Serenity Yoga Farm

I made four batches of soap in four days!  I was planning on continuing on to seven, but then I noticed…

Some upsetting white spots appearing on my soap!

What on earth could they be?  First thought, undissolved lye.  Some “soap people” gave me tips on how to test whether it was indeed lye but I didn’t like the main tip, so skip that for now.

Other white spot options…soda ash.  But no, that’s more like a white film over the whole top of the soap.

And then…stearic acid spots were a possibility.  But upon closer inspection, stereaic acid spots are more like little snowflakes than these textured white bumps on my own soap.

Next…could it be butterfat from the milk??

Back to the lye.  The test that people kept telling me to try involves putting your tongue onto the dots.  If it shocks you (these women kept saying, “it’s not as bad as licking a 9v battery…” umm what??  Also not something I want to try!) then it means it is indeed lye.  If it doesn’t, who knows what it is.  I may have been unwilling to potentially get zapped, but Christine had invested a lot of money into this soap making and so she was quick to lick the soap.  She licked various white spots, but nothing.  Hmm.

In trying to figure out what it could be, I also realized I did many, many things wrong in my soap making.  Things I thought were not a big deal but turned out could have made my soap imperfect (oh nooooo, not that!).

Some of these Leah fails are:

–pouring the oils into the lye mixture and not the lye mixture into the oils

–not straining out the butterfat after the lye dissolved into the milk

–keeping the temperature way too low on the lye/milk mixture (45 degrees when it apparently should have been at least 80)

–mixing the oil and lye/milk together when they were over 10 degrees different from each other in temps (err…my oil was 100 degrees)

–not spraying the soap with alcohol after putting it into the mold

Probably I’m forgetting some.  But it’s all a learning experience, no big deal, the soap might be able to be cleaned off a bit and it won’t shock or hurt anyone, so it’s okay after all.

One of my friends really wanted to make soap with me, in fact I think she kind of wanted to try it together rather than having me make a batch (or 4) first, but I was so glad I did the messing up and learning before going to her house to make soap together.

So on Monday I went to her house with my soap gear, all set to make soap with her and do it right this time.

Only, I didn’t.  I really messed up.  BAD.  And this time it hurt.

People may laugh when you talk about soap making being dangerous.  Those are the people who either don’t know how to make soap or make the melt and pour soaps (does that really count, come on, you’re just melting machine made soap and adding fragrance and color to it).

Soap making is dangerous.  Lye is a chemical and that’s the truth of it.

I was prepared with my gloves and long sleeves and apron.  So was my friend.  But even after watching so many YouTube videos and reading articles, I did not know how necessary a vapor mask was.

In trying to get the lye to a better temperature, I didn’t do the ice bath this last time (previously I put the pan in an ice bath and then poured lye into the pan which already contained my frozen milk).  I thought the frozen milk would help it still stay low-ish but not the extreme lows I’d dealt with in the other batches.  But it actually got up to almost 120 degrees which created ammonia smelling fumes.  We were inside in a large kitchen, but we didn’t have a fan in there and we didn’t have masks on.  In my own household we don’t even use bleach and we keep things chem-free as much as possible.  So I’m not used to it and I’m perhaps more sensitive than most people are.  I got an instant headache and my throat got scratchy.  When I talked I sounded like I had a sore throat.

We turned on the fan above the stove and hoped that an ice bath would help get the temperature back down soon and it did, eventually.  But my headache did not go away.

That was Monday.  I still have not fully recovered.  I texted my friend about it and she had a headache that evening but it was gone the next day.

I feel SO STUPID.  I wish more people wore masks in their videos.  I wish I hadn’t laughed off the one person’s video I saw who insisted upon making their soaps outside for better ventilation.  I wish I had known how hurt I could get so that I could have better protected myself and also warned my friend.

On a bright note, we did make pretty soap.  I have to find the light, you know?  It’s been a painful week and I don’t want to give up on soap making.  I have invested so much in all the supplies and people have commented on how much I light up when I talk about soap (well, to be fair that was before this incident).

So I plan to recover and get a vapor mask and do at least the first part of the soap making process outside and then the second part will be done in the office where there’s a fan and vent and no children who could have been harmed.  Yes, I’m SO GRATEFUL that this did not happen at my house where everyone is much more chem sensitive.  I can’t imagine how bad that could have been.

We’re living to learn, right?  Can’t stop now.