Here are the goals we have so far. They may sound really lofty but we have the whole year to progressively work toward them.
1) Start making all of our own bread again.
2) Grow our garden again this year but learn to can at least two vegetables out of it.
3) Decrease our average water usage by 5%.
4) Barter at least one time this year (I'm sort of thinking of trying to barter homemade bread for farm fresh eggs from someone).
5) Do two humanitarian aid projects this year with the children.
6) Double the amount we are paying monthly to local humanitarian aid by the end of the year.
7) Switch from non-durable goods to durable ones (as many as I can). For example - stop buying paper napkins and make some out of used fabric.
8) Learn to make more of our cleaning supplies.
9) We want to cut the grocery budget but we haven't yet come up with a $ amount. May have to get back to you on that one.
10) This one is sort of a repeat - but in general, we want to learn to make a lot more of what we are currently buying at the store. For example, salsa, spaghetti sauce, bread, tortillas, cleaners, etc.
11) Bryan is considering taking on some mowing jobs this mowing season and we would use all of the money he earned to pay off the truck (that's our only debt besides the house).
12) I am considering selling my homemade bread one day a week over the summer and using the money to purchase a deep freezer for us and stock it.
So, those are things we've come up with that we want to work on. We tried to make the goals as specific as we can but some are still a little open-ended. We really think if we just keep working a little at a time we can make a huge difference over a year's time. Wish us luck! The journey should be interesting!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
I Promise!
I promise to blog again as soon as I can. I've been sick for about 5 weeks now - with one thing after another. I'm on antibiotic again and today I'm feeling a little better for the first time in SO long. So, hopefully, I'll get a little caught up around here and be able to continue the new blog. Stay tuned....
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Making Your Own Laundry Soap
We've not yet gotten all of our concrete goals in place so I thought I'd go ahead and show you how to make your own laundry soap.
You are also going to need a 5 gallon bucket with a lid (we purchased ours from a local farm supply store) and a container for daily use of your laundry soap (I used an old liquid laundry container).
1. First, grate the bar of Ivory soap. This may sound labor intensive, but it's not that bad. It only takes a couple of minutes. Add the grated soap to a saucepan of 4 Cups hot tap water. Stir continually over medium heat until completely melted and dissolved.
As I mentioned before, I got to attend a class recently taught by a woman who lives in our area. She has been making her own laundry soap since this summer and she showed us how. I was extremely skeptical. I figured it would be lumpy or wouldn't clean as well. I thought it might fade out our clothes or be hard to make, etc. Nope. I love it. It works great! I've been using it for a couple of months now. The cost? It figures out to around 78 cents for ten gallons. Can't beat that. It's practically free.
The ingredients:
1 bar Ivory soap (If you are allergic to Ivory - try this recipe)
1 Cup Arm and Hammer Washing Soda (this may be hard to find. Call 800-524-1328, 9-5 ET to find a local relailer)
1/2 Cup Borax
You are also going to need a 5 gallon bucket with a lid (we purchased ours from a local farm supply store) and a container for daily use of your laundry soap (I used an old liquid laundry container).
1. First, grate the bar of Ivory soap. This may sound labor intensive, but it's not that bad. It only takes a couple of minutes. Add the grated soap to a saucepan of 4 Cups hot tap water. Stir continually over medium heat until completely melted and dissolved.
2. Next, fill your 5 gallon bucket 1/2 full with hot tap water. Add the melted soap, washing soda and Borax and stir until the powder is well dissolved.
3. Fill the bucket to the top with more tap water. Stir, cover and let stand overnight to thicken.
4. The next day your laundry soap is going to have thickened quite a bit. It may remind you of Jell-O. It's hard to stir at first but you want to mix it all together thoroughly. If you want to scent your laundry soap you may now add 10 - 15 drops of essential oil.
5. Now it's time to fill your clean laundry soap dispenser. Measure out a cup at a time and fill half of your laundry soap dispenser. Fill the other half (and you know exactly how much water to add because you measured how much soap you put in) with water.
6. SHAKE WELL BEFORE EACH USE. For this reason, I chose to use a smaller laundry soap dispenser. Use 5/8 Cup for regular washing machines and 1/4 Cup for HE machines (This is after it's been mixed with water in your daily laundry soap dispenser).
Don't forget to stir your soap in the big bucket before each time you fill your laundry soap dispenser. It will always appear clumpy in the bucket, but when you put it in your dispenser and shake it, it gets rid of the clumps. Like I said, my clothes are clean and smell fresh. I couldn't be happier! You will notice that you go through your daily dispenser a lot quicker than if it were store bought - because you are using more - but it's still SO much cheaper. And you have that HUGE bucket when mixed with water will make 10 gallons, so no worries!
I'm curious to hear if any of you try it and what you think! Best of luck!
Friday, January 1, 2010
Our Resolution
I've never been one for New Year's Resolutions. This year there's been something nagging on my mind for months.
Every time I leave Wal-Mart I have this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach as I load all of those bags into my van. I hate the feeling of, "Oh, we ran out, we need to go to the store to get more." It has to do with a few things. First, I don't like the idea of being dependent upon a store for our basic life necessities. Secondly, I don't like how much our family is consuming. For me, this has nothing to do with leaving a smaller carbon footprint, not that that's wrong - it's just not my motivation. I just feel that as our family grows we are consuming a mind-boggling amount of stuff. And I consider myself a frugal shopper. Besides making our budget feel strapped, I just wonder what would happen if we switched to just consuming what we needed and not a lot more. And, thirdly, the idea of "running to the store to get more" just feels lazy and uncreative. Not sure if that one makes sense to everyone - but I feel the security we'd gain with a little hard work would be well worth the effort.
My hope is that by consuming less we can become more free. More free in a few ways. We would become less reliant upon unreliable resources (like the store) through learning to make more of what we use ourselves. We would free up more of our income to use on long-term storage and emergency preparedness. We would also have more income free to do more humanitarian aid work, a value I want to cement into the core of my children's beings. Many of you know our church is big on self-reliance, food storage, etc. The idea behind it is that if you have taken care of your own needs, you are then free to help meet the needs of others who can't do for themselves. Makes sense, huh?
My mother said during the last election that our country is losing the meaning of freedom. She explained to me that to be free means that we can choose what we want, and we can work for it ourselves. Therefore, it becomes ours and ours alone. We are not beholden to anyone. I believe this to be true.
What inspired me to do this? Besides the sick feeling I get carrying all those plastic sacks of Wal-stuff into my house every week, I had the experience recently of learning to make my own laundry soap. I went to a class about it taught by a woman in our community who'd learned how. I was skeptical that it wouldn't work as well as the All Free Clear that I spend over $10 a month on every month. The homemade laundry soap was liquid and had three ingredients besides water. The cost? About 78 cents for ten gallons. Yep. Surely it wouldn't work as well, or it would be clumpy, or fade out my clothes. Nope. Couldn't be more thrilled with it!! I've been using it for two months now. It's so easy. After we post our concrete goals for the year it'll be my first post.
What will I be posting on this blog? First of all, I don't intend for this to be a really wordy blog like this post. I plan on posting our concrete goals next. We will work on those as a family. I want goals related to resource usage (water, electricity, etc.), lowering food costs, planting a garden and learning how to can several items I buy almost weekly at the store, increasing the amount of hands-on humanitarian aid work we do, and learning how to make more of what we use ourselves. I also hope to learn to barter, a technique my friend Jolin is fabulous at, and I want to store up more necessities for future needs. Those are just a few examples. After we come up with our goals, I plan on posting our progress one step at a time. If we learn how to can something, I'll blog about it. If we make our own soap, I'll blog about that. So, I plan on lots of pictures and information to share with others who might want to try something new, too. I also can't wait to hear other's suggestions as we go through this year.
Am I nervous? Definitely. To me, this has felt like something we've needed to work on for a long time but it felt too big to really tackle. We are, however, doing this as a family. I've found that children often have the most practical solutions. Mostly, I can't wait to get started.
So, I can't wait to hear what everyone thinks! Let's see what happens....
Every time I leave Wal-Mart I have this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach as I load all of those bags into my van. I hate the feeling of, "Oh, we ran out, we need to go to the store to get more." It has to do with a few things. First, I don't like the idea of being dependent upon a store for our basic life necessities. Secondly, I don't like how much our family is consuming. For me, this has nothing to do with leaving a smaller carbon footprint, not that that's wrong - it's just not my motivation. I just feel that as our family grows we are consuming a mind-boggling amount of stuff. And I consider myself a frugal shopper. Besides making our budget feel strapped, I just wonder what would happen if we switched to just consuming what we needed and not a lot more. And, thirdly, the idea of "running to the store to get more" just feels lazy and uncreative. Not sure if that one makes sense to everyone - but I feel the security we'd gain with a little hard work would be well worth the effort.
My hope is that by consuming less we can become more free. More free in a few ways. We would become less reliant upon unreliable resources (like the store) through learning to make more of what we use ourselves. We would free up more of our income to use on long-term storage and emergency preparedness. We would also have more income free to do more humanitarian aid work, a value I want to cement into the core of my children's beings. Many of you know our church is big on self-reliance, food storage, etc. The idea behind it is that if you have taken care of your own needs, you are then free to help meet the needs of others who can't do for themselves. Makes sense, huh?
My mother said during the last election that our country is losing the meaning of freedom. She explained to me that to be free means that we can choose what we want, and we can work for it ourselves. Therefore, it becomes ours and ours alone. We are not beholden to anyone. I believe this to be true.
What inspired me to do this? Besides the sick feeling I get carrying all those plastic sacks of Wal-stuff into my house every week, I had the experience recently of learning to make my own laundry soap. I went to a class about it taught by a woman in our community who'd learned how. I was skeptical that it wouldn't work as well as the All Free Clear that I spend over $10 a month on every month. The homemade laundry soap was liquid and had three ingredients besides water. The cost? About 78 cents for ten gallons. Yep. Surely it wouldn't work as well, or it would be clumpy, or fade out my clothes. Nope. Couldn't be more thrilled with it!! I've been using it for two months now. It's so easy. After we post our concrete goals for the year it'll be my first post.
What will I be posting on this blog? First of all, I don't intend for this to be a really wordy blog like this post. I plan on posting our concrete goals next. We will work on those as a family. I want goals related to resource usage (water, electricity, etc.), lowering food costs, planting a garden and learning how to can several items I buy almost weekly at the store, increasing the amount of hands-on humanitarian aid work we do, and learning how to make more of what we use ourselves. I also hope to learn to barter, a technique my friend Jolin is fabulous at, and I want to store up more necessities for future needs. Those are just a few examples. After we come up with our goals, I plan on posting our progress one step at a time. If we learn how to can something, I'll blog about it. If we make our own soap, I'll blog about that. So, I plan on lots of pictures and information to share with others who might want to try something new, too. I also can't wait to hear other's suggestions as we go through this year.
Am I nervous? Definitely. To me, this has felt like something we've needed to work on for a long time but it felt too big to really tackle. We are, however, doing this as a family. I've found that children often have the most practical solutions. Mostly, I can't wait to get started.
So, I can't wait to hear what everyone thinks! Let's see what happens....
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