Tooth Soap - or perhaps I just need a vacation

And did I mention that I love old tools? They just don't make
them like they used to.  Those toothbrushes have real boar
bristles, but they are way too big and scratchy to be used for
anything other than cleaning. And, yes, I use them for that.

I made tooth soap, oh! probably about a year ago.  I actually got quite absorbed by the subject and experimented with different recipes and forms.  I made one that actually (quite by accident) had the consistency of toothpaste and I really liked it.  It had a mild and nice taste and a lovely green colour but it oxidized very quickly and turned an ugly brown colour.  I used it for the longest time by wiping off the oxidized surface and using the fresh lovely green paste, but in the end I gave up and threw it out.  My current tooth soap is a white bar soap.

My interest in tooth soap started a few years ago when I started to look at toothpaste in the "natural" section of the grocery store.  I had tried Tom's and found that to be quite nice, but then I tried Weleda toothpaste and that had no fluoride.  Now I'm not going to say anything to discourage anyone from using toothpaste with fluoride, but I decided for myself that the health of my gums was a higher priority than cavities.  So I used the red Weleda toothpaste for a while and liked it a lot.  But it started me wondering what toothpaste was anyway.  And after reading labels and researching I discovered that people have used a lot of different stuff to clean their teeth and soap is certainly one of them and modern day toothpaste contains SLS.

Now, I need to say that my dentist hasn't noticed any change in my oral health since I gave up commercial toothpaste, but I would not want to interfere with anyones use of the commercial stuff.  I just gag if I use it after all this time.  Nuclear waste springs to mind.

But I am very interested to hear if anyone has done experiments with tooth soap.  The soap that I have used for the last few months is very simple and I have to admit that it has a horrible taste.  But only in the beginning, you get used to it.  It's a basic 70% olive and 30% coconut.  To that I added calcium and magnesium tablets that I crushed and some bicarbonate as well.  The bicarb is what gives it an unpleasant taste.  In an effort to counteract that I added some Xylitol, but I cant's say that I taste any sweetness.

If I were to do another one (which I will eventually although tooth soap seems to lasts forever) I would probably try to dig up the recipe for the green paste and use some parts of that and use 100% olive oil.  Suds really are unnecessary.  But I have to say that my favorite recipe is the one that I read that Benjamin Franklin used. It was honey and charcoal.  My son-in-law agreed to try it out with me and I think I have to hold him to it.

But, having confessed to this strangeness, I also have to admit that I just really need a vacation.  I think I have mentioned once or twice that I don't like cold weather at all.  So even if we have had a fairly mild winter so far I am jumping ship and heading for the southern seas to bask in sunshine for two weeks.
...

Silk and Sorrel shampoo bar

Another weakness is glass. I found this carafe dirty
and full of spiders.  The candlesticks were favorites,
but I wasn't careful with the candle and one of them
broke when the candle burned down. I should throw
out, I know, but I can't bear to just yet.

Finally I made a shampoo bar with silk.  I've wanted to do one ever since Strenua Inertia gave me a tip to add silk to the lye.  That soap turned out really nice.  I liked it so much that I used it on my hair with very good results.  So I had to do a shampoo bar with it.  And since I really like Njóli oil, I decided to use the infused oil of it's close cousin Rumex acetosa (Sorrel) or as we here call it, Hundasúra.  I have had this one root infusing in oil since last fall when I pulled it from the garden where it had enjoyed a lovely summer.  The root of it just looked so jummy that I cleaned it and cut it up into oil.  The colour of the oil is a nice yellow with a slight orange tinge.  It's not quite the same colour as my previous Rumex oil (which is from the species longifolius) so I have been very curious to try it in soap and see what colour it gives.

So I did and obtained a beautiful, but rather strange colour.  At first it turned a pretty pink, but when I added the EO's they imparted a very yellow colour that changed the soap to a lovely peachy orange.  Now that I've cut it, I think it is perhaps a bit like is in vogue right now - those pale fleshy beige tones.  I'm used to Rumex oil changing overnight from beige to dusky pink.  But this one didn't.  It started out a fairly warm pink and turned into a salmon colour.  That may be because of the EO's that I used.  For scent I used a combination of Lavender, Sweet Orange and Vetiver.  It smells green and fresh.  It is the start of my blending experiments.

Olive oil 40% 240g / 8.5oz (out of this 15g was sorrel root infused)
Coconut oil 25% 150g / 5.3oz
Soybean oil 20% 120g / 4.2oz
Cocoa butter 10% 60g / 2.1oz
Castor oil 5% 30g / 1 oz

Water 30% 210g / 7.4 oz
Lye 99g / 3.5 oz

I used both sugar and silk in the lye water hoping to make the soap that lathers nicely and leaves my hair very silky.  Even if it hasn't cured long enough I did try it out and I think I achieved that.  It lathered exceptionally well and my hair felt very, very silky.
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Essential oils and fragrance blends

I can always use more bottles and jar. Although I probably
need a bigger house soon.

I love my stuff.  I don't feel quite comfortable to be so materialistic, but I really, really love my stuff.  To the point of having to fight a wish to hoard.  I often feel a slight reluctance to use my precious essential oils.  I almost act like Gollum in Lord of the Ring whispering: "Mine, all mine" in a half crazed voice as I clutch them to my bosom.  Ok, maybe not that.  But I look at them, sniff them and Google in order to get inspiration for combinations that are to die for.  I also dread the day that I have an empty bottle.

Last year I made many soaps and usually a different recipe each time.  I have learned a lot from that and have formed what I would call an intuitive sense of what combination of oils and fats I like in soaps.  All that means is that I couldn't write down "the perfect soap recipe", but would have no problem to put together a recipe that I really, really like at a particular moment.  My preferences still change a bit from day to day.  One thing that I feel I still have to do is a series of single oil experiments.  I have read the results of other's experiments (in particular Helen at Strenua Inertia blog), but feel that there is nothing that replaces hands on experience.  I have even started to think about doing a series of two oil combinations  and three...  Somehow I get a feeling that things could get a bit difficult quite quickly.

But one thing I am certain of and that is that this year will be devoted to colour and scent trials.  I want to start to blend EO's to get some more sophisticated scents.  I have been reading about scents and I have a few ideas of my own, that probably are a bit crazy since I haven't seen them anywhere else, but that only means that I simply have to try them out.

I did find an interesting website about EO blends.  It's a company called Rainbow Meadow and they have a section where it is possible to tick individual EO's and get suggestions of blends.  They even give ratio's and have a calculator to give amounts according to soap batch size.  It's fun and I thank whoever did that.  Another blending guide is at About.com where cotton swabs are put in a jar.  Another even more economical way is to use toothpicks.  This way if the recipe is for 2 drops of one oil you dip two cotton swabs/toothpicks in the oil and put in a jar or plastic bag, three drops = three swabs/toothpicks.  Then you close the jar and sniff it a bit later.  Very simple and clever.

Fragrances are frequently classified into top, middle and base notes.  The top notes being the smallest molecules, the ones that are most volatile, reach the nose first and last for the shortest time.  Citrus is typical of these.   The base notes are the heavy scents like sandalwood, vetiver and oak moss.  And the middle notes are in between the two and serve to marry the scents together.  I read somewhere that it makes sense to always start with the base note when blending oils.  I am going to follow that advise since I've read in several places that the order that the fragrances are mixed matters to the outcome.  The proportion of base, middle and top notes also matters.  The base note needs to be about 55% in order for the fragrance to last.  The middle notes should be around 20% and the top note 25%.  So in numbers of drops, that would be 11 of base, 4 of middle and 5 of top.  Obviously each note can be made of different fragrances and most commercial perfumes are very complex blends of a lot of ingredients.  Very few are made of natural flower essences or absolutes, but two that I know of are Joy and Chanel no. 5.  I love the former and am starting to like the latter.  But of course this is about perfumes and those rules may not necessarily apply to soap fragrances, but it's good to have a starting point.  Now all I need to do is to classify my EO's into base, middle and top and start blending.

New beginnings - or Sugar Scrub Cubes revisited

How cute is that lamp base. Someone has carved a garland
of flowers on it. And it's actually quite well done. I keep
wondering who didn't want it because I absolutely loved it.

I'm not one for New Years resolutions, it's all I can do to remember to write the new numbers for the year much less initiate a complete change of lifestyle.  Who on earth got this idea that the deepest, darkest winter is a great time for major upheavals in peoples lives?   But even so there is always a magical kind of feeling about the start of a new year.  It's a fresh start even if it's the most miserable time of year.  One of the only redeeming qualities of January is that it's the time to get a new yearly planner.  I love all sorts of calendars, planners, diaries and datebooks especially when they are new and pristine and virginal.  Digital doesn't have the magic at all.  Although I have to admit that I rarely find exactly what I'm looking for in the printed versions.  I have always thought  that one of these days I'll design my own system that will work perfectly for me.  Who knows, maybe one of these days I will.

I made more Sugar scrubs for Christmas presents.  This time I used an ice cube mold that I got in a junk shop so they are not dollops like before, but proper cubes.  I have to say that it is much easier to use a mold.  Just fill it up and put it in the freezer for a few minutes and they pop out easily, for the most part.

I have grown to really like the Sugar cubes.  They are a gentle way to scrub the skin, perfectly safe for the environment and leave the skin very soft with all the nice oils and lovely soap.  I made them to go with the bath bombs so I used Alkanet infused oil and got a pretty pink.  The Alkanet may also give a slightly lavender colour which probably happens if the soap is very alkaline.  I also used scents and the pink Sugar cubes got Lavender EO,  just a few drops are enough.  I also used Annatto seed infused oil to get a yellow colour that accompanied the Lemongras EO.  No colour for the Peppermint but a mix of Rumex/Njóli oil and Alkanet for the Palmarosa EO.   That produced a rather dusky pink which went well with the Njóli soap that I put the tiny rose buds on.

I experimented with using Coconut oil instead of Cocoa Butter and that works fine as well.  They were a bit softer, but that's all right.  The recipe is here and also a link to Mayren Abashed's blog which is where I found it originally.  I wrapped the Sugar cubes like hard candy, although my cellophane was a tad to stiff for that to work really well.  But it looked kinda cute and the recipients of the gifts were quite pleased.  And that does count.  There really is a lot of truth in the old saying that it is sweeter to give than to receive.