Hell must be freezing over, whodda thunk I’d ever talk about housekeeping or beauty?!? I know it’s sort of out of the way topic-wise, but I kept thinking, “Boy, I should really blog about this, this has changed my life!” So here I am.

Now, you may not know, but during the past year, I have been trying to phase out the kinda-toxic-but-super-effective cleaning agents from my house. I’ve been attempting to use more homemade cleaning solutions that are based on baking soda and other less scary stuff. But peoples, cleaning with such mild agents takes a lot of elbow grease. I’d rather not die of fume inhalation when I clean the bathroom, but I’d also rather not spend 60 minutes cleaning it.

Effective homemade cleaning solutions are tricky for me to find on the Internet because whenever I find a Web site that describes the supreme cleaning power of combined baking soda and vinegar (“the fizziness tells you it’s effective!” blah blah blah), I close it out and discount the credibility of the info on the rest of the site. I know not everyone is a scientist, but I distinctly remember covering this in 3rd grade (kitchen volcanos, anyone?). Baking soda and vinegar combine to produce WATER and CARBON DIOXIDE (and the salt, sodium acetate, but I guess I didn’t learn that in 3rd grade). Thus, any cleaning effect of a mild acid or mild base is more or less negated by putting the two together.

Cleaning hint #1: The shower.

We use mostly drugstore soap and shampoos when we bathe, and we have mineral-laden water. Together, these form a lot of soap scum. (That and, as I mentioned to a friend some years ago, perhaps Matt and I are a waxy people.) I can clean the shower ’till it’s sparkly, only to have a totally dull surface within days. What’s a girl to do?

I tried one of those daily shower sprays (Method, purchased at Target), spritzed the walls, floor, and curtain religiously, and that seemed to work quite well until the entire 28-oz bottle was empty ~1 week later. At $4+ a pop, I couldn’t see myself buying a bottle every week. I found an Internet shower spray recipe that seemed like it would work. I scrubbed the shower completely and then started spraying this stuff every day. It’s been almost a month now, and I am super impressed!

Say it with me, “Oooh, shiny!”

In a 28-oz spray bottle (I’m using the old Method bottle), add the following:

1/2 c rubbing alcohol
1/2 c hydrogen peroxide
6 drops dish detergent
1 capful (about 2 tsp) Jet Dry or equivalent (I use “Earth Friendly” brand, purchased at my local co-op)

Top off with water, invert to mix. I make this up weekly because the hydrogen peroxide degrades in light (the spray bottle is clear), and that’s how long 1 bottle tends to last. I spray this on a dry shower (after I come home from work, usually). The alcohol smell lingers for about 15 minutes. The chemistry behind it all, as I understand it: rubbing alcohol – disinfectant, helps “dry” the shower faster, may help dissolve stains. Hydrogen peroxide – disinfectant (may help prevent mold; so far, our shower curtain mold hotspot is clean as a whistle). Dish detergent – cleaning agent. Jet Dry – “sheeting action” helps prevent water spots.

It’s amazing.

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Cleaning hint #2: The washing machine.

We recently bought a king-size bed. I tried to wash a king-size mattress pad in our standard top-loader machine. It barely fit, I had to stuff it in there. When the cycle was done, I realized the top few inches never even made it under water (off to the laundromat I go). I started to pull the puffy thing out of the machine and saw that where it had scraped against the inside rim of the wash basin, it was picking up some brown residue. Ewwww.

I looked under the rim. I’ve never done that before, not in the 6 years we’ve owned this machine.

Gah! What *is* that?! Old dirt, detergent residue…? It felt like sticky, like oxidized fat. Yeech. I went after it with a scrub brush and some dish detergent. I was really surprised to see all of that gunk. You’d think that a machine whose purpose is to clean things would somehow not get that dirty. It was as if someone told me I needed to wash my toothbrush to keep it clean.

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Beauty tip: The skin on your feet.

When I was nearing the end of pregnancy, I got a lot of information about breastfeeding and all the myriad problems that could occur. I tried to prepare for everything, just in case. I purchased a tube of pure lanolin for the treatment of sore, cracked skin. Actually, I purchased a couple tubes (on sale!) and then received one as a gift. And of course, Meredith and I learned to nurse quite easily, and I never needed the lanolin. What to do with it? Last fall, I started using it on my feet, esp on the heels and around the edges where the skin was tough or cracked.

I applied a very light coating of lanolin to my feet just about every day (put wool socks over it on most days, but also pantyhose). I saw improvement within weeks. Now, almost 6 months later, the skin on my heels is just great. No cracks, no peeling, no thick areas – all that without filing, scrubbing, callus shaving, etc (I’m generally a low-maintenance type, if a procedure is fussy or takes time, I’m unlikely to do it).

It’s hard to take a photo of one’s own heels! Just sayin’.

My sister is married! Doesn’t she look beautiful in this picture? She just glowed all day.

We flew out east last weekend to celebrate. It was wonderful to meet the groom’s family for the first time, and I also got to see some old friends and cousins.

This gorgeous cake symbolized the theme of their wedding – cherry blossoms.

Parents of the bride. In about a month, they will be celebrating their 38th wedding anniversary.

We are all very happy to see my sister get married.

Congratulations, Amy and Ricardo!

According to the manual for my 2008 Prius, the capacity of the fuel tank is 11.9 gallons. The manual also reports that the “add fuel” indicator will begin flashing when approximately 3 gallons of fuel remain. The dashboard computer, which calculates miles per gallon in real time, suggests that the car currently is achieving ~44.8 mpg (this figure varies with the seasons, and mileage decreases with the outside temperature).

Monday: Six miles before I get home, the car indicates that I need to add fuel. I mentally calculate that I can drive 100+ miles on what’s left in the tank. I go home to see my baby instead of refueling.

Tuesday: I work from home that day. The car gets driven ~4 mi (to get Matt to and from work and the baby to and from day care). We also drive ~2 mi to a restaurant and back. We consider refueling the car after dinner but decide against it because we are abutting the baby’s bed time.

Wednesday: At 6:30 AM, 10 miles into my 15-mi commute, the gas pedal starts to feel mushy. I note decreasing power. The car starts gliding and doesn’t respond to the gas pedal. I coast over to the shoulder and turn on my emergency blinkers. EVERY WARNING LIGHT ON THE DASHBOARD LIGHTS UP. (OK, if that isn’t a cause for mild panic, what is?) The car will not move.

Hm.

I put in a call to AAA. (Thank heavens I had my phone with me – I often forget to put it in my bag.) A nice man with a tow truck arrives 45 minutes later with a gallon of gas. The car perks right up and about half the warning lights shut off. We turn the car on and off a few times (rebooting, essentially), and the rest of the warning lights shut off. He follows me to the nearest gas station. I fill up and observe that I cannot get more than 8 gallons into the car (even with topping off – I know, bad bad).

My consternation mounts as I realize that 11.9 gallons minus (1+8 gallons) = 2.9 gallons, and 2.9 gallons x 45 mpg = 130.5 miles, and I drove a hair over 20 miles and yet ran out of fuel. What gives?!

I call my dealership and find out that A) Mr Serviceman is not the least bit surprised by my story; and B) the car has a “collapsible fuel bladder” instead of a rigid-wall tank. I poke around teh Internets and discover that said fuel bladder is made of some tricksy rubber-like material that does not like cold weather. At temperatures less than 70F (come ON, this is MINNESOTA, when is it NOT less than 70 degrees?), the bladder does not expand well and can reduce its holding capacity by up to a third. When the bladder is not able to hold its true capacity (or maybe it’s not dependent on that at all), the accuracy of the fuel gauge goes to hell.

Lesson learned. I am the April Fool today.