What's Cookin'?

You don't want to know.  But I'm going to tell you anyway because I am so excited about it!  I have been boiling clothes and dish cloths and my cleaning rags.  Why?  Because it cleans them miraculously!  You know how dish rags and hand towels get kind of stiff after a while?  Well, apparently it's because there is still a TON of dirt in them. 

I pulled the dish cloths out of my drawer where I keep the clean ones (which I change every day, by the way) and put them into a stock pot with some Oxi-clean and some Borax powder.  I boiled them for a few hours and this is what the water looked like when I got ready to dump it out:

 

 Isn't that disgusting?  These are my dish cloths we're talking about!  The ones I use to wipe the counters and table and wash the dishes that we eat off of.  (Okay, that's not exactly true: my dishwasher washer 99.9% of our dishes.)  It made me want to throw out all my dish cloths and buy new ones.  But we're going on a cruise so I need to be extra frugal.  Instead I got fresh water and did it again with the same dish cloths.  I then threw them in the washing machine on a normal cycle with normal laundry detergent and they came out softer and more pliable than ever!  Now I feel like they are clean (boy do I wish there was some kind of home testing kit that I could buy to measure bacteria) and I am so excited about this.  I want to boil everything!  I want to boil my favorite robe (it's white) that I just can't part with because I love it so much, but has too many stains on the front from doing dishes to actually wear.  I'm going to have to get me one of those big, giant pots people use for canning.

 I also did a pot of whites and my favorite pajama shirt that has turned grayish and was no longer soft is now softer than I remember it ever being and the gray is gone!  The deoderant stains came almost completely out of our white shirts, then I rubbed some Fels-Naptha soap on them and threw them in the washing machine and guess what -- they came out beautifully!  It also worked on the ring around the collar of Rob's shirts. 

Note: When checking to see if the stains are gone, use some kitchen tongs.  I held them over the sink with the kitchen tongs, then sprayed them with my faucet sprayer to get the soap and excess dirt out before repeating the boiling or throwing them into the wash.  I know this seems like a lot of work, but mostly you just need to be around in case the pot boils over.  Need some inspiration to get you started: when I finished with my dish cloths, there was a really gross, thick layer of white on the bottom of my pot.  It took some serious scrubbing with a harsh green scrubby sponge thing to get it to come off.  Just think - that was in my dish cloths!

Warning: My son's off-white shirt is no longer off-white.  It worked a little too well.

Anyway, I am excited about this and thought I would share.  I got the idea from one of my favorite blogs: The Lazy Organizer.  She uses Biz laundry detergent instead of Borax and Oxi-Clean.  She's been able to get nail polish and ink out of clothing and wrote about it on her blog.

Various Pictures - February 2010

At Ashlie's last swim meet - She's the one on the right, eating an apple, while waiting for her next race.

 

  

Swim meets go a lot faster for Olivia and Alex if I let them play games on my tiny computer while they wait.  A typical meet is about 2 hours long.

  

2 hours is a long time for baby Avery to be in a confined area, but he is usually pretty darn good considering the circumstances.

  

Avery LOVES my phone.  I wish there was a stronger word that could explain just how much he loves it.  Tip for new moms and dads: NEVER let your baby play with your phone.  You let them once and then they whine and cry and complain every other time you say "no".  Seriously, just make it known that it is OFF LIMITS.  I so regret that I let him play with it because now he is unbearable when I tell him he can't play with it!

  

I just love this picture of Olivia!

  

A side view of my new hair cut.  Unfortunately, my hair grows really fast and I already need another hair cut.  It's only been 2 and a half weeks and it's already touching my shoulders!  Yet another reason I haven't kept a short hair cut for very long.

  

Just bein' cute:

 

A New Game To Play

Remember Chinese jump-ropes?  At an activity at Ashlie's school last week my kids learned to play with a Chinese jump-rope.  They had a great time and made their own jump-ropes out of elastic when we got home.