Making Your Own Scent Booster and Wool Dryer Balls

A few months ago I decided to try making my own fabric softener.  I had seen it on Pinterest of course and it seemed simple enough.    All you need is some Epson salt and some nice smelling essential oils.  I went with Aura Cacia brand in Lavendar and Sweet Orange scents.  You can pick them up at several stores, like Mom's Organic, or just do what I did and grab them from Amazon:

Aura Cacia Lavender

Dolly Is Cooking has easy to follow instructions on exactly how to make the fabric softener. I recently purchased some Vanilla scent that I plan to use with my next batch.  I really like how it softens and scents the laundry and its so easy to make, it literally just takes a few minutes.

I also ordered some Wool Dryer Balls (Amazon again) and I have been scenting those with the essential oils as well. I am normally sensitive to scented laundry detergents and dryer sheets but I find that with the essential oils I do not seem to have any issue.  I do occasionally have a problem with static cling when using the dryer balls but its not with every load, just those items that are more prone to static.  And usually hanging them for a bit allows it to dissipate. Worst case scenario, Ill throw it in the dryer with a Bounce dryer sheet but I have rarely had to do that.  

Overall I really like using both the fabric softener and the dryer balls and plan to continue.  The scents are less harsh to sensitive skin, you only need to use a small amount and I do not have to buy dryer sheets every month.  The balls are still going strong after many, many uses and I just re-scent them about once a week.  I also leave two balls unscented for loads where I prefer no scent. 

More information on the dryer balls can be found here at the Paleo Mama , including how to make your own wool dryer balls. 

And here is a photo of my laundry tools... the fabric softener and dryer balls are in the middle ( I haven't labeled them yet but you know I will). 

Miracle Cleaner for Baking Pans?

I am a bit of a Pinterest addict.  Its my go-to source for household tips and information.   During a recent visit, I came across a pin about cleaning your baking pans and it included some pretty impressive before and after pictures which immediately sucked me in.  My pans looked just like that (okay maybe worse) and I had just been getting ready to order some new ones from Pampered Chef because we use them almost everyday.  They are small and perfect for heating up individual portions of chicken or bread for the kids.  So I figured cleaning was worth a try before I spent $$ on new ones.  According to the article, combining peroxide and baking soda creates a miracle cleaner and makes it much easier to clean off all that baked on crud.  There are a lot of posts on this topic at Pinterest, but you can read the one I followed at onegoodthingbyjille

So here is my before photo (don't judge):

And here is my after:

I cannot lie, this took a whole lot of elbow grease and some serious steel wool and even then, I could not get the corners clean, which was mentioned in the article as well.  So overall a major improvement for sure but I wonder how much was steel wool and elbow grease and how much was  the miracle cleaner.  Certainly something I would try again though, especially since it didn't involve using any nasty chemicals.  What do you think?

10/18/15 Update:  My pan is already getting gross again, so I gave it a quick scrub with the steel wool.  No improvement whatsoever.  So I revise my earlier statement, it is pretty close to a miracle cleaner and definitely softens up the grime and make its easier to scrub, even though it still does take some elbow grease to clean it up.  Let me know if you try it, how it works out for you.