Sunday, December 26, 2010

Cleanup Time



Christmas is over and oh what fun it was. Now it's time to cleanup the mess. All the gifts are put away and now it's time to scrub the kitchen counters, the whole bathroom, all of the floors, etc. You might be asking yourself what this picture has to do with cleaning. Well this is my all purpose scrub. It scrubs away bathtub scum, dirty floors, and whatever else needs a little extra scrub.

Here's the recipe. Mind you that I don't measure recipes often. Recipes are guidelines and it's best to get a feel for what works for you.

- 1 part borax
- 2 parts baking soda
- 10-20 drops of preferred essential oil(s). I like to use grapefruit seed extract, lavendar, tea tree, and sometimes a drop or two of patchouli.
- liquid soap. I use peppermint or eucalyptus liquid castile soap
- water

Stir first three ingredients. Add enough liquid soap to make a crumbly mix with the consistency of corn meal. Slowly add water while mixing until it is a smooth paste. The thickness of the paste will depend on what you're using it for.

I use this recipe mostly for scrubbing the bathroom tub, but it can be used for many things. The beauty of a recipe like this is that it's non-toxic. A lot of times the boys want to help me clean and they can with this cleaner. No need to air out the house for fear of putting nasty chemicals in the home. This cleaner smells so good and you can personalize it to your fragrance needs.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!.......and happy cleaning

Friday, December 3, 2010

Take a Guess



















So what do you think these are? Go ahead take a guess.......

If you said pumpkin seeds think again. These are acorn squash seeds. Who knew that you could eat acorn squash seeds like pumpkin seeds! Actually you can eat all winter squash seeds if you want.

I was preparing some acorn squash to put in my chili and was feeling guilty about tossing the seeds. I decided to save them and let them soak in a salt water until I was able to bake them, which was about an hr. or so. I baked them in a preheated oven (350 degrees) for 20 minutes or until they're golden (stirring them after 10 min.). The results were a crunchy, salty, yummy goodness that I couldn't stop eating. Honestly I couldn't taste a difference between these and pumpkin seeds. I'm totally going to eat all the seeds from the winter squash that I have bought this year so far.

It feels good to have one less thing to throw out and to get more bang for my buck. There's definitely something satisfying about using as much as I can in things that I buy. Now I just need to figure out what to do with the skins.