0091 - I should be sleeping...

I was wondering why Facebook traffic has slowed, and then I took a look at the clock... it's 1 AM... on a school night... Somehow my body clock readjusts if I have too much time off and I will stay up until 3 or 4 am, waking around 10 or 11 am. Not to intentionally create a pun here, but when it happens - it's like clockwork. Right now I'm not tired at all...

I've been cooking for the past couple of weeks. So far, so good. I've lost about nine pounds and eaten a greater variety of food (Guiness beef stew, a chicken casserole, and beef stronganoff so far). The sleep may be helping... I never got enough sleep before, and now I'm not setting any alarms so I wake up when I wake up. I also started exercising a little bit because as much as I hate being fat, I hate being weak even more. I've never been weak and I don't like it but I noticed that my strength and endurance suck lately. Along with recipes and decorating tips, I've started to pin exercise routines on my Pinterest boards that I can do with no equipment, or those I can do with a resistance band.

I can't eat it every day, but this is my favorite food hack... take one box of angel food cake and mix it with any other flavor of cake mix you want... strawberry... lemon... devil's food... chocolate... whatever floats your boat. They call it 3-2-1 cake. You take 3 Tbsp of the combined mix, add 2 Tbsp of water, and microwave it for 1 minute. Voila - you have individual cakes like the Betty Crocker Warm Delights - but for a fraction of the price. Seriously, you can make probably 50 cakes for the cost of two boxes of cake mix, versus 50 cakes for around $2.50/ea and cooked in plastic that probably contains BPA. Me likey.

As you may have guessed, I'm on a homemade stuff kick. I've been meaning to get around to it for months now, but I wasn't finding recipes that I liked. Sure sea salt and baking soda works as a toothpaste... but I don't particularly like it. So when we get the RV back and I have my bag of bentonite clay and my stevia extract, I'm going to try this recipe. It has no fluoride and I control what goes into it. Fluoride is bad for you, it affects your thyroid, and it causes infertility, among other things. Glycerin, "an ingredient in some toothpastes, can interfere with strengthening your teeth. Glycerin layers your tooth in a sticky film that keeps minerals in your saliva from interacting with your enamel to strengthen it." Supposedly your teeth are just like any other bone, and given the opportunity (i.e. the right nutrition and non-interference with their natural cleaning processes) can heal and be strengthened. It makes sense to me... I never stopped to think that teeth are made of bone just like your leg - which can break, and knit itself back together.

And... I'm almost out of shampoo. Shampoo is not only expensive, but it is chock full of chemicals as well. I'm not ready to go 'no poo'... which is washing your hair with baking soda and then conditioning it with apple cider vinegar - even though... proponents claim to love it once they have gone through the greasy hair transition period (your body is so used to compensating for the oil that shampoos strip out of your hair that it goes into overdrive until it goes through a reset period, or so they say).  I can't stand it when my hair is greasy... not for one day, much less 28 of them. So... I'm going to try this formulation which does have a little bit of shampoo in it, but it's baby shampoo and they suggest organic so it shouldn't have all the fragrances and sulfates. I have a lot of coconut oil to use, so why not? If I don't like it I haven't wasted much because I have most of the ingredients already.

For chemical avoidance, and (okay it could be equally for) frugality reasons, I'm also jumping on the homemade cleaner bandwagon. My favorite find is this homemade laundry detergent that you can use in HE washers. I haven't decided if I'm going to add the fabric softener to it or not, it seems sort of contrary to the reasons I'm making it, and Mike's skin appears to be sensitive to fragrance, but anyway... I like the price... instead of buying detergent at $10 a pop and getting maybe 40 loads, this stuff supposedly makes enough for 2,184 loads at around $28... I, personally, think it costs a little more than that but still, it's quite a savings.

And then there are all the basic cleaners... window... all purpose... bleach... and my favorite - homemade Febreze. Febreze is incredibly simple, and you can make a larger variety of scents because it's just water and liquid fabric softener. I've always found the real stuff to have a slightly chemical smell mixed in with the 'fresh' scent, and maybe this is a way to alleviate that (and yes, I realize there are still chemicals in there).

Citrus infused vinegar is another option for cleaning and supposedly it smells like oranges, not vinegar. Homemade color catchers, if you use them would save tons of money. Foaming handsoap, much cheaper than ready made. DIY room fragrances are so, so easy (I'm thinking cinnamon and clove). And DIY baby wipes... you don't have to have a baby to use them, they can remove makeup, clean your hands when you can't get to the sink, take a sponge bath if water isn't available, etc. They aren't septic safe though, so no flushing...

There are several food mixes I want to try too, but I'm waiting on the 5'er for those since I have a lot of the ingredients already... onion soup mix (have done this one actually, and Mike said he preferred it to Lipton's for making onion dip)... ranch mix... homemade bisquick... pancake mix... pudding mix... cocoa mix... spice mixes (taco seasoning, etc.). There are so many neat ideas out there to save you money and stop the extra ingredients and fillers from getting into your system.

Enough of that.

Mike is still on travel, somewhere in Arkansas on his way to Missouri. After this stint we're going to retrieve our house... tired of being without it. When we could take off any time to go get it, it wasn't ready... the minute Mike gets a job - poof! It's ready. Hopefully we'll be able to stop by Tennessee and look at a couple of homes we're interested in on the way back to Texas. For the foreseeable future we'll be somewhat Texas-based since the home office is in Dallas, but we hope to eventually transition to another office that will put us where we want to be. Because yes, we still want to be there. Speaking for myself, I want to be there very badly; I hate even the little bit of traffic we have here in Georgetown.

I'm trying to figure out how to get him healthy foods on the road. If we can take the 5'er and he comes home at night it's not really a problem. If he's gone on multiple night stints and can't come home I have ideas but haven't tested them yet. They didn't occur to me until he'd already gone... :(

As for me, I have a couple of potential job possibilities in the works. If either of them pans out I will be a happy camper. I don't know that that will be the case, but I will keep my fingers crossed. One could happen any day. The other wouldn't start until the new year but I will know more at the end of November. Both would be good opportunities, so I really can't lose if either of them come to fruition.

Okay, so now that you're caught up, and you have been loaded up with DIY stuff... I'm going to try and find the sandman because we need to have some pillow talk. Good night!