Making melt and pour soap is an excellent activity to do with the kids on a rainy weekend or during the holidays. All you need is a block of melt and poor soap (we have a range of different types to choose from), an essential oil or fragrant oil to scent the soap, a saucepan, a glass bowl, a metal spoon, any colour food colouring and some kind of mould. It doesn’t have to be a soap mould, you can use a cardboard milk carton or the silicon tray cupcake moulds you can get in Kmart or Big W in fun shapes such as stars and flowers.
Fill the saucepan with a couple of inches of water and bring to a simmer on the stove top. Cut the soap into small chunks with a large knife and place into the glass bowl. Place the bowl over the saucepan and allow the soap chunks to gently melt, stirring occasionally with the metal spoon. Once melted completely, remove from heat and allow to cool a little so that the essential oil doesn’t evaporate when added. Add the fragrance or essential oil to the bowl (we recommend about 1-2% so for a 1kg block of soap add 10-20ml of oil) and a couple of drops of food colour. Stir well and pour into mould. Allow to set. It will set within a couple of hours but for best results leave it overnight to set thoroughly. If you have used a milk carton, after a couple of hours you will need to tear away the carton from the block of set soap and cut it into pieces. You should get 9 or 10 pieces out of 1kg of soap and a large milk carton.
For a bit of extra fun, if you are using individual moulds, use the clear melt and pour, and once scented, only half fill each mould. Allow to set. Then place a small plastic toy on the top in the centre of the mould and fill the rest of the way to the top with the remaining soap. Set over night and once you remove the soaps from the moulds you will have fun soaps that will encourage the kids to wash their hands to get to the toy!