My name is Anthony and I go to Paradise Knoll School in Newfoundland, New Jersey. I am in 5th grade and this year was my first experience with TREP$. I thought of my idea for Slap Shot Soaps after I got home from hockey practice. My dad and I were thinking of ideas and he said I should invent something so my hockey bag didn’t stink so bad. I said, how about soap because at least I’ll smell better than my pads. He explained about all of the ingredients we would need to make soap and the work to make it look like hockey pucks and package it but I knew that it was the product for me.
We watched a few videos about soap making and found out that after you make the soap it has to cure and dry out so that it will last longer. I had to get right to work! We made 2 batches of soap with olive, coconut, and avocado oil. I colored the soap with charcoal powder and scented it with tea tree oil so it would smell clean. I really wanted to make a good quality soap. My dad did the step where we had to add Sodium Hydroxide. It’s a strong chemical that is used to turn oil into soap. The change is called saponification.
The day of the Marketplace I decorated my table with an ice rink tablecloth and had some of the soap cut up in a bowl so people would know what it smells like. I listed all of the ingredients so people could see all of the good stuff I used to make each soap. I was really proud of the soap I made and it really did look like hockey pucks! I wore one of my hockey jerseys too so people could see my theme from far away and come take a look at what I was selling. I made a lot of soap so I did not sell all of them, but I covered all my expenses and learned how soap is made. I did make some money, but used it to shop at the marketplace. It was nice to buy stuff from my friends with money I made from my soap. My hockey bag does still stink though, so maybe I can think of a way to fix that by next years TREP$.
