Need some SS ideas

[Bethanial]

Washing soda is VERY easy to make yourself! It's chemical name is sodium carbonate, a close relative of sodium bicarbonate - aka baking soda. It's apparently a very easy and painless chemical process we can all do at home to turn baking soda into washing soda - line a cookie sheet with foil, fill with baking soda, and bake in the oven at 250* for an hour!

More info here, complete with a link to a recipe for making your own laundry detergent, and an UBER cheap way to source baking soda: http://www.mysuburbanhomestead.com/...washing-soda-aka-soda-ash-sodium-bicarbonate/

 

[tortoise]

Washing soda is VERY easy to make yourself! It's chemical name is sodium carbonate, a close relative of sodium bicarbonate - aka baking soda. It's apparently a very easy and painless chemical process we can all do at home to turn baking soda into washing soda - line a cookie sheet with foil, fill with baking soda, and bake in the oven at 250* for an hour!

More info here, complete with a link to a recipe for making your own laundry detergent, and an UBER cheap way to source baking soda: http://www.mysuburbanhomestead.com/...washing-soda-aka-soda-ash-sodium-bicarbonate/

THANK YOU!!!!

 

[Bethanial]

Welcome

 

[TanksHill]

Wow, good to know.

 

[CrimsonRose]

wow good to know about the washing soda!!! I never could find any so I just used baking soda and my clothes come out nice and clean with no issue...

 

[uvia]

wow good to know about the washing soda!!! I never could find any so I just used baking soda and my clothes come out nice and clean with no issue...

Me either, never found washing soda! But have had the chance to appreciate baking soda quite a bit, especially on particularly smelly clothes, like tshirts worn during heavy workouts or stuff like that. Soda washes everything away.

 

[Denim Deb]

I just read the instructions for both that and the detergent. I just might have to try it!

 

[Beekissed]

Deb, I cannot describe to you how much money I have saved by making my own detergent! I have three boys and massive amounts of laundry at any given time and this detergent has been a lifesaver.

My mother uses it, my aunt now makes and uses it, my sister now does it and any number of other friends and family.

I have used it for so long that I didn't know the current price of laundry detergent and was shocked at how much it had gone up since last I bought some.

 

[lwheelr]

So I'll chime in with another "I know you said no livestock, but..."

Muscovy Ducks. Just gotta say that! They are very quiet, they don't make a lot of noise. Clip their flight feathers (ask me how if you need to), so they won't alarm the neighbors by roosting in their trees. Ours are very well behaved, they are fun animals. A few ducks waddling across your lawn isn't something that will usually offend the neighbors, because most people don't think to call ducks "livestock". They associate them with parks and lakes.

Muscovies produce a fair amount of eggs, reproduce well, and produce the BEST red meat ever. Tastes like marinated steak. Awesome. And it is more easily digestible than beef or wild game - so much so that people with digestive disorders can get much more nutrition out of it than they can from commercial meats. Other duck meat is NOT easily digestible, but Muscovy is. It is not greasy, just really good stuff.

They are so quiet, that our neighbors don't even know we have them, and we started with a flock of 16. They require less water than most ducks - ours have two dishpans full of water, which we clean out morning and night (we toss the dirty water at the base of our trees, or use it to dampen the compost pile).

Keep them in a fenced area. A 3' fence is high enough to contain them, lightweight wire dog fencing works fine. You can train them to herd too.

The best thing is, they eat LOTS of bugs, and they will devour weeds also. We had a grasshopper plague here when we came back from camp this summer. We got the ducks, and they cleaned out the yard in three days. Not a hopper left.

Just tossing that in for what it is worth...

Laura
Mom to Eight, Web Designer, Milker of Goats, Feeder of Chickens

 

[tortoise]

I tried the washing soda thing today. It totally worked! As in the appearance/texture changed and it was irritating to my skin/nostrils to measure it out after heating it. It was just "different" from the baking soda I started with.

Then I made a batch of laundry detergent.