7 Quick Takes #3

I love to save money. One of my favorite ways to do that is to make things instead of buying them. So here's a list of my favorite DIY projects we've done.

1) I love to spoil Jack but dog treats can be so expensive so I've learned how to make my own. Jack seems to like my Peanut Butter Poppers the best. I make a double batch and they last us a few months. Plus I know exactly what he's eating and can make them the size that's just right for Jack.

These are not mine. They look way better than mine did.

2) Last week I mentioned that I love doing laundry and part of the reason was because of the detergent. My friend Hilary and I made a batch of the Duggar's recipe for homemade laundry detergent to split (it makes 10 gallons.) It is by far the best smelling detergent I have ever used and it's so cheap and easy to make. We made our 10 gallons for about $1.50 total and it's enough to do 640 loads.

The soap you put in the detergent to make it smell so amazing.

3) Earlier this year we bought a house that has a pretty large back yard but doesn't have any patio area at all. We had a grill and furniture but no where to put it so we called a concrete guy to get an estimate on how much it would cost to get a patio. It would have been over a thousand dollars so we decided to go a different way. We bought some bricks on Craigslist and Steven went to work. We're not done yet but I love it already. Plus we're making it twice as big as we originally planned and we're doing it for about a third of the price not to mention adding a firepit and retaining wall.

Partially done patio.

4) My husband works outdoors and Jack loves to lay on our blankets and pillows. Essentially what I'm getting at is my house stinks sometimes. I spent so much money on Febreeze because I was constantly spraying the couch, the recliner, blankets, jackets, shoes, curtains, everything. Fortunately my friend Hilary intervened. She gave be a recipe for homemade Febreeze that costs about 15 cents a bottle. I actually like it more than real Febreeze and don't have any guilt about using it all the time.

Fake Febreeze

5) Chicken Broth. My mom came up one weekend after we moved to help with settling in and what not. She also helped me make a bunch of food that she used to make at home that I never got the hang of or just didn't know how to make. One of them was chicken broth. I cannot believe how much the mark up on cans of chicken broth is. Not only was I getting super cheap chicken broth out of the deal but I also had a bunch of chicken left over so I made some chicken enchiladas.

Thank you, Mr. Chicken

6) Vinegar. You can use vinegar to clean almost anything! I use it as part of a jewelry cleaner, to clean my coffee pot, to clean the bathroom, pretty much I use it on everything. My new favorite is to put it in my dishwasher in place of Jet Dry. 

7) I saved my favorite for last and I'm sure you could have guessed it: NFP. Totally natural, free, and easy to use, what more could I ask for? I don't ever have to go to the doctor to get my 'baby-proofing'* needs taken care of nor do I have to put a bunch of carcinogenic chemicals in my body. Plus I get all the benefits of experiencing the true blessing of life-giving love. 

Those are my 7 Quick Takes! Check out more at Conversion Diary!

* Baby-proofing is not my term but one that I hear very often in clinic, especially with Depo-Provera shots.