Homemade Laundry Detergent

I am really surprised it isn't more mainstream to make your own laundry soap at home. I mean, we make our own meals to save money and this takes no more time to make than a meal. And saves TONS! I easily found all of the items to make this at my local hardware store in the cleaning supplies aisle. I have also seen them in my grocery store.

In all fairness, it was my cousin Jenna who sent me this recipe but it seemed too fit right in with Kim's awesome pearls of knowledge. And again, for the sake of fairness, Jenna got this from someone else. And the pattern repeats back to the "original" source of the information, which is cited below.



Homemade Laundry Detergent

4 cups hot tap water

5.5 oz bar soap, grated (surfactant)~~I used Fels Naptha

1 cup Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda (builder)

1/2 cup 40 Mule Team Borax (builder)~~I used 20 Mule Team borax since that's what my store had and I didn't really notice the difference before purchase.



Grate bar soap and add to saucepan with water. Stir over med-low heat until melted. Fill a 5 gallon bucket half full with 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. Optionally, add 1/2 teaspoon or more essential oil.

Adapted from www.duggarfamily.com/recipes



5 gallons = 640oz/80oz = 80 cups = 160 half cups (top loaders) = 320 1/4 cups (recommended top loader) = 640 1/8c (front loaders)

$0.003 to $0.015 a load



Enjoy the satisfaction of making your own laundry detergent and saving big money!

Elderberries

Kim and my friend Dani told me how to make a healthy little elixir to give the family to get them and/or keep them well.

Find elderberries. As many as you can-or want. You kind of need a lot. By a lot I mean we picked about 5 gallons of berries-on the stem- and got 5 pints of juice.

Wash them- no soap, just water. Pluck them off their stems with a fork. This is definitely the most time consuming part for me. Wash them again.

Toss em in a pot with a little water. Cook the juice out. Squish em with a squisher- I used a potato masher. Squeeze em through cheese cloth- this part is really messy.

Add sugar to the juice to a taste to your liking. I make my family suffer the bitter taste a bit because I am not a huge fan of sugar. I have also sweetened with honey which I felt much better about.

At this point it you should have pretty hot stuff. I bring the heat back up to almost boiling just so it is ready for the jars. Your jars should clean and hot. I wash mine in the dishwasher just before using.

Fill your jars to 1/4 inch from the top. Clean rim with moist, clean washcloth. Put clean, new jar lids on. Turn jars upside down for about 10 minutes. Turn jars right side up and wait for the pinging sound of the jars sealing. Once the jars are sealed, I suggest you store them in a cool, dark place until you need them.

For information about the healing properties of Elderberries, see this (and many, many others) web site:

http://www.herbwisdom.com/herb-elderberry.html

ALSO, Heidi Says-
+You can buy elderberry products at your local health food store for a lot of money! This is FREEEEEEEE!
+I have found there to be a residual smell on my hands when picking and plucking the berries. If you want to avoid this I recommend wearing rubber gloves when you are handling the berries and stems.

Creative Writing for Kids

Nick, who is 12, hated writing until a few weeks ago. I was not really sure why he hated it because he was so good at it. After Kim told me about "story starters" I decided to try it myself. Basically, I would write the first few sentences of a story, creating a scenario. Then, the kids would go from there with their story. The first few ideas came pretty easily and the outcome was hilarious. All of my kids were writing very creative, very funny stories. And, out of the blue, Nick tells me that he LOVES writing!

Well, this week my own creativity for the story starters started to drop off. Apparently, so did Kim's. That must have sent her on the hunt for more ideas because she just sent me this link, which I love!

http://www.brucevanpatter.com/what_if_questions.php

One of these days soon, I WILL figure out how to put in a nice pretty link!

Modest swim wear

For once, a comfortable and modest suit that is pretty cute too. WARNING!!! These suits are in no way revealing! But who ever said we had to be exposed to have fun around the water. Why is it that people will walk around in public in a bikini but not their underwear? It is essentially the same thing.

http://www.swimmodest.com/

John Adams

We didn't used to particularly like John Adams until watching this movie, which you can check out at your local library:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Adams_(TV_miniseries)

(sorry, I am no good at links.)

And we like this, too:

http://www.scmidnightflyer.com/adamsjohn.html

Free Audiobooks for Children

http://librivox.org/childrens-literature/

A Thomas Jefferson Education

Because a lot of the neat stuff Kim sends me are from other people's blogs, of course those links will end up in this blog. This is one I am super excited about looking into. I actually had this book on my mind before Kim told me about it but just haven't gotten around to looking into it yet. If you do, PLEASE post a comment here telling me what you think of it.

http://www.design-your-homeschool.com/a-thomas-jefferson-education.html

A Cool Site

Here is a cool site Kim has told me about a few times. That makes it worth sharing here. Good for homeschoolers and vegetarians.:)

http://vegsource.com/homeschool/

"Your shoes are on the wrong feet."

I tried this today on a couple of kids that I am watching. They informed me immediately that they like it!

If you have a child having trouble getting the shoes on the correct feet try this:

Draw a smiley face on each shoe on the edge of the sole of the shoe where the arch is. When the smiley faces are smiling at each other the shoes are on the right feet.

My Friend Kim

I am pretty sure that my friend Kim is a parenting and homeschooling genius. She is about doing things smarter not harder, providing for yourself, helping kids learn, feeding your peeps healthy and yummy food and raising kids to be unique, responsible, contributing adults. She is like a lot of great parents I know but she has a way of distilling info and ideas to a short little tidbit that i can handle.

One reason for starting this blog is just to have a way to keep track of all of the little things she sends me or tells me. Most of the ideas that she has sent me are currently randomly stored in my email inbox. I told her to start a blog so that she could share with everyone but she scoffed at the idea. I told her, "Fine, then I will start a blog and take all the credit for myself!" She said, "Ok."

So here I am with a place to share all of Kim's great ideas with anyone who is interested.

I hope you enjoy Kim's ideas as much as I do.