The rug is off the loom! I reapeat the rug is off the loom!

Anyone who knows me, knows that I have a long history of starting a project and not finishing. This can become problematic. So in an effort to better myself, be a better example to my children and generally get rid of a mass amount of clutter, I have been very diligent in finishing projects. This includes new ones and ones that have been sitting in my "closet of doom" for a year (or two).

I am happy to announce the finishing my first knitted rug! It has been a long process of starting, stopping, and starting over. This rug began as an I cord rug knitted on my "knifty knitter" loom. After many attempts of lacing the cording together, I still could not get the tension right. So I changed direction.
I tore out all the I cord, re- wrapped each ball of yarn and decided to make a double knit rug on my loom instead.

I used yarn that I purchased for $1 a bag at a book sale. Although, I did need to buy 1 skein of blue to finish the rug off so overall I used 7 skeins of yard and spent $3.25 on the entire project. Plus I used up some yarn.

This rug is going to be used in front of my childrens' bunk bed, when the get a bunk bed that is!


I hope you enjoy!

Little Giggles

As frustrating as sewing can be sometimes it is always worth it in the end when you receive such beautiful smiles and precious little giggles as a result of your project. There is something special to know that a little piece of you is in that dress, or blanket or whatever the project is. It is no where near the same feeling of giving a store bought gift. If you have never sewn before I suggest just try something small. A blanket maybe. The sky is the limit for creativity.
It is a forgotten craft that I feel needs to be revived in our culture. We have relied too long on the stores to provide our basic nessecities. Lets take back our ability to stand on our own two feet. It is a great skill to have for no other reason that when you can't find what you are looking for in the stores you can produce it.
Well that is it my plea for women everywhere to pick up the needle and create!

Felicity Costume

The first costume of the 2010 Trick or Treat season is completely finished! Here are some photos of Miss Grace's "Felicity" dress.






This is the front view. I had to make a couple of modifications do to mistakes on my part. But over all I am pretty pleased. I really hope she likes it.

















This is the back view. The only reason this is up is to show the first real zipper I have ever put in!! Woohoo! I had to have my mother in law show me how to properly place one in. I am ashamed to admit that up to now I have tried to find every way around putting in a zipper and have even not done a pattern due to a zipper! Not any more!

So here it is: Costume #1 finished and ready to go! Now on to an ewok and to finish the tree.

Rainy Day Inspiration

A sister of mine posted a really awesome blog today on face book that is completely up my alley!

365 dresses in 365 day with 365 dollars

There is not for me to say on this so just go there and be inspired!

What to do with all the Saxon Math Meeting Strips

School is quickly approaching and for the most part I am pretty organized this year. Cadence is starting the first grade and Isaac will be doing pre-school (well as much "school" as a 2 1/2 can do).

In all my planning and organizing there was still one thing that remained to figure out, what are we going to do with all these meeting strips that Cadence will be doing each day? So after much pondering this is what I have come up with.

• I took the master copy of the meeting strips that is in the Saxon Teacher's guide and reformatted on my computer. This way it is just easier to print them out without having to deal with a copier or scanner. As soon as I figure out how to add a document file to the blog I will post it here for you to use.
  
• Next I cut out each strip to the same size.
• Then I found a scrap piece of wood from my scrap wood pile that was just a little larger than the cut strips and sanded it until it was smooth. Then I used left over spray paint and paint the block of wood.
• Next I placed a meeting strip on the wood and marked where I wanted the holes and nails would be.
• Finally I used 4 small nails (the heads need to be smaller than the hole of a hole punch) and hammered them into the wood were marked. After that I used a hole punch to punch all the strips to match the nail holes.

And this is the final result, a place to keep all those meeting strips. The great thing is she can set it on her desk and see the date all during school. I am still thinking of what to do just beneath the meeting strip.

The Making of a Tree

I know it has been ages since the last time I posted, but here I am. I have actually found a way (I hope) to help the blogging process. This big help is using an old camera for just blogging. That way I do not have to sort and weed through pictures every time I want to blog. Some of you out there may say "well why do you need to post picture?" Well, part of it is I am personally a very visual person and so my thinking is that there may be more like me out there.

Ok so on to making The Making of a Tree.......

So for those of you who may not know I enjoy making costumes. I enjoy the challenge and the wide range of creativity that comes with it. So when my 6 year old daughter asks to be a fall oak tree this year I was excited at the opportunity!

So I began researching and found some completely awesome costumes. Here are two:

Now this is a Tree Face
Magic Tree Costume

However, many of the ones I found and really liked as if they would cost an arm and a leg to make. Plus many appeared to be a little restricting in movement and being this is for a 6 year old who will be walking around, I did not feel a full trunk would be a good idea.

So I set out to develop a cheap, light weight nice looking tree costume out of nothing but paper, paint, tape and glue. And these are the result so far:



This is the front view. I was really awesome to watch Cadence's wheels turn as she thought of all the possibilities to enhance her costume.










This is a close up of the bird sitting in the tree. (Cadence has told me it is a robin)











So what would a fall oak tree be without falling leaves? If you look you can see the leaves dangling from the branch.










And finally, what would an oak tree be without acorns? We had so much fun gathering them!









I will try to remember to post the finished product. I will say I am glad to have this part done. With still having a "Felicity" dress to make for a friend's daughter and an ewok to make for my son and with the fair and school on its way in about a week or so, things are going to get pretty busy around here.

Let's soften things up a bit!

Making your own laundry softener is very easy to do, not too mention cheap!

Materials:

One large mixing bowl
Mixing spoon
Measuring cup
Funnel
Container to hold 1 gallon of softener (I use a left over downy bottle plus a container to hold the extra)


Ingredients:

3 Cups of vinegar
2 Cups Conditioner (1 15 oz bottle is exactly 2 cups)
6 Cups water

Procedure:

This is super easy. Squeeze the conditioner into the bowl.
Add two cups of the vinegar to the bowl. Use the remaining one cup to clean out the conditioner bottle (no since in anything going to waste!), add that as well. Add the 6 cups of water and mix well with the spoon. Use the funnel to pour the mixture into your container. Use as you would store bought softener. It takes about 1/4 of a cup.

Now as for the pricing it is right around $1.20 for a GALLON of softener. Not to shabby!

No Heat Required!

In my endeavors to make more of the things we use around the house, I have naturally been drawn towards soap; Body washing soap and laundry soap. The laundry soap will have to wait for about 3 more weeks. You will see why in a minute.

With all things new, the first thing I did is research. And once again this process began over at my partner in crime's house. I guess I just need encouragement because, to be honest, soap making does seem as if it would be incredibly hard. I learned so much about the topic in just one night from watching her and her sister. Actually, just like the toothpaste, it was not that hard at all! So, once again I went home and began to research.

I not only researched the process and the different recipes, (which let me tell you there are lots of), but I also did a bunch of comparison shopping online. That part was probably the most important because if you're not careful you can spend way too much! Here are a few of the places online I compared:

1. http://www.camdengrey.com
2. http://www.soaperschoice.com
3. http://www.mountainroseherbs.com
4. http://wholesalesuppliesplus.com

If you too make soap and have another place for me try please feel free to share!

After I found the best pricing possible I ordered all my supplies. Which recipe did I go with you ask? Well, I am keeping that a surprise until this weekend when I should be able to make my "good" stuff.

So the point of this blog? Well before I use the more expensive oils, I thought I would try a tester soap. So I decided to make a simple lard soap recipe I found at: http://fimby.tougas.net/. I did make one slight change in the process, as the title suggests I am using no heat in the making of this soap. Everything was done at room temperature.

First a little back ground there are two basic soap methods that most soapers use. The first in the hot method which takes a few hours cooking in a crock pot or on top of the stove. The benefit of this process is the cure time does not take nearly as long. The second, and from what I have been reading, the most popular is the cold process method. This one involves placing oils on the stove to melt them and then bringing the temperature back down. Once that is finished you can finish your soap. This process is relatively quick compared to the hot method. The down side is it takes about a month for the soap to cure to where it is usable.

So which method did I use? Neither!

So let's get started.........

The Recipe

4 pounds Lard (I found mine at Wal-Mart however you may want to try a local butcher)
28 oz of water
8.5 oz of Lye (the Lye I found at Menards)

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The Supplies

One large stainless steel or glass microwave safe bowl
One smaller bowl the same as above
Scale
Latex gloves
Eye protection
Immersion blender

Metal spoon
Cardboard box line
Vinegar (just in case of spills. It
neutralizes the lye)




* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Once you have everything out and ready to go make sure your counters are completely clear! I forgot to do this and spent a good amount of time cleaning lye splatters. Put on your protective wear. And lets get to work!

First weigh everything out into separate containers. If you use a different recipe with more than one kind of fat or oil you can put like oils into the same containers after they have been measured. The solid oils in one bowl and the liquid oils into another.

Next prepare your lye solution. It is important at this point to have good ventilation because the water and lye mixture will give off some fumes. I placed this batch on my stove top (I have a flat ceramic top to my stove) where I was able to turn on our stove vent that sucked the fumes right away. SLOWLY pour the lye into the water. NEVER the other way around bad things can happen. Stir as you pour until all the crystals dissolve.

Now you need to wait until the lye solution becomes clear. Once it does pour it over your hard oils. The heat the lye and water produces in its chemical reaction will melt your oils. Use a large metal spoon to mash the oils down and to stir. I would not use a whisk the oils just clump up and makes a big mess! Trust me I know, I tried!

Once the oils have melted if you have liquid oils now is when you would add them, but I didn't, so now I began to mix. Use the immersion or stick blender to mix everything together. Mix until the mixture traces. (This is the time you would add color and fragrance) Everything should be blended completely with no little beads of water in the soap mixture.

Now just simply pour the mixture in the mold, smooth it down and tap it a bit to get out any little air bubbles.

I let the soap rest over night and then the next day I cut into bars. Finally, I separated each bar and placed them standing up in a shoe box. Now they need to sit for a few weeks before they will be shredded and used in laundry soap!

From the Kitchen to the Bathroom! Making homemade toothpaste.

I never thought that my first blog post would be about making toothpaste! But here I am. And to be honest I was expecting something a bit harder. The hardest part of the entire process was actually the research. There are so many different ideas and recipes out there when it comes to cleaning our teeth.

How did such an idea ever cross my mind, you may be asking. Well it all came about from watching a friend of mine make soap (this is the same friend who helps spark many of my adventures). During the process she explained some of the other interesting projects her family was doing. One of those happened to be brushing their teeth with baking soda only. Knowing my husband, I knew I had better start looking for an actual "toothpaste" recipe.

So I went home and began researching. The one I chose consisted of a baking soda base for cleaning, Glycerin as a sweetener, mint extract for flavor and water to make it pasty. You could also add salt for an abrasive. I suggest you do a little research yourself to form your own views.

The Recipe

Ingredients:
1c Baking soda
8 tsp glycerin (2 tsp for every 1/4c)
Mint extract to taste
Enough water to form a paste
A squeezable container (I used a plastic ketchup container I got from Walmart)

The Process:
1. Measure out the baking soda
2. Add the glycerin (more can be added if more sweetness is desired) and mint then mix. This mixture will be clumpy.
3. Next add the water a little at a time. You just want the consistency of paste
and if you are not careful it will be too liquidity.
4. Finally carefully pour the paste into the bottle and you are done and ready to brush!

*Note* be sure to shake the bottle before brushing the soda tends to settle at the bottom. And it does not take nearly as much on the brush as store bought to get the job done!


We have been using the paste for a few days now and it seams to be working fine. There is a slight baking soda taste that pops up the longer you brush, but now I hardly notice it. The children are still getting use to it, but when you are use to an overly sweet trainer toothpaste that is to be expected! I guess the real test will be when we go to the dentist for our 6 month check ups.

Some may be wondering about the cost. Is it worth it financially? After dividing everything up and adding everything together the total for the entire tube was $1.13. But after weighing it I realized that it was twice as large of our store bought tube so that price can actually be halved. The nice thing is I have ingredients to make a couple more batches when we run out. If you want to see the math let me know I will gladly share!