Scaling Mt. Laundry.........

Today is the day I must catch up on laundry. As you can probably tell, it is not a task I particularly enjoy, but there is some satisfaction in the finished outcome.

One highlight of my day will be the making of my own laundry soap...a skill I was inspired to perfect when a friend, who isn't normally "crafty" decided to give it a try to help save some money for her family of 10 (she and her husband have 4 natural kiddos and 4 foster children). She was inspired after watching the TLC show 19 kids and Counting featuring the lives of the famous Duggar family. She found Michelle Duggar's recipe for homemade laundry soap on their family website and decided to give it a shot. Much to her relief, it turned out wonderfully and she has been making her own laundry soap for many, many months now. Not wanting to miss this opportunity to be frugal, I decided to give it a go myself.

Much to my frustration, my first batch of soap was a major flop. Granted, I did not follow the directions correctly either, but that's because I tend to go about things by the most difficult route the first time around. I've never understood why. Anyway, the trouble began when I decided to attempt a half-batch instead of following the directions exactly when I'd never made anything like it before. I didn't know what to look for or how the finished product was supposed to look either. Luckily, the ingredients I wasted weren't that expensive! (That would have made me mad)

Here is the recipe Michelle Duggar uses for her laundry soap (copied from the Duggar Family's website with my own annotations in brackets):

Homemade Liquid Laundry Soap- Front or top load machine- best value


4 Cups - hot tap water

1 Fels-Naptha soap bar

1 Cup - Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda*

½ Cup Borax

1- Grate bar of soap and add to saucepan with water. Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves and is melted.  {This step took the longest. Take the time to make sure it is completely dissolved! You don't want to be able to see ANY little bits of grated soap. It should be completely melted}

2-Fill a 5 gallon bucket half full of hot tap water. Add melted soap, washing soda and Borax. Stir well until all powder is dissolved. Fill bucket to top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.  {The mixture will feel slippery like soap...because it IS soap :)...haha }

3-{the next day} Stir and fill a used, clean, laundry soap dispenser half full with soap and then fill rest of way with water. Shake before each use. (will gel)  {Do not panic if it looks "lumpy"...you did it correctly. That is how it's supposed to look! It will feel a bit like a watery jelly consistency. Give it a good stir and don't worry about the lumps. They will not effect your soap's cleaning ability at all....and they'll just be back the next time you fill up your dispenser anyway as the soap tends to settle when it sits. Congrats! You did it, you soap-maker you!!!}

4-Optional: You can add 10-15 drops of essential oil per 2 gallons. Add once soap has cooled. Ideas: lavender, rosemary, tea tree oil.

Yield: Liquid soap recipe makes 10 gallons.

Top Load Machine- 5/8 Cup per load (Approx. 180 loads)

Front Load Machines- ¼ Cup per load (Approx. 640 loads)

*Arm & Hammer "Super Washing Soda" - in some stores or may be purchased online here (at Meijer.com). Baking Soda will not work, nor will Arm & Hammer Detergent - It must be sodium carbonate!!

TIPS FOR LAUNDRY SOAP: We use Fels-Naptha bar soap in the homemade soap recipes, but you can use Ivory, Sunlight, Kirk's Hardwater Castile or Zote bars. Don't use heavily perfumed soaps. We buy Fels-Naptha by the case from our local grocer or online. Washing Soda and Borax can often be found on the laundry or cleaning aisle.

Well, there you have it. My little tip for saving money as you tackle Mt. Laundry in your home. Here are pictures of the products in case you have never heard of any of them before:

This recipe is easy and inexpensive to make and works wonderfully in my front loading machine. The amount of soap it makes lasts my family of 6 several months (depending on how tall Mt. Laundry has grown because this fluctuates) and costs approximately $6.00 to make a 5 gallon bucket full. That's concentrate, folks!! That's right, you add equal parts soap to water into an empty laundry soap jug (which I know you frugal folks have been saving for something) and there you have it.....10 whole gallons of your own totally customizable laundry soap.

We love it and it has saved us probably upwards of $80 or more so far on soap!!! Try it. I'd love to hear how it works for you and your family. Leave me a comment and let me know.

{If you live in my area, I buy all the ingredients I need for this at Winco and I bought my lovely aqua-colored 5 gallon bucket for $4.97 at Walmart. It matches my lovely bathroom and that thrills me to no end!}

Blessings,

Sprouting something new....

Good morning everyone! I am enjoying a mellow station I made on pandora.com today as the sky is a veil of grey and the rain pours down. Sometimes these are my favorite sort of days. I often find my mind pondering and reflecting on days like this. Good for a cup of hot tea (my current favorite is a lovely honeybush I purchased from the Stash Tea Co. on a birthday getaway with my oldest daughter) with honey and some sort of quiet work.   ...sigh...

Well, I have so many posts to catch up on this will likely be my quiet work today. Luckily, I've been keeping a list of all the things I wanted to share with you.

First thing's first. I am excited to share my recent venture of sprouting right in my own kitchen. I must admit that I have had this little puppy hidden away in the back of my pantry for more than 2 years (*hangs head with sheepish grin*) with all the greatest intentions to grow sprouts and boost the fam's nutrition long ago. ...but hey, I got a great deal on it at least, right?! .... 

So I bought some wheat berry seeds (kernels?...hmmm I don't know what they are) from the bulk section of the grocery store and decided to give it a shot. According to the instructions on the box, I simply sprinkle 1 tablespoon of whatever I want to sprout into each tray (there are 3 growing trays included but I only used 2 for this attempt) ...

...then you add water to the top tray and put the lid on.

The water slowly filters down through all the trays soaking the seeds as it goes until it's collected in the bottom tray. Then you simply empty the bottom tray and add more water to the top one.

You do this twice a day for 2-5 days depending on what you are sprouting and how big you want them to get. (I watered once in the morning and emptied the same water from the bottom tray into the top again for the afternoon time and started with fresh water the next day.)

Here's what I ended up with after only 3 days!

They were a hit with our organic greens from a local farm we checked out this last tuesday....but that is another post for another time. Don't worry....it's on my list :)

 

(because I know some of you are wondering, yes that's a pansy :)  Did you know you can eat them? The other purple flower in the top of the picture is the flower head of a chive plant...mmmm)

Well, I would encourage all of you to give sprouting a try. It's a fun, fast and wonderful way to naturally boost your family's nutrition everyday. Check out this info I found on the nutritive value of sprouts. And just in case you are wondering what in the world you are supposed to do with them now that they are sprouted, check out this list of great suggestions I copied from the same website's recipe page:

GREAT WAYS TO SERVE SPROUTS

• Add to tossed salads
• Use in coleslaw (cabbage, clover, radish)
• Try in potato salad (mung bean, lentil)
• Try in wraps and roll-ups (alfalfa, sunflower, radish)
• Stir-fry with other vegetables (alfalfa, clover, radish, mung bean, lentil)
• Blend into fruit shakes or juices (cabbage, mung bean, lentil)
• Blend with vegetable juices (cabbage, mung bean, lentil)
• Replace celery in sandwich spreads (lentil, radish)
• Mix with soft cheeses for a dip (mung bean, radish)
• Grind up and use in sandwich spreads (lentil, radish)
• Top grilled cheese sandwiches after grilling (alfalfa, clover)
• Stir into soups or stews when serving (mung bean, lentil)
• Mix into pancake or waffle batter (buckwheat)
• Eat them fresh and uncooked in a sprout salad (salad mixes)
• Top omelet or scrambled eggs (alfalfa, clover, radish)
• Combine in rice dishes (fenugreek, lentil, mung bean)
• Add to sushi (radish, sunflower)
• Saute with onions (mung bean, clover, radish)
• Puree with peas or beans (mung bean, lentil)
• Add to baked beans (lentil)
• Steam and serve with butter (mung bean, lentil)
• Use in sandwiches instead of lettuce (alfalfa, clover, radish)

 Alrighty, well, I'm off to go enjoy a lovely salad for lunch. You're welcome to join me in your own kitchen.

Blessings,

Too much cream and no more strawberries...........

Good afternoon!  Boy, time seems to get away from me quickly sometimes.  The pace of life seems too fast for me more and more these days. Perhaps it's my age.......or I could blame it on the seam-bursting schedule that we find ourselves scrambling to keep up with most of the time.

Hubby and I got to take a little time out and head to the elementary school to check out our 4th grader's Pioneer Days expo. We got to enjoy several historical activities the Pioneers would have experienced like making homemade yo-yo's, writing with a quill and ink and making our own butter. Then to top the night off we were entertained by some local musicians with an authentic hoedown complete with banjo, mandelin, guitar, fiddle, singing and square dancing by our own kiddos! We enjoyed ourselves immensely and came home with a few new skills.

Had it not been for that Pioneer Days expo, we might have missed out on a wonderful opportunity for family bonding only a week or two later.  After whipping some cream to use with strawberries in a simple dessert for a lifegroup meeting here at our house one sunday, I found myself wondering what to do with the cup of cream left over. The strawberries were such a hit that there weren't any left and I was drawing a blank until I remembered our little lesson in making butter.

One night just after getting dinner on the table, everyone was gathered around and I saw a perfect opportunity. I poured the rest of the left over cream into a quart sized canning jar and capped it off and set it on the table in front of me as I took my seat. My family all gave me curious looks which I returned with a tiny smirk.

"What are you doing with that, Mom?" they asked with raised eyebrows.
"We're gonna sit here and take turns making butter while we eat", I said matter-of-factly.
"What?"
"Yup. Who wants to shake it first?"

Well, that jar went round and round the table and we each took a few turns shaking it for all we were worth and before long we had some fantistic homemade butter for all our efforts! Wonderful! They were hesitant to sample it at first, but after the first taste of that creamy goodness they've been generously slathering it on everything they can find to put butter on.  I think my little experiment was a huge success. Just yesterday they asked me the question I was waiting to hear.............."When are we going to make more butter, Mom?"

I thought I'd share the fruits of our labor with you. Check it out:

Mmmmmmmmmm..............best ever! Go make your own!