Housekeeping

I am a home body. I enjoy being in my home more than any other place. There is so much to do here, it's never tedious, the hours are filled with cleaning, cooking, sewing, knitting, gardening and bits and pieces that fill my days to the brim.

Yesterday was a catch up day - Thursdays always are because I spend the beginning of the week at the Centre, so I did some cooking, swept the floors, baked bread and made up some liquid soap and a new batch of laundry soap. I have been using this in my front loading washing machine for many years now and it always gives me a good wash. The only ingredient I've changed is that now I always grate my own homemade soap instead of using Lux flakes (too expensive) or yellow laundry soap. When I need to treat stains, I find that for the type of stains we have - garden dirt, a drop of blood, tea or coffee - I can usually shift them using liquid soap. I pour the soap onto the stain, rub it in for a few seconds, then put the item in with the normal wash. Nine times out of ten that is enough to move it, but if it isn't I use the Aldi brand of an oxygen bleach (Napisan). So yesterday I also made another batch of liquid soap and that will probably do me for the next six months.

LIQUID SOAP
Grate a bar of soap - I use my own home made soap, and place it in a saucepan with two litres (quarts) of water. Stir over heat until the soap is completely dissolved and allow it to cool. If it's a gel consistency when it's cold, re-heat and stir again as it wasn't completely dissolved the first time. Cool before adding it to your storage bottles. I use this soap for general cleaning and washing up.

ADDITION: I use my homemade soap for this liquid soap and it doesn't turn to gel. If you find yours does, reheat and add 2 tablespoons of glycerin to your mix to stabilise it.

When it was time for morning tea, I made a quick and easy apple yoghurt pikelet which we ate, still warm, with a little melted butter and cinnamon, with organic black tea. I have quite a few Pink Lady apples here at the moment so after morning tea, I peeled about 10 of them, added a little honey and cinnamon and cooked them in a saucepan for 10 minutes. Last night I made some more pikelets that we had with the stewed spicy apples and a dollop of yoghurt. Delicious!

APPLE YOGHURT PIKELETS
2 tablespoons melted butter
2 cups of plain flour
1 teaspoons baking powder
pinch salt
half cup of yoghurt (or sour cream)
2 eggs
sugar to taste
milk - enough to make a thick batter (or whey when you have it)

Melt the butter and add it to the sifted flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Add yoghurt and beaten eggs and mix well by hand - don't over beat as it will toughen the batter. Add enough milk to give you a thick batter. Allow to stand for 10 minutes.

Add some butter to a frying pan and add dollops of batter. Form round shapes with the batter and then grate some apple over the non-cooked side while the underside is cooking. When the first side is cooked, flip over and cook the apple side. When cooked, add a sprinkle of cinnamon.

With morning tea over and the sun streaming onto the front verandah, I sat there knitting for a while. I'm making Shane some dishcloths using Debbie's wonderful waffle pattern that is easy to knit and makes an excellent cloth. Australian ladies: you can now buy the Lion cotton yarn Debbie talks about at Spotlight. I found some a couple of weeks ago in a variety of beautiful colours. That is what I'm using for this cloth.

While I was knitting I could see the volunteer tomato still growing nicely at the end of the verandah. There are bunches of pear shaped tomatoes there now as well as many yellow flowers. This plant is growing in a crack in the concrete. Amazing. Mother Nature is certainly a fine mistress.

The rest of yesterday was spent working on a quilt, tidying up and researching the article I'm writing this week for Warm Earth magazine. It was a quiet and slow day with plenty of work to keep me on my toes, along with enough time to be mindful of what I was doing.

And now it's raining after a period of about three dry weeks. I was going to do the washing today so if I go ahead with that it will be hanging on the back verandah. No doubt work will continue on the quilt, another dishcloth will be started, hot bread will be ready for lunch and all those other chores that make my days now will gently mould around the hours that lead us to the evening.

I hope you all have a lovely day. Thank you for reading and connecting with me through your comments. I truly love reading every one of them.

Happy 4th July to all my American friends.

SHARE: