Homemade Laundry Soap - 1 year later review and updated recipe

So, a year ago I adopted this laundry detergent recipe.  It says it will last a whole year and it really does!  And I love it!!  I just made a few changes this year.  So, here is my updated recipe: 

Here are the ingredients.  

And here are the things I changed: 

First of all, I miscalculated the size of the canister I'd need, so I upgraded to this larger size.  I really love these canisters from {Target} and I use them to store flour and sugar as well. 

The other thing I changed about my recipe is that instead of using a normal cheese grater to grate the soap, I decided to try a zester to get the pieces as small as possible.  It worked like a charm.  I set up my bucket and grater like this and my third time doing this was definitely a charm.

The reason I made this change is because sometimes my washer had a hard time disolving the larger soap shavings, especially on a cold water cycle.  The smaller pieces seem to dissolve much easier.

Once the soap was grated, I just threw all the rest of the ingredients into the bucket and mixed them all together.  And it rubbed my hands raw...so next time I'll be wearing gloves for that step. 

Anyway, the result is a wonderfully beautiful detergent that looks and smells like summer. 

I ended up using the smaller canister to store my Oxiclean White Revive which I add to loads of white laundry in place of bleach.  I really love that stuff.  It does the trick without ruining anything! 

There you have it!  All in all, this laundry detergent costs about $20-$30 to make, and it lasts for a whole year!!  That's a pretty good deal, if you ask me.

Cocoa & Conversation Relief Society Activity

For January, we wanted to keep it simple and we just decided to have a get together.

And we decided that the get together was going to be a hot chocolate party.

I mean, after I found these printables at {Upcycled Treasures} it was a must in my mind, cause Baby, it IS cold outside, and everyone wants hot chocolate when it's cold. 

And when I found this quote from Eliza R. Snow, it made me feel even better.  What makes you feel better than warm chocolate along with warm conversation?  Nothing.  The answer is nothing.

So, we got a lovely sister in our ward to host the party at her lovely, inviting house, and brought in all the fixins for a real party!  And this one was A LOT of fun to put together! 

I found these awesome little wooden scoopers and drizzlers on Amazon and prime got them to me right on time. We used the scoopers for most of the toppings, but to make the fudge and caramel sauces easy to apply, I actually put them on electric candle warmers to keep them warm and stuck a honey drizzler in them.  It was perfect.

The jars all came from the dollar store...and they were the perfect size!

I found the stir sticks in the craft section at Walmart, and glued snowflake buttons to the top...and I LOVE how they turned out!

I found these little labels on {Upcycled Treasures} as well, and because I loved them so much, they kind of dictated what we served as toppings, but the list was pretty extensive and I couldn't think of anything else I'd want anyway!  We had white chocolate chips, tiny marshmallows, crushed peppermint, mini marshmallows, chocolate chips, cinnamon sticks, carmel sauce, and chocolate fudge sauce.  And of course whipped cream to top it off!

A little red and white bakers twine was just the thing to hold these labels in place.  I loved the way it all looked!  I brought in my snowballs, my snowmen, and my mini trees to round out the display, as well as some apothecary jars filled with pinecones and berries. 

My favorite purchase for this party is a toss up between the scoopers and these awesome cups, which I also found on Amazon.  I just loved them so so SO much better than foamy cups.  And they came with that awesome cardboard sleeve!  Then, these labels made them just theeee cutest!  I think everyone else appreciated them as well.  Plus, they had lids so sisters could take some for the road.  

Because one serving of all this just wasn't enough!  Gotta do at least two different versions of toppings, right? 

If anyone came to this party cold, they definitely left feeling warmed up. :)

I used {this hot chocolate crock pot recipe} which I found on Pinterest and everyone liked it, plus it was easy to make, serve, and keep warm in the crock pot. 

 We all just had a grand time visiting with each other.  Sometimes it's nice to just get together without a program!  

We are all sisters, after all.

Thanks & Giving Relief Society Activity

I got the inspiration for our End of the Year activity from this image I saw on Pinterest.

The holiday season is a great time to offer thanks for all that we have, but it's also a great time to serve.  And that's just what we did.

We started out the night by having a "Thankful Dinner" which consisted of 3 yummy fall soups: Butternut Apple, Cauliflower, and Potato Bacon.  We also served a bunch of different salads and some rolls.  I decorated using Thanksgiving decor including my {Thankful Banner I made and posted about here} which I love so much!

We set up the round tables in the Relief Society room and used real tablecloths and the real dinnerware out of our church kitchen.  We wanted this night to be special and using the real stuff just made it feel so much nicer! 

Different sisters brought centerpieces with the Thanksgiving theme for each table . 

And then we had several pies for dessert. 

Each place setting had a napkin tied with a dried grain of wheat and a tag that said, "So Thankful for You." 

So, the sisters came and ate and visited.  We invited the Young Women in our ward to join us for this activity which was great!  

And then we moved into the gym for our service project.  I found this great idea on Pinterest from {this Little Dresses for Africa blogpost} to make pillowcase dresses for {Little Dresses for Africa} an organization that makes and sends these pillowcase dresses to little girls in Africa and other countries all over the world who have never had a dress.  Thier mission is to give these little girls some self esteem.  I loved the idea of making things for some fellow sisters in need, and I thought there would probably be many sisters in our ward who had extra fabric they could donate to make these dresses. 

I was right!  We had more fabric than we could use!  Maybe we'll have to do it again sometime.  The {Little Dresses for Africa website} has a lot of information on how to make the dresses and how to determine sizes and package them up, etc.  

Here are the measurements we used for the pillowcases donated.

And here is the pattern for how to make these pillowcase dresses using just fabric donations.  Most of our dresses were made out of fabric scraps.  

Then, we just followed the instructions from this: 

{Little Dresses For Africa Pattern}

So with the fabric scraps we were pretty much just making a pillowcase first by sewing up the sides before we were able to follow the rest of the instructions.

So, we had a cutting station, where sisters determined what size the dresses could be accourding to the size of the fabric or pillowcase donated.  Then we had an ironing station with tons of irons where the sisters prepared the pieces for sewing. 

And then we had a sewing station where ladies who had brought sewing machines stitched away and mad as many dresses as we could!  I called them my little sweatshop because they were working so hard. 

A lot of the dresses ended up being really cute! 

We strung them all up at the end just so we could see how many we had made. 

I loved how colorful it was!  So many fun fabrics made so many fun dresses! 

It was kind of slow going at first as the sisters got the hang of how to make them, but I was so impressed with how many dresses we were all able to make!  At the end my feet were killing me!  But my heart was happy!

39 Little Dresses for Africa.

Back 2 School Relief Society Activity

In August, we had a Back 2 School night with our Relief Society.  This one was a lot of fun to put together!  To create this vignette, we brought in the portable chalk board from the church, and strung up my Target special bunting that I use for every party.  I also pinned up my book page wreath handmade for me by a friend of mine as a housewarming gift.  Love it!  We stole the stool from under the podium to raise up our vintage school desk one of our members just happens to have, which seemed just a little too small next to that chalkboard, and threw some books and lunch boxes on there for good measure.  BYU even made it to this party in the form of a crate from the Creamery we somehow inherited while we were attending years ago.

We strung jute string across the ceiling and clothespinned and paperclipped flashcards to it to create a school themed bunting.  On the chalkboard, I wrote welcome to class, in true 'first day of school' fashion. 

 

 And the podium table was just decorated with a bunch of nicknacks from around my house.

The more I looked at my house, the more I found I could use to make this look like a vintage school room.

  Globes were a must.  I put some $1 flags in a vase, and got a pack of pencils and put them in a mason jar.  I had recently bought a slate chalkboard from Hobby Lobby to do the '1st day of school sign' with my son, and wrote Back 2 School on it in chalk.

I also filled a container with scrabble letters, and bought a bunch of cheap rulers to put in a pitcher.  These pinwheels I made using doublesided scrapbooking paper.  I just hot glued them onto scewers.  They don't spin, but they sure look cute!

I used some photo albuns to raise up my vintage lantern, pulled in a vintage clock I have, and at the last second thought it would be a good idea to use a statue of the Savior in our display.  

He is, after all, our greatest teacher.

I just love the mix of the neutrals looking like a vintage school room with a little bit of those bright colors still thrown in.  That bucket was filled with bookmarks which we gave the sisters at the end of the night.  Loved the colorful rainbow of ribbon they provided in the display.

I found this quote to go along with our theme, printed it off on cardstock, punched a hole in the top and looped different ribbons through.  Easy peasy!

To make it feel like a school room, we brought in all the classroom tables and put them together, so each table sat six people.

We had set up different displays in the center of each table as well.  Most with bundles of books from my house.

And more pencil bouquets.

At each seat, we placed a notebook for them to take home as well.

These were just the mini composition books Target and Walmart sells during back to school season, with a "Search Ponder & Pray" label stuck to the front of it.  Our last mini class was on studying the scriptures, and this gift tied in with that lesson.

On the side board, we had a back to school bunting hanging, as well as grade level printables found on Pinterest.  Here is another shot of the flashcard bunting we made across the ceiling.  That really made it seem festive!

On this table, there was more stuff from my house.  These giant crayon penny banks were perfect for our display.  I also threw my magnet letters in a few jars - amazing how that classes them up.  Maybe I'll start doing that at home!

More pinwheels - I loved the feel those gave to this activity!  I found this printable (along with most of my other ideas) on {here on Pinterest} and just clipped it to our clipboard.  Had an apothecary jar filled with apples.  And this is actually how I store our blocks.  I love the way they look on top of my kids dresser.  A decoration that can be played with!  Cute and functional are my favorite.

Our dinner that night was a school lunch.  We had veggie cups with rach dip, apples, chip bags, sandwiches, lunch drinks, and rice crispy treats (which didn't make it in time for the picture).

I was surprised at how fast we ran out of chocolate milk!  You're never too old for that stuff, I guess.  However, hardly anyone drank regular milk.  Curious...  

When I told my helpers my idea for the food, no one was too excited about it, but it was actually really good!  

The display over here consisted of my oversized scissors, some mini trunks, another globe, and a vintage style lantern.

I had fun making these plates.

Just added some paper leaves using double stick tape and voila!  Apple plates!

We had 3 mini classes:

Home Economics - we learned how to make our own laundry detergent.

Mathematics - we learned about Budgeting and Finances

Reading - we learned about studying the scriptures.

All in all, it was a great activity!