Prepped Living Blog

We finally did it! We made homemade soap! I had been really nervous about it due to the causticity of the lye, but youngest daughter came over one afternoon and we braved the experiment together. Overall, it was a good experience, though I did have a big mishap. I didn't get the lid to the lye container screwed on tight enough, and when I picked it up (by the lid, of course 🙄), it fell, tipped over, and spilled half its contents. This became a learning opportunity on how to best neutralize lye pellets. I am slowly making my way through neutralizing half a container of now-dirty lye pellets (I was mixing the lye-water solution outside to better vent the fumes and had to sweep them up, dirt and all). 😂  For our first experiment, we followed the recipe and directions from  The Soapmaker's Companion , a book we had sitting on the shelf waiting for the moment when I would finally try soap making. We used the recipe for the Soap Essentials Bar II (p. 18 in my copy) and added lemon...

As noted in previous blog posts, we have made several batches of different salves over the years. However, we had not yet experimented with making black drawing salve. Black drawing salve gets its name from the color of the salve, which is owed to the activated charcoal powder that it contains. Husband's   grandmother once shared her memories of buying black drawing salve from the Watkins representative that would come door-to-door when she was young. She mentioned that it was something they always had on hand for splinters, boils, insect bites, and minor irritations. We were looking forward to making our own medicinal drawing salve to have in the medicine cabinet. While some black drawing salves use corrosive ingredients that can be harmful, the recipe we found uses safe, natural ingredients.  For our first time making this salve, we followed the recipe by Living Simply with Valerie . (Note: please go to the website for the recipe. We are will refrain from posting here in ord...

We have homemade salves a few times over the past five years. We have made healing salve, balm of Gilead, and St. Michael's oil. Each of these are wonderful salves with slightly different beneficial properties. We have given away several jars from each batch (these make lovely gifts!) and they have all been well received by the recipients. Of the three kinds we have made so far, our all-purpose, go-to salve has been the Herbal Healing Salve . Each batch is slightly different based on what infused oils we make and use each year, but the basic recipe we follow is this one we put on our website. We have used this for rashes, cuts, bruises, dry skin, swollen tissues, and insect bites. We were nearly out of the healing salve we made a couple of years ago, so it was time to make more. We started this year's batch by solar infusing a mix of olive oil, coconut oil, and avocado oil with calendula, plantain, and a small amount of comfrey. Once that was done infusing (see DIY Infused Oil...

After writing the blog article on ways to use soap slivers, we were inspired to turn the soap slivers we had collected into new soap rounds. The Process: We had a small collection of soap pieces that we had saved and dried.  We wanted to repurpose these for Husband's shaving soap dish. I thought about pressing it into the cup itself, but we had too many slivers to fit into the cup. Since cupcake holders fit inside, I decided to mold it using cupcake holders instead. This would give us a few soap rounds to refill the shaving dish. We looked up a few articles on how to remake soap bars from soap pieces. We settled on following  Bottega Zero Waste 's instructions. First, we ground the soap slivers into shavings. Then, we added the shavings to a pot and added a bit of water. We heated it on low and slowly stirred it. It didn't melt in a couple of minutes like the instructions claimed it should. We had quite a bit more than the quantity shown in the instructions, which made it s...

Back in July we posted a review of the first two homemade dishwasher detergent recipes we made. This week, we are posting a review of the third recipe we tried. We found this recipe on wellnessmama.com. It is very similar to the second recipe we tried, only this one includes borax. Homemade Dishwasher Detergent #3 Ingredients 1 c. borax 1 c. washing soda ½ c. citric acid ½ c. sea salt 20 – 30 drops lemon essential oil (or other citrus oil, optional) Directions Stir all ingredients together. Store in a glass jar. Use 1 – 2 T. per load. You can add a couple of drops of dishwashing liquid to the powder before closing the soap dispenser if you want extra cleaning power. Note: Adding too many drops of liquid dish soap will cause problems with your dishwasher. What we liked The dishes were clean.  The recipe is simple. The ingredients are non-toxic. There was no detergent taste left on the dishes. What we didn't like Citric acid isn't something we typically kept on hand...

Are you not sure what to do with the small piece of soap left near the end of your soap bar's life? We don't like to be wasteful and toss the soap "ends," so we came up with a couple of ways to use them. We also looked into a few more ideas to use soap ends that we could share with you. Grafting to the Next Bar For the most part, we incorporate the small piece into the next bar by getting them both wet and smashing them together. Sometimes it takes a few washings before they stick well. Using a Soap Saver We recently received a soap saver bag as a gift. These are bags made of natural fibers. The idea is to put your bar of soap in it, use it as a washcloth or scrubby, and then hang it to dry. This is supposed to lengthen the longevity of your soap bar by using less soap to lather and by letting it dry well in between uses. Adding your pieces to your soap saver is another way to use up your soap slivers. Turning it into Shave Soap We have also saved a few pieces with t...