Wild Hair

Yesterday, after seeing the Coop Keeper's post about homemade laundry soap and the cost per gallon I reconciled myself to making it again.  I stopped because  making it was not convenient, and I like Tide.  BUT I can not afford Tide and no amount of coupons reduces the price and I also hate scouring the coupons to find the best price on  laundry soap when I KNOW how cheap it is to make my own.
Started yesterday but had to stop to go to visit my mom in the hospital.
By starting it, I mean that I grated my Fels Naptha and put it in a pot with water...that's it.
But what I discovered is that by leaving it soaking in the water all day, it almost melted itself and cut down my time at the stove stirring considerably.
I am not a patient stirrer at the stove.
I want to turn the heat on high and get it over with....not a good idea...stuff burns that way.
Anyhow, I finished it up right after dinner and then this morning I poured it from my big container into an empty smaller size bottle of laundry soap so it can be easily shaken and measured just in case any one else in the family gets a wild hair to help out with laundry.
I'm back on the homemade soap bandwagon and the ride is a lot smoother than I anticipated.

Not related to laundry but to the Coop Keeper...when I was reading backwards through her blog yesterday I saw she had posted the same picture that Gloria had posted.  Thought of it while I was jogging this morning and wondered if I wanted Josh to take a picture of me jogging, but I jog in the dark so that would be kinda hard.  This morning after I got home and looked at myself I thought how much of a "before" picture I look like....I don't know how self deprecating of a thought it was or just reminding myself that even though I jogged 5 & 1/@ miles in 49 minutes,.... I still have a ways to go and don't think for a minute sista that you can slow down or slack off....that was my self talk this morning. I hope you are encouraging yourself as well this morning.  You are doing a good job and your source is abundant and rich in Mercy and when you need to stop and rest in His Everlasting Arms He knows. Keep up the good work.

Laundry

Saturday I made laundry soap.
Originally I typed in Duggar's homemade laundry soap and got a recipe from one of the Google listings...a place I can't find this morning.  There was some aspect of the Duggar recipe I didn't understand and that's why I looked for another recipe. 
For months now I have been gearing myself up to make the laundry soap.
First I had to find the ingredients...all the sites say its easy...pick it up at your local store...but even though I had seen Fels Naptha at my local prior to my endeavor...I couldn't even find the spot on the shelf where they should have been.  If you can't find them either try Amazon.  I think I found it at a Publix but that was after checking several different locations...
Normally I use Tide and anytime I have switched our clothes end up with stains or we have rashes.  It'll be a couple of weeks before I know the results of the homemade variety.  I have two empty Tide bottles to fill up with the homemade batch.
The dilemma going into the process rested on where I was going to mix up 5 gallons of laundry soap?  First I thought of my mop bucket but then I remembered that we had just used up all the cat litter and that plastic container had a lid on it.
The measurements are still hard to wrap my brain around...I meant to save a milk jug to measure gallons with but had to use my 2qt Kool-Aid pitcher.  All these figures makes my brain hurt.  Did you know that your blood vessels actually constrict in your brain when you do Math?  No wonder my brain hurts so much!
I didn't take pictures of the process but I found someone who did.
And I found a bunch more recipes here.

Wordless Wednesday

Vintage Girl at Heart participates in Wordless Wednesday with some other blogs. I haven't made the time to visit that hostess or to see how to join in...maybe I never will, I mostly copy and make it my own. So this is mostly wordless wednesday...
Theme: Dishes
Top picture is of my hands slathered with cream before putting on gloves.
You can guess what the next picture is about. :(

Carrot Cake

Last year Josh made me a carrot cake for my birthday and knowing how I try to cook healthy he substituted all the oil for applesauce and all the sugar for Splenda. This year I made my own cake. I made it last night so all the flavors would meld. Today, John-Thomas looked up in the cookbook how to properly brown the coconut to sprinkle over the cream cheese icing. He has seen me burn more coconut than should be allowed so it was a good moment for us to both learn. My intent was to take a picture but of course by the time I got done yakking about my blog to my sister, jump roped and showered it was already 5 and that was when we were supposed to be at my mom's for dinner. No picture.

Mom made goulash (kinda like spaghetti pie) and had a salad and multi grain bread from Publix.

We had small group tonight so the carrot cake went with us and there was one slice leftover for us to drop off at my mom's on the way home.

Josh and the kids got me a shredder slicer attachment for my stand mixer. Carrot cake will be so much more easier now.

Thank you for your birthday wishes, it was happy indeed.