Luna Carruthers's Blog, page 41

Learning Your Way Around the Kitchen-Homemade Pancakes

One thing that I have always found interesting since moving to Germany is how many people have asked me about pancakes. I am not joking about this. After getting asked where I’m from and then where in the US I’m from(and after they are disappointed to hear that I’m from the Midwest and not New York or California), I get asked if I know how to make pancakes. I do not know why Germans, at least the Germans I have met, have this fascination with pancakes. I remember once when Daddy and I were with our poly partner, Schnubbi, grocery shopping and I found myself staring at pancake mixes. The kinds of pancake mixes that are in a plastic bottle and you add water or milk, or whatever it calls for, give the bottle a few quick shakes and squeeze it out into the pan. Schnubbi asked if at some point on a weekend if I could make real pancakes. I told her there’s no reason why I couldn’t. Not like pancakes are hard to make.

Well, I was kinda secretly freaking out inside because growing up, any pancakes that were made in my house, came from a box of pancake mix and I was never the one making them. Plus, at the time, I wasn’t a huge fan of pancakes. But, before completely freaking out, I turned to my good friend Google and I found a recipe for pancakes. After the first time I made, them I felt super silly for getting as nervous as I did because there’s really nothing to them. They get made on a regular basis on the weekends and there’s so many different things you can do, like add fruit or sprinkles, or chocolate chips, or whatever you can imagine. I love adding fresh blueberries to them and then eating them with whipped cream and some cherries on top. YUMMY!

1 ¼ Cup all purpose flour

1 ½ Tablespoon sugar(I use more like ¼ cup because Daddy likes them sweet)

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1 ⅓ Cup milk

1 egg

3 Tablespoons oil

¾ Teaspoon vanilla

1 Tablespoon cinnamon(optional)

Whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and cinnamon if using. Then add in all the wet ingredients.

And now you’re ready to make pancakes! I do want to share a few tips with you that I’ve learned along the way. My first ever attempt at pancakes was sad. They tasted delicious, but they didn’t look like pancakes.

Tip #1: Make sure your pan is nice and hot before you start making them. I always use a couple of drops of water to test this. If the water sizzles, then your pan is ready.

Tip #2: Turn down the burner before you actually start melting the butter in the pan. If you keep the temperature up too high, when you put butter in the pan it’ll brown and make your pancakes all brown. They’re still tasty, but they’re brown.

Tip #3: When you see bubbles forming on top of the pancakes, then it’s time to flip. This was something I had trouble with and would constantly come up with odd shaped pancakes because I was flipping them too early. Once I read this nifty little tip, my pancake making life got a little easier.

Tip #4: Check the date on your baking powder. This is something I just recently learned. If your baking powder is old, it’s not as potent and the pancakes won’t rise like they should. Still yummy, but very flat.

If you’re not up for standing over the stove flipping pancakes, then I do suggest trying this baked pancake version I found on the blog Six Sisters Stuff. I’ve made them and they are super yummy as well, and you can freeze them, which is totally awesome if you want some pancakes but don’t have time to make them in the morning.

I hope you enjoy these pancake recipes I have shared with you and I look forward to hearing feedback about how yours turned out!

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Pre-Planning For Quick and Easy, Last Minute and “I Don’t Know What To Cook” Days

Some days I just don’t know what to cook. Even if I’ve made a meal plan, I sometimes don’t feel like fixing it or I forgot to thaw the protein. So, my go to are pantry dinners. These are dinners that you can whip together with the ingredients you always have on hand. The ingredients often have long shelf lives so you can have them ready for just these occasions.

The ingredients you have in your pantry will be different based on your food preferences, but having a few basics available will always provide you with the means to making a quick meal when things just aren’t coming together for dinner.

The Ingredients

A well stocked pantry can feed you for quite awhile after your budget has run dry if you make sure to have it well stocked with common items. Some ingredients to consider having on hand:

Dry or canned beans
White or brown rice
Canned tuna
Other canned meats
Diced and stewed tomatoes
Canned vegetables
Dry pasta
Chicken broth or stock
Olive oil
Spices and dry herbs
Eggs
Milk
Butter

The Meals You Can Make with Pantry Ingredients

Beans and Rice
Mexican Bean, Rice and Corn Bake
Quick and Easy Black Beans and Rice
Easy Red Beans and Rice

Pasta
Pantry Pasta with Romesco Sauce
Ree’s Pantry Pasta
Spaghetti with Bacon and Eggs
One Pot Pantry Pasta

Tuna and…
Pantry Tuna Penne
Tuna Rice Casserole
Tuna Patties

Vegetarian Chili
Spicy Three-Bean Chili
Veggie Chili
Pantry Chili

Brinner (Breakfast for Dinner) such as pancakes or waffles
Waffle Mix
Basic Fritatta Formula (to make your own creations)

Veggie Fried Rice
Sandwiches, Melts or Open-faced sandwiches

Share your recipes! I’d like to know what your go-to meal ideas are when you have no drive to cook or no fresh ingredients. Link to recipes or write them out in the comments!

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 26, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: How Cooking From Scratch Can Save You Money

Continuing on the path to better domestic service by way of saving money we’re going to talk about cooking from scratch. Don’t get all panicky yet. I don’t meant to scratch cook everything – as no one has that much time anymore. But there are a few things that will definitely save you money if you could make them from scratch instead of buying them. Convenience always comes at a cost, remember that! It will take longer to make but the goal here is to save money and we can always figure out how to budget time for the important things.

So what sorts of things can you make at home that will be cheaper (and often healthier) than the store-bought versions? Baked goods, sauces and soups/stock are a good start. They are all things that are overpriced at the store because you are paying for the convenience of someone else making them, and then all the preservatives in order to keep them tasting moist and tender past its homemade shelf life versions.

The first thing I decided to figure out if making it at home was cheaper was bread. The loaf of bread that KnyghtMare prefers is usually sold for $2.50. If I could make a loaf for less than that, that he would eat then I had a winner. Once I added the ingredients together I had a mere $1.25. It would be less if I purchased the flour and butter during sale seasons. My first experiments were a mess, but I was quickly a bread maker that KnyghtMare would ask for homemade bread over the loaf.

Now I make chicken stock, pizza sauce, bread, breaded chicken tenders, spice mixes like taco seasoning and my coffee mix (it’s like International Coffee’s French Vanilla Cappuccino). These things are cheaper than the store versions and taste better too!

Here are a few examples from my shopping trip this week:

I looked at precut peppers and onions mix for fajitas in the produce section. It was $4.99/ lb! If you purchased and chopped your own…. the peppers were $1.50 for three and the onions were only 0.89/lb. I’m cutting my own, thank you.
Baby carrots: $2 for 10 oz bag. Two pound bag of full size carrots for the SAME price. Just cut them into sticks, put in a container with a little water and they’ll last just as long.
Bone-in chicken breasts were $1.89/lb. The boneless ones? $4.29/lb! Buy a boning knife and remove the breast bone yourself. But don’t toss it! It’s prime stock making material.
Taco seasoning packets were on sale for 95 cents each. But if you have the spices in your cupboard, and you likely do, it will cost you far less.

Don’t do more than you can handle or have time for. I work at home, so a lot of the things I do for scratch cooking you may not be able to do but a few things I learned you can too. Perhaps you are a convenience shopper and you buy the precut vegetables, deboned meat, and sliced or shredded cheese. Consider how much money you could save if you cut your own veggies, deboned and prepped your own meat (it’s not as hard as you think) or shredded your own cheese from a block. This simple change can save you money in the kitchen!

Spend 30 minutes after you come home from shopping to prep the veggies, portion out the meats and shred/chop the cheeses. This bit of work when you’ve already allotted time for groceries will save you time when rushed for meal prep after a busy day at work.

Use your crockpot! This is the busiest pot in my kitchen. I make chicken stock, soups, pizza sauce, spaghetti sauce, shredded chicken and more in it while I’m off doing other things. If you are short on time, this is the best way to get some home-made foods made with very little time investment. If you can afford it, get a bread machine and you’ll have homemade bread for just the time investment of tossing in the ingredients too.

Find home-made versions of your favorite foods. Are you a mac and cheese fanatic? Or maybe your weakness chicken nuggets? These things can be made at home, in large batches and frozen to use when you get the craving. Batch cooking and “for the freezer” cooking are smart tactics to save money also. The next time you make a meal, double the amount and freeze the left overs for a future meal.

You can save money buying groceries if you take the time to prepare them at home. Convenience is nice, but only cost worthy if you just can’t possibly find time to get it done yourself. And let’s face it; better time management will give you the time you need to save money in your home.

Do you cook from scratch? What other tips do you have about cooking from scratch?

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 25, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Creating a Stockpile – A Buffer For Any Size Home

I know what I was thinking when I first heard that a stockpile could save me money. How could having more of somethings be cheaper? There’s just the two of us, why would I need 10 packs of toilet paper? But I learned pretty quickly that a stockpile is only as large as needed for the family that it’s supplying.

What you need to know about stockpiling is that you will save money, stress and help supply your home during lean times. You don’t have to have a garage reserved for 6 months of supplies or a ton of one item or another. I like to keep one extra of all toiletry items like shampoo, soap and deodorant, but also toilet paper and tissues. The good news with that is often coupons are on a purchase of two so that helps. And you know what? You never have to worry about running out of mouth wash in between grocery days.

I have a shelf in the kitchen and in the hall closet that I store my surplus things. It feels just enough for KnyghtMare and I. How do you know how much to stockpile? I pick the 3 month time frame and keep on hand how much I would use in a 3 month period. Now, if it’s a seasonal thing I might buy enough to last until it’s on sale again. I’m so grateful for the times that are lean financially that I have food and items in the stockpile to keep us going until the next time.

Are you interested in starting a stockpile?

How to get started:

Start small – If you go out and buy six cartloads full of groceries, you’re going to accomplish only one thing: draining your bank account. Instead, build your stockpile slowly and steadily. When you go to the store, buy extra of what you’re already buying. If you buy 5 cans of tuna normally, buy 10 cans for 2 or 3 trips or until you have enough built up that you’re comfortable.

Use coupons – Stockpile things like cereal, canned soups, household goods and health products can be significantly cheaper with a coupon. While you shouldn’t take it to the extreme, saving a few cents and dollars here and there never hurt anyone.

Buy on sale – This goes hand in hand with starting small. If you’re buying something because it’s on sale, then buy more than you currently need within reason. It is better to buy a few more when you’re paying less than to buy it when it is regular price. You might only save a dollar or two but over time that dollar will add up. Want to save even more? Combine your sales with your coupons.

Buy Only What You Need – Yes, you’re trying to build a stockpile. If you fill it with foods that your family won’t eat you won’t have much more than shelves of unopened cans and boxes. Instead, buy what you eat and eat what you stock. This goes for beverages that you might be stocking up on too.

Minimize waste – When you buy a product for your stockpile, especially food or beverages, make sure that you write either the expiration date or the date of purchase on it using a sharpie. When things expire without being used, you’re doing nothing but throwing money down the drain. Keeping waste to a minimum is the best way to make sure that you’re not wasting your money too. Another way to keep yourself from wasting foods is to make sure your stockpile is rotated. When you’re putting it away, put your new purchases in the back so that you use the older stock first.

Keep track of what you have on hand – Have you ever gone to the store and bought something only to bring it home and find out that you have 20? That can spell wasted money for a stockpile. Making sure that you keep track of what you have on hand with a spreadsheet or other organized method will help you do that without too much work. After all, if you have enough of something, there is no need to buy more.

When you’re budgeting for your stockpile, don’t add too much to your grocery budget each month. Instead, work to get your actual grocery costs down and use what is left to stockpile. If that absolutely isn’t possible, start with a small amount like $20.00 extra. You would be surprised at how quickly you can build a usable stockpile with an extra $20.00.

You can do this and breathe easier when you know you are providing for your family and can survive anything that could come up.

Do you have a stockpile? What tips would you give for something just starting out?

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 24, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Developing a Meal Plan for the Budget Conscious Cook

Whether you’ve been preparing meals for your family for years, or you are just starting out in a place on your own, one of the best ways to save money and sanity in the kitchen is to plan your meals. Meal planning is an important skill for the organized budget-conscious domestic submissive because not only does it provide healthy meals for your partner, but it will save you money and food waste if you plan correctly.

What do I mean by a meal plan, you may ask?

A meal plan can be two different things. The first is a plan of the meals that your grocery shopping trip will cover. You would make this list each time you are preparing to go shopping for the foods you’ll need for the week/month. The second is the list of common meals you prepare on a regular basis. Often these meal lists will have a common focus, like frugal, or pantry staples or clean out the freezer, favorite meals, or even holiday favorites. I’ll make sure to cover both of these in this article.

Why should you have a meal plan?

Meal plans save money, use ingredients from your pantry and fridge to reduce waste and to minimize left overs. They also help alleviate the 5pm stress of “what’s for dinner?” It a simple way to be organized and definitely helps reduce your grocery budget because you won’t buy things you don’t need. You’ll also make less impulse trips to the store because you forgot one item or you didn’t know what you were going to have so you wandered the aisles and picked up whatever looked good (and everything looks good when you are hungry).

How to make a pre-shopping meal plan

When I get ready to go shopping, I go through my freezer and pantry to make note of what I already have. I write down all the meats I have and the left overs that need to be used up. Then using that as my foundation I create meals adding a few things here and there that I’ll need from the store. I like to make new recipes but I don’t plan more than one new recipe in a week and only if I’m struggling to come up with meal ideas. Otherwise I use my common meals list to fill out the meals for the week.

Make sure you are planning more than dinners. All meals you will be preparing need to have the supplies on hand. If you eat breakfast at home, brown-bag your lunch and any snacks you like to have around make sure you put those on your meal plan. KnyghtMare and I eat different lunches so I have two lunches listed for each day. I’m more likely to eat left overs for lunch than KnyghtMare is and he’s got specific things he prefers to they are always on hand. Remember – a meal plan is not your grocery list, so you don’t need to itemize out the things you need to purchase. Just plan out the meals on this one and write your grocery list based on it.

How to make a common meals list

A common meals list is another way to have a meal plan. You will have all of the meals you like to make in a list so that when you plan your grocery trip you can make sure you have supplies on hand for the meals you make often. For example, KnyghtMare and I have some form of grilled chicken every week so I make sure there are marinades and chicken on hand every week. Breakfast for dinner is common, also called Brinner, so I like to have some breakfast meat, eggs and pancake mix available. Here’s a glimpse of my list:

Chicken Kebabs
Roast Chicken
Jambalaya
Hamburgers
Smoked Sausage and Rice
Chicken Grillers
Breakfast for Dinner (B4D)
Homemade Pizza
Turkey Roast
Italian Wedding Soup
Spaghetti
Pork Chops
Chicken Curry
Ham Steak
Steak
Steak Kebabs
Meatball Subs
Spaghetti and Meatballs
Chicken Flautas
Tacos
Pulled Pork
Beef Pot Roast
Meatloaf
Minute Steaks
Ropa Vieja
Chicken Parmesean
Airman Anderson’s Chicken
Pork Tenderloin
Beef Stew
Bratwurst
Ham and Potato Soup
Zuppa Toscana
Greek Chicken in Pitas
Chicken Rice Soup
Now I never have items on hand to make all of these things, but they sure help with making my weekly meal plan to create variety and use the things I have on hand.
Activity

Pull all your cook books and recipes out and make a common meals list. You can sort things according to main component if you’d like. Just having this list will help you organize your cooking and relieve stress at dinner time. Add your common meals list to your Home Management Journal.

On Being Pansexual

I used to struggle with my sexual orientation. Well, that’s not entirely true. I used to never think about my sexual orientation. I was always attracted to cis males (a male assigned male at birth) and never once felt an attraction to anybody but that.

Until I did.

It is quite a shocking experience to question your sexual orientation for the first time when in your thirties. I spent quite a bit of time soul searching, questioning how I could have missed out on some shred of a clue that this was an option, and wondering what it meant for my (ethically non-monogomous) marriage. None of the labels I read about seemed to fit. Not heterosexual any longer, not bisexual, bicurious, “heteroflixible.” Because it wasn’t about men or women or their sexual organs. It was about this one person that I was all of a sudden attracted to. Something about this individual would turn me on and it had nothing to do with what was between her legs. Finally, I came across “pansexual” and I knew with certainty it was how I felt.

Pansexuality means that one is not limited in sexual choice with regard to biological sex, gender, or gender identity. I am turned on by a specific individual.

So what is it like, for me, to be pansexual?

I am turned on by how soft skin feels under my hands.

I am turned on by feeling arms flex when a partner holds me tighter.

I am turned on by a gentle touch after a play session.

I am turned on by them being only them.

I am turned on by how much a woman may smell like me;

I am turned on by how different a person may smell.

I am turned on by the sound of the garage door opening when that person I care about arrives home.

By tasting a meal a caring person has prepared for me.

When I laugh at his or her jokes.

When I run off to Google something that I didn’t know I needed to know until I knew my partner enjoyed it.

When I pick up quirky gifts in a quirky store on a rainy day and smile, excited to share it with a person and see them in turn smile.

They make me feel like the most beautiful woman who ever lived.

I want to make them proud, I want to make them blush, I want to hear them crackle through the phone from thousands of miles away, I want to hear my phone “bing” with a waiting text.

I want to make that person moan. I want to nibble at their throat and feel the vibration of pleasure under my lips. I want to kiss that same spot later while entangled in a mess of wet and limbs.

I want to make that person come.

I want to feel that exact moment a person’s breath switches from awake to asleep and lie there and listen to them at peace.

What doesn’t matter is whatever lies between that persons legs. That’s secondary; an afterthought. Whatever is there I want to learn to please it because it is a part of a whole person that I care.

I am pansexual. I love people. And my lust is unrestricted.

How do you identify? Do you see how pansexuality is different and unique?

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 22, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Home Management Journal Showcase

We’re over half way through the month’s series on improving your domestic skills and I’m so proud of the progress you all have made!

Today is all about you. I’d like you to share your progress with us. You can share images of your physical home management journal, screenshots of your digital one or even that way your home looks after implementing the journal’s organization.

In order to make this as seamless as possible please follow these tips:

1.Upload your image to IMGUR or another photo sharing website and then share your link in the comments.

2. If you’ve blogged about you progress, share the link to your post in the comments.

OR

3. If you don’t have a blog you can share in the comments (no images please).

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 21, 2015 07:00

Keep Your Voice: Your Rights as a Submissive

With franchises like Fifty Shades of Grey having integrated themselves almost completely in the mainstream, I have had the combined frustration and horror of my role as a submissive and my role as a teacher nearly clashing more than once. While I would NEVER share any part of my home activities with any of my students, it’s difficult to curb my teacher’s instincts when I overhear the sharing of opinions which have clearly been formulated by a Hollywood-ized variation of a story which has very little understanding of what the power-exchange between a submissive and his/her Dominant actually entails.

Understand that I teach teenagers; I overhear conversations about who has had sex with whom and in what bathroom at what party with enough frequency that the topic of sex itself can be categorized as “yesterday’s news.” What concerns me regarding the reaction that people have had to movies and romance novels like Fifty Shades is that adolescents and young adults who are genuinely interested in the lifestyle are going to end up in positions where they can easily be taken advantage of on a physical or emotional level. Having read some of the questions that appear on this forum alone, I feel some strong, plain words of advice are needed for some of our newest voyagers.

So here they are:

Dominance/submission is a game of pretend. It doesn’t matter if you call yourself a sub, a slave, a pet, or an object; it doesn’t matter how kinky you like to be in the bedroom, if you’ve checked the “rape fantasies” box on your list of interests, or like being asphyxiated during intercourse. It doesn’t matter if you are aroused by being demeaned, if you enjoy your punishments a little too much. At the end of the day, there is a VAST distinction between a situation where you truly have no control, and the situations you allow yourself to be put in as a submissive.

You are your own advocate. You should NEVER disappear so far into a relationship that you lose sight of who you are; you should never allow yourself to be talked into something that you aren’t comfortable with—or at least excited about. You should never—never—feel hesitant in telling your partner to stop or to say that you’ve had enough. And you should never be in a relationship with someone who is so caught up their side of the game that they are willing to sacrifice your physical and emotional safety for his or her own enjoyment. This goes far passed the premise of Safe, Sane, Consensual or Risk Aware Consensual Kink (both of which, you’ll notice, have the words “Consensual”), and into your survival and development as an individual—which you should retain, even if you have been happily married to a person for several years and spend most of your time with them.

Good Doms let their subs use Safe Words, and you should definitely have a Safe Word at your disposal long before you enter a scene. If you don’t have a Safe Word, the phrase “Time Out” is well enough culturally embedded in most societies that it should get your point across. Remember that it is your right as a human being to use your Safe Word the moment that you feel you are putting yourself at risk, or you are no longer enjoying yourself—because the entire point of the Dominance/submission power exchange is that both parties are doing things that make them feel good.

Finally: understand that your initial willingness to participate in a scene does not mean that you are obligated to finish said scene. You reserve the right to retract your consent at any time (this is why Safe Words are so very important). If for some reason you find yourself in a position where you were coerced, or denied your right to say no, you are in no way, and by no laws of humankind, required to accept that as part of the Dominance/submission exchange. Pretending to be reluctant, and actually being reluctant are two very different creatures. If you have expressed a sincere desire for something to stop in a scene, and the Dom in that scene has continued, it’s the Dom, and not you, who was in the wrong, and that situation needs to be followed up with some serious conversations between you and the Dom.

Submission, more than anything, is about trust. You as a sub need to trust that your Dom will listen to you if you say no, but your Dom trusts you to express your needs as well.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 20, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Review – Unfuck Your Habitat

When you are learning a new cleaning routine, any and all helpful resources are the motivation that you may need. I’m going to talk about a great site and app that is available to give you that kick in the pants you need some days when those lovely cleaning lists just look like insanity contained in a check list. This app is Unfuck Your Habitat, abbreviated to UfYH in the app store of your choice (Unfilth Your Habitat on iOS).

“Terrifying motivation for lazy people with messy homes.” — Unfuck Your Habitat

This person, this beautiful foul-mouthed creature, has created an entire site dedicated to tips and tricks and motivations for cleaning, or “unfucking.” She recognizes the inherent laziness of mankind, and gives advice on cleaning in stages, daily/ weekly/ monthly chores and offers up challenges to keep you motivated.

The Before and After pictures shared by people on the Tumblr site are inspiring and interesting, people are proud of their little spaces and the progress to clean they have made. It’s motivation in itself.

The point behind the site isn’t necessarily to inspire you to be super clean and rigid and totally on top of everything. The idea is just to do something. Something is better than nothing, and even if you only manage to pick up a few things during the day, that’s still an accomplishment! And accomplishments turn into more accomplishments.

UfYH advocates small, manageable cleaning at a time—starting with your bed.

It’s a habit that’s relatively easy to form, and helps to make way to form other habits that are beneficial. If you spend 30 seconds making your bed every morning, 20 minutes doing housework in the evening isn’t such a difficult thing to conquer.
A messy bed tends to give a room an overall sense of chaos, whereas a made bed can make even a messy room seem more put together.
Why wash your dishes? You’re just going to use them again, right? Why throw your trash away? Aren’t you just going to make more trash later? Well, by resetting one thing to a point of being clean or even just slightly neater-looking, you’re that much further ahead in the unfucking game.
It’s a small but tangible form of control over one’s environment. So many people let their homes get and stay in states of disarray, messiness, and chaos because it seems like the mess has more power than we do. If you can’t do everything, you can’t do anything, right? Wrong. You can make your bed.

It’s definitely a unique app that’s meant for adults who don’t mind a ton of profanity, but if you’re looking for a more humorous, goofy, and over-the-top motivator to clean up your house, Unfuck Your Habitat is worth a look.

Copyright 2008-2015 Submissive Guide. This Feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact lunakm@submissiveguide.com so I can take legal action immediately.

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Published on October 19, 2015 07:00

31 Days To Better Domestic Service: Simple Homemade Cleaners

You may have seen the two previous posts about some green and homemade cleaners on the guide. If not, here are links to the articles.

Green Recipes for Home and Health

How to Make Laundry Soap

In this article I’m going to share even more recipes for making cleaners that are safer for the water table and don’t have any weird chemicals in them. Oh and they are a lot cheaper to make!

I’m finding recipes all over the web as I begin to remove the chemicals in the home and replace it with vinegar, baking soda, bleach and salt. The way people cleaned before all the expensive blends on the market. It will save us money and save the environment at the same time. I’ve collected most of these from down—to—earth where I go almost everyday to read about Rhonda who lives simply every day. Highly recommended!

INGREDIENTS FOR HOMEMADE CLEANERS

Baking soda
Washing soda
Borax
Pure laundry soap or homemade soap
White vinegar
Tea tree oil
Eucalyptus oil
Ammonia
Liquid bleach

NEVER MIX AMMONIA and BLEACH! THE FUMES COULD KILL YOU!

Never mix ammonia with vinegar – they neutralize each other.

All these products will cost you less about $30 to buy at the supermarket and you’ll have enough to make the recipes for various cleaning jobs for many weeks.

Some of these I have not used yet. If you’ve used it try to comment on how well it works.

Oven Cleaner

¼ cup ammonia
2 cups of warm water

Turn on the oven and leave to heat up for 5 minutes. Pour ammonia and warm water in a baking dish and leave in the warmed oven overnight. This will loosen the grime in the oven, which you can then clean with an ammonia-based cleaner or soap and water. You can also scour with a paste of bicarb soda and water.

All-Purpose Cleaner #1 – do not use on aluminium

1 tablespoon ammonia
1 tablespoon liquid soap or homemade laundry detergent
2 cups hot water

Combine in a spray bottle. Pour in hot water, screw on the spray bottle top and shake until completely dissolved. This cleaner can be stored in this spray bottle, so mark it “HOMEMADE ALL PURPOSE CLEANER” with a permanent marker.
Spray the cleaner on surfaces you wish to clean. Use your terry cloth to rub on as you go. For hard to move grease or dirt, leave the cleanser on for a few minutes before wiping it off.

All-Purpose Cleaner #2

¼ cup baking soda (bicarb)
1 cup ammonia
2 litres warm water

Creamy soft scrubber

Simply pour about ½ cup of baking soda into a bowl, and add enough liquid soap to make a texture like very thick cream.

Note: To keep it moist, add 1 teaspoon of glycerin to the mixture and store in a sealed glass jar. Otherwise just make as much as you need at a time.

Toilet bowl cleaner

1 cup baking soda
1 cup vinegar

Will fizz. Let sit for 10 mins. Scrub with toilet brush and flush.

Floor cleaner – floating wood, tiles, vinyl or laminate

½ cup white vinegar plus 4 litres hot water in a bucket and a clean mop will clean up all but the worst floor.

If you have a really dirty floor to deal with, add ¼ cup grated homemade soap to this mix.

Wooden floor cleaner

2 tablespoons homemade vegetable soap – grated
½ cup vinegar
500 mls strong black tea (about a pint)
bucket warm water

Concentrated laundry powder – this is the powder I have used for over a year and it’s only cost me $12 for the ingredients… for the whole year!

4 cups grated laundry or homemade soap or soap flakes (Lux)
2 cups borax
2 cups washing soda

Mix all the ingredients thoroughly and store in a plastic container with a lid. Use 2 tablespoons per wash. This powder will not make suds, this is perfectly okay.

Fabric softener

½ cup white vinegar in final rinse

Window Cleaner # 1

¼ – ½ teaspoon liquid or grated soap
3 tablespoons vinegar
2 cups waterspray bottle
Put all the ingredients into a spray bottle, shake it up a bit, and use as you would a commercial brand. The soap in this recipe is important. It cuts the wax residue from the commercial brands you might have used in the past.
Window Cleaner # 2

Vinegar and newspapers

Pour a little vinegar onto a sheet of newspaper and wipe windows. Remove all the grime and polish the window with a clean sheet of newspaper.

Misty’s Cleaning Solution – for Swiffer Mop Systems

2 tablespoons of ammonia
½ cup of vinegar
½ teaspoon of Johnson’s baby shampoo

Fill the rest of the container with water.

While researching the properties of the different ingredients:

1. Ammonia is an awesome cleaner and spot remover

2. Vinegar kills bacteria, mold, and germs and it’s a great rinse agent

3. Johnson Baby shampoo smells good and seems to add a sparkle to the floor (don’t try to use an off name brand – they streak!).

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Published on October 18, 2015 07:00