Category Archives: I made something

Homemade Laundry Soap!

May 7, 2010 – 7:10 pm

Have you seen the Lehman’s catalog or their website? I love Lehman’s! They started out supplying goods to the Amish in Ohio in 1955 and now they have a huge wonderland of goods available to everyone. They supply many tools for homesteaders. Since I am a Homestead Hopeful, I thought that a great thing I could easily implement into my own sacred routine would be their Homemade Laundry Soap Starter Set. So I ordered it! I am so pleased with it, that of course, I want to share the love with you, dear readers. The Set comes with everything you need to make your soap including great intructions, neatly packaged in the 4 gallon bucket you’ll use to store the soap.

Here are some snaps of the Sets at Lehman’s in Ohio, before mine came to me. What? Don’t you have the new Canon Teleport 2500 lens for your camera? Hee hee =)

And onto the soap making!

Step 1. Grate your soap

Step 2. Melt the soap in boiling water

It smells soooooo good and with all the steam and the wooden spoon and all the stirring, I couldn’t help but sing “Cheer up Charlie,” during this step.

Step 3. Add Borax and Washing Soda and keep stirring till dissolved

The Set even came with the measuring cup pictured, which you later measure the soap with when adding it to your wash water.

Step 4. Pour mixture into your 4 gallon bucket, add water and stir

Step 5. Let it set for about 24 hours and it will congeal into a liquid gel consistency

Step 6. Store and use

Doesn’t it look cozy in our laundry room cabinet? I’ve actually since moved it because I doubled the batch this time to make about 4 gallons. It is heavy! So I put it in a bigger cabinet where I don’t have to lift it out to get the lid off.

Being a Homestead Hopeful means I’m perpetually looking for simple ways to be wise with our money, honor the gift of the wonderful planet we live on and improve the effectivity of my work, sorta working toward self-sufficiency. Making my own laundry soap absolutely fits that bill and this Set provided the ease I needed to get started! I am gratified in every way, to have implemented it in my life.

Find all of the astonishing facts about how much money you save using this set and how well the soap cleans on the Lehman’s site.

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4th child journal home life I made something my children photographs

Sewing together

March 22, 2010 – 10:51 am

That’s me working on a blanket for the new baby (it’s finished, but too wonderful for how the photos of it have turned out thus far) and Jonny’s experimenting and practicing with his sewing machine. He got my hand-me-down since I got a new machine for my b-day and Christmas.

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food Homestead Hopefuls I made something

the recipe that changed my life

December 12, 2009 – 2:55 pm

Artisan Breads in 5 Minutes a Day is a book I do not own, but am forever indebted to. From that book, a recipe was featured within an issue of Mother Earth News that I happened to buy. The summation of this wonderful recipe is: You mix flour, yeast, salt and warm water to make 4 pounds of dough. After it rises for about 3 hours you refrigerate it and it’ll keep, in its risen form, for up to two weeks. During this time you can lop off a pound at a time and make it into all sorts of yumminess. I’ve personally made pizza, caramel sticky buns and French boules. Here’s a link to the mag article and then some photos of my fun with the recipe.
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Here's the dough in the bowl I mix and store it in, it has fallen, but rises again during the resting and baking

This is the lid I use when the dough is stored since it cannot be stored airtightly

One pound of dough, shaped and resting for 40 minuted before baking

The dough after the resting period, with the cute slashes in the top to allow for the rising that occurs during baking

Going from the pizza peel (where it rested upon a bed of cornmeal to make this step easier) with a quick flick of the wrist, onto the pizza stone for baking

The broiler pan goes on the bottom rack and is filled with hot water just after the dough is flung onto the stone above. The steam makes for a crispy, "singing" crust

The broiler pan goes on the bottom rack and is filled with hot water just after the dough is flung onto the stone. The steam makes for a crispy, “singing” crust
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Isn't it cute in there, baking at 450º for 30 minutes?

Done! So pretty.

My friend Jeanine loves the crust, that piece would have been for her :)

I enjoyed it in her honor, mmmmm

I put honey on my next piece and held it up to see the beautiful rainy day on which it was born, and eaten

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home life Homestead Hopefuls I made something

even more handmade x-mas

December 10, 2009 – 10:45 pm

Here’re some photos of my lip balm operation. This is my 3rd year making lip balm to give away for x-mas. I haven’t tried this year’s recipe yet, cause I’m afraid if I use one, later I’ll wish I hadn’t because there’ll be someone I want to give it to. But I am optimistic that it’s my best batch yet.

My recipe is 4 oz of beeswax, 6 oz of grapeseed oil and 6 oz of sweet almond oil (though in the pics, it’s doubled).

If you would like to try it at home, you’ll first want to set out your open containers . . .

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melt the beeswax slowly, in a pot . . .
bees
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add the oils . . .

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stir . . .
stir
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pour from pot into a vessel with a pour spout, from that, pour the melted balm into desired containers . . .

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allow them to cool/harden . . .

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before trying any fancy tricks like this!

POW!

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If you would like to incorporate a bit of arithmetic, find the sum of ounces of the ingredients to figure how many containers you’ll need. For instance, the above recipe will yield 16 ounces of balm, so you’ll either need 16 one-ounce containers or 32 half-ounce containers (again, in the pictures, I doubled the recipe). I skipped this step last year and the year before and found relief in exercising more precision this year, ie. it was nice not having to run around the house searching for more containers (not really) suitable for lip balm as the remnants of the batch cooled/hardened in the vessel with the pour spout. Heh, heh.

Happy x-mas making!

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home education home life Homestead Hopefuls I made something my children

more handmade x-mas

December 5, 2009 – 9:57 am

Recently my sewing machine was commandeered by Captain Scar Booty (this has been Jonny’s pirate alias ever since a certain unfortunate accident that befell him when he was about 3), most menacing pirate of the seven seams. He has watched me sew enough, so when he sat down at the helm, he felt he knew what to do. A scrap of fabric for his sea, he practiced “beating” a course into the wind (zig-zag stitching), as well as sailing a straight course with the wind in his sails (straight stitching). He soon decided he would like to make use of his new skill and create Christmas presents for his cousins! He did such a good job! He soon made the declaration that sewing is just as fun as video games . . . Wow! I never thought he would bestow that honor upon anything!

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Homestead Hopefuls I made something

Einy journals (more handmade x-mas)

November 30, 2009 – 9:10 pm

Remember, uh, member how, uh, in Back to the Future? Yeah. Doc? Yeah, his dog was named Einstein, but he always called him Einy? Member that? Member that? . . . . . . . . . That was awesome.
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Anyhoo, here’s the detail on my [clever] Einstein journals. Firstly, the cover.
Hey! Who put that there?————-^

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Secondly, the inside cover, for some encouragement, just in case.

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And thirdly, a bit more than halfway through, just when the recipient – and thus the writer of this journal, in this case my nephew Drake- might be thinking his thoughts are incoherent or irrelevant, I offer some pep from Mr. Spacetime Fabric himself.

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I know, I’m silly.
Is silliness biodegradable?

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Homestead Hopefuls I made something

handmade x-mas

November 29, 2009 – 7:28 pm

Not having to homeschool last week, I decided to get a start on some handmade gifts to give for x-mas. I love making stuff.
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Let’s start with a photo of what our living room looks like after I spend the day creating.

Not too bad.
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I made journals.

The artwork on them came from a book I got in Japan, seven years ago. The artist is Chinami Nakajima. I Mod Podge-d the color-copied art to adhere and lightly seal it to the cardstock cover.
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Here’s the inside. All along the bottom inside cover is a fold that makes a pocket, that’s what the Ticonderoga #2 is nestle into.

Also, on the inside cover I typed “Your thoughts are so important!!” But the photo of those kind words didn’t turn out.
What did I use to apply the type, you ask?
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This.

My Royal Aristocrat Cursive Typewriter! I got it off eBay and it became my present for my 32nd birthday, which was on Thanksgiving this year (Happy Birthday to me). I love it. There also in that photo are my stacks of journals. I’m so blessed to have so many family members to give my handmade junk to. Poor fellas, they’re sweet to put up with me and my “creativity.” I figured, even if they don’t use them and they end up in a landfill, at least they’re biodegradable. I’ll show some more detail on the Einstein ones in another post, cause I know you’re dying to see more.