A Change Of Heart

Raspberry, lemon yellow and the palest of greens...

Sea Foam, pale green, violet, lemon yellow with a splash of raspberry...

Violet, Sea Foam and the perfect pale green....a cool soothing palette

For years I've been resistant to color other than clays,herbs or oxides. I really wanted to keep my product as close to natural as possible, and so color has been a bit of a conflict. Upon returning from the Conference in May, I decided to give color a whirl and as you can see I have been having an amazing time with color. Oh my gosh! I am loving micas they are too much fun.

 I've also had somewhat of a change of heart in terms of my soapmaking. I think that perhaps I was putting too many parameters on what I thought my soap should be, and I was really squelching the joy that IS soapmaking. I was taking it all way too seriously-I'm so glad I decided to add a little color to my life-what fun! Making soap should be ALL about fun-if it's not... relax and try a little color.

Baseline

Yep, I've been playing with color yet again. I had a disappointment that ultimately spurred me to work towards a baseline of all the micas I have. I should have done something like this in the beginning. duh! I'm doing each test with the same amount of mica mixed with a bit of water from my lye water in 16oz. batches to see if I then need to adjust color from there. The next step will be to cut and see if any of them bleed so that I can see if I need to adjust down a bit. I have a mini rainbow of colors that I will show you once I have them all soaped. I am love, love, loving this green.

Micas are a bit tricky because there are no definitive usage rates out there. It seems that learning them is sort of a trial by fire, but if you are persistent you will soon get the hang of them. I've also heard through the grapevine that Amy over at Great Cakes Soapworks is working on a video that addresses the proper use of micas- I can't wait, this is a gal that has lots of experience with micas and is sure to have lots of useful tips to share.

When Color Fades To Gray

This was baby blue

So disappointing, to have a pretty color and then poof just like that it's gone. It really didn't have  much with gel as the color was disappearing right before my eyes even before I could pour it up.This was a new mica that just didn't hold-too bad, they would've been so coastal like and pretty-now they're just a shadow of what was...oh well, they smell nice anyway and at least it's a pretty gray.