VACATIONING DURING THE DOG DAYS OF SUMMER

I took vacation this year from July 21 to July 27.  My daughter and grand daughter flew in from Florida and my other daughter and grandson came down from Tulsa. The title of my blog came due to the extremely hot and muggy days we were having.

Ever wonder what "dog days" means? Well, I did so I had to look it up.  Here's what it had to say.

The brightest of the stars in Canis Major (the big dog) is Sirius, which also happens to be the brightest star in the night sky. In fact, it is so bright that the ancient Romans thought that the earth received heat from it. Look for it in the southern sky (viewed from northern latitudes) during January. 

In the summer, however, Sirius, the “dog star,” rises and sets with the sun. During late July Sirius is in conjunction with the sun, and the ancients believed that its heat added to the heat of the sun, creating a stretch of hot and sultry weather. They named this period of time, from 20 days before the conjunction to 20 days after, “dog days” after the dog star.

Thought that was rather interesting!  Yet I could definitely say Oklahoma and Texas are having a wee bit more than dog days.  We're having a drought!! But that is subject to change!! We finally got a small cool front with some rain last night and today!! YEA!!  We'll see what the rest of the week brings.  I pray we'll be out of  this blasted 105-113 heat soon because I'm not fond of having to stay in the house all the time!   

On to the reason for this blog.  I had a wonderful time with my girls.  We didn't do much but we decided to go to a favorite place we all really enjoy. Little Niagara in the Chickasaw National Recreation Area in Sulpher, OK.


Now here is a picture of the falls last year.  

When we arrived this year the place was crowded,but we were still able to find a picnic table close to the falls.  This is how the falls looked this year.

Barely a trickle went over the falls.  The creek water was dirty not crystal clear as it usually is.

My oldest daughter and grand kids went in and took their usual walk up to another small fall and back down to the large fall.  See the girls in the background?  That's the small fall. It was barely trickling down the rocks.  


We all had fun but it didn't last very long since it was hot and crowded.  Here are some more pics I took.

After we ate our picnic lunch my youngest DD put down a couple towels over the plastic tablecloth so she could lay down and read.  I was in sitting in my lounge chair taking pictures and watching people.  I love to watch people!!  You see some very interesting things.

This is a little fall just below the big (LOL) Little Niagara fall.  I was wanting to take a picture of a small cave I saw down at the  bottom of these rocks.  I wasn't watching where I was walking so of course I slipped on some moss and landed on my rear. When I fell I tried to catch my self with my hands and jammed my thumb on my left hand.  I sat there rather stunned that it had happened.  A teenager did ask if I needed help, but I said no.  Took my a bit to get up.  I felt like an idiot for not taking into consideration there being moss on the rocks that was still wet.

I just thought this little pool of water was kinda cool looking.

My granddaughter so graciously took the camera and went down to take this picture for me.  I never even realized there was a small opening in these rocks.  Course you never really saw it due to the water flowing over the rocks.  Or maybe you could and I just never noticed it.


The only other interesting thing we did was take the grand kids to a splash pad not too far from my house.  They enjoyed it until too many people started coming there, so we decide to go home. On Tuesday night we went to see  the "Green Lantern" movie.  It was better than what I thought it would be.  My niece ask if I would babysit her dog on Saturday.  Her  Mom was having to study for her sermon Sunday so she really did need to be watching little Lucy. I'll tell you all bout that in another post I'll share this weekend. Other than that the only exciting thing we did was watch movies at home, sleep and eat take out food my daughter from Florida wanted. Hey, there were things here she did not have in Florida so we let her do most of the choosing.   Not the most exciting vacation, but I did enjoy being with my daughters and grand children. Oh, I forgot my youngest DD and I did some thrift shopping one day, but I'll post about that one later.

Enjoy the rest of your summer! 

DIY - - HOME MADE DISHWASHER DETERGENT

I finally got to make the homemade dishwasher detergent!  YEA!!  I really do enjoy making my own laundry and dishwasher soap.  Especially since it cleans  even better than store bought and on the plus side its CHEAPER cost per load! You're calling my name when something is better and cheaper!  The original dishwasher recipe had called for citric acid.  When my DD was here last week for a visit with my DGD we were talking about making our own laundry soap.  I mentioned I wanted to make the dishwasher soap but could not find any citric acid locally and DD told me that I  could use unsweetened  Kool-Aid lemonade in place of citric acid. I had forgotten that I had read you could replace Kool-Aid Lemonade for the citric so I was totally excited that I could now make my dishwasher soap.   Friday after work I came home and made detergent.

Here's a picture of the ingredients. Remember my camera does not take good pictures (or maybe it could be the operator)!!

As you can see by the already opened pkg of Kool-Aid I thought of taking this picture after I had already made the detergent.  Here's a close-up picture of the unopened Kool-Aid.

This is the recipe as I found it on line:

1/2 cup  20 Mule Team Borax
1/2 cup  Super Washing Soda
1/4 cup Kosher Salt
4 packets of Kool-Aid unsweetened Lemonade.

Put all into a bowl and mix well. 

Use 1 TBSP per load 

I wanted a full quart jar of the detergent but did not have enough Kool-Aid packets. I had only bought 10 packets so I fudged on the measurements.

My Recipe Measurements

2-1/2 cups 20 Mule Team Borax
2-1/2 cups Super Washing Soda
2- 1/4 cups Kosher Salt
10 packets of Kool-Aid Lemonade.
   
From what I read on line they stated use only the Lemonade Kool-Aid since the other Kool-Aids will color the inside of your dishwasher.  I can't vouch for that just telling you what I read. Also, on http://jenerallyspeakingblog.blogspot.com/ she used the entire box of borax and super washing soda, 3 cups of Epsom Salt and 24 pkgs of the Kool-Aid.  I just might have to try that next time to save making the soap for a long time.


Here's my finished product.

I went on line and found a picture of a dishwasher. I then saved it into my pictures and opened it up in my handy-dandy GIMP Editor and added my words.  I also did a label for the lid.

 Here's a picture of the dishwasher without the words on it.

 

Feel free to copy the picture of the dishwasher and use it if you want. 

This label I got free off of http://www.cottage-industrialist.com/blog/  They also have other free labels.

Next I will try my hand at making the liquid laundry detergent.  For the recipe on that go to http://andthenshesaidblogblogblog@blogspot.com/.  This is my DD's blog.

I'm off to use my first tablespoon of detergent!!

Have a blessed and wonderful weekend.

PS:  I tried my first dishwasher load with the detergent.  It worked even better than the Cascade I've used. Cascade always left spots of detergent on my lock and lock that I use for work lunches.  Nary a detergent spot on this load and it looked cleaner and brighter than any load I've ever done with any type of store bought detergent. The white vinegar I put in to eliminate spots was awesome! No spots!  This is definitely a keeper.

PPS:  One suggestion.  Put the detergent in something that will not break because it tends to clump up and harden if it sits too long.   If it's in a glass jar you won't be able to hit it against a counter to help break it up. 

CRAFTING SATURDAY!!!

I woke up this Saturday morning in the crafting mood.  I haven't been able to do a whole lot for a while so today was my day!!  What I really wanted to work on was a small metal stool I got at a garage sale for $1.00, but I could not get one of screws out so I'll have to wait on that until I can get someone to help me with that crazy screw. I started my morning by making two small bulletin boards out of picture frames, but when I went to paint them well lets just say I had problems.  On the first one I ran out of black spray paint :<( and on the second the paint is still in the process of drying.  Oklahoma is having extremely hot weather this summer and it's running anywhere from 100 to 110. Mostly in the 105 up area.  It's also humid so paint is not drying quite as fast as it usually does.  So those will have to wait for another post.  Here's what I did today.

My first one was this:

I got the texture from here:  http://www.mayang.com/textures/Metal/html/Flat%20Metal%20Textures/index.html.  Sorry it's so long I bookmarked the page so I would have it to go to. I found a texture I liked and saved it to my pictures on the computer.  When I pulled it up it I opened it up using GIMP Image Editor.  This allowed me to size it big enough for my gallon can.  I actually had to cut off a portion to make it fit the width.  I then took my handy dandy Mod Podge and glued each sheet onto the gallon can.


Cost:    Gallon Can - Free (got off Free cyle)   Texture - Free

You can't beat anything better than that.  In fact all my craft projects today cost me nada, zip, zero!!!

I did two more cans.  The first one I got the image off The Graphic Fairy. Again I used my handy dandy GIMP Image Editor to size it just right for my needs and then Mod Podged them onto the can.

 

This is the last can I did for the day.

You may be wondering why I am doing so many cans.  Guess you could say I am preparing for next spring.  I'm going to use them to put plants in.  I.E.  ivy, succulents, etc.  I have four more can's to do!!

And for my last project of the day. 

This is part of a container that held cd's.  The sound guy at church has to buy the cd's by the case, since we use so many.  They just throw away the container when the last cd is used. One day I noticed them in the trash can and it got me to thinking "Surely they can be used for something else." I pulled three out of the trash.  Each container had a little round black disc that you pull out  Guess it was used on the top of the first cd.  I hung on to them for several weeks and then one day it dawned on me. USE THEM TO HOLD YOUR BRACELETS AND RINGS, so I hung them on the wall and put my rings and bracelets on them.  They look rather bland hanging there without any embellishments on them.  I wanted something to make them stand out.  I looked on the web for something to put on the little round disc and found nothing.  I looked through all my scrap book paper.  Again, nothing, but then I remembered I had some material, so I pulled out the box and found the leopard material.  I used the big portion and drew a circle on the material then cut it out and Mod Podged the material on the disc. Hopefully I can find something besides nails to hang up my wonderful little jewelry holders.  If you have any ideas please let me know.  In the meantime the old gray matter will be putting a lot of thought into what I can use beside the ugly nails.

 

Here's all three of them. I think they look pretty good over my mirror.  As for the lids to the cd container.

I used them to put all my ear rings in.  In August I get to buy the paint for my bedroom.  Can't wait to paint my room.  

 I had a fun and fruitful day!!  Really wish I could have more of those days.  There's nothing more fun than doing somthing creative.

Hope ya'll have a fun and blessed week.