If you are on a mission to find a DIY gift that uses essential oils, think about making your
own soap. There are different types of soap you can make and you can even start with
a gift to make it a simpler process. With some seasonal essential oil scents, it is perfect
as a holiday gift.
Choose What Blends to Use
You can first decide on the essential oils you want to use for your seasonal soap, unless
you decide to go with blends. There are holiday and Christmas themed blends pre-
made, or you can put them together yourself. The blends you use will depend on the
theme for your soap, so if you want to make soap that smells like a Christmas tree, you
might have fir, orange, and spices like cinnamon or nutmeg together. There are many
ways to put blends together, so think of the scents first before you start making your
soap.
Decide on the Type of Soap
Before you start making your seasonal soap, you will also need to choose the type of
soap. There are three main varieties of soap you can make, including vegetable soap,
glycerin soap, and milk-based soap. The glycerin is often the most common though
many melt and pour and other soap-making kits will give you the option of some other
types of soaps. Do your research and decide which of these will work best for you and
your skill level.
Get a Soap Making Kit
While you can get the ingredients from scratch, this might not be something you are
going to continue doing. For holiday gifts, it is best to start with a kit that includes
everything you need. Hobby and craft stores usually sell a variety of different soap-
making kits for you to try out. All you need to get separately are the essential oils you
intend to use. One thing you will notice when you begin looking at the different kits is
that there are different methods for making the soap. With the home kits, melt and pour
is often the most common, but you can also find cold process soap and hand-milled
soap.
If you are looking for a simpler method, the melt and pour is recommended. You just
melt the ingredients together, add your oils for scent, pour them into molds, and wait for
them to harden. It doesn’t get much easier than that.
