1. Start by getting yourself a barn, straw, a bunch of hay, and couple of doelings (baby female goats) and raise them up! Luna & Eleanor are twin sisters and were our first goats at Luna's Prairie.
2. Find yourself a buck (male goat) and have them spend some time with the does (female goats). Gandolf is the big red guy with the beard. He came to visit Luna's Prairie from Walker Homestead and successfully "hooked up" with Luna & Eleanor!
3. Deliver some baby goats! This is Luna soon after she delivered one of her twins, Apollo. Below that you'll see Luna & Eleanor each with their first set of twins a few weeks later.
4. Start milking your does every morning. They jump right up on the stand for their morning alfalfa!
5. Strain & freeze all the milk you can, but leave enough for those babies!
6. Now you can start making batches of soap. We use the traditional cold process method: First, frozen goat milk is combined with lye/sodium hydroxide and slowly melted so the sugars in the milk do not scorch. Get out your eye protection and rubber gloves because that lye is HOT at this point!
7. Then the oils (coconut, olive, castor oil, and shea butter) are melted together and cooled to be within 10 degrees of the goat milk. Depending on the type of soap, you'll need to get the necessary essential oils and other ingredients (like French green clay, red Moroccan clay, oatmeal, honey, turmeric, ginger, poppy seeds, coffee grounds, cinnamon, activated charcoal, etc) and the soap molds ready to go! Speaking of soap molds, rather than the basic rectangular bars you most often see with other handcrafted soap, we choose to use molds that create beautiful shapes with soft edges for your comfort and enjoyment.
8. The oils & the goat milk & lye are then mixed together until they go through the process of saponification (a chemical reaction that creates soap). The lye is neutralized during this process and completely dissolves from the soap over the next 24 hours.
9. Essential oils and other ingredients are added and the soap is poured into the individual molds. The soap goes into the refrigerator for 24 hours and then gets taken out of the molds to cure.
10. The bars are stored in a cool dark place for 4-6 weeks to cure. This ensures a hard bar of soap that is then ready to use!
Two years and 10 steps later you have a batch of soap (about 10 bars/batch).
And this is why each bar is worth every penny you spend at Luna's Prairie!
2 comments
Isaac, the story of soap making, the photos, the website & the writing are all fabulous!!! Looking forward to giving a few bars as gifts (I bought one for Gramma)!
Keep on doing what you’re doing!
Isaac, I really loved the story of how you make the soap! It’s beautifully told.
And I get to see the goats!