Snack Mix For All

Warning: My daughter has no known food allergies so I have included peanuts in the recipe. If your child is allergic to nuts please don't attempt to feed some to them.

Earlier I posted my snack pack ideas here and mentioned my snack mix. This stuff is magic to kids. Have you even been ready do give your little one a snack and they can't decide what they want or won't eat what you gave them. Fret no more fellow mommies! Seriously, it's as simple as throwing all kinds of  similar ingredients into a container and going on about your day.

This bad boy is filled with pretzles, goldfish, raisins, honey roasted peanuts and cheerios. Really anything can be used in these. I have mine in an air tight storage container but mason jars work great too. You can always add things like dried fruit, different nuts, seeds and even those yogurt dipped snacks.

Be creative and if your kids are old enough this could be a great activity for them to do during the week. One less thing you have to do and we all know... there is too much to do.

Good Luck!

DIY Snack Packs

Traveling with a toddler is quite the endeavor sometimes. Have you ever noticed they eat.... constantly! My rugrat has always been a good eater but this also means she wants to eat all the time and packing snacks in a diaper bag doesn't always work out as planned. Snacks get left in the bag and go stale or the apple sauce will spoil when the car heats up and cheerios... friggan... everywhere!

While my methods are still in, what I like to call, the planning stages, I have found a few hacks over the last year or so that have made my life slightly easier and I'm here to share them with you guys.

I found this idea on Pintrest and adjusted it to suit us.

 My daughter had mostly formula as a baby and I had dozens of these plastic containers lying around. (I also use them to store crafts like beads, pom poms, washi tape and rogue crayons. Highly recommend holding on to a few of these if you are going to buy them anyway. The scoops also work great for the DIY detergent I posted yesterday. DIY Laundry Detergent)  A few staples I throw in these are oatmeal, fruit cups or fruit snacks, animal crackers and those squeezy applesauce packets. You can obviously adjust the contents for whatever you kids may prefer just don't forget to take some of the perishable stuff out and throw it in the fridge when you get where your going. These little guys are perfect for a night at the Grandparents house. (My parents don't usually have a lot of kid type food around.) A trip to the park or the beach. (Wishful thinking!) I also make a snack mix that she just loves and it saves a little packing time when getting ready to go. I will be posting my snack mix soon so you guys can give it a shot.

As always feel free to share and comment away and I hope this helps you guys in your own planning stages.

DIY Laundry Detergent

Recently I was asked about making my own laundry detergent due to a FB post I posted the other day. Well, it's true, for around 30 bucks I was able to make over a years worth of detergent and it works great. The next time you hit the grocery store go ahead and pick up a few ingredients.

3 Fels Naptha bars. (These are with the regular detergent, in fact most of these things will be in the same aisle.)
1 box Arm and Hammer Washing Soda
1 box Arm and Hammer baking soda
1 box Mule Team Borax
1 tub Oxi-Clean stain remover
1 bottle of Purex crystals, any scent

Alright, you got a bunch of random cleaning stuff, now what? Brace yourself, this part gets a little complicated....
Grate the Fels Naptha into a powder. then, mix it all together. I recommend using the oxi clean tub to keep a small usable amount by your washer and keep the rest in a bucket in the basement or garage.

As a nanny I am constantly cleaning up gross stuff. Blown out diapers, spilled food and the ever present milk residue that gets literally everywhere. This stuff cleans great and smells awesome, you know, as awesome as laundry can smell.

You can also use a little distilled white vinegar and either a cake pop pan or an ice tray and press the mixture into handy tabs. I tried it with half of the mixture and it came out just fine. I recommend using only half the space in an ice tray as it wont completely dissolve and you will have little white stuff from the undissolved solids. Personally, I just use a baby formula scoop and use two or three depending on the load. (Don't use a scoop in the detergent then make a bottle with it. Have one designated for the laundry room. I don't feel it is necessary to inform you all of this but well.... There are some people...)

So there you have it, I have saved hundreds if not thousands in laundry detergent. Don't forget to use walmarts savings catcher app to save even more money and an occasional bleach run through the wash will help keep your washer clean and avoid that mildew smell some washers tend to acquire over time.