Soap, soap, soap.  I love home-made soap.  I haven't used store-bought soap in several years.   This weekend I tried a new flavor - Peppermint Scrub.  Two reasons for that:  1)  the essential oil company I order from sent me a free bottle and 2) I like soap with oatmeal in it.  It's kinda like a natural loofa.

This time I used a receipt that used coconut oil, olive oil and lard.  I can't say I've ever cooked anything to eat using lard, but it makes a great soap!  To make soap out of oils you have to use lye (sodium hydroxide).  That's in the white bottle to the right.  Every ingredient has to be weighed exactly using a scale.  While you're melting the oils in the crock pot dissolve the lye in water.  Then pour the lye mixture into the oils and start stirring.  I use an emulsion blender to make it trace faster.

This is trace.  When your mixture is thick enough to leave a trace pattern dripped from the spoon.  It looks like pudding.

Plug the crock-pot back in and let it cook for an hour or so.  Always test the results with PH paper.  You are looking for a 7 or 8.  You can see to papers below.  The one on the right is still a 10 or 11 after an hour.  (That will take your skin off if you use it now!).  I cooked it for another hour and tested again and got an 8.  Good enough!

At this point your soap will look like mashed potatoes.  Now you can add your essential oils, oatmeal and color.

Like I said before, this one is Peppermint Scrub  I decided to use the violet coloring I have.  But for some reason, it just wasn't turning violet - it just looked gray.  After I'd added twice as much as I usually would, I put the mixture into my super duper soap mold that my son--in-law Bill made for me.  Then I let it sit overnight.

I almost passed out when I pulled the paper back the next morning.  Wow!  Was it purple!

Then I sliced it into soap bars.  The texture is just really creamy.  It smells so good!  The whole room smells like peppermint.

Here's the real test:  "Mike!  Did you like the new soap?"  "I liked it"  he says.  That's all I need to hear.  My honey puts up with a lot from me.  A manly man doesn't mind smelling like a peppermint drop!