How to make your own beautiful bars of all-natural soap the easy way: using the rebatch soap method, warming up premade soap, adding natural colorants, and essential oils with recipe and free printable label.
I couldn’t fall asleep last night I was so excited about sharing this craft with you!
Today I’m going to tell you about something I have never talked about on this blog before…soap.
It probably seems kind of random, but it’s not for me. I’ve been making my own soap for about fifteen years!
Soapmaking is actually what got me started on my adult creative journey. And I still love to do it when I have time.
I’ve been wanting to share soapmaking with you for a while, but I wanted it to be easyish, so that many people would be able to try it if they wanted.
So, I finally came up with an easy all natural soap project and I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner.
Today I’ll show you how to make pretty handmade soap bars by rebatching already made soap and adding natural color and essential oils. This is going to be so fun!
Table of Contents
- What is all natural soap?
- Easy DIY All Natural Soapmaking Video Tutorial
- How to Make Easy All Natural Soap
- How to Care for Handmade Soap
- Frequently asked questions
What is all natural soap?
As we all know, the word natural is used in many different ways these days.
Basically, natural soap is made, colored, and scented with things found in nature.
One of the things that makes this recipe so easy and beginner friendly is that I use already made cold process soap that you can purchase through a bath and body supply store. This way you don’t have to deal with the safety concerns of working with lye like you would if you were making soap from scratch.
You just heat the soap base up on the stove top and add a natural colorant and fragrance.
All natural soap ingredients
- Soap: Cold process soap is “soap made from scratch” mixing oils, water, and lye at similar temperatures which creates a chemical reaction that yields soap and glycerin. There is no lye left in the final product.
- Colorants: Natural colorants such as herbs, botanicals, spices, and clays are used to color the soap.
- Scent: Essential oils are used to fragrance all natural soap.
Easy DIY All Natural Soapmaking Video Tutorial
It’s fun to make your own soap! Customizing it with scents and colors that you like. And I’ll show you the easy way, using premade soap and items that you likely already have around your house. Watch how to make all natural soap the easy way in this short video tutorial:
How to Make Easy All Natural Soap
Simple All Natural Soap Recipe
- 40 ounces Rebatch soap base
- 3-6 ounces distilled water
- 0.6 ounces Lavender essential oil
- 5 teaspoons Rose clay
Additional tools needed
- measuring cup
- large stainless steel pot
- large spoon
- soap mold (make your own! See below)
- measuring spoons
- small glass jars
- kitchen scale
Step 1: Prepare your soap mold
You can buy a soap mold. But if you are starting out, I recommend not spending too much money up front on fancy gadgets that you may never use again.
It’s easy to find something around your house that you can use as a soap mold.
I used a cracker box as my soap mold. I chose this item to use specifically for two reasons: 1: it makes a nice size bar of soap approximately 2 1/4 x 3 1/2 inches 2: it is a common item that most people have access to inexpensively.
Just cut the box in half the long way with scissors.
Then I attached pieces of heavier cardboard from a delivery box and taped them to the sides to make it a bit sturdier.
Because this “soap mold” is cardboard it needs to be lined with something plasticky, so the soap doesn’t get stuck to the cardboard.
I used freezer paper to line my mold, but you could try using a plastic bag like a large Ziplock or plastic grocery bag.
Check out my video for details of how to line a soap mold with freezer paper.
Step 2: Prepare your soap additives
Once we heat up the soap and becomes a more liquid consistency, we’ll add the colorant and fragrance into it.
Measure 5 teaspoons pink clay and 5 tablespoons distilled water into a small glass jar and mix until incorporated.
Weigh out 0.6 ounces of lavender essential oil into a separate glass jar.
Step 3: Heat up soap base
Next, heat up 40 ounces of rebatch soap base by adding it to a large sauce pan to “melt” it to an apple sauce consistency. If you use the same size soap mold as I did this will leave you with a little extra soap leftover when you are all done.
Pour about half of the rebatch soap base and part of the distilled water into your large stainless-steel pot and heat it on low to medium low heat on the stove top.
Stir in about 3 ounces of distilled water and stir up with a spoon.
Continue to check on and stir your soap base every few minutes. You don’t want it to “burn” onto the bottom of the pan.
Once the soap starts to turn translucent and liquify, and there is enough room in your pot, add the rest of the rebatch soap.
Add more distilled water a little bit at a time if the soap is thick.
Step 4: Make soap!
Once the soap has fully “melted” and has a loose mashed potato consistency it’s time to add the rest of the ingredients.
Stir the clay and water back up, as the clay has a tendency to sink to the bottom of the container.
Pour the clay water mixture into the soap and stir it in thoroughly.
Then, take the pot of soap off of the stove burner and stir the essential oil in well.
Once the ingredients are thoroughly incorporated, pour the soap into your soap mold.
Fill it about halfway up and smoosh it down to make sure it is filling all of the corners of the mold. This will help limit the amount of air bubbles in the finished soap.
Then finish filling the mold to the top.
Let the soap cool and harden in the mold for at least one day.
Step 5: Cut soap
After a day or so you can remove the soap from the mold.
It will still feel sticky and somewhat pliable when you unmold it. Gently handle it.
Remove the soap from the mold and peel away the mold liner.
After that you can cut your soap into bars using a non-serrated knife.
I like to measure mine so that I get fairly even bars.
At this point the soap should sit in a cool dry area for about 2 weeks so excess moisture can evaporate and it can harden.
Step 6: Label Soap
After about one to two weeks when your soap has had time to harden it’s time to use it and/or package it.
I made a soap label printable that you are welcome to use. Click on this link if you would like a free all natural soap label printable for yourself or click the button below to get access to the free pdf.
Just print it out. I like to use card stock.
Trim the width to fit your bars of soap. And don’t forget to cut out the adorable sneak peek soap window!
Wrap it around your soap bars and secure it. I used washi tape, so the packaging is 100% ecofriendly!
That’s it! Now you have pretty all natural bars of soap that you can use yourself or give as gifts!
I’m pairing mine with a bottle of my easy floral infused body oil to give to my mom for Mother’s day.
How to Care for Handmade Soap
Don’t worry, you don’t have to feed it and water it every day! But there are a few considerations to take care of handmade soap so that it will last longer.
- Don’t let it sit in a puddle of water. Handmade soap, naturally, has a lot of glycerin in it so if it sits in water, it will soak it up and become smooshy and waterlogged.
- Do use a well-draining soap dish. (see above)
Frequently asked questions
How long is this handmade soap good for (shelf life)?
According to Brambleberry’s website, where I purchased my supplies: The rebatch soap base is good for up to two months and the soap that you make with it is good for up to one year.
Thanks for taking the time to check out this tutorial!
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