Our Gardens

Here are a few pics of things going on in our gardens right now.

Driveway Garden

This garden is by our driveway. There are dwarf daylilies in the front. Standard orange ones further down. To the left, near the truck's bumper, is a perennial sage. The fragrance of the leaves is really great. The purplish flowers don't have much of a smell. I think I have had this one for about 5 years in this spot. I trim it down every year to new growth and it gets better and better. Between the hoses, you can barely see the yarrow. Behind the standard orange daylilies is a Weeping Holly.

Back Fence Garden

From the driveway garden, if you follow around a little, this is the birdbath garden between willows. Yarrow is in front of the birdbath. The white flowered vine is Confederate Jasmine. It has a really pungent fragrance. The grassy stuff in front is something that grows wild here. It stays in a clump and seeds very well from the spent flowers. I don't know what it's called. It is also sold in the garden centers for quite a few dollars. Hmmm. I got lots of these free flowers. I give credit to the birds for helping spread the flowers, too!

Back 40 Garden

Way in the back of our property, we have a very large garden. Peppers to the left. Tomatos in the center. Cucumbers to the right. There are beans, squash, radishes, lettuce, onions and potatos in here as well. We're anxiously waiting to see what we get from here. Gardening in SC sure is a challenge! We have 3 seasons for gardening. We've only had 15 years of trying to figure it out. It's crazy!

Take care, for now.

One More Thing

Here's a pic of a shawl I made for myself. I make stuff for everyone else, so I decided that I had some lovely leftovers and made this shawl.

I finished this a couple of months ago, but I never posted it. It is all acrylic yarns from leftover afghan projects this past Christmas.

Bars of Soap

Here are the bars I cut from the soap log. After I took this picture, I cut them in half again because they were pretty big. But this will give you a good idea what the log looks like when it's cut.

Bars of Soap

Another high-tech soaping tool. It's a drywall mud knife that I bought just for this use. It cuts the soap like a hot knife through butter! If I sold this soap, I'd probably buy a few nice molds for aesthetic value. But it's just for me and hubby so we don't need to be fancy. I also have a mitre box to put the loaf in to make even cuts. I use it when the log fits and I'm giving the soap away as gifts.

Here are some reasons I like homemade soap.
 - It smells clean when you pick it up.
 - It smells good when you use it.
 - It has all of the glycerine in it, which is very moisturizing.
 - It has no funky detergents or added ingredients.
 - If I use it for shampoo every day, I don't need a hair conditioner.
 - When I color my hair, which is never anymore unless I get highlights, I still don't need a conditioner.
 - It's great to use in the winter because your skin doesn't dry out as much with it.
 - It's very gentle even though it's made with lye. Lye reacts with the oils and the danger of it goes away.
 - Best of all, it's fun to make!

Finally Soap

Here is my soap the day after. It hardened enough to turn it out and cut it.

Soap Log

You have to line the mold with plastic wrap or the soap will stick to the waxy film on the carton. I used olive oil, coconut oil, soybean oil, corn oil and castor oil. The castor oil gives it a really really great lather. You use only a little bit, like an ounce or two, and you can't even smell it in there. Thank goodness for that!

Soaping (continued)

Here is what the soap looks like when it starts to 'volcano'. That's soap lingo for fluffing up and trying to crawl out of the pot.

Soap Volcano

I've already stirred this down once. I let it go again until it gets oily looking. Then I'll do the 'zap' test. That is when you touch your finger to the lye and just touch it to the end of your tongue. If you get 'zapped', then it's not done cooking. I got zapped right here. That's why I let it go again. The second time I didn't get zapped and it was oily looking like I wanted it.

Soap Log

I didn't add fragrance to this batch. I like it best without fragrance because it smells fresh like outside air when there is no fragrance to it. I made a chocolate swirl last time and it smells good. The only bad thing is that you use real cocoa for the coloring and it can look like potty stuff on a towel if you don't remember to rinse your hands after handling it.

Note my high-tech soap mold. It was an organic milk carton I rigged. It works well.

Soaping

I am almost out of soap. I use homemade soap to wash my hair and the rest of me. I love the lather I get from homemade soap. If you've never tried any, you ought to invest in a bar. I guarantee you'll become a 'soap snob' like me. That's what the hard-core soapmakers call those who won't use anything but gentle, homemade soaps.

Soaping Supplies

I like to make my soap because I love the chemistry of it. I enjoy figuring out which oils to use and how much lye to use. It's really cool to do, but very dangerous to do. If you look, you'll see my goggles and dust mask to protect me from the airborne lye particles. Lye can kill you if you inhale it. The lye is in the brown paper bag to the left of the gallon jug. By the way, the gallon jug is vinegar in case I get lye on my skin and need to neutralize it quickly.

The stick blender is for blending the oils and lye together until it reaches 'trace'. That's soap lingo for getting thick like pudding.

This picture shows me in the process of letting the lye mixture cook. I get to sit back a while and let it do its thing. I won't have to do anything for about 1/2 hour.

More Strawberries

Here I go with the sugars, again. I can't help it. I love strawberry season. Uh, huh.

Homemade strawberry shortcake with a dollop of canned whipped cream and milk. Yum!

I said I love strawberry season!

Now that they are coming on quickly, I'll be making my strawberry jam for the year. I'll probably post about that later.