Pipd's Peeps!

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I tried out Red Apple Disaster today and, despite its flaws, it is usable soap! I've done some looking and might have found an apple fragrance that doesn't accelerate (at least, neither the description nor the reviews indicate that it does ) so I may still be able to make some non-disasterous apple soap in the future!

I'm planning on throwing together another batch of vanilla tomorrow with a slightly altered recipe to compare with the first batch of vanilla. It's not a huge difference, but should make for a slightly harder bar without losing too much of the sudsiness. Depending on which I prefer, I'll keep and use that recipe from here on.


EDIT 2/6: Okay, soaping tomorrow. My soaping space was being used most of the afternoon and now it's too late to throw a batch together because of how long the lye takes to cool.

 

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Today's batch of vanilla egg soap! I forgot how to properly do the swoops on top so after I messed up that portion of soap, I did something different for the other portion. Definitely needs some work, but I like how it turned out overall!

I pulled up a video on soap top textures and watched it again so I feel better equipped to attempt the swoops next time around. Turns out I angled the spoon wrong, whoops. It'd been too long since the last time I swooped.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

Looks like fun. Will the textures be throughout the soap or just on the top?

 

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Just on top! Since I make such small batches, the 'top' of my bars is wider than most homemade bars, but they're also shorter, if that makes sense.

For patterns throughout, you have to include colorants and you can do nifty things like swirls or layers, or make long cylinders of soap in different shapes and colors to insert in the batter and have a star or moon or flower, etc, in each bar. I'm not quite to that point yet, though I've dabbled in swirls. With vanilla scented soap like this batch, it just turns dark brown in the end, so there's no real point in trying to put colorants in it. Even my pretty swirls in the last batch eventually turned dark brown just from the fragrance oil in the adjacent soap. So, vanilla soap from me is just going to be dark brown.

 

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I meant to post about this last night, but Zinnia and Myrtle are both laying again! I found two eggs in their nest box last night! That means as soon as it warms up some, I can start to collect eggs for a silkied Cochin hatch from them and Gus! I'm hoping that Dandy comes back into lay soon and without issues so that I can test cross her to Gus and determine whether he carries recessive White or not. I suppose if I hatch any Whites from him and the other two girls that that would also answer that question, but it would be much faster with Dandelion as the mother passing the gene to all of her chicks.

Still waiting on the silkied Cochin pullets to come into lay. They're sure taking their time! Ideally, I'd like to get the Blue girls set up with Diesel as soon as possible and get hatching from them as well, but it feels like they're never going to come into lay! I think once the snow melts off and the weather starts getting nicer that I'm going to rearrange some pens and set them all up together in what used to be the duck coop so that as soon as I start finding eggs, I can start planning a hatch from them.


I've also been eyeballing some Chocolate Cochin bantam hatching eggs here recently, and thinking of how lovely that would look in a silkied variety, and how easy it would be to incorporate them into my BBS silkied Cochins and get Mauves as well... But I also know that this year could get pretty busy for me and I don't want to go overboard like last year, not to mention those eggs originate in one of the states where there's currently been HPAI detected, so obviously I'm concerned about bringing them here just in case... Maybe next year?

 

[Crazy Maizie]

Do you still have ducks?

I figured out which australorp is laying too - my Violet. She's walking around talking all the time and squatting. My other BA just runs from me. She's not as social anyway. Oh and my young polish hen is molting. She's looking pretty silly with only a few feathers and an array of pin feathers on her head.

 

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I still have a duck, my call duck Crashie. I was not particularly happy with how much additional work ducks ended up being compared to the chickens, even eensy ones like my calls, so I don't intend to get any more, at least not for a long time. There are silkie-feathered ducks, though, so I leave open the possibility that I may end up with some of those at some point just because I'm obsessed with silkied feathering.


Yay, Violet! I'm pretty sure that Isolde is laying eggs now as I found a smallish brown egg a couple days ago that was immediately underneath where she had perched the night before. I've gotten at least two eggs every day all winter, though! It feels like it's been a long time since I've gotten this many eggs consistently through the winter!

That Polish is crazy, molting right now!! I've started to find white feathers under where Ganymede perches which makes me wonder if she's going into a molt again. This will be like the third or fourth molt she's had in the last 6 months if she is!

 

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Haven't updated in a while, whoops! I don't have much to post right now, but I thought I'd pop in to say I've confirmed Isolde is laying!

Also, I've cut the last batch of soap and the funky swoops don't look half bad now! This batch looks even more like fudge, though, and because it's vanilla scented it also smells really sweet. I promise it's not worth a taste, though!

 

[Crazy Maizie]

Looks like chocolate! Lol I'd be tempted to try it.

 

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It both looks and smells quite good. It's really puzzling to the brain.