The Dirty Laundry Truth

I have always bought Arm and Hammer liquid laundry detergent.  Some of our laundry can be pretty stinky now with all the animals.  Of all the detergents I have tried Arm and Hammer has showed the best results.  I can say I have always bought the biggest jugs I could find too.  This way it would last through to the next shopping day.  I have found lately that the size of the bottle is shrinking and the price is rising.  I decided it was time to finally make my own detergent.  

For less then what I pay for one jug of Arm and Hammer liquid detergent I was able to buy everything I needed to make even more then a regular large jug.  Plus I can still have the same freshness I was used to.  Now it was just a matter of finding the time to make it.

Today I did it!  I finally made my own laundry detergent (insert happy dance here) and it was easy and took no time at all!  No way, I was expecting it to take forever but it didn't and I was done in no time.  Plus an additional bonus that I wasn't expecting is now the house smells so fresh and clean now too from melting the soap.

I have to admit I have been putting it off for a while now.  I was sure it would take half the day plus it was so much easier (or so I though) to just grab another jug at the store, which I did last week.  I had the supplies sitting on the counter for two weeks now and the directions sitting there with them.  But still could not bring myself to make it.  The thought of grating a soap bar and waiting for it to melt was probably the biggest deterrent for me to actually start making it.  Let me just say it was done and ready almost quicker then it took me to get the 5gallon container and the water ready.  Note to self have everything on hand and ready next time.  I completed the whole process in maybe 15-20 minutes. 

For anyone who has wanted to make their own but has been putting it off for one reason or another like me you will be glad you did it.  I have to say that I'm feeling a little ashamed now that I bought the jug last week rather then just making it when I already had the supplies on hand.  Guess I will just toss it up to a lesson learned.  I will also be sure not to make that mistake again.  Not only was it not all the "Hard Work" I was expecting but I actually had fun doing it.

Here are the directions I followed to make my detergent (liquid). With a thank you going to ehow.com for them.

Homemade Liquid Laundry Detergent
Things You'll Need
  3.1 oz. bar of soap
  1 cup 20 Mule Team Borax
  1/2 cup Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda
  Water
  5-gallon container
  Knife or grater
  Pot large enough to hold 6 cups of water
  Long stirring stick or spoon for 5-gallon container

Instructions
1  Use the knife/grater to shave the soap into small pieces. Then place 5 cups of water into the pot and heat the water on the stove.

2   Place soap into pot and begin stirring until the soap melts. If the water begins to boil, turn the stove off to prevent it from bubbling over.

3   Place 3 gallons of hot water into the 5-gallon container once the soap has melted.

4   Pour the melted soap mixture into the container of hot water. Stir.

5   Add 1/2 cup of washing soda. Stir until the soda dissolves, and then add 1 cup of Borax. Stir until dissolved.

6   Add fragrance, if necessary.  from your favorite scent. (I did not add fragrance as I liked the way it smelled as is).

7   Cover the container and set it aside. Let it sit overnight so it can cool and gel. The detergent will not gel uniformly; it may appear watery and clumpy.

Tips & Warnings
1/2 cup of detergent is sufficient to clean a full load of laundry.

Homemade laundry detergent is low sudsing and thus perfect for high-efficiency, front-loading washing machines.

This recipe makes 442 oz. of laundry detergent. At 4 oz. per load, you'll be able to wash 110 full loads.

If you're using a high-efficiency washing machine: Prior to adding the homemade laundry detergent to the dispenser, stir it to break up large lumps. This ensures the detergent will fully dissolve in the normal wash cycle.

My Yearly Quilt

Well, its winter and other then feeding our animals and playing in the snow with the kids (on their days off from school) I will be spending a lot more time indoors.  I try to keep myself entertained in the winter by crafting and sewing.  I'm starting off my winter "fix" with a quilt.  Most of my quilts I usually end up giving away as gifts to friends and family but this one is staying in my home.  
The first quilt I ever made was for my Hubby, then boyfriend.  I had sewed a few things before so he said I should make him a quilt and I guess looking to impress him I decided to give it a try.  I went to my Grandma and asked for a simple but not too simple pattern.  She set me up with a simple rectangle pattern, I think she called it a Split Rail pattern but I'm not sure if that's what it was called or not, now 10yrs later.  I did all the cutting and sewing with just advice from her and she also showed me the way to put it all together so it made a nice pattern.  I went and purchased all matching "manly" material and had extra of everything for just in case I messed up, and I did many times but even I was impressed with the end result.  I also realized how much I liked quilt making and have been making at least one quilt a year since then.  We still have that quilt today and it sees regular use, mostly by my son (4yrs) on his bed so it also see regular washing as well and it still looks the same as the day I finished it.
As for this year's quilt I planned on doing it just a little different.  I wanted to make a special quilt for my youngest daughter.  I decided rather then going out and purchasing new, perfectly matching material I had a "brilliant" idea of trying to make this quilt using only scraps of fabric left over from previous projects as my "scraps" pile is getting out of control.  Since I was planning on only making a twin sized it was going to be easy right.  Ha!  
Trying to make something that would not only match her personality but her love of the color PINK has proven to be a bit of a challenge.  I wanted to make something bright and happy like her but not something too old or babyish.  She is only 5 but I want her to be able to have it and the memory forever. 
I finally found a style that I was looking for on Pintrest but the picture had no link to it, thus no pattern.  I spent almost a whole day just making the pattern for it.  Simple triangles and squares right, sure but getting them the size I wanted took a bit of math and a bunch of time.  So my first attempt at making a quilt with out a pattern to use started out rough.  Using "scrap" material has proven to be just as rough.  Finding patters and colors that match up was easy but not having enough of each material, not so easy. 
I think I have finally come up with what I hope will turn out to be a refection of my daughter: a bright, happy, full of energy, girl.

This was just my template block and it doesn't really line up well but I wanted to give you an idea of the colors and pattern.  I have made most of the blocks now and just have to figure out how I want to put them all together; border, no border, quilt it or tie it off with knots the way my grandmother used to.  I will be sure to post an updated photo once I have finally finished it (might be spring then though).  I know she will love it and I she will know I made it with nothing but love for her.

Finally, an update

Okay so I have been lacking in updating my blog, I apologize.  It seems as things just have a way of getting out of control this time of year for me.
I hope everyone had a lovey Christmas, we sure did.  I think the best part of Christmas is that I actually get to spend some time with my family with out all the daily interruptions (school, work, and general life).  We did spend most of Christmas with some ailing plague.  I was sick for almost a week leading up to Christmas and the kids got it shortly after me :(  No fun when your sick but we made the best of the situation.
For the first year we spent Christmas Eve home as a family and it was great.  We usually go to Thad's brothers which is fun but we end up getting home way too late, the kids get cranky, and then we still have to do "Santa".  By the time Christmas morning comes we are all tired and cranky.  This year was so nice to be able to relax at home and enjoy the kids excitement over Santa coming.  We even did a special home grown dinner of only things we grew or raised ourselves.  We had spare ribs from our pig, corn on the cob, potatoes, and for desert apple pie from apples I froze from our tree.  It was so delicious!  Think this will be our new tradition for years to come.
Now all the craziness of Christmas is over and we are starting to feel better from what ever illness we had we can focus on all the great things we will have in the coming new year.  We have many new ideas for more gardens, animals, and building we need to make so hopefully we will be able to get some things done.  Winter is a bit slow for accomplishing things but we are hoping also do some clearing of the land to make pasture.  With only needing to worry about plowing snow and staying warm we are hopefully that we will have time to cut trees so come spring we can have more open space. 
With New Years just around the corner I should have more great stuff to update for everyone.  I debated making a resolution to work more on my blog but I know if I make that resolution it will fall by the way side just like most I have ever made.  I decided instead to not make that resolution in hopes that I will be able to follow through.  I know with the winter months ahead still I will find myself indoors more and that should allow more time for more updates. 
I hope everyone has a great New Year!

Fall At The Bull Homestead

I have always loved fall.  From the beautiful colors, the changing of the leaves, the crisp cool air, the bountiful harvests, pumpkin flavored everything, the beauty of the landscape and everything fall offers.  My grandmother always said it was because I born in the fall, maybe but either way it is my favorite season. 
I also love to decorate for fall.  I have tons of boxes/totes full of fall decorations yet every year I feel the need to make even more.  From the big display out at the road end to the cushions on the couch and everything in between.  This year I have only made a few new decorations so far but fall is far from over too. 

I wanted to take the time to share some of my fall favorites at the Bull Homestead.

This is my fall display at the end of the driveway for this year.  I have made one every year since we bought the property.  Although this is the first year I have not been able to use my 100+ year old wagon in the display I think it turned out well.  The wagon  just always added something special to it for me and it saddens me to be able to use it any longer as it needs major repair.
Apparently my displays at the road end have become quite popular with the local community as well.  This year with limited time and dreary weather I was behind on setting up my display.  I had a ton of people in my local community come up to me and ask if I was making the display this year.  One person who I would have never thought paid any attention to what I do actually told me they look forward to the change in season to see what great ideas I would come up with next.  It really made me feel good to know so many are interested in it as I love to make them and put a lot of thought and effort into making it. 

These are two of my favorite fall crafts so far this year.  The first (fall tree) was actually something I came up with last year.  I took a small tree cut it down and glued pretty colored fake leaves to it.  I liked it but the tree last year was so big with branches in all the wrong places it just never really looked right.  This year I was quite picky when it came to tree selection and it make a big difference in the finished product of the tree.  We will use the tree through out the fall, first decorating it with Halloween and then we will put Thanksgiving decorations on it.  My kids love making little decorations for the tree so it is fun for them too.
The bouquet of leaves (second picture) was made because I was looking for something to decorate my sitting porch with.  I used the same basics of gluing leaves on branches only on in a much smaller scale.  I put florist foam in the planter and covered it with hay.  I added some tops from the corn stalks we grew then finished it off with a small scarecrow.  It was actually quite easy but one of my favorite decorations so far.

This is just a small sample of the fall beauty here this year.  The colors started out very dull and with in days were brilliant and colorful unfortunately the weather has been rainy and the skies gray hiding the beauty of the hill sides. 
The first picture is the hill behind the house.  Most of our property is wooded and it sure makes for a gorgeous display in the fall.  Although I searched all over trying to find a nice view of our property this was the only one I found that fit most of the property in the picture.  The dreary skies that day however did not help in showing just how pretty everything really looked.
The pumpkins in the picture are only part of the 70+ we grew this year.  I love pumpkins and when they still a little green they always look so pretty in pictures.  The pumpkins didn't take very long to turn the beautiful orange color though.
The rest of the photos are just little favorites around the house/property I wish we could have had a few more sunny days for photo taking but it is still beautiful just the same.

Hope everyone has enjoyed fall here so far and although the wet weather lately has affected the amount of beautifully colored trees the mountains are still beautiful to look at here.  When the leaves are gone I will still love fall and all that it still has to offer.

Raising The Pigs

We raised our own pig (for meat) for the first time this year.  We started from scratch back in April building a pen with help from friends and family, plus getting everything else we would need.  In return for their help we also raised pigs for them and two other friends.  So we ended up raising five pigs our first year!  Talk about jumping in head first to the unknown.

Our pig the day we got her

I had no idea what we were getting into other then that "pigs stink" or so I remembered from being a kid when my aunt raised one.  I knew I would have to help with the feeding and interact with the pigs as Thad works during the week and I was not looking forward to it at all.  I will admit that being short did make the thought of a 200 lb. pig very intimidating.  I was worried that no matter how hard I tried not to I would find myself attached to them only to have the time come to get rid of them.  I also worried how our kids (3-6yrs) would handle the situation as the rest of our animals are "pets".  We let them know from the beginning that we would be raising them for food or "bacon" and that they pigs were not "pets" to keep.  We didn't name any of the pigs other then calling them "Our" pig or so and so's pig to help prevent any attachment to them.  

The pigs really weren't that hard to raise.  The guys must have built a great pen for them as the pigs didn't escape once not even when they were tall enough to climb up on the fence and try to come over their feeder when I fed them.  Although half way through we did have to make changes to the feeder as they would not stay out of it making it almost impossible to get feed in it.  I would feed them in the mornings when I did the other animal chores and Thad would feed them at night.  He would always give them extra attention and play with them.
We did have one pig that wouldn't eat for a few days.  It was in the hottest part of the summer and this summer was hotter then normal for here.  After an online search and questioning friends who had pigs we ended up giving the pig Gatorade and feeding it separately for a few days.  It was soon back to normal but was the smallest pig at butcher time and I believe it had to do with not eating those days. 
When the day came to butcher the pigs the kids and I went to Grandmas house so we wouldn't have to witness the end.  I know its all part of raising animals for food but I was not about to subject the kids to this part of it.  The kids did know what was happening that day with out seeing all the gory details.  That and I did not want to be here for it myself either.  I think it was the best decision as the first thing our daughter said when we got home that day was can we have "bacon" yet and not really caring that we no longer had the pigs.
I think our first year was pretty successful considering "Our Pig" (the biggest for the beginning) ended up being 200lbs!  Since we already have everything set up we will most likely do it again next year.  Oh and as for the smell I remembered as a kid was so dreading it really wasn't that bad.  Maybe it was that the pen was not right next to the house or that having the other animals first has made my sense of smell less sensitive?  

Our pig a week before the end.  Some how they never appeared as big as they really were in pictures.

Please keep all comments on here respectful.  We respect your difference in opinion or that you do not wish to eat meat, raise animals for food, and so on.   We will not tolerate disrespectful comments and they will be removed.

Garden's End

The gardening season has come to an end here.  It is so sad to look at an empty garden after all the hard work and beauty that was in it at one time.  Now what to do with our "dead" plants and empty "plots"....

....How about turn it into a cemetery!!!  The fence was already there so we just removed the bright and colorful signs and replaced them with a few dollar store items (free from my sister who didn't use them any longer).  The ghosts are just broken branches and trash bags filled with "dead" leaves.  We used a marker to make the faces and instant ghosts....BOOOOOOOOOOO

The tombstones in the garden have a bit of a story behind them...I made them the first year we bought the house.  Since I never had much area to decorate for Halloween and all of a sudden I found the few decorations I had looked out of place in such a big space.  I used them the first year and when I went to use them the second year my oldest (2yrs at the time) was so scared that real ghosts would come out of them I had to take them down.  We stored them in a small storage area under the house.  The next spring we built a new porch and framed in the house but never remembered to take them out of storage:(  They remained in there for the next 4 years only to find them accidentally when we were replacing a board on another construction project.  Thankfully my daughter is now old enough not to be scared and the worked great for the garden.  I only wish I would have put vegetable names on them.

Not Dreading School Shopping

With school quickly approaching for my girls I was dreading the thought of going shopping plus the added expense of school shopping is never fun.  Last year I shopped sales all summer to save time and money when it came time to go school shopping.  This year the lack of time to shop had left me wondering what we were going to do for school shopping.  I think I hoping that their clothes would just magically appear....

...And they did.  Just look at this drawer full of school clothes!  The best part is they didn't cost us a penny that and they are new with only a few "almost" new hand me downs.  This left me smiling and relieved at the same time. 

With two children going to school both girls and my little guy still too young for school all needing clothes I was dreading going shopping.  They needed clothes not only for school but for the coming colder weather and some that were bigger sizes too it was not going to be cheap this year.  With some great luck we wont be spending quite so much time or money shopping.  Here is the story of our great fortune and how it didn't cost us a fortune!

My oldest daughter also my neatest had a birthday in the spring and got a nice combination of warm and cool weather clothes.  Thankfully this summer has been HOT and she didn't need to wear any of her new warm clothes so they were packed away in storage still new.  The few outfits that she did wear are still in nice shape as she rarely ruins her clothes and any that wont work for school are in good enough shape that she can still wear when she changes out of her school clothes.  Her downside on birthday clothes has always been that she has grown every year and never really reused her clothes after they were stored away so they were always handed down to my other daughter sometimes with tags still on them.  This year she will be lucky enough to keep those clothes because when everyone asked her size I would tell them a size bigger thinking ahead so to speak.  That and I always felt bad that she didn't get wear some of them before.  So although we will need to buy her a few things as she doesn't get hand me downs from a bigger sibling we will not be replenishing her complete wardrobe this year.  Yes I am smiling again just typing this :)
My younger daughter's clothes "magically" appeared from hand me downs (some still new) and her most recent birthday.  The clothes we stored that her bigger sister outgrew two years ago are a perfect fit for her this year.  This year instead of adding to our toy supply I asked everyone to get her clothes and some school supplies for her birthday.  She still got toys enough to make her happy and the clothes made me happy and saved us tripping over even more toys.  It was a win, win!
My little guys clothes were the issue.  We could hold off buying him clothes as he wouldn't be going to school but he needed clothes the more then the girls going to school as he has grown so much this summer.  We have already started cooling down here and he need sweaters and pants that fit as his that were left from last year are now two sizes too small, literally.  He had even already out grown some of his summer clothes.  Believe it or not like "magic" his clothes appeared too.  A friend of a family member was looking for someone who would like some boys summer clothes their son had out grown so they took them thinking of our son, not even knowing we were looking for some too.  As for the need for warm weather clothes that was quickly solved too.  Someone who works with the hubby said he had some smaller boys clothes from his son who is much older then ours but figured we could just hold them till we needed them.  Well apparently they have been storing them longer then he knew as the clothes are the perfect size.  Plus we will have some that are both warm and cool clothes in bigger sizes we will store till needed.

Yes we will still need to buy shoes for everyone, some supplies for school and a NEW outfit or two for the girls we were so lucky for all that we were given.  Now I cant wait to take the kids shopping as they will have fun trying on shoes and clothes and I will be able to share in their excitement knowing it won't be a three day process and we wont be breaking the bank to buy them clothes.