natural living

shout out!

/ erin / 3 Comments

EVERY time I go to the grocery store as of late, I am complimented on my basket that I tote around with me.

 

It was a gift for our wedding from Ben’s sister and I am in LOVE with it 🙂

You can reshape the basket by soaking it in warm water, then you are set to mold it whichever way you want! It was handmade, and I know I have the tag around somewhere that says where it is from… and I can let you know!

In other news, we installed a handle and deadbolt to our door so we are now able to lock it up tight from the inside. We are in a secure location so our bungee chord method was doing okay… but with the cold weather, it was nice to be able to get it to close tight and keep the chilly air out!

I will have a better picture of it, it’s still pretty ugly to look at currently because we will need to put a fresh “face” on the inside of the door.

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Homemade Toothpaste

/ erin / 1 Comment

I’ve been trying to be less wasteful, more natural, and be more open minded to trying new things, and making my own products at home rather than buying them.

Our friends we stayed with in Iowa for Thanksgiving make a lot of their own products as well, and they have gifted us their homemade soap and I am in LOVE with it. While we were staying with them, I had the opportunity to try out their homemade toothpaste, and I decided I would have a go at making my own.

Now I pulled THIS RECIPE from google and tried it, and I also added Dr. Bronner’s peppermint Magic Soap to the mix. JUST A TINY BIT, like… 1/2 of a teaspoon. The oils I used were peppermint and eucalyptus.

Here is where I went wrong.

And I ALWAYS go wrong.

When I started making it I decided to half the recipe to start, to have a tester bottle. When I half a recipe I forget I am doing so at SOME point in the process of adding ingredients, and I did that this time too.

I halved the portions and then decided to use the same amount of drops of oil as if I didn’t half it. *facepalm*

I noticed when I brushed my teeth to see how it tasted.

SO. I went BACK to the drawing board to finish the full recipe to make up for the STRONG taste.

Its been about 3 days now. I don’t mind it at all. Ben on the other hand….

Well it just doesn’t seem to agree with him, and it just sets his gag reflexes going. He thinks it may be the coconut oil (I used unrefined) but I think it may be the baking soda? It tends to have such a salty strong presence that it can easily overpower the senses.

I may try looking up some other recipes and try them out, and pay attention when I make a small portion this time! 🙂 But it doesn’t seem all that bad to me.

If you have any suggestions or make your own and you like it, let me know your secrets! 🙂