Budget Saver Tip #35: Baking Soda Challenge

Remember back in October I posted about using baking soda instead of shampoo? And then a couple weeks later I wrote about using baking soda as a facial cleanser and exfoliant? Well, once a week or more, I still like to wash my hair with baking soda because, for one thing, it doesn't dry and irritate my scalp--giving me a break from shampoo, which does. And nearly every night I still use baking soda for my face. Its surprisingly gentle and very effective.

What I had never tried until recently was using baking soda as a body wash or to replace soap. Sure, baking soda doesn't make anyone smell pretty, but to me that's the beauty of it. Instead of masking body odors with artificial scents, how about neutralizing the odors altogether? After one or two uses in this way, I was sold. I still use soap for some things (like regular hand washing), but baking soda definitely has a permanent place in my shower.

Do you dare take the baking soda challenge?

Baking soda is so cheap in comparison to beauty products--and what you see is what you get: no unpronounceable names on the label of who-knows-what chemicals. If a catastrophe happened and soap, shampoo, body wash, etc. were not able to be produced any longer, my family would totally be fine. :)

Homemade Hand Sanitizer

In our family, we used to use too much hand sanitizer, too often. When you're a SAHM with young children, trying to keep them clean and prevent illness, getting everyone to wash so often can be difficult. So I ended up resorting to hand sanitizer more often than I should have. Finally, the nagging doubts and concern got to me, and as I researched more (click here to learn why sanitizer is bad), I decided we were done with the stuff, except for the occasional exception.

But we needed a replacement for those times when we are at the park, in the car, have been in a public place, etc, and still need to get rid of germs. I found lots of recipes for homemade sanitizer (noordinaryhomestad.com, doterralife.wordpress.com, onegoodthingbyjillee.com, natural-supermom.com, doterraforyourlife.blogspot.com) which started the wheels turning in my head. My whole purpose in wanting to make my own was to get away from alcohol-based products, yet some of these recipes call for it (or witch hazel, which contains alcohol) as a main ingredient. I ended up making a couple batches of a solution that used pure aloe vera gel, fractionated coconut oil, and essential oils. The pros for this recipe were: It smelled way better than commercial hand sanitizer, didn't contain any petrochemicals, and moisturized the hands without being sticky or oily. The cons were: Pure aloe vera gel is way too expensive to use like this all the time. So I moved on to the next phase of my experiment.

When this homemade hand sanitizer was gone, we all just had to wash with soap and water more, which is ideal anyway. And as it turned out, the easy answer for a substitute was the best one: OnGuard spray. I wrote last month about the virtues of the OnGuard essential oils blend and how I have been using OnGuard in a bottle of water (shake before each use) to spray on all germy surfaces once a week. I was also already using it before snack time on the children in my church's nursery each Sunday. And after my research showed that nothing else is more effective, I wondered why I had waited so long. Now I have a pretty little blue glass spray bottle filled with water and a few drops of OnGuard that I keep in my purse for when we need it. I love how it smells, how well it cleans and disinfects, and knowing that it's good for ingestion and boosting immunity. I also love the fact that each drop is only 13 cents--making my bottle of homemade "sanitizer" less than $1.

The Many Uses of Baking Soda

Two weeks ago I posted an article about using baking soda in place of shampoo.  Last week I tried baking soda as a face cleanser and exfoliant.  W.O.W!  Why didn't I try this before?!

I know baking soda has lots of other home uses (besides baking)... What do you use it for?

Budget Saver Tip #26: Skip the Shampoo

I first heard about the "No-Poo" movement a couple years ago and made some changes then to how (and how often) I wash my hair. Then a couple months ago I watched this video and was reminded of what I'd meant to try long ago.

Video: Skip Shampoo - Use Baking Soda and Vinegar

So I tried it this week and, like the woman in this video, was pleasantly surprised. It didn't even feel harsh, like I thought it might. My thought was, If it doesn't work very well I can always rewash it with my regular shampoo. But my hair hasn't been greasy and my scalp hasn't even been itchy (which it often is in our dry western climate). In fact, my head feels very clean. So I think I may just have to keep experimenting with this. Maybe next I'll try the vinegar for conditioning...

The environmental impact difference between all the chemicals in shampoo and the lack thereof in baking soda is pretty obvious.

As for the economical difference, the shampoo and conditioner I buy are very inexpensive already, but baking soda and vinegar are so cheap and go so much farther that it's laughable! To illustrate: You can typically buy a pound (16 oz.) of baking soda for $1. When you consider that to wash your hair with it you need only a tablespoon (give or take, depending on the length and thickness of your hair), that pound could last a very long time. Similarly, vinegar goes for about $2 a gallon, which would also last a long time. Hmmm, this definitely gets my wheels turning.