We have just one week left before the kids go back to school and I've been trying to make it memorable with fun outings - which isn't easy given the pandemic, the heat or the wildfire smoke.
But I did find a fun indoor activity perfect for small groups - soap and bath bomb making at Buff City Soap! We headed to our nearest Buff City Soap in Aurora earlier this week and spent an afternoon with some good clean fun.
Our first step in making our bath bombs was choosing a scent. Trust me, this was not easy! There were so many wonderful fragrances to choose from, but we settled on a combination of two classics: vanilla bean and rose. They actually mixed together to make a beautiful fragrance.
Once we had chosen our fragrance the ingredients were all mixed up together. Just like making a cake! We could have chosen to add a color to the mix, but decided to stick with white seeing as the kids would be "painting" their bath bombs.
Once the mixture was ready it was placed directly on the work surface and the girls got to work filling the molds. They filled two sides of the mold separately and then carefully squished them together.
The next step was to decorate the bath bombs by painting them with a pigment powder mixed into an oil. The bath bombs needed to dry out a little before this step, so while we waited the girls practiced painting on flat pre-made bath bombs.
It didn't take very long for the bath bombs to be dry enough to decorate so before long the girls were painting them. We had about 16 bath bombs to paint between the girls. Some were painted with illustrations (like Ava's lemon bath bomb below) while others were much more abstract. There were a lot of polka dots and stripes.
As well as the pigment and oil mix, there were also bottles of pigment mixed with rubbing alcohol that could be squirted and dripped on to create patterns. This was good for covering large areas with color, but there was less control than a paintbrush.
Our bath bombs were left to dry a little longer (the paint heavy ones were quite wet) and then they were shrink wrapped to take home.
Wondering about the soap making?
Due to the ingredient involved in soap making (mostly the lye) this was less hands on. Like the bath bombs, the girls chose a fragrance as well as three colors. They decided to go for Black Raspberry Vanilla in blue, pink and purple. This was all mixed up and layered into a prepared soap mold. The girls sprinkled a sea salt and glitter mix on top and the soap was put aside to set. This was actually the first thing we did when we arrived in the store and the soap set while we made the bath bombs.
When we were done with the bath bomb making the soap was set hard enough to cut into pieces. It was still warm at this point but nice and solid. The girls took it in turns cutting slices of soap with a large crinkly cut cutter. This made me hungry for crinkle cut fries! It was pretty cool seeing the patterns made as the girls cut through the soap. No two pieces are alike.
Our goodies were bagged up and we were ready to go home - for a bath! Ha! we needed to test out what we'd made, right?
Now for all the "need to know" info...
We visited the Buff City Soap located in the Southlands Shopping Mall at 6155 S Main Street, Aurora. Prices and hours below are based on this store and may vary from store to store.
Pricing
Bath bomb making is $20 per participant
Soap making is $50 for a half loaf (trust me, this is a LOT of soap)
Hours
11am - 6pm 7 days a week
Health Measures
In order to practice safe social distancing bath bomb and soap making sessions are currently capped at five people. Masks are required upon entering the store and must be worn at all times. Hand sanitizer is available at the entrance of the store and there is also a hand washing station. With these measures in place I felt perfectly safe.
For more information visit https://www.buffcitysoap.com/
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