Welcome to Nashville, TN!

I am so very happy to be in this beautiful place.

Happy New Year!

Have a healthy, happy 2012! Here's to all the best for all of us.

                                  (click it!)

Make Your Own Laundry Detergent!

http://www.mnn.com/your-home/at-home/stories/homemade-laundry-detergent

Today I made my own laundry detergent (which my cat promptly knocked off the washer).
Verdict after use: Cleans well, no heavy smell, clothes were softer than usual. Only used 2 tablespoons!
I'm trying to locate Dr. Bronner's Lavender bar soap for the next batch to give my clothes that wonderful lavender scent.

Making-Yogurt-Day!

The title says it all. The milk is in the crockpot on low until 12:30pm. Then it'll be off for 3 hours. The hardest part is watching the clock! I use these recipes from 365 Crockpot and The Simple Dollar .
More as the day evolves!

Unprocessed October

October is "unprocessed" month.

Recently it occurred to me that I'm eating a lot of salad and using a lot of store-bought salad dressings with lots of ingredients I can't identify or alter. So I purchased Ranch dressing dry mix and instead of making it with mayonnaise and milk, I made it with 0% fat plain Greek yogurt and 1% organic milk. It's not quite as rich as with mayonnaise but it's still pretty tasty and about 75% less calories per serving. This makes me super happy.

Today I decided to dive it a bit deeper and make French dressing. I used the recipe at http://allrecipes.com/recipe/french-salad-dressing/detail.aspx although I didn't use nearly the amount of sugar the recipe directs you to use. (Only had a little less than 1/4 cup on hand. I also used apple cider vinegar.) And  I used onion powder instead of fresh onion. All I can say  is ....... WOW is this good stuff! The yield is about 18 servings (yes, it makes a lot of dressing) and has NO added preservatives. The pictures do not do it justice. So yummy!