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<\/p>\nMelt and Pour Soap is a blank canvas just waiting for you to be creative and add colour, fragrance and lots of additives! There are a few things that differ when choosing additives for Melt and Pour Soap as opposed to Cold Process Soap.\u00a0 The main thing to remember is that botanical materials need to be dried before adding to avoid them going mouldy.\u00a0 You need to hydrate them in fragrance, sodium lactate or liquid soap before adding, and then you are good to go!<\/p>\n
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Less is usually more!\u00a0 Believe it or not, only a small amount of exfoliant is needed to slough away dry skin cells.\u00a0 If you are wanting a really scrubby soap, then go for it!\u00a0 Salt and sugar are not the best options for an exfoliant in soap. As soap is a moist environment, they will begin to dissolve or take on moisture and eventually become mouldy or make the soap soft and icky.\u00a0 Here are a few good well suited exfoliates to get you started:<\/p>\n
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We have so many clays to choose from! Often used for their natural colours, they also have a light exfoliating effect as well as drawing out impurities.<\/p>\n
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This topic is huge, and takes in many things included for use as an exfoliant or colourant too! The main thing is to ensure you moisten the powders (such as the Charcoal Powder in the graphic above) to avoid dry spots and clumps. You can use glycerine, sodium lactate, fragrance oil or herbal extracts.<\/p>\n
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If you are interested in experimenting, make sure the botanical material is WELL DRIED and the pieces are very small or fine. Calendula petals look so nice in white soap and won\u2019t cause you any problems with mould.\u00a0 If you add dried lavender petals, over time you’ll eventually get a ‘mouse poo’ effect as they will start to brown!\u00a0 For Melt and Pour Soap either add some dried botanicals on top of the bars so that most of the material is out of the soap, or use a coffee grinder to powder your home grown herbs and flowers. This will add a slight exfoliation, but you’ll certainly notice them in there.\u00a0 Here are a few to get you going:<\/p>\n
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<\/h5>\nWe don’t tend to add powdered milks to Melt and Pour Soap as they can turn sour and that is not a pleasant washing experience!\u00a0 All our milk soap bases have the milks added during production thereby avoiding any issue with mouldiness.<\/p>\n
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A word of warning.\u00a0 Many ingredients can be taken straight from the kitchen to the soap room, such as lovely oatmeal flakes.\u00a0 However, it is worth remembering that many spices, including cloves and cinnamon can cause sensitisation when used on the skin and should be used with caution.\u00a0 You can see on the main graphic the smallest sprinkling of cinnamon on the surface will wash away very quickly to reveal clean soap underneath.<\/p>\n
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There’s always a lot of opportunities to use oats in bath and body products!<\/p>\n
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Poppy seeds give this soap a faux watermelon seed look – not too many though as they are quite exfoliating!<\/p>\n
If you are crafting Cold Process Soap you can safely include fresh milks, purees and juices; however this is not the case with Melt and Pour Soap.<\/p>\n
These liquids will go off in the soap.\u00a0 It is not formulated to accept large amounts of liquids, fresh or not, so powdered additives or concentrates are always best.<\/p>\n
You will always get slimy or mouldy soap if you add fresh rose petals, frangipani flowers and freshly picked herbs to your Melt and Pour Soap.\u00a0 That\u2019s unfortunately the way it is. It is a moist environment and they are going to turn into compost!<\/p>\n
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