life with soapnuts

Months ago, I've tried making my own shampoo.. well, not really my own.. but a DIY shampoo.
I ordered my self a bottle of castile liquid, brewed some rosemary and wah lah...
my own diy shampoo...

After using it alternative days for 2 weeks. I didn't feel that the texture of my hair has change instead it became drier. So to counter that with rinsing it off with 1 part vinegar and 2 part brew rosemary...
I was hoping that it would help with me scalp condition, but it didn't. So i gave up after 2 weeks of trial.


Then came my discovery of soapnuts.
I realize I have not pen down my experience with soapnuts ever since I started using it.
I LOVE it.!!
I've used it for laundry wash and the cloths came out soft and clean and did i mention soft...? I mean ... really soft comparing with washing our cloths with the normal detergent. Yes, normal detergent does give the nice fragrance but after drying it under the sun, the cloths are all stiff and hard. You know what I mean?

I don't like to use softener cos I feel like, I'm adding too many chemical just to wash my cloths and it does more harm then good. On top of that, the cloths would not last long as well.
What I do is, I would add some of my fruit enzyme and sodium bicarbonate. The enzyme is for extra cleaning and the sodium bicarbonate is for stains. I can do away with the softener.


I've even tried cleaning my old jewelry and coin collections. I reuse the soapnuts from my laundry wash, soaked it for about 2 days and everything was bright and shinny. It looks like brand new.., clean! Well if you ignore the scratches and all.


Since my diy castile shampoo did not do so well with my scalp problem... I'm trying soapnuts this time around.

Will see what happen....

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handmade

I've been storing my 500pcs of muslin bags for ages now... and this year around it has finally been leaving me bit by bit.

My first successful buyer makes handmade accessories and cards. Looking at her paper crafts brings me back to me high school times when I use to be quite 'active' in handycraft stuffs. :)
I remember making my own recycle papers.... making my own notebook with nice little detailed hard cover to go with it... ahh... those were the days...

Anyways,..
I looked thru her site and saw something that I like. A nice looking necklace to add on to my collection. The price was reasonable, so I made the purchase.
Joey was nice enough to throw in a discount price and a little cute pin.
so niceeeeeee :D

The necklace came with the muslin bag. Love it.

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simple weekend lunch

Made dried noodles with stir fried beef on the weekend. On top of that, I couldn't help myself to make another round of herbal chicken since I have a quarter of chicken before I restock some fresh meat for the coming week.

This dried noodles recipe is really easy. Normally the 'mr' would whip this meal up when we're lazy to head out for lunch. Cook the noodles, chop some fresh shallots, add some pepper, cook garlic oil, a spoon full of oyster sauce and mix it all up.

photo by melmok

photo by melmok

This time around I made a stir fried beef to go with it.

photo by melmok

photo by melmok

photo by melmok

Mix it up and you have a yummy fast lunch.

photo by melmok

Plus my mouth watering herbal chicken that would keep me alert for the day.

photo by melmok

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stir fried pea shoots

Made stir fried pea shoots with garlic, prawns, wolfberries and dried oysters last week.
The wolfberries and dried oysters was an additional ingredients... I soaked both ingredients thinking that I was going to make soup.... my brain was not working well that evening.

So instead of wasting it, I added it to the pea shoots dish. :)

photo by melmok

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brandy 'thedog'

I've been keeping track on how Brandy 'thedog' has progress/change since we got her by taking snap shots of her every week (well mostly every week).
I was looking through her pictures and notice how time has pass so quickly. I remember the day we saw her and the day she came into our life. Mischievous innocent looking little puppy…

photo by melmok

photo by melmok

photo by melmok

We had the intention to bring her to dog training classes, as usual we delayed it and it's been 2 years now. She does know the basic commands.

photo by melmok

I didn't realize her 'maturity' until we bought her some new toys recently.
We were expecting her to destroy the toy within 24hrs. But to our surprise, her toy is still in full intact.
She still can't get enough of food even after feeding her, she would still follow us around hoping that we will give her more food.

Recently, the vet said she's fat and looks like a piglet….. hahaha...

photo by melmok

she still hates her bathing session.

photo by melmok

As she gets older, she destroy less things now...

For example....
footwear :
We have lost numbers of slippers and shoes when she was younger. As time goes by, with some scolding and training she doesn't bite off our footwear anymore.
We can safely leave our footwear at the porch area and it will still be intact the next morning.

plants:
Our plants are safer now cos she used to bite off the leaves of any plants at the porch. In the end, we had to place 'playpans', protecting the plants at the corner of the porch. Recently, I've tried leaving the 'ungated' plant area open to see if she would bite the leaves off. Nothing happened.. she sniffed around and left the plants alone….  *happy me…*

Just when I thought I could take the 'playpans' away, I discovered something.

Brandy 'thedog', has a very interesting hobby.
She likes to bark at lizards, hunt them, play with them, and then kill them. Cockroaches wasn't spare as well. hahahaha....


One afternoon, (the 'ungated' plant area was open) she spotted a lizard on the wall behind the pot plants, then she bark and scratch her way to get the lizard and the plants fell to the ground. From then onwards, it wasn't the bitting of plants anymore, it was her hobby of catching 2,4 or 6 legged creatures. With the 'playpans' around, she would just bark at the lizards, but without the 'playpans', she would just go full charge attacking the poor little lizard.

photo by melmok

photo by melmok

The thing that I notice now is that she barks more often then last time. Anyone who comes by or anyone who walk pass our house or even kids playing outside our house, she would bark and bark and bark…. Most of these people are 'regular' by passer. She practically sees them everyday, but yet she still barks at them. My 'mr' said that most likely the kids likes to tease her. But then my neighbor who goes in and out of the house, and sees her everyday would also gets her barking. The funny thing is that, she only barks when she knows that we are watching her or when we are watching tv at the living room. She would bark, then turn around to look at us to make sure that we are looking and continue with her barking.

why…why does she do that?… 
hmmmm...

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seeds,pots,bags

While searching for places to buy pots, herbs and nursery I finally found a few places that sells vegetable seeds in a bundle.
If only I've found these places 4 years ago.. my mini muslin bags would not have gone to waste and I would have been able execute my wedding gifts. bleehh...

how things have change just in a span of 4 years...

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