Sunday 19 January 2014

Have You Seen My Pterodactyl?

Well last week, I had the conundrum of trying to find a mould big enough to hold my orphan pterodactyl. I didn't realize I had bigger problems than that.

The only thing big enough to hold the beast was the 8X8 silicone pan, but I didn't want to pour a lot of soap to make that one, so I made 3 more pterodactyls so I could have a pan of embedded soaps. The next step was to figure out how to make an amber coloured soap. I googled but didn't find anything that  talked about a colour combination to make the colour I wanted, so I decided to experiment.

First lesson of 2014 in soap making:  don't attempt anything new late at night, especially when the lighting in the room is less than ideal. I thought a combination of orange and yellow mica would make a good amber-ish colour, then a light switch went on in my head and said, how about turmeric? Turmeric is a beautiful colour and in the continuer, looks like the perfect colour. However, combined with everything else, it's a little dark.


Of the 4 soaps I liked this one the most. The top layer of soap didn't cover this one as much and the effect, I think is much better than say…


this one which looks like the dinosaur version of Alfred Hitchock's silhouette. 

My next questions are, will the turmeric stain and make me look I went to a tanning salon of ill repute, and what the heck do I do with all the leftover pieces of orange-y soap? Wonder if the show, Orange is the New Black needs any soaps made for them. 



18 comments:

  1. Tanning salon of ill repute…hahahahaha!!! Why don't you try washing your hands with one of the bars and see? I could have sworn I'd read about other soapers using turmeric, so it must be okay. But I have no personal experience…since hubby cooks, I have never even handled it before.

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    1. You know these seedy neighbourhoods in the 'burbs. ;) Actually you don't, but that's another story.

      I think I've seen other soapers use turmeric as well, but usually in CP soaps, and I don't think they dumped in half their bottle of turmeric into the soap. But I did try a small sliver and nothing turned orange, so that was a good sign.

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  2. I'd go with Teresa suggestion and wash your hands with the soap! I've used turmeric before, but a small enough amount it didn't give me a rich color like I see in your soaps.

    The soaps are looking awesome!

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    1. I tried a small piece of the soap and it seemed to have washed without leaving any stains behind, which I'm happy about. I don't think most people would've used as much turmeric as I did Carrie, you'd think I was making a curry rather than soap, but I'm glad you like the colour.

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  3. Oh, it's so dramatic-looking,the first one. I see his eye!
    I don't believe turmeric will make you yellow, at least it doesn't in cp soap.
    As usual, your humour is terrific, always fun to read you!

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    1. Thank you Maja, you are so sweet and supportive! There was just the right amount of orange soap in that first one to cover without hiding the entire dinosaur. I think you're right, I think he's giving us the evil eye. ;)

      The soap did stain my cloth that I was using to clean up the soap a bit, but at least it doesn't stay on the skin, so that's a good sign.

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  4. The first one looks great! It looks like it was frozen in time with mineralized ice.
    I have used turmeric in cp soap and the suds didn't turn yellow. Did you put a lot?
    You can chop up the excess orange soap and use them as embeds. I have been making a lot of embedded soaps because I have soaps that didn't quite make the cut in the looks department, so off to the chopping block.

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    1. Thanks Silvia. I like that term, mineralized ice, mind if I use it if I ever put this soap on my website?

      I did put in a fair amount of turmeric, more so than I probably should've, but it's hard to tell what the colour is with poor lighting and bad eyes.

      Good idea about the embeds, can you suggest another colour I should throw in as embeds to complement the orange?

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    2. By all means, please use the term mineralized ice. I don't even know if there is such a thing. When I saw your soap my imagination started turning. I was thinking of fossils preserved in ice but since your soap is orange, natural colored pools/lakes (like the ones in China that I saw in pictures) came to my head.
      I don't feel I am good with color combinations, but I think orange can go with a wide range of colors-brown, lime or olive green, mustard, cream, indigo, to name a few.
      Good luck with the embeds! :-)

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    3. We'll make mineralized ice a new term to be placed in the urban dictionary. :) That's a great thought about the coloured bodies of water, I don't' recall seeing them when we were in China, but I probably just wasn't paying attention.

      I think you have great colour combination ideas, thanks for these ones!

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  5. Is the top soap colored with turmeric? It looks amazing!

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    1. They're actually both coloured with turmeric and orange and yellow mica Cee. The second picture, I just turned up the lighting so you could see the pterodactyl better.

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  6. I'm glad that you found a way to use the pterodactyl soap! I like the way it looks fossilized in amber. I haven't tried turmeric in soap, but I've heard of other soapmakers using it. Looks like it gives the soap a neat color!

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    1. Thanks Jenny, I'm glad it worked out more or less. ;) It'll take a few more tries to get the right amount of soap to let the dinosaur show through a little more clearly. The turmeric definitely gives a nice colour to soap.

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  7. Embedded soap is so fun to make! =)

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    1. You're so right about that Anne-Marie, the possibilities are endless.

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  8. Lovely colour you obtained using turmeric, Monica!
    And such an interesting design! This would make a great soap for Halloween!

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    1. Thank you Nat! The turmeric definitely gives a very strong colour, and a little would've gone a long way. Great idea about making this for Hallowe'en!

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