I also added previously made soap chunks that were navy blue and a few castile spirals that I had on hand. Surprise! The batter turned camouflage green, thus the name. This soap making is a crap shoot.

Camouflage Soap: Security for our troups!

 This is the first batch of soap eggs that look good. I bought this “mold” at Goodwill and suspect it was intended for Jello. If I decide to make egg soaps to sell I’ll probably invest in a “real” soap egg mold.

Egg Soaps

 This pic below is of the base I make for the hand milled tomato, cucumber, carrot and strawberry soaps. The reason I’m posting this largely unexciting photo is because it displays my first successful attempt at folding parchment paper into an actual box-shape. That may not seem like much to anyone reading this post, but for me it’s a landslide victory. Geometry has always baffled me. I use gift bags at Christmas because I cannot wrap a decent looking package. Angles and the ability to achieve them have always eluded me. I’m very proud because I just kept at it until I succeeded. 

Soap base and first successful parchment folding