DIY Vanilla Extract

When faced with my husband's question of why, exactly, I was making our own vanilla, the only answer I could come up with at the time was that I could.

A better answer would have been to explain to him that I like the idea of going back as many steps as possible when making food from scratch, and that going back and making as much as possible at home increases the transparency of what is in the food and makes it simpler for your body to digest.

Hm.

Anyway, I found a few recipes (Caveman Keto and The Prairie Homestead) and they basically seemed the same.  

Slice a vanilla bean in half, put it into a glass bottle, and pour vodka or bourbon over it and let it sit.  Times vary from 6 weeks to 6 months in the recipes; I will smell mine at 6 weeks and see.  We chose bourbon because we are used to using bourbon vanilla and, if faced with any leftover, we prefer bourbon to vodka.

  Label it if you want. Shake it every so often.  

Looks like when it is ready, you can leave the used bean in there and re-fill it with alcohol and let it sit again (and re-use the bean indefinitely).  Or take the bean out and give the bean a second life in your sugar storage bin making vanilla sugar.


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Sourdough Bagels

I saw this post on 60 Ways to Make Sourdough and was inspired to do more than the Tartine Country Loaf I have been making (and everyone has been loving).

I started with the sourdough bagel recipe.  I used my starter (there it is in the back, in the big glass jar) the night before and made the dough, then let it sit overnight.  In the morning, we shaped the bagels, boiled them, and baked them.  They were surprisingly good, and surprisingly easy.  The only modification we did was not adding sugar to the boiling water, and pushing some frozen blueberries into some of the bagels after boiling. 

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Homemade Toothpaste

I tried making two recipes for homemade toothpaste.  I made Homemade Squeezable Toothpaste and DIY Remineralizing Toothpaste.  Another option, which I didn't make, was the Homemade Remineralizing Toothpaste. There are a ton of recipes out there, which seem to be variations of Bentonite Clay, Coconut Oil, Peppermint Oil, Baking Soda, and Salt (mostly).  I made both and put them in these BPA free tubes.

They are... ok. I keep wanting a bit more zing like I get with Ecodent tooth powder (see this post).

Want to learn more? Read Cure Tooth Decay by Ramiel Nagel. It's fabulous.  Ok, he talks about what to eat and to do oil pulling and use a waterpik, but it's a great read (and slightly on-topic).

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Fireplace Remodel Part 4: Lighting

Here is the "before" photo for the project.  Notice the lighting: two matching lamps.  Nothing special- just balanced on both sides.

Then the fireplace was finished, and the space for the lamp on one side was now taken up by a piece of furniture for the TV stuff.

So now we at least have a workable solution, though it is nothing fabulous.  We found a table lamp which looks similar to the original floor lamp.

Perhaps one day we will do something permanent with lighting in this room, like sconces or track lighting or something.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Fireplace Remodel Part 1: The Chimney

Fireplace Remodel Part 2: Bricks to Ledgestone, the Firebox, the Gasline, and the Electrical 

Fireplace Remodel Part 3: Natural Stone Mantle, Mounting the TV, Gas Logs, Decorating

Fireplace Remodel Part 4: Lighting 

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DIY Lip Balm

We decided to spend a little time making some of our own cosmetics.  First up- lip balm.



We found two recipes and assembled our ingredients and the tins/ labels. I decided to use metal tins instead of plastic containers because I would be filling them hot and didn't want plastic residue in our lip balm. I used these tins, but these also look nice.

Here is the chocolate recipe.
Here is the peppermint recipe.

Turns out that both recipes called for beeswax, coconut oil, and peppermint oil.  The chocolate recipe also called for cocoa butter and cocoa powder.  The peppermint recipe also called for honey.

Both were easy to make, but I thought the chocolate was easier, only because the honey didn't end up melting all the way and clumped into a few of the containers.  I also should have halved the peppermint recipe.

They both go on nicely, but I like the feel of the chocolate one better.  The taste is actually a bit strong for me; I think that next time I will use the cocoa butter only and skip the cocoa powder.

 

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Smoothie Help

 

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Persimmon Cubes

These are ripe pointy (Hacyiya) Persimmons.

To keep them a bit longer, we wanted to freeze them... but in usable portions.  So we put them into the food processor.

Then I froze them in our ice cube tray.

And they are going to be stored in freezer bags so we can use them in smoothies.

 
 Or eat them plain!

 

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DIY Crock Rocks- Fermentation Crock Weights

I saw crock rocks on amazon as a way to hold down the plate that fits inside the fermentation crock.  Brilliant!

But wait- I have rocks.



So I washed one, covered it in tin foil, and put it on the inside plate atop our newest batch of sauerkraut.

 

 

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Organizing Seeds

I saw a post (sorry I didn't bookmark it!) where someone did their winter gardening and organized their seeds.  I was inspired.  My seeds were in a plastic shoebox, strewn about.

I had to contend with this:

but was able to cut file folders into the right shape (of mini-dividers), then paperclip seed bags onto them, label them, and alphabetize them.

My favorite?  The potato seed.  It's in a bag, labeled for potato.

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Upcycle Workout Pants to Bikram Shorts and Owly Baby Yoga Pants

This was an old pair of navy blue workout pants.  They were a bit short for my liking.

So... I cut off the bottoms and hemmed the top part.

Here are my new Bikram shorts:



Here are my younger son's new yoga pants, based on the Owly Baby Yoga Pants pattern.

 

 

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