Soap Making Instructional: Inserting Objects into Melt & Pour Soap
How to insert soap objects in melt & pour soaps
Embedding eggs, stars, or any other soap object is a very simple process and though time consuming, it's also a great way to use up those last bits of M&P soap when you've melted a bit too much. Many thanks to my dear friend Paula from pjsoaps.com for the "how-to" on making these lovely, colorful soaps.
Here's what you need:
Clear or White Glycerine Soap or colored soap scraps. Use clear for the oval. You want to be able to see the painted egg. White or clear soap base can be used for the eggs.
Cornstarch (yes, the kind used for cooking)
3 or 4 good quality artist paint brushes (fine-tip brushed work best)
Mold Market Beveled Border Oval Mold
Plastic egg mold. This project uses an egg shape, but a number of different mold shapes can be used. Our novelty mold section offers many options.
Soap Colors in assorted colors- use only our liquid gel colors. They are suspended in vegetable glycerin and make great soap paints.
Rubbing Alcohol (put some in a small spray bottle). Helps soap layers to better adhere and removes soap bubbles that occur during pouring.
Fragrance of your choice.
GETTING STARTED
Step One
Assume you have just poured a batch of Fleur de Lis soaps but find you have maybe an ounce or two left over melted and scented soap. Get out your egg molds and pour your left over soap (making maybe 2-6 eggs). Turn the eggs out when cooled and lightly dust with corn starch. Do this as often as you have left over soap and use virtually any novelty mold you have on hand (including stars, angles, pumpkins, snowmen, etc.).
Step Two
Once you have a good stock of molds for painting, sit down in front of a favorite movie and be prepared to paint for hours. If you use the liquid gel colors, it is going to take 3 coats of paint. So start out with maybe 2 dozen items to paint, put the first coats on each, and then go back to the first one you painted (which is hopefully dry by now) and apply your second coat (or do it the next day). Don't apply the 2nd and 3rd coats until the previous coats are completely dry.
Step Three
Let all the painted embeds dry for a minimum of 3 days (or months if you want). Just place them on a couple layers of paper towel in a drawer where they will be free from dust but can breathe. The rest is a cakewalk.
Step Four
Just take any basic mold shape rectangle oval etc, pour about 1/4th inch or more of a clear LIGHTLY tinted fragranced soap base and let that cool completely (maybe a half hour). Make sure to have enough of the base to cover all your embeds. If you need to add more soap then it's going to be a nearly impossible trick to match the color of that first layer so it all looks seamless.
Step Five
When the first layer has hardened lightly spray the surface of that layer with rubbing alcohol (which will enable the next layer to adhere to the first) pour the remaining clear & lightly scented soap to the near top of the mold (make sure the base is warm but not too hot), then place the painted egg or penguin face down (without moving it around) and move on to the next. Repeat until all the embeds are covered. Ideally each object should be covered 1/4th inch top and bottom less on the bottom if you have a deeper embed.
