a little of this, a little of that

Here's a mishmash of little projects from the past several days:

A pair of pillowcase dresses for a pair of cute sisters.  :o)

A pair of bracelets for my Etsy shop inventory.

And last but not least, DIY dish detergent packets. I know, random, right?

I got the recipe and instructions from this blog.  I'd been using homemade dish detergent for about a month now, and while I was pretty satisfied with the results, I hated how much it clumped.  No matter what I tried, the citric acid made the mixture so hard it was difficult to scoop out.  But citric acid is a must if you have hard water like I do, so I decided that if the detergent was going to clump, I might as well make a batch and form it into individual packets.  Turns out it's not that much more work...you just spritz the mixture with water until it resembles damp sand, and then mold it into tablespoon-sized portions.  I used cut-up coffee filters to lay the mounds on, and after they dried for an hour or so, they were ready to go in the container.  The ones on top ended up kind of messy, but they still hardened very well.

So how do I feel about homemade dish detergent?  I'm still on the fence.  I feel like in some ways, it cleans better than the store-bought stuff I used to get (adding white vinegar to the rinse aid dispenser has also helped tremendously).  But with my plastic items (especially the valves to my son's sippy cups), I've noticed they don't get as clean.  However, I'm thinking the hot water in the dishwasher should sanitize everything well enough, which is really what I'm concerned about.  So I'll keep using this homemade stuff till it runs out, then I'll make the decision about whether or not to keep at it.  :o)