Fred-n-Sara

Today we had a Snow Day, so instead of calculating grades I calculated our Taxes.

What’s really funny is that this could be any of our cats…especially Sally, who is very large.  Then again, Casper will eat anything in front of him, including ziploc bags, cheese, and bacon.

Fred recently directed me to a website that has funny animal pictures and I just had to share this!

I should have posted this before Valentine’s Day, but it’s been a little busy with my birthday and the holiday…

Here’s a good recipe that satisfies any sweet craving early in the morning, but is also healthy and easy to make.  Fred loves waffles and asks for this a lot, from cooks.com:

**I added the chocolate chips to the ingredient list myself.  Just add them in at the end, after beating all the ingredients together.  Trust me, it’s good!

I’ve been looking into making some more changes to lead a “green”-er lifestyle.  My latest change is something I found on greenlivingtips.com; All purpose cleaner.  This stuff is pretty good!  I have been using it for a few weeks now and it’s working very well.  I’ve used it on my counters, sink, stainless steel appliances, windows, mirrors, toilet, shower, kitchen tile, pretty much everywhere you can think of, except marble.  It’s not meant to be used on marble.  Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients and supplies

- 32 oz. (around 950ml) spray bottle – try to use a bottle made from recycled materials, or is recycleable. Maureen recommends #2 plastic  **I found #2 plastic bottles at the Dollar General

- water

- White distilled vinegar. It should be vinegar made from grain or plant material. Believe it or not, some is made from petroleum based (crude oil).  It gives a whole new meaning to fuel as food.

- Genuine lemongrass essential oil. Lemongrass has anti-bacterial properties. For increased disinfecting power, you can use Tea Tree oil which also ahs anti-viral and anti-fungal properties.  **I found these at the Mustard Seed Market, any health food store should have them.

- Earth friendly dishwashing liquid. This can be found in just about any supermarket. The dishwashing liquid is necessary to clean mirrors and glass streak-free.  Many commercial window/glass cleaners have chemicals of a waxy nature in them; so when you switch to vinegar/water, there will be streaking unless you have the dish detergent in your cleaner.  **Seventh Generation is a pretty good, inexpensive brand.

Method

1. Fill bottle half with water

2. Top it up with white distilled vinegar, but leave a little room for the additional ingredients and for shaking

3. Add 10-14+ drops lemongrass essential oil. Maureen says she uses around 30 drops, but started off with 14 to minimize the chance of skin irritability.

4. Add 2-3 drops of the earth friendly dishwashing liquid.

5. Cap and shake. There should be a thin layer of foamy bubbles at the top – but not too many. 

6. Label container clearly. Shake before using and store out of direct sunlight.

From what I have experienced using this cleaner, it does smell a little vinagery, but that goes away very quickly.  When I made mine, I mixed in some tea tree oil as well, for extra anti-viral/fungal umph.  I got the essential oils from the Mustard Seed Market, but any health store will have them.
Now, think about how much you spend on cleaners all the different for glass (Windex), bathroom (Scrubbing Bubbles), floors (Mr. Clean), kitchen counters (Fantastic), stainless steel cleaner (Method), and whatever other cleaners you buy.  This is an all-purpose cleaner that is pretty cheap compared to that!  The most expensive part of the cleaner is the oils, which range from $8 to $12 for a small vial, but 1 vial will make a few bottles of this cleaner anyway.  Vinegar costs next to nothing, and you probably have dish soap anyway (I recommend Seventh Generation’s soap, made with all natural products, not petroleum based ingredients).

So, for something that works well and is inexpensive, why not give it a try?