Homemade Glass Cleaner!!!!

I was in a dilemma.

I was rushing through the house cleaning while the boys were gone and Holly was napping. Time is limited, right?! I just got done scrubbing floors and counter tops when it was time to clean the mirrors. I went to the cleaning closet to find our Windex was empty. (An empty Windex bottle left in the closet? No surprise there, love ya Honey!)

Anywho, I really wanted to get the cleaning finished when I remembered my pin on Pinterest for the Homemade Glass Cleaner. Just my luck, I had all the ingredients!! ChaChing! So, I got to mixing. Here is what you need.

A spray bottle
1/4 cup Rubbing Alcohol
1/4 cup Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Corn Starch
2 cups Warm Water
Shake together and voila! That simple.

Really this is a "better than the store bought stuff" item. Something I never have to buy again and just costs .48 to make!!!

A big thanks to Crunchy Betty for the effort in testing four different recipes in the battle to find the best homemade glass cleaner. She found the true winner and saved us all the hassle of testing them ourselves! Thank you!

Happy Cleaning!

~Keli~

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Homemade Laundry Soap

As mentioned earlier I am on a "Homemade Adventure". I am looking for new ways to save money, be healthier and be more self-sufficient. Homemade Laundry Detergent has always been something that has intrigued me. I love that one of our most basic necessities can be so frugal and easy if we wanted to take the time. I spent hours and hours online searching for the soap I wanted to try. After reading several reviews I decided to try the "Duggar Family Homemade Liquid Laundry Soap". You know the Duggar Family, right? Sure you do, they are on TLC Twenty and counting. I knew that they would be the ones to look for when considering: cost effectiveness, materials and how much product. Let me just say approx. $2 a batch, 10 gallons of soap and 640 LOADS!!!! Sounds wonderful doesn't it?!

Let's get started, here is what you need:
a 5 gallon bucket
1 Fels-Naptha Soap Bar
1 cup Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda
1/2 cup Borax



Now, let me say they made finding these products sound a little easier than it actually was. I found the bucket at our local hardware store. Fels-Naptha I ordered online from a hardware store advertising on ebay, everywhere else I looked I found you had to buy it by the case and I wasn't ready to make that leap yet. The washing soda I have heard people can find at Wal-Mart but I couldn't. I ordered this from my local hardware store. Borax I found at every store I went to in the laundry isle. The great news about these products is most have multiple purposes. I use the washing soda and borax in my homemade dishwasher detergent. All together I spent about $20 and still have tons of product left!




Grate your bar of soap and add to a saucepan with 4 cups- hot water. Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves and is melted.





This does take some time, I think it took me about twenty mintues or so to get all the soap melted. Be patient and resist the urge to turn the heat up. :)



Fill the 5 gallon bucket half full of hot water. Add melted soap, washing soda and Borax. Stir well until all powder is disolved. This can be hard to tell because the water gets foamy. Fill the bucket to the top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.




This is what it looks like when you open it the next morning. Its a thick gel. It smells wonderful though! You are thinking, "thats only 5 gallons though?" Well, let me finish. This is a very strong concentrate and is doubled by dilluting it with water in your small container. Stir your gell and fill a re-used, clean container half full with soap and then fill the rest of the way with water. Shake before each use. It does form a gel and after you shake it it becomes watery. Remember this is normal and does not effect its power at all.

Top Load Machine- 5/8 cup per load (Approx. 180 loads)
Front Load Machine- 1/4 cup per load (Approx. 640 loads)

I have used this soap for the last month and found that it removes stains better than my Gain alternative. I had baby clothes with old stains and this was able to remove them. My clothes don't look dull and they smell great. What a wonderful savings I have found. Hope you enjoy!

Homemade Lotion and Heal All Salve

Last month a friend came to visit. Meet Dez everyone...



Well, we hadn't seen eachother in over a year so this visit had to be good. And, it was! We are long time friends from our high school days and both have husbands and two kids each now. Needless to say.. we had lots of catching up to do. Well, both of us have been looking into a more natural, safer, domestic ways of living. Part of my mission to be fully self- sufficient started here. Dez showed me how to make a homemade lotion and heal all salve. This was so much fun to make and let me tell you... they work AMAZING!!!

It started like this... a couple of lotion bottles, ointment containers, and a trip to the herb store for all of our supplies. First, we started with the lotion. This lotion was customized for my families EXTREMELY sensitive/dry skin. Great for the treatment of Eczema. Of course looking into different herbal properties you can customize a lotion to meet your personal needs. For my lotion I used oatmeal, lavender, comfrey, calendula, aloe vera, glycerin, vitamin E, olive oil, essential oils and bees wax.





Once you have the necessary ingredients start with placing 1-2 oz. of herbs in a jar, pour boiled water over herbs seal the lid and let sit for approx. 1 to 1 1/2 hours. About 10 to 20 minutes before herbs are ready measure out 3/4 cup oil (olive or jojoba) into a glass measuring cup or glass jar, add the bees wax and set the jar into a pan of water creating a double boiler effect. Stir occasionally. In the meantime, strain the herb water until you have one cup of herb water measured out. Add water to a blender. Once the wax has melted remove from water and allow to cool until it starts to harden. Add wax to blender while running on low speed, stop and scrape sides occasionally. As it sets it will solidify.



Pour into lotion bottles and use as often as you would like. Enjoy!





The homemade heal all salve is made using most of the same ingredients and a few more. For my heal all recipe I used lavender, oatmeal, st. johns wart, comfrey, peppermint, plantain, calendula, 20 drops tea tree oil. I made a small container of this for my mother-in-law whom suffers from fibermialgia and arthritis. She swears by this stuff now! She rubs a little into her knees or sore muscles and says it helps her aches in her joints. Sounds good to me! No promises though. ;)

To make this ointment put one cup oil and 1-2 oz. of herbs into a crockpot and cook on low for 3 to 5 hours. Strain herbs to save infused oil. Make a double boiler effect using a jar and a pot of boiling water. Add infused oil and 1 oz. bees wax to jar. Test with a popsicle stick to test for proper consistency. Once consistency is reached pour into containers, let the oil solidify. Keep in fridge or cool place. Lasts approx 6 months to 1 year in fridge.





Use the ointment in place of neosporin, I have used to clear up cold sores, stings, bites, cuts, rashes and any other irritant. As I stated earlier sometime just massaging it into your aches can be of help from this salve.

Let me know if you try any of your own combinations.

Enjoy!