Ice Packs for School Lunchs

Saw this neat idea on Pinterest and would have loved  this back in the day when I was packing the kid's lunches.  Now that they are teenagers I no longer care if their lunches are cold!
 My Kitchen Escapades: Lunchbox Icepacks:

Homemade Cleaning Supplies Not Just for Home

A few years ago my sister sent an amazing book called Clean House, Clean Planet ( see 28 Jan 2009 post). I love how the author rates each product in terms of effectiveness against a similar store bought brand. I have been faithfully using a few of the recipes but decided to try out a few more out and bring them to work. Why not spread the love?


I work in an office and often do a spot clean up, especially in the slushy season. I much prefer this to the commercial stuff the staff use as the smell is overpowering. This has an effectiveness rating of 90%. Mix with equal amounts of white distilled vinegar (recommend Heinz brand) and water. Add 15-20 gtts of peppermint essential oil.




This surface cleaner works very well. I use it to wipe off my desk and any table top surfaces. Smells great too. According to the book it has an effectiveness rating of 70-80% but I find it to be closer to 100%. Mix 2 tsp vinegar with 1 tsp borax. Fill rest of bottle with hot water. Mix until Borax dissolves. Add 1/4 cup liquid soap and 15 gtts of essential oil. I used peppermint.



Ingredients: baking soda and lemon essential oil. Don't waste your energy making this!

Last but not least, the bathroom air freshener. Someone in my office is addicted to a popular store bought brand. The fake smell makes me want to gag. This is much better. Effective rating 90% but I would rate it even higher. Once I find another spray bottle to bring to work, the other brand may go "missing". Fill a spray bottle with distilled water and add 30 gtts essential oil. Give a little shake before using and for the love of God do not get this stuff in your eyes. You will not go blind or anything but you will not forget the experience either. Again I used peppermint essential oil but lemon would also work great. This is my favourite because of the cost savings. It costs $7-$15 to buy an organic type air freshener but only pennies to make your own. You can go and buy yourself a few organic chocolate bars with the savings.

On a last note, I was too lazy to buy distilled water. Tap water was used in all of the recipes.

Laundry Soap Recipe

The idea for the following recipe was taken from the green spa which is connected to the David Suzuki Foundation. The most difficult thing about the recipe is finding some of the ingredients. I found most of them at Eat It...a little organic and local food store on Wall St. I tweeked the recipe a bit and have been using it for months with very good results.

INGREDIENTS:
1 cup Dr.Bonner's Peppermint castile bar soap
1/2 cup Borax
1/2 cup Washing Soda

Grate the bar soap with a parmesan grater then mix with the other 2 ingredients and voila! you are done.

Use 2 Tbsp for large soiled loads and 1 Tbsp for light loads.



...remember to always label your jars.

By using a natural soap instead of detergent you will you no longer need fabric softener. I once read that chemicals in detergent is what causes static cling. It took about 3 washings before I noticed a difference when originally switching over. In the interim you may want to add a little vinegar to the rinse cycle until the problem is gone. It worked for us.

Carpet Deodorizer

This recipe is from 'Clean can be Green' which I found from the David Suzuki site a few years ago. I use it around this time of year when giving the house a good Fall cleaning. It smells really good.

INGREDIENTS:
2 cups baking soda
4-5 crumbled bay leaves
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 tablespoon ground cloves

DIRECTIONS:
Mix. Sprinkle on carpets and let sit up to 24 hours and vacuum.

Body Lotion Update

After a lot of trial and error, I finally found a lotion that works for me. It was a simple solution of replacing the cocoa butter with shea butter. The shea butter does not have a strong odor so it picks up the frangrence of the oils a lot better. I also replaced the olive oil with sweet almond oil. I made a lavender one for the evening and a 'pure energy' (combo of essential oils from Body Shop) one for after the morning shower. My kids still won't use it though. Sigh.

Body Lotions and Home Cleaners

I am lotion fanatic and go through a lot of it on account of the dry winter weather.  Decided to make my own as the supply was running low.   I love the idea of not wasting containers and being resourceful.  I chose this recipe because it was off the David Suzuki website ( look for Queen of Green).  The jar to the left is  body butter.  The other one is cocoa butter.  This recipe definitely needs tweeking . The strong cocoa butter smell does not appeal to my senses and the kids  hate it.  It smells sort of earthy, heavy.  It is initially greasy.   The ingredients were expensive but  I don't know how many jars I'll get out of it.  Once the lotions set they became quite hard and I have to dig it out. I have to warm it up in my hands so the lumps melt.

They are however, effective at keeping my skin soft which was a pleasant surprise.  I  added lavender to get more of an appealing scent (seeing as it'll take about 3 weeks for it to be used up).  

My sister sent this AMAZING book.  What a coincidence because  I gave away all of our store bought household cleaners the day before.  I have tried everything I made  and THEY WORK GREAT!!!!!  I loved that I can store them in old water bottles.  Too bad she doesn't have a book out on how to make body lotions.  Sigh...