Doing Those Dreaded Dishes

I will be the first to admit, I HATE DOING DISHES. I hate doing them with an unbridled passion. And unfortunately in this household I AM the dishwasher, as well as the dish dryer and the dish putter upper. (Yep, I make up words as I go along, it makes things more interesting and that way I don't have to worry about finding just the right word. :-p) I'm not sure if my hatred of doing the dishes stems from having to do them every day as a child or what but there it is for what it's worth.

On top of hating to do the dishes, I am a dish detergent snob. I just cannot use cheap dish detergent. I can't use the $.97 stuff from Wal-Mart, so this recipe is probably going to be one of the hardest for me to implement into my life and strike off my shopping list. But for the sake of saving a dime I'm darn sure gonna try.

I was cruising TipNut today and ran across a link to another blog with recipes for making your own dish soap. I figured it can't hurt to give it a try, and who knows, maybe I WILL like it and get away from that $4.00 bottle of Dawn I just have to have. (Or at least that is what I keep telling myself anyways.) The link for the recipes can be found here:

DIY Life - How To Make Your Own Dish Soap

I think I am going to use the third recipe in that list. I already have a nice little jar of soap bar leftovers sitting on my kitchen counter, so I've already got a jump start on the whole process. Every time the bar of soap from the shower (Yep, I make my own soap too.) gets to the point it starts breaking when we try to use it, into the jar it goes with a tiny bit of water. I also add the drips and drops of dish washing detergent, that is never quite enough to do a load of dishes, to the jar as well. At this point I could probably just add some more water and let it stew and end up with a nice batch of dish soap. Keep in mind while reading this post that I haven't yet tried this recipe, but I will gladly post my findings at a later date.

Happy DIYing Everyone!!!

How To Get Rid Of Uninvited House-guests.

No I'm not talking about your in laws or in my case, MY parents. I'm talking about roaches. Or more generally those big roach looking things that southerners call water bugs. In general, the larger cockroaches do not bother me as long as they stay out of my house but, because of the drought we are currently experiencing in Central Georgia, several of these nuisances have taken up residence. So, in my fashion, I set out to find a way to get rid of the dreaded things naturally and at little cost to me. And thanks again to TipNut, I believe I have found the solution to my "bug" problem. You can find the original article here.

Roach Ball Recipe
White Flour
Boric Acid or Borax (although Boric Acid is a bit more effective)
Confectioner's Sugar
Water

The amounts for each of the things listed above are something you will have to figure out depending on how much coverage you need. To start, mix the Boric Acid and Flour in a 50/50 ratio. (I used half a cup of Borax and half a cup of flour.) I added in 1 tbsp of confectioner's sugar and just slowly added water until it formed a sticky dough. (Don't add to much water...You don't want to end up with a soupy mess.) Roll the dough into marble sized balls and place them EVERYWHERE. Especially the dark recesses where your uninvitees like to hang out. The trash can, the backs of cupboards, under furniture, etc. You can always add a bit of bacon grease to the mixture to make the roach balls a bit more "appealing". The original article said it should take about a month for the roaches to be gone so we will see how it goes. They also list a recipe for larger infestations, but since mine is limited to seeing one of the little freaks every now and then I didn't bother with it, but you can find it here as well.

Happy DIYing Everyone!!!