little bitty girl

I am a bit of a mad scientist. Or at least, that is what Stefan calls me.

I go through phases of being guilty about various different things - wasting water, pouring poisonous liquids that are in many of our basic cleaning fluids into the local ecosystem etc. These phases have spawned the homemade cleaning solutions, homemade fruit fly killers and -- the worst homemade experiment -- making homemade laundry detergent. DO NOT TRY TO DO THIS IF YOU ARE AN IMPATIENT PERSON.

Anyways, today I am making homemade yogurt which is actually a really simple process. Boiling milk and having plain yogurt to start to act as an active culture and then maintaining a certain temperature for 6 hours. I love plain yogurt so I am always happy at its result, although Stefan will not touch my homemade yogurt because he is sure that at some point, I could have possibly screwed something up. Thereby making him ingest more bacteria than needed. He's chicken with my experimentations. Oh well..

I am not really sure why this kind of stuff fascinates me but I blame it all on my wretched curiosity. I am always wondering how our ancestors figured out how to do things and sometimes I wish we all could take that time to do what they did. They all seemed to create less waste or pollution back then. Anyways, to commemorate my "Mad Scientist" Sunday I thought I would share some handy household tips. This is from one of my favourite sites, Care2.

Keeping your drains clog free.
Ideally, use washing soda on your drains once a week to keep them clear. Just pour 1/4 cup or so down the drain, and then flush with water. Washing soda is found in the laundry section of the supermarket. You can use baking soda instead by pouring 1 cup of baking soda down the drain, followed by three cups of boiling water. The boiling water will change the chemical composition of baking soda to become more alkaline like washing soda. If you already have a clog, try pouring 1 cup of washing soda (or baking soda) down the drain followed by three cups of boiling water. Repeat two or three times. If you still have a clog, try pouring down 1 cup of vinegar. Being an acid, the vinegar will neutralize the washing soda or baking soda and there will be some foaming and gurgling, but sometimes this agitation is all that is needed in the end to dislodge the grime.

Trust me this works better than any drano or whatever commercial stuff they have out there. We had a nasty clogged toilet once and luckily we had all the things listed above and it worked like a dream.

Cleaning Hardwood Floors
Combine 20 drops of pure essential oils with Murphy’s oil soap or a health-food store brand of all-purpose detergent (Murphy’s is actually a detergent) as directed, to 2 gallons of water.
SUGGESTIONS
Eucalyptus, Lavender, Lemon, Pine, Rosemary, Sweet orange

Sometimes, I combine the scents and the apartment smells so good for days. Our floors always shine after this as well.