I spy with my little eyes

I wanted Robbie to be able to give a gift to all his little buddies at daycare, but didn't really want to spend a lot of money.  When I saw the idea for making your own 'I Spy' bottles on the Meet the Dubiens blog, I decided to try this out.  I'm so pleased with the results.  My bottles don't look nearly as professional as hers, but I don't think Robbie's toddler friends will care.  

Step 1:  Collect stuff

Fortunately for me, my mother is a collector and was able to send me lots of little goodies to use.  Make sure your stuff will actually fit through the top of the container you are going to fill.

Step 2:  Fill bottle

I used an empty Fiji water bottle because it was a nice size and shape.  I looked all over for containers that would work.  Voss water bottles would have been great, but difficult to locate in my area.  I filled with the items above, miscellaneous "sprinkles" of sequins and confetti, and dry rice.  Be sure to leave room at the top to allow for shaking.

Step 3: Seal and Finish
We super-glued the cap of the bottle.  For added security I wrapped some electrical tape around the cap as well.  I'm less concerned with Robbie's friends ingesting the bottle contents and more concerned about them spilling the contents... 'cause y'know little kids WILL FIND A WAY to make a huge mess given the opportunity.  I took a picture of the contents of each bottle and then laminated the picture and a message together.  This was tied to each bottle.

This craft was super easy to do.  Now that I've made a few, I will be on the lookout for interesting little items for bottles and also for other containers that might work.  Merry Christmas!

{Insert Egg Pun Here}

I hate hard boiled eggs. I think they are gross. Slimy bland outside, chalking dry eggy inside. {blech}. So while it is rotten that Robbie is allergic to eggs, it really doesn't hinder our life too much as we are not big egg eaters. If he eats eggs, he gets hives. Too many "egg ingredient" meals in one week causes him to get rough rashy patches on his legs and torso.

But! I LOVE TRADITIONS. And darn it, if the Easter holiday calls for egg decorating, by golly, we are going to to do it. Enter the salt dough ornament. We made salt-dough ornaments at Christmas and gave them away. Robbie had a blast, so I thought we'd do it again. I used a different recipe this time, which I ended up not liking as well. Next time, I'll go back to the one I used at Christmas.

Salt dough: 2 cups flour, 1 cup salt, 1.5 cups warm water. Mix/knead to form a smooth dough. Add more flour if dough is sticky. Roll onto floured surface. Cut with cookie cutters. Bake 300 degrees for an hour or until 'dry'.

Enter the biggest problem. I only roll and cut cookies at Christmas. So, what to I do for an Easter shape? I have circles, hearts, stars, stockings, trees, men, etc. I have other holidays like a turkey, a four leaf clover, a palm tree, etc, but no oval or egg. I have a cross... but I am weird about food being "religious" which is a whole other blog entry. So hunting through my cabinets, I found this:
This is a tool used for chopping nuts like pecans or walnuts. Egg shape! Awesome. So we rolled the dough. We cut out the eggs and we used a straw to poke holes in the top for hanging. (The straw poking was Robbie's favorite part.)

Into the oven with you, my little eggys.

Once they had cooked dry (about 45 min) and cooled, I mixed up some of my acrylic paints, adding white to lighten the shades and make them more "Eastery." I find that the ice cub tray is a handy little paint tool for my budding artist. I like to leave several cubes empty so he can mix his own colors.

Big concentration.

Every artist should blend, blend, blend!

At the end, everything was sort of multicolored and splotchy.

Perfect!

Adding a sprinkle of glitter makes for a shiny springtime.

Robbie was a bit heavy handed with the glitter, but hey, it was his first time and a kid's gotta learn somehow!

After the paint dried and Robbie went to bed, I pulled out the trusty clear polyurethane varnish and gave the eggs a coating. This dough doesn't last long if you don't seal it. If there is moisture in the air, they sort of swell and crumble. (creepy) Tomorrow after the varnish is dry, we will decorate them with ribbons maybe and hang them around the house. We may also mail a few out to relatives... the recipe made 16 eggs... that's a lot of eggs. Hoppy Easter! (Almost made it through without a single pun!)

Laundry Soap Adventure

I hate spending anywhere from $9.95 to $17.99 for a jug of laundry detergent that never seems to last very long. Several of my friends on facebook and at work had spoken of making their own, but I thought, "Wow that sounds like a lot of effort and surely it doesn't work as well."


I was wrong. This was super easy to do, it works really well, and is really cheap. I figure the entire 1st batch costs less than $5 for 10 gallons of detergent.
Step 1: Start with a bar of non-scented soap. I bought Fels-Naptha from the grocery store, but you can also use Ivory soap or any other soap without moisturizers or perfumes (which will stain your clothes.) Use a cheese grater or food processor to grate the bar of soap into tiny pieces.

My son thought this looked like cheese. After I got the bar grated, we had to take a break and actually eat some cheese.

Step 2: Fill a soup pot with 4 cups of tap water and add the grated soap. Heat over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the soap dissolves and you have a sort of "soap soup". This took several minutes and during this time I had to help my son use the potty, clean up the cheese snack, and start up an episode of "Dora the Explorer" on the DVR.

Step 3: Fill an EMPTY, clean five-gallon bucket half full with hot water. Add 1 cup of Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda, 1/2 cup of Borax, and the "soap soup" mixture to the bucket. Stir until all the powder is dissolved. (note: the recipe I was following noted several times that you had to use "super washing soda" and not to use "baking soda". I have a friend that says she replaces the super washing soda with generic oxyclean and it works well.) I got the 5 gallon bucket with lid, the borax, and the super washing soda at our local hardware store.

My son helped stir the pot. It was pretty foamy and had a strong scent. At one point he looked at me and said, "Is this puke, mommy?"

Step 4: Fill the bucket the rest of the way with hot water and stir well. Cover and let sit overnight. This will form a gel-like substance. Stir well to eliminate as many clumps as possible. It will be very "gloopy".

Step 5: Fill a clean, empty laundry detergent container with half water and half soap mixture. This is easier said than done and I ended up with quite a mess. After speaking with my friends they all suggested getting a large kitchen or automotive funnel for the container and pouring from a liquid measuring cup. Noted for next time. Because I am math-minded, I actually filled my entire laundry container up with water first and poured it out to measure that my jug held approx. 13 cups of fluid. So I added 6 cups of water and 6 cups of soap goop to my jug.

Instructions for use: BEFORE EACH USE SHAKE YOUR JUG as it will gel. Add a little over 1/2 cup to your load of clothes for a standard top-loading washing machine. The lid of my jug holds 1/4 cup, so I add two capfulls. You could also add 1/4 cup straight from your undiluted 5 gal bucket if you wish.

This recipe comes from the Dugger Family of TV fame. If you google "Dugger Family Recipes" you will find this and several other similar recipes. They recommend adding 5 - 10 drops of essential oil to each gallon to add a scent to the detergent if you prefer.

I am very pleased with the results. Our clothes are just as clean as with store-bought detergent. The clean laundry doesn't smell like ANYTHING which is our family preference. All of the supplies (including the soap, washing soda, borax, AND 5 gal bucket) cost about $20, but next time I will only have to by a bar of soap since I used just a small bit of the huge boxes of powder. I figure the whole batch costs less than 5 bucks. It took me about 20 minutes to make the batch including the little stops I made to take care of my little guy.

You should do this!

It is worth it!