Remember, how I mentioned we think Maxx is getting a bit rolley-polley?
Yeah...about that.
When I was back visiting home, Cody ran through Starbucks drive through with Maxx. Turns out they give "Puppy Lattes" to dogs in the drive through! So, on a recent trip to Starbucks we had Maxx with us and let him have another. This is only his second one, and he won't be getting them often. I have no clue how healthy they are, and he doesn't need to be too spoiled!
Turns out it is just milk foam, and looks like whipped cream.
He loves it! We let him enjoy while we waited for our drinks, and then I took it away while we were driving home. He stared at the cup the whole way home like this:
After successfully using the homemade laundry detergent for several months, I started wondering if I could make dishwasher soap too. A quick pinterest search later and I had a recipe!
1 Cup Borax
1 Cup Washing Soda
1/2 Cup Salt
1/2 Cup Lemi-Shine
Combine all in airtight container. Use 1 Tbs per load.
Easy peasy lemon squeezy!
*I also always use vinegar as a rinse aid in every load, no matter what detergent I use*
I still had the soda and borax left over from the laundry detergent. I think I've made 4 batches of detergent and one batch of dishwasher soap and still have half a box leftover each. We always have salt too, so the only thing I purchased for this was the Lemi-Shine. It's key to the recipe because it prevents the dishes from being cloudy, especially if you have hard water like we do. At first I didn't think I could find it, but trip #2 to Walmart and there it was! Apparently they were just out of it the first time. It's located in the dish soap aisle near the rinse aides and was about $2.50 ish. Unfortunately, I think this small container will only make two batches of soap. Still saving money though since I won't have to buy everything else!
For now I'm storing it in this plastic food container. I wanted to make sure it worked before buying anything more fancy/permanent.
Definitely saving some space compared to the Finish packaging! I wasn't unhappy with the Finish brand, and was really only using that one versus Cascade because it was cheapest at Costco. My only complaint was that if I didn't use vinegar as a rinse aid, the dishes would have little specs of detergent on them.
The results? AWESOME. I really didn't expect it to be different at all, because I thought I was happy with the Finish. However, I compared glasses (did not photograph well at all) and realized that the Finish glass had more water spots, and left a film on the inside of the glass! The homemade batch left all the dishes looking shiny and crystal clear, with few water spots. They also felt much smoother compared to the almost waxy film left by the Finish. I had always blamed the poor quality on the old dishwasher, but it looks like it was my soap all along!
After I rearranged underneath the sink and finished taking pictures, I looked up to find Zoey sitting like this staring at me!
We always take Maxx with us when we go, and I can honestly say I've only gone without him twice.
It wasn't nearly as much fun as when he goes! We take him in the car with us a lot, but he always seems to know when we are destined for Petsmart and gets so excited!
See that blur of a tail? Yeah, that tail doesn't stop moving the whole time we are in the store!
Maxx will be one year old February 14th! He has grown so much since we got him. We use the store's scale every now and then to weigh him. We've been thinking he looks a little...roley poley, and at 42 pounds he's probably getting close to pushing his limits. We are working on getting him more exercise!
This trip to the store was slightly special. Maxx got to pick out a new tag for his collar! Okay...we picked it out (he has horrible taste in such things). The one he had was from the shelter and fit him just fine when he was this big:
Aww, look how tiny!
Now that he is twice as big as Zoey he definitely needed an upgrade!
Check out my awesome, very grown up Air Force collar!
Here is the old one. Tiny and always bugged me that you could see more of his yellow tag (microchip info tag) more than his name tag.
Laser engraving his name.
We picked out a bigger one, and then got to use the stores laser tag engraving machine. This thing was so cool. Easy to use and so neat to watch the little laser beams etch into the metal!
New tag!
Look how grown up! The new tag has his name and phone number on the back, and this fetching bone design on the front. I actually liked the paw print design better, but he does LOVE his bones so this one is more appropriate!
He's so spoiled. We also picked Zoey up a laser light to play with so she didn't feel left out!
Just in case you have the Lady and the Tramp new collar scene stuck in your head now...oh just me? Ok, then for some Disney cuteness...
I ran across this recipe today on pinterest and had to make it! Looked delicious and, since we won't be roasting marshmallows anytime this season, was a good substitute.
Bonus, I had all the ingredients except the marshmallow fluff and chocolate! It was easy to make and didn't take long either. I ended up using a round cake pan because we don't have a square one yet. It worked just fine, just looks like cookie pie instead of bars.
The verdict: YUM. Cody had 1 1/2 pieces and asked if I could make it everyday. It is super rich though, but still so good!
For our guest book at our wedding we had guests sign wine corks. With some awesome help from my Aunts we collected a ton of corks! After the wedding I had a bunch leftover just waiting for a project.
I found this Monogram Letter idea via pinterest (finding lots of neat ideas there!) and thought it looked easy enough!
I picked up a wooden "M" from Hobby Lobby for about $1.50 with a coupon. I sorted out the blank corks for the middle and the decorated/printed corks for the outside. Then I hot glued away!
95 corks, 9 glue sticks, and 3 burnt fingers later and I had this:
I'm not sure what I'll do with it yet. I originally was going to add ribbon and hang it on the front door, but now I might just set it on the mantle or hang it on a wall some where. For now it's living on the kitchen table. Which still looks pretty cool.
I recently ran across this recipe for laundry soap via pinterest. At first I thought "Why in the world would I take the time/effort to do that?" but the recipe was actually really simple. Once I saw that it made enough for an estimated 576 loads for $6 I was sold!
I figured it was worth a try for that price!
(Plus, hearing my sister mad it and it was working well didn't hurt either!)
I found the washing soda, borax, and bar of soap (Dove) at Walmart, and totaled about $10.
I ended up making half a batch since my pot wasn't big enough for full one!
It was super easy, didn't take long, and I have a ton of supplies left over.
I'm storing it in my old Tide bottles, so I can use the lid to measure, and so far it's working really well! It doesn't leave a strong soap scent, and everything looks clean.
I even washed Cody's yucky muddy/sweaty workout shoes and they came out looking brand new!
