Toothpaste - it's not just for teeth

Permanent Marker Removal

Unfortunately, we live in a small house so craft time is at the kitchen/dining room table. Gavin was coloring a picture one day (boy, it was beautiful). Oops! He was using permanent maker and it soaked through the paper all over our table!  How on earth do you get permanent marker out of wood? I tried numerous things to no avail. Then I did what every resourceful mother does and googled my problem.  Whoo hoo! I found an answer. A little unexpected, I'd say. But here it is: toothpaste!

I simply squirted toothpaste on the marker.
Took a rag and gently scrubbed.
Amazing! The toothpaste took the marker right off!

Zit Cream

Another use of toothpaste that I found back in high school -- big zits. If you have a pimple that is unresponsive to any other anti-acne cream, put a dab of toothpaste on before bed (I know, not very attractive) but by morning, the pimple should be ready to pop or dried out.  

Colored Ice Balls

This one is cool!  And I have to credit Grandma Barb - she made these and had them outside their store (Legends of the Celts) on Main St in Hayward during the Birkebeiner weekend. So many people stopped to admire them and my kids thought they were pretty neat, too. So we made our own.  This is how we did it:

Supplies Needed:

Balloons (probably 10-12'' work best)
Cookie sheets (or something to put filled balloons in to transport)
Food coloring
Kitchen faucet

Steps to Make "Ice Balls":

Put a few drops of food coloring inside the empty balloon.
Fill the balloons with water and tie, placing on cookie sheet (or some container)

After filling balloons with water & food coloring they need to be frozen.  We placed ours on the cookie sheets outside. Luckily, it was a below zero night here in the Northwoods and they froze overnight.  Quite possibly, it may take a few nights for them to freeze solid. 

Once the water is frozen, simply cut open the balloon and peel it off the ice.  (Ours weren't completely frozen solid, but the water just oozed out the middle and they kept their shape perfectly.)

My husband suggested rotating them every hour or so at first if you want more uniform color.

And next time we make them, we will try to place them in the snow to freeze - that way they won't have flat bottoms and sides where they are touching other things!

There you go! You now have colored ice balls to decorate your yard, planters, or as my son did, patio.  Great winter fun! (I'll post pictures later...)

Everyday Essential Oils Spray Cleaner

As anyone with children knows, cleaning is a never ending process.  I truly feel like it's all I do! And if you use traditional cleaners with all those chemicals it's really not that good for anyone either.

I have to give credit to Aunt Karen for this one. One Christmas a few years ago, she gave all of us cute little bottles of essential oils spray cleaner.. I don't think I've used anything else since...It works on absolutely EVERYTHING (and smells great, too!)

Her recipe may have been different but this is what I typically use now:

Everyday Essential Oils Spray Cleaner:

1 empty spray bottle (I like to recycle like an old glass cleaner bottle)
fill the bottle about 2 inches from the top with water
add a few drops of natural dish soap
add a cap full of vodka
10-15 drops each lemon, lavender, and eucalyptus oils
(Sometimes I'll add rosemary, grapefruit, or orange to change things up)

Shake it up and spray away!

I use it, seriously, everywhere. I clean my counters, kitchen, bathroom, windows, laminate flooring, ceramic tile, and more.

Sometimes, I put the ingredients in a bowl and use it to clean my floors. The house sure smells wonderful afterwards!

Scented Play Dough

We've tried various play dough recipes, but today's was the best so far. I hadn't had cream of tartar on hand so I was looking only for recipes that excluded it. However, I think it's a huge bonus to use it! And just for the fun of it, I used some essential oils to make the play dough smelly. (I'm sure others before me have done the same, but I hadn't seen any recipes for it and I have a tendency to try essential oils in everything.)

Scented Play Dough Recipe

2 C flour

2 C warm water

1 C salt

2 Tbs vegetable oil

1 Tbs cream of tartar

Mix all the ingredients together in a pan and cook over medium heat, stirring frequently. It will be lumpy and look like mashed potatoes. When it starts to peel away from the sides of the pan, it is done. However, if it is still very sticky, cook it longer.

(Mine was pretty sticky but I couldn't really stir it to cook it any longer so I added just a bit more water and then cooked it again.)

Once it has cooled enough to work with it, place it on wax paper (or something like that) in 4-5 balls.  Here comes the fun part!

Make a little crater in the balls of dough.  Then add 4-5 drops of food coloring and 4-5 drops of essential oil*. ( I suppose you can use other things to color - like unsweetened drink mix; and other things to scent but this is what I used)

Fold the dough over on top of the color and oil. Continue to mash and knead it until the oil and color are evenly distributed and absorbed. (Use rubber gloves to avoid rainbow colored hands, if you so choose.  My hands are nice and colorful today!)

Add more color or essential oil, if needed. **

Today's scents: peppermint, lemon, lavender, eucalyptus, geranium

** Be careful, though, not to add too much oil.  Essential oils are very concentrated and you really don't need much at all!

Store in air tight containers. I placed mine each in a separate sandwich bag (immediately to keep the scent and moisture locked in) and am demanding that my children only play with one color at a time! (Maybe we won't have to make another batch of play dough in another day if they don't mix them and leave it out!)

* see my blog post (when I finally get it done...) on the benefits of various essential oils. Hoping that they work their magic on my kids while they are playing with the play dough...