Easy DIY Soap Gifts

As Christmas is approaching, a special soap for granny, auntie or cousin is always well received and so easy to make. Handmade soaps are also quite popular on Christmas markets if the kids want to earn a bit of extra pocket money over the holiday season.

We’ve been making our own soap for some time, when the kids were younger, they thoroughly enjoyed choosing moulds, colours and fragrances. They would match yellow with banana, blue with bubblegum, red with berry and so forth. You can get extra creative and pour soap in different coloured / fragranced layers. The variety of fragrances to choose from is huge.Now that they are a bit older, they still enjoy the whole process, with very little help from me.

You will need:

• Pure unfragranced glycerine soap
• Moulds (you can order these from your soap supplier or use silicone moulds as used for baking)
• Liquid colourants
• Fragrance
• Isopropyl alcohol (from your chemist)
• Microwave container or old pot
• Clingwrap

What to do:

Once all your needed items are ready, start by cutting your soap in small pieces, the soap is quite soft but slippery so supervise older children and rather do the cutting yourself for younger children.

Fill your microwave container to about 3/4 soap pieces. Microwave on defrost or low for a few seconds at a time and stir frequently. If you do not have a microwave you can melt your soap in an old pot on the stove. Use a low temperature and stir constantly.

Note – Melted soap is extremely hot so supervision is imperative.

Once your soap has melted, let it cool down for a few seconds and add 5-10 drops of fragrance and a few drops of colourant. Stir your fragrance and colourant thoroughly into the melted soap. You can also use essential oils to fragrance your soap. If you are going to use essential oils, 1-2 drops is sufficient.

Pour your soap into your moulds and spritz with a bit of alcohol to remove the bubbles on the surface.

Leave your soap to set. This usually takes about an hour. Once the soap is set, unmould and leave for a few hours before wrapping in cling-wrap or packaging in gift containers.

We bought all our soap supplies from The Soap Barn in Johannesburg, but I am sure you’ll find it on Amazon too.

Have fun making soap as gifts this festive season!