As I write this, I have just officially launched this shop as the new base of opperations for New Moon Soaps. I'm very excited and the feedback has been so lovely. There are a couple of teething issues, but I'm onto it and will be getting it sorted as soon as possible.
In the launch are two timely soaps: hearts for upcoming Valentine's Day, and a water rabbit as a nod to Lunar New Year. I talked (at length) with a friend of mine who is Chinese and very connected with her Chinese heritage and culture about this because I didn't want to appropriate a special time that is not from my culture. She guided me on colours, fragrances, and even came up with a brilliant design idea: to put a koi fish in the water rabbit. She's awesome.
There are also two completely new products: two perfume oils. I'm really excited about these because sometimes I just want to stand in the Lab (read: the office room in my house where I keep all my supplies and stock) and smell all my fragrances, but then I'd never get anything done. At markets, I've enjoyed seeing people standing at my table and smelling every single product. The perfume oils mean you can take a wonderful fragrance with you everywhere and be the one to smell amazing.
Currently in the Lab are two curing loaves of cold process soap. One honestly looks a little like fudge, which is not what I was aiming for, but I'm not mad at it. The other is pretty close to the colour I was going for, which is the Pantone Colour of the Year: Viva Magenta.
Part of making cold process soap (meaning making it from scratch from oils and saponifying them with lye) is that once you add the lye and it emulsifies, it starts to thicken. And once it is thick, you can't thin it out again. My biggest learning curve right now is to notice exactly when the soap has emulsified so that it doesn't thicken. Once I master that, I'll be able to make patterns in the soap. Most guidance I have recieved on this recommends that I blend the oils and lye for much longer (around a minute) to achieve emulsification than works for me and I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. Mine was going thick after 30 seconds! Then recently a fellow soaper shared a tutorial with me that showed blending for only a few seconds followed with a small hand mix would be enough and reassured me that I wasn't ruining my batch.
I'm much more confident now, and ready to try some basic designs. I really wish the soaps didn't need 2-3 months to cure before use, I want to share them with you and hear what you think of them now!
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