by Robin from Scented Life
Soap crafting has unlimited fun-factor potential for kids of all ages.
If you’re crafting soap to make bath-time fun for younger kids try embedding a non-toxic plastic toy like this goldfish-bowl soap. For a natural alternative you could use shells or semi-precious stones. Inserts don’t have to be a different material though; you can make shapes from soap and have them floating around in a clear bar. Use letters or numbers when your child is learning to spell or count. There are countless possibilities! Of course shapes don’t have to be inside a traditional bar; the entire soap can be moulded into a huge variety of forms.
Soap is an interesting medium for expanding your child’s repertoire of colours, textures and scents. For a toddler you may want to stick with gentle formulations without too many added textures but soon enough you will be able to introduce all kinds of natural ingredients like seeds, herbs, sand or seaweed.
Start your baby with unscented soap and then introduce scents as soon as baby skin is ready for the rough and tumble, scratchy world. Try to choose a different and more challenging scent each time you craft for your kids. Having an educated nose is just as valuable as having an educated ear! Help them to recognise similarities between scents in a category like fruity or woody and to find the same scents in the garden or kitchen. By the time your child is ready to craft her own soaps (12 at Scented Life) she will have a good understanding of how to go about choosing pleasing combinations.
A newborn is nearly colour blind and your child’s colour vision develops over time along with a mental framework for categorising colours. Bright colours are recognised earliest and this may be why they are preferred even for toddlers and older kids whose colour vision has long-since fully developed. Colour certainly draws attention and is useful even if only to attract little fingers away from Mommy’s expensive Shea and Jojoba soap!
Scented Life is situated in Solaris Business Park, Lekkerwater Road, Sunnydale. Contact them for a unique soap crafting experience full of inspiration and fun!
http://www.scentedlife.co.za/