Homemade laundry soap

I have seen several people on my FB feed talking about making their own laundry detergent.  I have been intrigued but not really investigated it.  I looked up the recipe and found that I could do 156 loads for about $10!  I am sold on that.  Not much investment if I don't like it right?  I will give it a shot this evening and see how it does. 

Here is the recipe that I will be using..

Ingredients:


1/3 bar Fels Naptha Soap ( Ivory and Zote will also work)

½ cup washing soda (found in the laundry section at most stores)

½ cup borax powder (the 20 Mule Team brand is a good choice)

2 gallons water



Grate the soap and put it in a sauce pan. Add 6 cups water and heat it until the soap melts. Add the washing soda (NOT baking soda) and the borax. Stir until it is dissolved. Remove from heat. Pour 4 cups hot water into a 2-gallon bucket. Add soap mixture and stir. Add 1 gallon plus 6 cups of water and stir. Let the soap sit for about 24 hours until it gels. Use a ½ cup detergent per load of laundry

Weekend of the $133 bathroom makeover

Let's take a step back in time shall we?  This is how the bathroom looked right before we moved in.  First step was remove all wallpaper and we did that and then painted it the ugly poop brown right?

 Removed the towel rack on the side of the vanity.  Only purpose it served was an arm rest.  lol

 Check out the sexy wood and brass door handles.  This poor vanity needed some TLC stat!

A gallon of Myan Treasure from Porter Paint ($30) 

A gallon of Pumpernickle from Porter Paint ($30)

A $7 print from Walmart above the toilet ($7)

New hardware for vanity ($18 for drawer pulls and $10 for hinges)

New shower curtain ($26)

A quart of white paint for trim ($12)

And check it out folks!!!!

 I love this color.  It is bright enough to wake you up in the morning but muted just enough to not look like a caution light. The vanity doesn't even look like it is the same one.  The brown rug that was already in the bathroom really helped ground the room.  The shower curtain add a bit of texture with the circle ruffle in it too. The crisp white trim on the base boards and the folding door on the closet really makes the room look put together instead of a hodge podge.  I am in the market for a nice towel rack for the facing wall when you walk in.  Maybe with a shelf included for some photos?

 Another view of the vanity. This didn't photograph well.  I think I should have turned the flash off but you get the idea.  The plates I pulled from the kitchen decor.

This was a lot of work but so worth it.  I am ready to tackle another room or maybe even the hallway now.  Watch out momma has a paint brush!

 It wasn't all work though as we found time to celebrate the birthday week with a little cake.  Addison wanted Princesses and Anthony is on a snake kick.  He wanted a cobra on his cake.  Odd combo but Sweet Stuff pulled it off. 

Ok just for the sake of before and after again. 

We're 5!!

For the twins today couldn't come fast enough, but for me I could wait another 20 years.  My babies are turning 5!  They woke up to balloons all over the floor in their rooms.  They were supposed to wake up to balloons on their walls but apparently duct tape doesn't hold balloons too well and there wasn't many options while oxygen deprived at 11pm from blowing up 50 balloons.  Good thing I quit smoking huh?

 Addison had a hard time getting ready for the day without getting "distracted".  lol  We told Grandma to come meet us and mommy wouldn't tell us where we were going.  She only told us all to put on play clothes.  So mysterious!

 The first thing that we did was go to Chic-fil-a for breakfast.  We love us some Chick-fil-a and don't get to take advantage of their breakfast often.  I had to take a pic of Anthony's oatmeal as Addison called one particular piece of apple a shark.  Such imagination.  After breakfast we met up with Grandma at our house and mom took us to the mysterious location.  We were all confused as we took off down a road that we haven't been down before.  We pulled up in the parking lot of a big building with SIGS on the side of it.  Mom explained that she was about to rock our world and boy did she!  She took us to a program called "Bounce Time"  We had the whole gym to play in.  For $16 we got the hours to.....

 Jump in the "Cheese Pit" about 400 times, giving mom great photo ops!

                                         Pretend that we are Superman

                                     Jump together while yelling "FIVE!"

                                            Swing on the rope swing

                          Give a little "Anything you can do I can do better."

                                                   Hang upside down

                                       Hang upside down while swinging

             Play with mommy and watch mommy find out just hold old SHE is.  :)

                                 And leave with our socks loooking like this

                      But not before we had one more go on the trampoline floor.

We all had a blast! We left soaking wet as a matter of fact Anthony was so wet that everywhere he would put his head left a wet mark on the mats.  That kid was getting a work out.

We loved Bounce time!  It was a great way to get rid of the obnoxiousness extra energy that we have given mommy the past week.  We told mommy over and over that this was the best Birthday ever and that we was so glad that mommy brought us there.  We want a do over!

The start of T-ball

 It didn't take Addison 2 seconds to set up her area. She has been wanting to break out this chair for Tball for quite some time now.  She has to make sure that her water is set up and all is in the correct spot.

" I can't believe I am here and that I FINALLY get to play."  He was so pumped!  This was the point where mommy put on her glasses so that nobody could see the tear welling up in my eyes.

 Anthony and his coach.  He was so excited to hear that he had a female coach.  He said I hope that she is pretty!  My, that boy is going to be a handful. When he caught the ball he would throw it back to his coach look over at me and point his finger to me like "That was for you mommy!" Melted my heart!

 Sock it to em buddy!  He really enjoyed hitting the ball.

Then they ran the bases. The coach had them run the bases and yell out the name of the base as they hit it.  This was hilarious as Anthony kept getting messed up and the more laps he took the more he would mess up. Such as this lap where he said 16th for 3rd base and got mad at himself about half way home.  Such a nut!

What a hunk!

While chatting with my nephew online about college life and feeding him and his 3 buddies he lives with it reminded me of something that I needed to tell him about.  Something I would like to look back on my blog in years to come and remember.  While at Meijer last night getting anything that was not nailed down and chocolate we walked by a huge display of Coors Light.  Anthony gave it the once over and said "There is beer!  That is what Tyler (my nephew) got on his (21st) Birthday!  A big hunk of beer!"  I fell out laughing in the store.  "A what?!" I said.  "Mom I said a hunk of beer."  I had to share with him.  Next time Tyler takes off to a party and needs to bring a case of beer with him I am sure that he will think of his cousin back home and get a chuckle.  I am sure that the term applies to Coke and Pepsi as well.

13X9 brick about sums it up!

Today is quite the intense day!  I started out doing some AMAZING hair on a friend of mine.  She went super blonde and it turned out great!  That was the good part of my day. 

About 20 minutes after she left the people at Lowes arrived at my house with the man that installed our new dishwasher.  You see the yard sale was for a new one as the old one appeared to be leaking so much so that had a spot of black mold in the basement corner.  Quite fun! Victoria sleeping in the living room black plastic hanging floor to ceiling to block off the area to get rid of it. Better safe than sorry right?  So we had the successful yard sale and bought a new one for about the total profit of the yard sale. 

Guess what?  The leak is still there!  I love the dishwasher. Does a great job and even has a sanitizing feature that I love.  But..... I would have rather used the money on a plumber bill instead.  I bite my tongue as my husband is just as frustrated and I don't want to be a nagging wife. 

Anywho, James called Lowes to make sure that they installed correctly. They were very sweet to return to my home and was able to find the problem.  The water is coming down the wall in the basement under the kitchen from the drain. It is escaping the pipe somewhere upstairs as the water is leaking under the cabinets and entering the hole where my dish washer is inserted into my kitchen.  That is why we thought it was the dishwasher, we was wrong.  So we now have black mold under our kitchen sink and was advised to knock down the wall under my sink and the bottom of the cabinet under the sink. 

I am trying not to complain too much but I am REALLY sick of dealing with water issues in this house.  I love my home don't get me wrong and have even made peace with the burgundy carpet. I know if I hang onto it long enough I will be back in style  :)  I appreciate the fact that we are no longer on top of one another in the house and we have more space etc.  I also understand that many, far too many actually have clean water accessible to them and that I have as much as I want available to me.  I just want it to stay in the pipes. 

On another note my husband is on his way home from California and isn't here to personally handle the problem.  So I wait and while I wait he has asked me to not run the dishwasher and not to let water down the sink.  He wants it as dry as he can get it so that Eric our plumber can come and fix the problem for us.  I decided to not freak out and cry and to just make a batch of brownies.  Chocolate could fix this right?

Tonight my mom came over and I had fixed meatloaf (already in the oven before I got the "don't use the sink" news) and she was gracious enough to assist me in washing the dishes in the bathroom in my tiny sink with spacious counter and freshly painted base. :)  I washed in the sink and then transferred into the bathtub to rinse.  My bathroom floor got cleaned in the process as well.  My back is KILLING me from the painting of the cabinet the highlight that I did today and not getting to the chiropractor in two weeks for my decompression.  I am about in tears at this point from frustration and laughter as my mom is sitting on the toilet drying the dishes while I wash.  Victoria is making trips to the bathroom picking up dry dishes and taking them back into the kitchen to put them away. 

Are you aware of how loud washing your dishes in the bathroom is?  I didn't realize myself until I started smelling something burning.  Something chocolate burning.  Crap! My brownies.  I didn't hear the buzzer got off and my brownies are burnt to a crisp!

Yep folks that about sums it up a 13X9 brick of brownie.  We headed out shortly after setting my smoking pan out on the front porch to get a chocolate bunt cake from Meijer.  While there I found a T-shirt fitting of the day it says.  Plan for the day: 1. Wake up 2. Survive 3.Go back to bed.  Believe I will wear that tomorrow.

OH YEAH!

Today I had a thousand things I wanted to do and the energy for none of them.  Isn't that the way it usually goes?  I did manage to get a batch of white chili in the crock pot and in no time my house was smelling delish!  I needed a red pepper and had been craving watermelon since I went to my parents yesterday so I looked at ads online to see if anyone had watermelon on sale.  What I did find was that Kroger had their tubs of Kool Aid on their 10 for 10 again.  I just recently ran out of Lemonade about a month ago from the 30 that I bought last time they had that sale.  I had the kids throw on come clothes and I took off to Kroger to get my red pepper, watermelon and about 40 tubs of Kool Aid with a quick stop at Home Depot in case I did start my project.

Kroger did not disappoint!  ANY flavor of Kool Aid was included in the deal along with Country Time lemonade and pink lemonade.  I started digging and within a few seconds my cart was full of Kool Aid burying my watermelon and red pepper (what I needed in the first place).  When I made my way to the check out the sweet lady said "Someone liked Kool Aid!"  I told her "Yes and we like this price!"  She started ringing up and the original price was 2.79 a tub.  By the time she got finished ringing up my 40 tubs she was blown away that I had saved $112.00!  I was a bit excited too and the people behind me in line as well.  I got drunk off of the savings and went back in to get another 40 tubs.  I know a bit obsessive but when you drink as much as we do around here it adds up very fast.  I wished I had purchased more last time that I went and have been keeping my eye out on the ads to see when the sale would happen again. 

Once we got home we had to unload all of them.  I needed a wheel barrel!  I backed the car in and unloaded right into my mudroom/pantry where I have my new shelves.  I asked Addison and Anthony to come and help me and Addison comes down the hallway in this....

 I hear ya fancy girl!  She was a huge help with her brother as they unloaded the bags and handed me each one so that I could stack them on the shelf.  My pantry now looks like Kroger itself.

 Once I got done with my stocking I started in on the house.  Someone came in and messed it up while we were gone. ;)  I got a burst of energy and decided to quit procrastinating and just get started on my vanity.  I have wanted to paint it for some time now and never gotten around to it.  I have regretted painting the walls that dark brown ever since we packed up the paint that day but it is just paint and paint can be covered right?!  So a quick review this is what we started with.  I had already taken the drawers out and started painting before I ran down the hallway afraid I wouldn't get my before shot. 

 Now about an hour later and a couple of coats I have this!  I LOVE IT!  I am going to put some brushed silver drawer pulls on it as well.  I found the poster hanging over the toilet while at Walmart the other day.  I love the colors and words so I grabbed it for the hallway and it is going to end up in my bathroom as my inspiration.  I am thinking maybe a mustard yellow for the walls now.  Can't be as bold as the sh*t brown right?  Of course this means that I will be replacing the shower curtain yet again.  I have only had it for maybe a month and a half.  For about $50 I have a "new" vanity.  Well worth the money I say!