Category Archives: DIY

DIY / Going "Natural"

DIY: Homemade Laundry Soap

February 21, 2019

As I mentioned in this post, I’ve been working on making most of the household cleaners we use myself, to both cut down on plastic waste and so I know what I’m putting on/around my kids.

There are a number of different recipes out there for making your own laundry soap, and the recipe below was not the first one I tested. The first batch I tried included Borax, but after reading up on Borax, I decided that it was an ingredient I didn’t want to include in my household cleaning products. (This is also the most likely reason that the dishwasher detergent recipe I used didn’t work well. Borax can really make a difference!)

I tested multiple laundry detergent recipes before landing on one I liked, and ultimately found the right recipe that makes a giant batch with minimal time commitment. Also, all the included ingredients have an A rating on the Environment Working Group website.

You don’t need a whole host of items to make your own laundry soap, and you can buy pretty much everything on Amazon for cheap and use the whole thing in one go. If you’re interested in making your own laundry detergent, below is the recipe I use, with a full linked ingredient list at the bottom of the post for shopping ease.

Recipe:

Laundry Detergent
55 oz / 3 lbs 7 oz super washing soda (one box)
64 oz / 4 lbs baking soda (one box)
4 bars castile soap
3 lbs OxiClean Baby or OxiClean Free (one container)
32 oz / 2lbs epsom salts (one bag) optional, acts as a softener

  1. Use a cheese grater to grate castile soap, or cut into pieces and add to a food processor with baking or washing soda then pulse to combine.
  2. Stir together all ingredients to combine and use 1 tablespoon per load — no softener needed. 

Shopping List:

Laundry Soap:
Washing Soda
Baking Soda
Bar Castile Soap
OxiClean Baby or OxiClean Free
Epsom Salts

Storage:
Large glass canister (for storing laundry soap — I also store excess washing soda, baking soda, and Epsom salt in these, since they come in a set of four)
Tablespoon scoop
Old-school label maker (if you’re extra type-A like me)

DIY / Going "Natural"

DIY: Homemade Cleaning Products

February 20, 2019

If you’ve ever done any research on the Environmental Working Group website, you’ve probably realized how many household and cleaning products are hazardous to the environment and/or your health. In an effort to limit the number of outside chemicals used in our home — especially those that come into contact with the kiddos — I decided to try and make most of our cleaning products myself.

There’s plenty of information out there on the web about how to DIY your own cleaning solutions, and after a little online sleuthing I set to work making ours and found it surprisingly easy and cost-effective. It requires a bit of an investment at the start, but overall I’ve found that my homemade recipes go further than the “traditional” cleaners I used before, and because I purchase the ingredients in bulk they end up costing less over time. Making my own products has also drastically cut down on the single-use plastic bottles coming into our home as well.

I’ve tried multiple recipes and have listed out the ones I use and like below. I tested multiple laundry detergent recipes before landing on one I liked (that post is coming up tomorrow!), and also tried both homemade dish soap and dishwasher soap, but hated both and so haven’t included those recipes here.

You don’t need a whole host of items to make your own cleaning products, and you can buy pretty much everything in bulk at Costco and/or on Amazon for cheap. If you’re interested in making your own cleaning products, below are the recipes I use, with a linked ingredient list at the bottom of the post for shopping ease.

Recipes:

All-Purpose Surface Spray
1/2 cup distilled white vinegar
1 cup purified water
20 drops essential oil
*I like to use a mix of seasonal/citrus essential oils in this for the kitchen spray and tea tree essential oil for the bathroom spray

Wood Furniture Spray
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup purified water
20 drops essential oil
*I like to use eucalyptus or pine, and sometimes mix it with lemon

Glass Spray
1/4 cup rubbing alcohol
2-3 drops liquid castile soap
1/4 cup distilled white vinegar
2 cups purified water
10 drops citrus essential oil

Tub and Tile Scrub
1/4 cup liquid castile soap
10 drops tea tree or thieves essential oil
1 cup baking soda
*add ingredients to a mason jar in the order listed, then shake to combine

Sink/Stove/Counter Abrasive Cleaner
I use straight baking soda mixed with a tiny bit of water and use a microfiber cloth or scrub brush

Shopping List:

Cleaning:
Baking Soda
Distilled White Vinegar
Liquid Castile Soap
Purified Water
Rubbing Alcohol
Essential Oils*: tea tree, thieves (this is a less expensive dupe), lemon, eucalyptus, pine, grapefruit, tangerine, orange
*My recommendation would be to start with three essential oils: 1. tea tree or thieves, 2. eucalyptus or pine, and 3. a citrus. This is a nice starter mix, though you may want to add on a citrus oil to it. This assortment is a nice mix if you want more than one citrus option. This is also a great comprehensive starter pack.

Storage:
Glass amber bottles (I use 8, 16, and 32 oz bottles)
Mason jars
Old-school label maker (if you’re extra type-A like me)

Birthdays / DIY / Sweet

A Fancy $19 Cake

May 12, 2016

img_8352-1In case you couldn’t tell from yesterday’s post, I am pretty proud of the tiny smash cake that I made for P’s birthday.

I aspire to be one of those people who makes adorable confections with the perfectly piped icing and sweet, cakey layers. But… I hate cake. I love the idea of decorating a cake, but eating it? Ew. I’m just not into it.

So anyway, for Prim’s party I was totally torn about what to do for dessert. I knew we were going to have a pretty sizable crowd of people attending, so anything homemade would be a bit of an undertaking. I liked the idea of having a traditional birthday cake, but wasn’t feeling particularly motivated to tackle making it myself. I had toyed with the idea of a Costco cake, since those cakes are actually quite good (according to the people I know who like and eat cake) and are very affordable, but I was sort of turned off by the cake designs.

While I was hemming and hawing over what to do, it suddenly dawned on me — why didn’t I just order a plain Costco cake and decorate it myself? Genius!

img_8348-1So that’s what I did. I ordered a plain white cake from the Costco bakery, and did it up like so:

img_8350-1I had purchased that glittery “one” for P’s smash cake, but it ended up being too big for the tiny cake, so I repurposed it for the larger one and surrounded it with fresh peonies, gerbera daisies and babies breath.

I had searched high and low for those old-school sugar letters that every grocery store used to sell and apparently none of them carry them anymore! What happened to them? I was stressing over having to potentially hand-letter a happy birthday message when I came up with the perfect solution:

img_8294Trader Joe’s to the rescue! Thank god for those little cookies. They were the perfect size and totally fit with the theme of the cake. img_8349-1img_8351-1So that’s how I turned a $19 Costco cake into a treat fit for any party. I’d totally recommend this for any occasion. Honestly, the cake looked freaking wedding-worthy (I thought, anyway), and it was so fun to decorate.

I’ll definitely be repeating this craft for many birthdays and parties to come!

img_8353-1img_8473-1

DIY / Personal

Karma, Don’t Fail Me Now

July 20, 2015

If you know me, or have been reading my blog for awhile, you probably know that for the past 2.5+ years KC and I have been renting a little green house at the top of a hill in Oakland.
our houseDespite the fact that we’re just renters, we’ve actually done quite a bit of work to fix up the house.  read more

Budget-Friendly Weekend Fun / DIY

Wall Art (for cheap)

March 25, 2015

I mentioned last week that we recently moved a large framed print from our dining room into our bedroom:

cribThe print is from Pottery Barn, and I do really like it, but given that we’re about to have a child, our finances don’t really include an extra $200-$400 for “wall art” at the moment.

I don’t know if you have ever looked into large prints or art pieces, but man are they pricey.  After scouring the internet trying to find a large piece to fill the blank wall in the dining room, I determined that we would either need to bite the bullet and spend $200+ (and likely close to $500) on something, or come up with an alternate plan.

I started looking through the photos on my computer, trying to determine whether there was anything “frame-worthy” that wouldn’t look terrible if it was blown up to a larger size.  Luckily, our amazing wedding photographers had taken some photos of the foliage around the hotel where KC and I got ready on our wedding day, which ended up being a perfect blend of attractive and artsy.

wall art 5 wall art 4

I ordered prints through Apple, blowing up the images to the largest size available (20 x 30), then headed to IKEA to pick out some large frames.

Frames can be super expensive — especially large ones — so the fact that you can get a matted frame for a 20 x 30″ print for $24.99?  Amazing.

wall art 1

The framing process was kind of a pain in the ass (because, hello, it’s IKEA), but the trouble was worth the huge amount of savings.

wall art 2

And check out our dining room wall now:

wall art 3

Pretty nice, right?  And what a steal!  Here’s what it cost:

  • 20 x 30″ print: $17.99 (x 2) = $36
  • IKEA Ribba Frame: $24.99 (x 2) = $50
  • Total cost: $43 per print/$86 total

PS: The print above the crib in our room is hung on hooks and anchored to the wall, so it’s nice and securely fastened (and that crib is on wheels and will most likely be pulled over to the bed when the little lady arrives anyway).  🙂