Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge October 9, 2016 12:23 38 Comments

This month's soap challenge is the wood grain technique and the guidelines are as follows.  The soap must be made from cold process soap only and must feature a wood grain technique.  Any shape or size mold is acceptable and the categories are split into all natural and synthetic.  I am entering the all natural category.  My inspiration for the soap I made actually came from a dream I had.  I am one of those soapers that dream vivid dreams about making soap and try recreating the image in my mind.  In my dream this piece of wood was barn wood that was old, sun bleached and weather damaged, almost petrified looking.  The next couple of days I began infusing olive oil with natural color powders of indigo, nettle leaf, and  alkanet root.  These would be three of the colors that I would be using, the other two were white kaolin clay and activated charcoal.  The next day with my natural colors ready to go, I lined my mold and gathered the rest of my supplies.

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

I am using a blend of juniper berry, cassia, and peppermint essential oils.  

My soap batter consists of avocado, canola, castor, coconut, mango butter, hemp, extra virgin olive, palm kernel and shea butter.

Let the adventure begin!  I brought my soap to emulsification, separated it out into five portions and started to mix my colors.

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge 

Once I had my colors mixed to my liking, I added the essential oil blend that I had made that I mixed with some white kaolin clay.  The excitement was building almost ready to pour.

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

I began pouring my soap one color at a time into my bowl, alternating until all the soap batter was gone, then poured into my mold.

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

I covered the soap and put it into the oven on warm for approximately one hour, took it out, left it covered until the next day.  After I removed it from the mold, I split it into logs, then blocks then sliced it with my bar cutter.

 Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge  Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge 

I tried keeping all the soaps in order for picture time.  Here are some of the nicer pieces put together how they were cut.

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge 

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

For some reason, this last set of soaps I could not find the end that went with it.  I think I drove myself nutty trying to match them with the twenty-five other bars in this batch.

Green Wood - Wood Grain Soap Challenge

I like the colors that I achieved, the subtle green, blue and pinkish purple hues.

I had a great time making this soap and the essential oil blend smell amazing.  I look forward to using this technique with other natural colors and of course I will give it a try with some mica too.

If you would like to purchase some of this soap, please visit the link below.

http://www.lisasnaturalherbalcreations.com/products/green-wood-soap

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