Tipsy Tuesday: Body Wash

I have sensitive and dry skin and so does my husband {which means the kiddo's are doooooomed}. So it's really tempting to try every label on the rack to touting a new ingredient promising to make my skin hydrated! but do i yield?!? well, ok, i did for a while but now I have discovered a new method.

Now just as a side note, I used to make soap so I know it's possible to make my own stuff. For the record, I was working around a couple of different factors:
1) we are trying to get out of a mountain of debt (who isn't!?) and so the less I spend the better
2) The dollar store is always nice for cheap alternatives BUT I really wanted to cut down the toxins I was putting all over my largest organ (my skin).
3) Less toxins is better for the environment too, double win!

So what I was looking to accomplish really needed to meet all of these requirements and that's not easy to do. Lucky for me, Tree Hugging Mom had the answer! I am going on a couple of weeks now and I cannot complain a bit. It took some extra thought process to order the soap on amazon (not that you have to, I just didn't have a store nearby that carried it) but that was about it. Go to this linky for her blog entry OR I did a little copy/paste of it below for your convenience (you really should check it out though she's got lot's o great green info): 

************************************************************************

DIY: Homemade Body Wash

We’ve been using the following recipe for a few months now and I don’t think we will ever change.  It’s so easy to make.

First, get yourself a good sized pump bottle.  I recommend a pump bottle because the finished product is a little watery.  We just repurposed an old baby wash bottle and removed the labels.

Fill it half way with Dr. Bronner’s Unscented Baby Mild Castile Soap.  Fill the remaining with plain old water.  Voila! You have body wash!

And, if you like a little fragrance in your soap, you can add 15-20 drops of your favorite essential oils.  We chose a blend of Sweet Orange and Lemongrass.

Now, you may notice your skin feels a little tight at first, but I assure you that will go away after a week or so.  Your skin just has to get used to not having all of the added chemicals found in commerical products.

Plus, this stuff lathers just as good as the store bought washes and I have found that if you shut the water off while lathering, you won’t need to use very much at all (and you’ll be saving water too!).

UPDATE: I just tried the Dr Bronner’s Almond Castile soap diluted and I LOVE the smell!  Plus, no need to add Essential Oil (money saver!)

************************************************************************

It's easy, it's cheap, and my skin has no complaints! I give total props to this lovely lady for such an easy tip {now i just need to fix that lotion situation...hmmm}:

Plastic bags have eaten me whole!!!

You know, you can only put so many bags aside to use as mini-trash bags liners. Even with my resolve to bring reusable bags to the store, I seem to have an abundance of these things around! They are taking up valuable space, getting in my way, look trashy, etc. Why? Because I used these things for packing up items for storage, and as I unpack two years worth of squirreling, I find myself utterly over run! Except for the occasional biodegradable bag which shatters at the slightest touch... they weren't kidding about that biodegradable part.

/sigh

What's a girl to do? Well, if she's this girl, she can look around and find out some new uses for bags that will give her hope that hanging onto the darn things will be worth it!

Fused Plastic Gift Bags-with tutorial! Found this awesome little tutorial on craftster.org. It's by Lillianpearl and she says it's her first tutorial but I think it looks pretty good! Way to go, lady :) My mom always saves gift bags too (who doesn't) so these things would get used over and over, it's the ultimate new life for ugly plastic bags.

I also thought this was a nice diversion from the more abundant tutorial of making a reusable shopping bag. Not sure how to fuse bags? Etsy's got you covered here.

While you're wrapping, you could use up some more plastic bags making pom-poms to decorate other packages, just like they do over at c.r.a.f.t. (i thought they were pretty cute, not to mention easy to make, always a win.)

I really enjoyed the look of these clutches over at Crafted by Us. These would make cute gifts too, not to mention they're a great way to use up cute bits and pieces of fabric or ribbon etc. that you just can't bear to get rid of because there's enough to do something it's just not a very big something. 

Not that I ever do that.

Quick! Look at the clutch!

And have you seen the tutorials on making iron-on's our of plastic bags? I wanna try this one, I could see this being really, really fun in a collage kinda way! Not to mention it's so personalized.

These get honorable mention for being cool and creative, but lets be honest, I don't have kids. And the light decor idea doesn't fit my needs...because I'm tall and live in a basement. I'd put my eye out. 

• Lampshade Made From Plastic Bags 

• Fused Plastic Bib 

• Fused Plastic Rain Coat

How to Throw a Party: Part One-Ambiance

am·bi·ance also am·bi·ence  (mb-ns, ä-byäs)

n.

The special atmosphere or mood created by a particular environment: "The noir ambience is dominated by low-key lighting . . . and deep shadows, creating feelings of disorientation, loneliness and entrapment" (UCLA Film/TV Archive).

---

[French, from ambiant, surrounding, from Latin ambins, ambient-; see ambient.]

There are several aspects to putting on a fun party. Mainly you're going for "ambiance," but ambiance can get expensive when, for example,  you don't live in a mansion but you want your house to have that haunted mansion feel, not that Haunted Upstairs Apartment feel. Even when you're not going full hog on some themed out party you can end up spending a wad on ambiance. Then again, ambiance can SAVE you a ton!

Ambiance keeps your party planning focused. Its the first and most important step in your planning because everything hinges on that decision. You don't want to go out and buy a mess of modern cartoony Santa Claus paper plates only to change your color scheme to vintage, right? Sure the show could go on, but wouldn't it be nice to just have it right the first time? You'll feel better, rather than getting stuck thinking about how you coulda-woulda-shoulda. It can also save you some dough because you can choose to come up with a theme that compliments the setting you've already got, thus less work for yourself and your wallet.  That's all up to you and your creative juices.

So how do you create the ambiance, once you've decided what you wanna go for? These are the aspects that I find go into it:
Invitations
Lighting
Music
Decorations
Treats/Food
Entertainment
Clothing
Beverages

Some of you, this is all you need to know. Heck, maybe you didn't even need to know this! But plain and simple, these are the basics. They can be subtle, but they are all part of the whole and if you can manage to cover all of these bases in some way then you're party will be that much better! (In future posts I am going to cover each with some basic brainstorming, etc. Don't worry, I won't leave you hanging!)

Coming up! Part Two: Invitations

I just have to say....

SO....I color coded my storage unit. Its like....a dream come true. You would not believe how many boxes I have of books. Not to mention all the yellow striped craft boxes! You can tell a lot about a girl by the contents of her storage unit and mine says "efficient craftaholic introvert" aaalll over it.  I am not sure why I am this excited. Maybe its because I know finding things in there will be so much easier! Maybe I just want to brag because this took me eight hours to do and my hip joints and lower back are currently reminding me I normally have a desk job. But then again, maybe it goes even deeper. There was some archeological evidence supporting a strange love of filing from a young age. DANG IT! I should have taken a picture! Then I could say "See Article 1.A" and show this lovely picture of the accordion file I still have from when I was a kid. I know this because on the front in big green letters it says my name, address and phone number. I was even smart about it, I put "Lucinda Lane" instead of "Dena Court" so if anyone found it at school then they wouldn't have proof I was being snuck into that district.

...I am pretty sure this means I should have been a spy...

                                      ....A spy with great fashion sense and the ability to make anything given scissors the right amount of glue.