Making Felted Soaps

Yesterday I told you all about the soap making party that our neighbor hosted recently. Well, we also had an entirely different soap craft that night called Felting Soaps and I thought it warranted a separate post.

In this project, we took a bar of Ivory soap and used a small knife to carve off the edges. Amanda had purchased an array of colorful wool rovings to layer onto our soaps. 

The gist of the project is to fluff and drape a main color of rovings around a bar of soap. Add tendrils of other colors of wool to add dimension and create a look. I was curious, so I arranged my pink tendril into the shape of a heart and placed it on my small sample soap. Okay, then you pat, squeeze and work your soap under hot (then cold) water to encourage the wool to shrink and morph into a coating. It takes a while for the wool to seize up and cling, but it does! Luckily, Amanda has a dehydrator so we placed the felted soaps inside that machine to dry out. It wasn't completely necessary, but I do think it helped. What fun!

I made the aqua, green and periwinkle soap on the right (behind the heart soap) and the blue & raspberry pink soap. Love! Thank you, Amanda, for encouraging us to play with this gorgeous selection of supplies. 

We made art and we made friends.

#neighbors #craftnight #gno #makersgonnamake #finddelight #colorsugarribbon #seattleblogger #soapmaking #soap #crystals

Sips & Suds: A Colorful Evening with Friends

I open this post with a photo of the finished products: felted soaps and soap crystals, so you can see just how much fun we had. Check tomorrow's post to see the description of felting soaps.

My neighbor Amanda likes a project; She likes to create; She is generous and loves to teach. She decided that it would be "easy" for our neighborhood ladies to make crystal soaps during one of our get togethers. I love color, so I was stunned when I walked in and saw the selection of supplies and soap shards Amanda had made for our project. 

The candle dyes, scents and add-ins were so beautiful that I just wanted to play with the color combinations like Legos. We had options for days and it was thrilling to be able to choose from such a wide range of colors. 

The instruction for soap crystals was to pick out several complimentary shades of soap shards that she had dyed, cooled and cut the night before. Using a small utility knife, we cut the shards into pieces and piled them in a clear plastic cup. Then we dyed some melted glycerin soap, added a drop pr two of scent and poured it over the shards until it filled the cup. We placed the cups in the refrigerator to set.

When the soap had hardened, we removed the cup and cut away at the shape until it resembled a real crystal. So interesting!

This is my soap crystal (above) that I scented with lime and blueberry. I think it is fantastic. And it was oh-so-fun to make. I have it next to my bathtub as a glamorous touch of luxury.

Clearly we were spoiled by Amanda and her love of making. We learned and laughed and all left with a beautiful and useful object. I can't thank her enough for giving us this wonderful evening to create. Shared experiences build friendships and for that we all benefit. 

#makersgonnamake #creativity #soapmaking #gno #sipsandsuds #makerevent #makerparty #party #neighbors #soap #crystals

Paas Botanical Easter Egg transfers

I made my first little instruction video. This is a 2 minute video on how to apply the new Paas Botanical transfers to faux Easter eggs. They are so beautiful and I can keep them for years.