Our Adventure With Making Homemade Laundry Detergent

We are attempting to make our own laundry detergent. It is not very costly and will save a bunch of money on cleaning supplies. All you need is a bar of soap, borax, washing soda, and hot water!
First you grate up the soap. I used Fels Naptha soap.
Then you put the grated soap and some water in a pot and over low-med heat melt the soap. This only take a few minutes. I think it only took about 15 mins.

Fill your five gallon bucket half full with hot water.

Then add the soap and water mixture to the bucket of hot water.

Next you add a cup of washing soda(not baking soda) and a cup of borax powder to the water and soap mixture. Stir this up until the powders are dissolved.

Last you fill the bucket up with more hot water. Leave some room at the top to stir the next day. It should gel up over night. Some people say to let it set for 24 hours to gel. After it gels, you dilute it with water in another container. I am going to use an old detergent bottle. Fill the container half with the gel and half with water. Shake it to mix before each use. It may still be clumps in it but it is still good to use. Be sure to cover your bucket of gel detergent when not in use, for kid and pet safety. Happy cleaning!

Update on goats

We are hoping that the girls have gotten bred this month. If they have the babies will be born on my birthday! How great is that. It would be a great birthday present for me.

It's Butter!

So I decided to show my daughter how to make butter. I used fresh cream and a mason jar. We filled the mason jar half full and let it come to room temperature and then we started to shake the jar.

After about twenty minutes we have butter!

Drain off the buttermilk (use this in pancakes) and keep rinsing with cold water until it runs clear. Transfer your butter into another container and you can then salt or season it. It does not keep very long so you need to put it in the refrigerator and use it in a few days.  Happy butter making!

Home Canning 2012

This is the first time that I made applesauce from my organic apples. It was fun and super easy to do. Most of the hard part was peeling, coring, and slicing the apples. I cooked them down, and then used my kitchen aid food grinder. I returned the ground up cooked apples to the pot and heated it all back up. I made five jars of plain and three jars of cinnamon. It only took 20 organic fuji apples to make 8 pints of applesauce. I was able to purchase juicing apples for 50 cents a pound. So this was a great way to use the few extra apples I had. I processed them in a water bath. All the jars sealed perfectly!!!

Our Borrowed Billy Goat!

This is our borrowed billy goat. He is a pygmy and mine are nigerian dwarf goats. I hope that they do not take too long to get bred because I can't wait to start milking them. It will be so cute to have little babies running around. The average size of the babies is one pound each! Updates to follow about our little farm.

A new school year begins!

It is about that time of year again. All of my children will be in school this year. Dyllon will be playing football for the high school. I will be sitting on pins and needles. My youngest will be going to kindergarten and that will be just as hard also. It is hard letting your children grow up. It is hard letting go. You hope that they will be alright at school, and that they will not be picked on or treated badly. You hope that they will treat others with kindness and respect. It is hard in today's society because others do not raise their children with the same morals that you do. Well here is to the 2011-2012 school year, may we all make it to the end in one piece, mentally and physically!!!

Juicing is going wonderful!

Well I have decided to start working food in sooner than I wanted to. I was losing weight a little too fast so I am adding one whole food meal per day. It will be vegetarian with no meat. I had my dinner juice and then I had a organic gluten free vegan burrito. It was yummy. I have to start back slow because I don't want to upset my stomach. Denny had his juice also tonight and he thought it was yummy. I never thought I would get him to drink a "green juice", but he tried it and he likes it now. I will be responsible for making his juices for him every day. I am so proud of him. He has quit smoking now for about three months, has not had a diet drink in a week, and has started to juice with me. Now the only other bad habit is that dipping he does. I can't complain because he has done so much already. Two of his three bad habits gone!!!! We also have a stray dog that has been dumped off at our house. The poor little thing had abrasions on her and ant bites all over her belly. Well she got a good flea bath, and a meal that she needed very badly. I will keep her for a few weeks then try to find her a new home. I'll post pics soon.