No Poo?

About a year ago I came across the concept of going "Poo Free" which is just going shampoo free, some even go soap free as well. I thought it was an interesting concept and people were raving about it but I didn't give it much more thought than, "Hmm."

Then about a week ago I came across this blog:
I haven't used soap or shampoo in a year, and it's awesome: personal experiment update

and it struck my interest up again. Then one of my Facebook friends posted a question about going poo free within the same week and I was like, "Whoa, this is a weird coincidence." AND THEN I saw a link to this blog post:

Triclosan, Soap and Pregnancy...What's the big deal? (GIVEAWAY!) 

which includes a link to a site called Skin Deep which will tell you the toxicity rating of the cosmetic products you use, enough to make you cringe...also in the blog post is a giveaway for handmade soaps.

All this lead up to something wonderful happening, I don't know why it took so long but a light bulb exploded in my head!

Anything that we buy in the store, we can make ourselves.

DUH!

I mean, that IS what people did before businesses started making the stuff for us and we all forgot how to make the stuff ourselves and then it became so convenient we started buying stuff we really don't need and now there are shows like Hoarders and people have bad credit.

I'm guilty, you're guilty, we're all damn guilty!

So anyway, I think I may go poo free, there is tons of information about it on the internet and you can choose your cleaning method. Some just rinse with water, some use only conditioner, I've seen some about people not using regular liquid shampoo but bar shampoo and then there is the most popular method of choice: baking soda with apple cider vinegar rinse. I think that is the route I am going to try. I figure with the surgery coming up next week it will be the perfect opportunity to try this out and see how it goes. There is a transition phase that will be tough to get through though. 

Here's what happens:

Shampoo strips your hair of natural oils, in return, your scalp produces MORE oils to make up for the oils that were stripped, therefore if you skip a day of shampooing your hair gets really greasy/oily really fast. 

You just have to get through that transition period where your scalp is trying to regulate the natural oils on your head and then your free...poo free!

I will however not be going soap free.

I instead will try my hand at making my own soap. Really, how hard can it be? I already make my own detergent, so I'm sure bar soap isn't any harder, not to mention you probably get a few bars out of every batch. I probably will still buy antibacterial hand soap though for when I cook with raw meat and clean up yucky baby poop and stuff that's gross.

I think going poo free will be better for the fam, especially the girls. Even though they bathe/shower everyday they only get soaped up as needed. I can always tell when they use soap too, frizzy hair and ashy skin and that is exactly the same thing that happens to me. 

If this goes well (poo free and handmade soap) deodorant and toothpaste will be next to research on the "do it myself" list.

So, with everything I'm starting to do myself, little by little, I'm feeling kinda like a modern day pioneer woman (which I'm still really far from) and I really like that feeling. 

Now to only figure out the deal with going organic which I've been putting off and putting off...baby steps...

Homemade Laundry Detergent

We made our own laundry detergent! So far I love it! Simple to make, makes a lot for a small price and seems to get my clothes cleaner than commercial detergent. The first load I washed with it was a load of cloth diaper inserts, when they came out they were soft like when I first bought them and I swear they were whiter. Here's the recipe I used but I think we'll also go through this list and try some others.

Here are the only ingredients: soap, borax, washing soda and water (not pictured)

The washing soda was the hardest to find but we finally found it at our local Ace Hardware store.

Dissolving the soap in the heated water, not as quick as it would seem, once the water starts getting super soapy it takes longer to get the last pieces dissolved.

The day after is was a firm gel but a quick stir broke it up and it's super easy to use! I love it!

Steps To Healthier Living

I hate grocery shopping! Especially the checking out part when I get stuck with a $400 bill for two weeks worth of groceries. I have friends who are coupon gods, saving boatloads of money on groceries. I have not seen one coupon for any items typically on our grocery list except for cereal. "They" (whoever they are) say you should only shop the outer edges of your grocery store: dairy, meat, produce. "They" fail to print coupons for such things! The majority of ourbill is meat+produce. It used to be meat+produce+diapers but since we switched to cloth we're saving at least $25-$50 a week! Woo! I wish I did cloth with Charlotte because the way I figure it we spent at least $1000 on diapers for her in just one year. So in an effort to start saving money on our bill we've been taking steps to eliminate items on our list which is helping us live a healthier lifestyle simultaneously.

Obviously step 1 was cloth diapers

Step 2 was eliminating red meat from our diet, turkey and chicken only for us! We were buying boneless skinless breasts but Travis happened to befriend a dietitian who told us they are filled with preservatives and more sodium than you could possibly ever need. So now we've switched to buying whole chickens and cutting them up ourselves. We really need to go price what they have at Central Meats and maybe we can go free range, yum! Eventually we might take step 2 a bit further and go meatless for good but I like eating meat so we'll see, that'll be like step 101.

Step 3 making our own bread products. Biscuits, pancakes, cakes, loaves, anything bread! It is so easy it's ridiculous that I haven't been doing it for longer. The last recipe I made gave me two loaves, so I figured a 5lb bag of flour will give me at least 7 loaves of bread. The flour costs about $4 the bread we usually buy costs about $3.50 a loaf. I have been looking through my cookbooks for the most nutritious bread recipe but think I may have to get an actual bread

cookbook to find the kind of recipe I'm looking for. Another plus to this step is Charlotte loves to help me cook, she's a great stirrer!

Step ? vegetable garden. I've been saying for almost 2 years I'm going to plant a garden. The first time I was planning I was pregnant with Alexis and that fell through, this past year I just got lazy and the upfront finances got in the way. I have been reading a book about square foot gardening for 2 years now, this upcoming spring is the damn year! If it doesn't happen this year I think I will make the effort to join a co-op, there is a farm right up the street from us that does it. I'm not quite sure what step this will end up being because we might come up with something else in between now and spring when we start the garden.

So far I like the way the steps are going and I like how healthy we feel knowing we are eating what we are actually eating and not some hidden junk.

I'd love to hear some ways my readers are leading healthier lifestyles!