Friday, December 28, 2012

Emergency washing machine

You never know when a emergency will take out your power.  I saw this on pinterest and thought it might be a good idea to have around just in case.

 

DIY: Hillbilly Washing Machine






This is a great method for off-the-grid low-tech clothes washing or, in my case, diaper washing as part of the Second Annual Flats and Handwashing Challenge.
The total cost to make this washer was around $6, and about 10 minutes. The amount of time it takes to operate depends entirely on the quantity of clothing and the type of material being washed. Denim, for example, will take more effort than t-shirts.
The first thing you need to do is obtain a suitable bucket. The place where I work often has empty 18.9L (5 US gallon) detergent buckets, so I popped over to pick one up. Total cost to me? $0
These buckets are great because the cover already has a small lidded opening in the cover — you will want to use it with the cover on to avoid splashing. For optimum efficiency, it’s best to have the hole centered in the lid, but I was coming at it from the “ease of construction” angle. ;)
The other thing you need is a traditional-style toilet plunger. I found one at a local building supply store for around $6.00.
The plunger, and the plunging action employed through good old elbow grease, act as the agitator in your washing machine. Depending on the style of your plunger, you may want to cut away the extra rubber flap inside — this can contribute to overly sudsy wash water, which is something best avoided when washing cloth diapers as it requires much more rinsing.

As an extra step to prevent this problem, you will want to cut between 3 – 6 quarter-sized holes around the perimeter of the plunger. It doesn’t have to be perfect — mine clearly isn’t! I found that three holes wasn’t enough, so I went for the full six.
Be very careful when cutting these holes — I found the squishy, thick rubber quite difficult to deal with, even using a very sharp knife. Remember to practice safe knife practices when cutting these — SAFETY CIRCLE, Everyone! :)
The next step is putting it through a trial run.
I opted to start with otherwise clean but freshly tie-dyed diapers, before moving onto washing today’s dirties. I added my detergent (1/2 what I’d use in our regular washer) to the bottom of the bucket and then filled the bucket half-full with very hot water. I dumped in the diapers (about 8 flats, plus wipes and homemade fleece liners) and started plunging. In hindsight, I could have used a bit less detergent, as it required two rinses, but they got good and clean in very little time.
After the final rinse, I pulled them out of the bucket, wrung out as much water as possible, and hung them on the line. The rinse water went straight onto my flower beds, where my roses gratefully drank it up.
Overall, it went together quickly and was very easy to use. I stood the bucket on a knee-high step to facilitate the plunging, but I think I will get a longer handle for the plunger so I can set the bucket flat on the ground. I’m not sure I’d want to wash two days’ of diapers in one go, but doing a single day’s worth was pretty easy and not a terrible way to unload the many little frustrations of my afternoon. ;)
We will take it with us when we go camping this summer and leave it at our cabin for doing laundry. I think the threat of washing clothes this way will serve as an incredibly effective deterrent for bad behavior with my older boys

Monday, December 24, 2012

Cooking in a power outage


I have come across a product that is great for cooking in an emergency.  It is like a crock pot without the plug.

 

The Thermal Cooker saves money and energy!  It is the perfect solution in the event of a power outage or other emergency.  It’s also fun to use on road trips or when camping.  There are two sizes of stainless-steel cooking pots that you put your food in, cover with liquid, and get to an even boil.  Then you place the two pots inside the 7-liter insulated container, shut the lid, and it will continue to cook and stay hot for up to eight hours.  The entire three-piece set weighs less than seven pounds. 

 

Reg. $109.95  Special $99.95

 

To order call Mindy at Preparedness Plus Products, LLC at 800-588-5412. 

www.preparednessplus.net
Slow Cooker is the Perfect Tool When the Power Is Out

 

The Thermal Cooker Conserves Fuel During Power Outages

I have recently discovered Saratoga Jack’s Thermal Cooker.  It is a handy slow cooker that I can use when the power is out.  What I will do is put my food inside the stainless steel inner pots, put the pots on my butane emergency stove, bring the food to a rolling boil, and then put the pots inside the outer insulated container and snap the lid shut.  This will make my emergency fuel last longer, especially when cooking something like beans that take a long time to cook.  I can also use the thermal cooker over other heat sources, such as a campfire or wood burning stove.  I like to think of it as a non-electric crock pot. 

 

Other Handy Tools for When the Power is Out

Besides my thermal cooker, other items I have at my disposal for power outages include my emergency candles and lanterns, my flashlight with batteries, my emergency drinking water, my sun oven and warm blankets.  I still want to get another heat source, such as a kerosene space heater and perhaps a generator for the refrigerator.  I like to keep good books and magazines handy to read to keep my mind occupied.         

 

Easy to Prepare Food

I have found that some of the easiest meals to prepare for power outages are Mountain House freeze-dried foods and freeze-dried fruits and vegetables from Rainy Day.  The most popular Mountain House entrees in this order include the beef stroganoff, scrambled eggs with bacon, chili macaroni with beef, lasagna with meat sauce and beef stew.  The Mountain House foods come in pouches or in #10 cans.  My favorite freeze-dried fruit is the pineapple and my favorite freeze-dried vegetable is the peas.  Freeze-dried food is fast and easy to rehydrate.  To rehydrate the Mountain House all you do is add boiling water and let the food stand for ten minutes.  That’s easy enough in a power outage or for those who don’t like to cook.    

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Track your spending on food.

It's hard to know how to cut back on your food budget if you don't know where it is going.  If you count every slurpee run and each time you eat out you might be surprised where it is all going.  I find with myself if I have too much on my plate I have a tendency to do fast food.  Knowing that I can make convenience meals that I can just microwave in a hurry.  Thus taking less time than getting fast food.  One of my favorite make ahead freezer meals is hot pockets.

Dough:
2 tablespoons  active dry yeast
2 cups warm water
2 teaspoons sugar
2 teaspoons salt
4 tablespoons oil
5 cups flour

Filling
1 pound ground beef
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 1/2 cup pasta sauce or pizza sauce
2-3 cups shredded cheese

Use what ever you want.  I used shredded pork and cheese.  I've done ham and cheese.  Pepperoni and olives.  The combinations are unlimited.

To make dough:  Mix yeast into warm water until dissolved.  Add sugar, salt, oil and flour.  Mix well
and dump onto a floured surface and knead 3-5 minutes.

To make pizza pockets:  Divide dough into 15-20 pieces.  Roll pieces into balls.  Flatten balls into circles with rolling pin.  Dollop a few tablespoon of filling onto dough circle and sprinkle with cheese.  Fold over and seal tightly.

Bake on a greased cookie sheet at 350 for 10 to 15 minutes.

To freeze cool completely and store in an airtight ziplop freezer bag for up to 2-3 months.

To serve remove desired number of pockets and warm the individually in the microwave for about 2 minutes or until heated through.  I wrap it up in a napkin or paper towel when cooking.  Or if you want to do a bunch at once bake on a cookie sheet at 350 in oven for 20 minutes

Friday, December 14, 2012

Ever wonder what powdered milk tastes best?

Someone has gone to the trouble of taste testing all the powdered milk out there.  My favorite is Morning Moo.  Look at this before you buy.

Great Powdered Milk Taste Test and Review




This post is cross posted from my blog.
Ever wanted to find a powdered milk that tastes good? You’re not alone. So just in case you don’t want to go through the expense and hassle of trying out every kind of powdered milk you can find, read on. I did it for you.
After a comment about the flavor of powdered milk on another post, I hatched a plan to have folks try a bunch of different kinds of powdered milks to maybe find one that tasted good so this reader and anyone else who wants to know (including me) will know which brands would be best to buy because you know powdered milk is not cheap. I had some super help with this milk experiment from Emergency Essentials, Grandma’s Country Foods, Walton Feed, Blue Chip Group (now Augason Farms), and Honeyville Grain who all donated some of their milk for the review. Thank you to all of you–we couldn’t have done it without you!
So here’s the basic setup. I gave each milk a letter A through J. Yes, we tried 10 kinds of milk. 2 powdered milk alternatives, 2 regular non-instant powdered milks, 5 instant powdered milks, and regular old skim milk in a jug thrown in just for fun and science (but nobody knew which one it was). There were also two kinds of chocolate milks which I labeled R and S. A friend and I mixed up each kind of powdered milk and let it chill. Then we had people taste them and grade each on a scale of 1-5 with 1 being really bad and 5 being really good and let them write any comments they wanted to about any of them. This happened over two days. Then I totaled up the scores, divided by the number of tasters, and did some other fancy math statistics tricks I learned from my third grader and came up with the results. We’ll start with Milk F–the real milk, then we’ll go in order from A to J which were all the regular milks. I’ll give the review results on the chocolate milks in another post.
Milk “F” was Great Value brand fat free milk from Wal-Mart. This is the standard. If we want something to taste “like milk” this is what it should taste like. No, I don’t think fat free/skim milk tastes like milk any more than you do, but because all of the powdered milks are non-fat, we are using non-fat milk to compare them to. It’s average taste score was 3.46, with scores ranging from 2-5 and the score chosen most often split equally between 3 and 4. Okay, for all you parents of grade schoolers, that is “mean=3.46, range=2-5, mode=3, 4″. Got it? Ingredients: milk, vitamins A and D.
Milk “A”: Honeyville Milk Alternative. Available from and donated by Honeyville Grain. $11.99/can
Honeyville’s milk alternative is not 100% milk. It has a whole slew of ingredients including sweet dairy whey, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil, corn syrup solids, and vitamins A and D3. The instructions say to mix it into warm water. We used the same mixing pitcher to mix each kind of milk, of course washing it in between. This one mixed up fairly easily. It took 2 cups of powder to make a gallon of drink. It was kind of thin, you might put more than that in. This one didn’t score too well on the taste. It average score was 2.09 with a range of 1-4 and the most common choice being 1. This milk settled/separated over time after being mixed, so you’d want to keep it in a container that you could easily mix it before pouring.
Milk “B”: Morning Moos Milk Alternative. Available from and donated by Blue Chip Group (now Augason Farms). Also available at some Utah Wal-Marts and Associated Foods Stores. $11.89/can.
Morning Moos is the second in our milk alternative group. This is not 100% milk. Its ingredients include sweet whey, creamer (including corn syrup solids), coconut oil, sugar, nonfat milk, vitamins A and D. The can claims great results when using it for cooking due to the high percentage of whey. I’m not sure I’d use a milk alternative to substitute for milk in a recipe. I think I’ll stick with real powdered milk. However, this milk alternative had the highest score among all the milks sampled for taste. So maybe some for drinking or putting on cereal would be good to have around. It mixed easily into warm water. It also took 2 cups of powder to make a gallon of drink. Morning Moos average taste score was 4 with a range of 2-5 and the most common choice was 4. I’m kind of partial to real milk, but if I was storing just for drinking and wanting it to taste good, I might get me some cans of Morning Moos.
Milk “C”: Western Family (Store Brand) Powdered Milk. This particular brand is available at Associated Foods stores. I’m guessing it is a comparable taste to other store brands. I really didn’t want to test all the store brands I could find, so this is it.
This is an instant powdered milk and mixed up the easiest of all. It dissolved readily in warm or cold water. It also didn’t taste very good. It was the classic powdered milk taste. Ick. It is 100% milk–ingredients: nonfat dry milk, vitamin A palmitate, vitamin D3. It took 5 1/3 cups to make a gallon. Wow. That’s a lot of powder to get a gallon of milk. Seriously, I had no idea there was as much variance as there is in the amount of powder required to mix a gallon of milk. The other drawback with this kind of powdered milk is that it is packaged in a box–not good for long term storage. Average taste score was 2.15, with scores ranging from 1-4 and the most common taste score was 2. My favorite comment on this one: “Bitter, tastes like old milk.” There you have it. So if store brand boxed powdered milk is what you usually buy, I have good news for you–There ARE better tasting powdered milks out there.
Milk “D”: Country Fresh Farms Instant Powdered Milk. Available in my Wal-Mart baking aisle for $9.99/can.
For starters, this stuff was a big pain to mix. We tried mixing it into warm water and it clumped pretty severely, so then we tried mixing it into cold water which made it worse. We ended up throwing the whole cold water pitcher out and starting again with warm water. Holy hassle, Batman. This stuff repelled water. We joked as we were fighting with it that it would probably be the best tasting just because it was such a pain to mix. It actually did turn out to have pretty good flavor. Its average taste score was 3.29 which was almost as good as real milk. It is 100% milk–ingredients: 100% real instant nonfat dry milk. It doesn’t appear to have vitamins added. It took 5 1/3 cups to make a gallon, so you don’t get very many gallons out of a can. Probably 2-3 gallons. So even though the cost of the can isn’t as high as some of the others in the experiment, your cost per gallon is pretty steep. Taste scores ranged from 2-5 on this and the most common score was 3.
Milk “E” Country Cream Instant Non-Fat Milk. Available from and donated by Grandma’s Country Foods. Also available at Utah Macey’s stores and some Associated Foods stores. $12.99/can.


This milk mixed up easily in warm or cold water. We used warm for the experiment (after the trouble mixing milk D, we just mixed everything else into warm water), but I have mixed this into cold and not had a problem. This was a pretty good tasting powdered milk. I liked it, but one farm lady thought it tasted like calf milk. It’s average taste score was 2.77, but the most common score chosen was 4. The few that didn’t like it, really didn’t like it, so that brought the average down. Scores ranged from 1-4. It took 3 cups to make a gallon, so a better mix ratio than some of the others. Ingredients: 100% real instant nonfat milk, vitamins A & D. I’d buy this milk. Especially when it goes on sale at Macey’s (too bad there’s not a Macey’s near me–that is one place I miss since we left living in the civilized world). You might get a can and test it out before buying a case of it just in case you’re one that doesn’t like it.
Milk “F” was the regular milk in a jug we discussed at the top of the post, so on to milk “G”.
Milk “G”: Rainy Day Foods Instant Non-Fat Milk. Available from and donated by Walton Feed. $13.00/can.
The ingredients on this one were nonfat dry milk, lactose, vitamin A palmitate and vitamin D3. The instructions say you can mix into cold water. We used warm again and it mixed easily. This milk had more “flavor” than some of the others. A common comment was “sweet”. For some uses, like baking, I don’t mind my powdered milk having “flavor”, but for straight drinking, I don’t like it so much. It took 5 1/3 cups of powder to make a gallon of milk, so this was on the high end of the mix ratio. Maybe if you mixed less in it wouldn’t have as much flavor. The average taste score on the Rainy Day instant milk was 2.81, with a range of 1-4 and the most common score chosen was 3.
There is one more instant powdered milk, but it got out of order in the lineup, so the next two milks are Non-Instant or Regular Powdered Milks.
Milk “H” Rainy Day Foods Non-Instant Dry Milk. Available from and donated by Walton Feed. $10.80/can.
Non instant milks just don’t have great “milk” taste, and this one was no exception. They do, however, generally cost less per can and usually are more concentrated than instant milks so they use less powder to make the same amount of liquid milk. That all equates to more milk for your money. When you’re baking or making canned milk substitutes or cheeses, it won’t matter how great your powdered milk tastes as a liquid–you’re not pouring it over your cereal. I’m all for stocking less expensive non-instant powdered milks for everything but drinking straight. We mixed this as the directions stated–mix the powdered milk into a small amount of warm water, then add the rest of the water either warm or cold. Maybe that’s what we needed to do on milk D. It worked great. Ingredients: Non-fat milk powder. The milk was not tasty with an average score of 2.0, scores ranging from 1-4 and a most common score of 1. One commenter simply said, “Bad!” Now before you go thinking how low those scores are, of the two non-instant milks we tried, this was the better one. It took only 2 cups of powder to make a gallon, so it’s really good on the mix ratio also.
Milk “I”: LDS Cannery Non-Instant Powdered Milk. Available through LDS church dry pack canneries. $7.05/can.
Okay, this is the least expensive powdered milk right now, and the one I have the most of and use regularly in baking and cooking. It was also solidly scored the worst tasting of all the milks we tried. No, I did not use the 12 year old stuff from my food room, I opened fresh stuff canned a month before the experiment. I had some folks about cry when they found out how bad it tasted because that was the only kind they had stored. But like I said before, I don’t care how it tastes as liquid milk when I’m making cheese or baking with it. I actually like the added flavor in my breads. So don’t despair, all that powdered milk you have from the cannery does not need to be replaced with something else. Maybe just supplemented with another brand to be used for drinking. The commenter who called that last milk “Bad!” called this one “Worse!”. Its average taste score was 1.75 with scores ranging from 1-4 and the most common score chosen was 1. It took 3 cups to make a gallon, so actually it makes the Rainy Day brand comparable in price for the amount of milk you can make from the can. Ingredients: nonfat dry milk, vitamin A palmitate, vitamin D3.
Milk “J”: Provident Pantry Instant Non-Fat Dry Milk. Available from and donated by Emergency Essentials. $14.95/can
This milk arrived in the mail in time for the second day of testing, so some of the people didn’t get to try it, but quite a few still did. It scored best of all the instant powdered real milks with an average score of 3.5 (actually slightly higher than regular skim milk), scores ranging from 2-4 and its most common score was 4. It mixed easily in warm water and took 2 2/3 cups to make a gallon of milk. It has a low mix ratio, but is also the most expensive can of milk we tried, so wait for a sale here if you can. I’d definitely pick some of this up for drinking.
Wow, are you still reading? Amazing. We made it through all the regular white milks we tried. I’ll cover the chocolate varieties in the next post, so now for you visual people, here’s the information in a table.
Milk Alternatives:
Milk Name
Cost/can
Cups/Gallon
Average Taste Score
1=low, 5=high
Taste Score Range
Most often chosen taste score
(mode)
Honeyville
11.99
2
2.09
1-4
1
Morning Moos
11.89
2
4
2-5
4
Instant Powdered Milks (and real milk):
Milk Name
Cost/Can
Cups/Gallon
Average Taste Score
Taste Score Range
Most often chosen taste score
(mode)
Western Family Store Brand
Varies (boxed)
5 1/3
2.15
1-4
2
Country Fresh Farms
9.99
5 1/3
3.29
2-5
3
Country Cream
12.99
3
2.77
1-4
4
Great Value Real skim milk
Varies
n/a
3.46
2-5
3, 4
Rainy
Day Instant
13.00
5 1/3
2.81
1-4
3
Provident Pantry
14.95
2 2/3
3.5
2-4
4
Non-Instant Powdered Milks:
Milk Name
Cost/Can
Cups/Gallon
Average Taste Score
Taste Score Range
Most often chosen taste score
(mode)
Rainy Day Non-Instant
10.80
2
2.0
1-4
1
LDS Cannery Non-Instant
7.05
3
1.75
1-4
1

72 hour kit one week at a time

I FOUND SOMEONE THAT MADE A 72 KIT ADDING NEW ITEMS EACH WEEK.  VERY EASY.
1. Container to hold your Kit.

2. 1 Flashlight for each person + extra batteries

3. Current family picture and photo of each family member (More on this later :) )

4. Can opener

5. List of important phone #’s (laminated if possible) (I added our cell phones, all 4 of our parents cell phones, our Family Doctor, the city police, and the city fire dept.)

6. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

7. 4 rolls toilet paper

8. 1 bar soap

9. 1 emergency blanket per person

10. 1 roll paper towels

11. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

12. 1 box bandaids

13. 1 package wet wipes

14. 100ct multi vitamins

15. 1 pack of gum

16. 2 candles

17. Package of matches

18. 2 decks of cards

19. Face Masks 2 per person

20. 1 bottle Ibuprofen (add baby Tylenol if you have a baby)

21. 2 lighters

22. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

23. 1 whistle per person

24. 5 dice (to play games)

25. Rubber gloves 2 pair per person

26. Sunblock

27. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

28. Gauze and medical tape

29. 3 heat pouches per person

30. Bugspray

31. Rope

32. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

33. 1 package garbage bags (10)

34. Package of tums

35. Pocket knife

36. Thermometer

37. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

38. Hand sanitizer

39. 2 packs instant hot coco per person

40. 5 packages garden seeds

41. 2 packs instant soup per person

42. $5 In one dollar bills + 4 quarters

43. 10 hard candies per person (i.e. butterscotch, cinnamon etc.)

44. 4 AA batteries

45. 10 instant crystal lite packages

46. 2 instant oatmeal packs per person

47. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters

48. Notebook and pens (for journaling/notes/entertaining kids)

49. Small pot

50. Travel size shampoo/conditioner

51. Bible/Book of Mormon

52. $5 in one dollar bills + 4 quarters


 

 


 



 

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Homemade fabric softener

Ingredients:
6 cups water
3 cups white vinegar
2 cups hair conditioner

Directions:
1.  Mix water, vinegar and hair conditioner into a gallon container.  Stir but do not shake it because it will cause foaming.
2.  Use the same amount you normally use in a rinse cycle or spritz it on a wash cloth and throw in a dryer.

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Baked Taquitos

Still using up the pork.  Needed to make a convenience food to make it so I don't get take out in the last crazy days leading up to Christmas.

Baked Taquitos

1 lb. cooked and shredded meat
1-2 T. Taco seasoning
2 C. grated cheese
2 T. lime juice
1/2 cup red or green salsa
1 can refried beans
3 oz. softened cream cheese
36 small four tortillas (corn will fall apart)
oil to spread on the top of the taquitos

Preheat oven to 425
In a gallon zippered bag, combine all ingredients except tortillas.  Mix thoroughly, cut a small corner off the bag and set aside.

Warm the tortillas.  Take on Tortilla at a time and squeeze about two tablespoons of filling on the tortilla.  The filling expands so don't put too much in.  Roll the tortilla as tightly as possible and place them seam side down on the baking sheet making sure Taquitos are not touching.  Put a small amount of oil on the taquitos and spread with your fingers or a small brush.  Bake for 15- 20 min.

To freeze, cool completely, place on zippered bag in the freezer.  When ready to serve, remove as many taquitos as desire.  Microwave individually wrapped in a napkin on defrost setting for 1 min..  If warming a bunch up warm in the oven at 350 for 6 min.

Monday, December 10, 2012

Cheap tortillas

If you haven't taken advantage of the tortillas at the the Don Julian factory at the freeport center you should.  Bought a 24 count package today for 50 cents.  Go to it from Antelope Drive turn into it from Chelms Way by Maverik.

Sunday, December 9, 2012

Do it yourself clorox cleanup spray

Fake Clorox Cleanup
1 Empty and Rinsed-Out Bottle of Clorox Cleanup/Empty Plastic Spray Bottle
1/4 Cup Bleach
1 Teaspoon Laundry Detergent
Fill the rest of the bottle with Water and Shake!

Just like my other Fake Cleaners, this one is mostly water, too.  Doesn't it just make you crazy that we are all paying too much money for what is mostly water? 

money down the drain
Credit
To make this, I picked up a gallon jug of Bleach at the Dollar Tree, so with 16 Cups to a Gallon, that one jug could potentially make 64 Bottles* of Fake Clorox Cleanup! WOW! The laundry detergent I had on hand, of course.

The Fake-It Yourself Breakdown:

Fake Clorox Cleanup (Bleach, $1.00/Gallon, Laundry Detergent, negligible)

Total Fake-It Cost:  $0.02/Bottle

Compare to Real Clorox Cleanup:  $4.99

Total Fake-It Savings:  $4.97

Thanks to fakeitfrugal blog for this information.  I so am going to try this tomorrow.

Spiritually Prepared

How to teach the nativity.  Cute blog that has printable cut outs of Mary, Joseph and more.

Printable Nativity set. Laminate, glue magnets on the back and put on the fridge for kids to play with.

Saturday, December 8, 2012

What to do with all that pork?

Here is one of the easiest recipes to do.  Put the pork roast in your crockpot add a small bottle of salsa.  I like the green kind best but use what ever you like.  Then add 1/2 Tbsp. minced garlic, 1/2 Tbsp. chili powder, 1/2 cup brown sugar and cook.  A half hour before shred the meat and add a brick of cream cheese.  Lower the heat.  Stir when melted.  Yum best pork ever.  Use on chips or over rice.

Friday, December 7, 2012

Cheap Meat!

At Smith's Boneless pork roast is on sale for 1.69 a pound.  However look close before you buy.  The pork roast back in the meat department is not marked at that price.  I found mine right as you came in the door.  This is a good price for boneless.

Also Kent's has a one day sale on Saturday.  The time is only from 6:00 until noon while supplies last.  20lb box boneless skinless chicken breasts 29.80.  Run don't walk on this one.

Don't get overwhelmed with it all!

We all see the need to prepare for a rainy day.  However it can be very overwhelming trying to figure out how to afford it.  It is also hard to know how to make the time to put one more thing into your day.  This blog is to give you reachable goals that you can do day by day.  You may not be able to do them all but everything you can do helps.

HOMEMADE DISHWASHER DETERGENT



Today's attempt is to make my own dishwasher detergent.  Tried some in the past and didn't feel like it did a good job.  I found a new recipe on www.onegoodthingbyjillee.com.  Here is the recipe she and I used.

1 teaspoon Sun oxygen bleach
1/2 teaspoon Dawn dish soap
1/2 cup white vinegar (poured into a bowl or cup on the top rack of the machine)

Now you will not need to make up a big batch that clumps over time.  Just measure and use each time.  Make sure when you buy the Sun oxygen bleach that you get the right stuff.  There is Sun dish detergent, Sun laundry detergent, Sun laundry detergent with bleach they are all the wrong stuff.  The Sun oxygen bleach is in powdered form.  Also you might be tempted to put the vinegar in the rinse agent spot.  This doesn't work as well.  Tried this new recipe and it left everything clean.  I was impressed.