Sewing: Soap Bar Scrubber Pouch

Soap Bar Scrubber Pouch is what I call this thing that I made. It's what I thought of to make so that my six year old boy would stop creating claw marks on my soap bars when he used it. At first I thought he was playing with the soap bar, it didn't occur to me that he was just trying to find a way to hold on to the bar when it was slippery wet. He was also overwhelmed by the size of using our scrub towel in the shower. Necessity IS the mother of invention so I got to thinking, started sewing, and this is what I came up with.

BTW: I much prefer using a soap bar than liquid shower gels on myself & on my older kids. It's cheaper, lasts longer & the kids can't pour half a bottle of liquid soap down the drain each time they take their showers.

So here's my tutorial on how to make this Soap Bar Scrubber Pouch:
You will need:
           Sewing machine w/ coordinating thread 
           Scissors
           Scrap ribbon, about 6 inches long
           Long scrub towel (I used the Salux brand cloth, found in most Asian stores, Filipino friends,
                                          you know it well.)

I took the long towel, folded it into thirds, and cut along the fold lines. You will get three equal parts.

All photos can be clicked on to see a larger view.

Working with one of the pieces, I folded it in half lengthwise, sewed up two of the open sides (I used a zig-zag stitch), turned the fabric inside out, then sewed the last side closed.

Don't forget to back stitch the beginning & ending of your stitches. Since this item will be used and washed a lot, you'll want to make sure that the stitches are really secure.

Lay the fabric down with the long side towards you and fold one side in towards the middle about an inch or so. Then fold the opposite end in towards the fold you had made. It will overlap onto the one inch flap.

  

Now is the time to pin your scrap piece of ribbon into position. It'll lay right under the one inch fold and place it sticking out a bit so you don't miss stitching it.  Add more pins to hold the sides & sew the sides closed.

Once you have sewn the two sides closed you will turn your pouch right side out (take care to really push your corner points out. Use a pencil if you have to.) If you did it right, it'll look like this:

Take your finished pouch to the bathroom, insert a bar of soap and hang.


Alrighty y'all I hope I made this tutorial easy enough for you to follow. Feel free to leave me a comment of encouragement. I am not confident in my blogging tutorial ability.

Fresh from the garden: Chicken Salad Recipe

 

I love chicken salad on a soft buttery roll. It's so easy to make & it's one of those recipes that allow you to substitute a few of the ingredients with what you have on hand and the outcome will be delicious every time. To me, Chicken Salad is like Fried Rice, it helps you use up what you already have. Basically my chicken salad consists of chicken, a crunchy vegetable, a sweet fruit, nuts, and binding like mayo.
For the chicken I prefer using boneless skinless chicken breast, coated in olive oil, & house seasoning, then grilled. It depends on my mood how fine I want my chicken meat cut up, some days I like it diced into little squares, on other days I like it very finely chopped. You can achieve the finely chopped in a food processor but it's just as easy to do with a very sharp knife. I prefer to just use a knife, but you really have to have a good sharp knife. I'll list the ingredients I used today & in parentheses the substitutes I use on occasion.


Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast: Finely Chopped or (Small Diced)
Crunchy Vegetable: Sweet Banana Pepper or (Celery, Any color Bell Pepper, cucumber, jicama)
Sweet Fruit: Dried Cranberries or (fresh grapes, raisins, fresh apples, dried apricots, mango, nectarine)
Nuts: Slivered Almonds or (chopped walnuts, macadamia nuts, pecan, pine nuts, or sunflower seeds)
Binding: Mayonnaise or (miracle whip dressing, ranch dressing, plain yogurt)
House seasoning to taste or (salt & pepper)

Mix it all up & assemble sandwich...I used thinly sliced cucumbers, tomatoes, and some basil leaves from the garden to finish off my sandwich. The basil really made this sandwich pop. Ate it up with some of the blueberries we picked last week. 

Organic Garden Update 7th Week

Harvesting, Harvesting, Harvesting. This 'ing' is yummy. We've harvested corn, peppers, and a huge melon!

When to harvest a melon...the melon will let you know. Look close at the part where the vine attaches to the melon, it's coming apart. Like a dried umbilical cord separating from a belly button.
I have been looking forward to eating this melon. I will wait for the hubby to get home to enjoy this melon though. Just so he won't feel left out, because I know the kids & I will devour this fruit.

4.02lb

The melon is almost as big as my head and weighs a whopping 4 pounds. This melon would have cost me $2.50 (on sale) at the grocery store or about $4.00 at the Farmer's market....but the fun of growing it ourselves would have been missed.

 

Thought this might happen.

The Burpless Supreme cucumber vine is absolutely gorgeous. Many blooms, attracting many bees, thus growing many cucumbers. There are six cucumbers maturing at the same time, all a few days shy of being big enough to harvest.

Some of the corn is ready to harvest. Employed my son to do it for me since a little green frog loves to hide in the leaves. I really didn't want the frog jumping onto me. Yes I'm really girly like that.
Here's where I learned how to harvest corn so not to damage the stalk & be able to let the other ears to continue maturing. How to know when to pick corn video.

Harvesting corn

Corn!!!!!

Made him husk it also.

 The Eggplant has grown into a bush. It's gorgeous. The leaves are massive. I've noticed 3 eggplant emerging.

 Harvested some peppers for our dinner last night. I found this Karma bell pepper to be the sweetest green pepper I have ever tasted. The red peppers are our Gypsy peppers. I roasted these peppers in olive oil & mixed with pasta.

Mini Garden Update

I was just so excited to see that the green bean plant is finally flowering. Oh I am so relieved. I was so worried that the over watering had really damaged the roots. Plants are really resilient though. I started to just water it every other day, didn't water it on days it rained, and only watered it enough to get the surface thouroughly wet. I guess it worked.

First flowers.

More flowers.

I don't think I pictured the Bush Pickle cucumber the other day. Here it is, doing so pitifully. I don't know if it will recover from all the mildew it developed on many of it's leaves. Like I mentioned before, this has been one wet summer.

My husband was worried that I was not keeping on top of the harvesting of our peppers. After looking up info on our plants again, I was right, they are not ready to be harvested. I guess it's not a well know fact, that you get red bell peppers from green bell pepper. Once this Karma Bell reaches it's mature size of 4"-6"inches in length, you can harvest it, or wait till it ripens to a red. I actually prefer red bell peppers, they are sweeter to me. As in many of his videos, John Koler, says to grow what you like to eat and grow what's expensive. So that's what I'm doing. Red, Orange, & Yellow Bell peppers are so expensive, so I am choosing to wait on these to ripen.

The eggplant just blooming away. I love the pretty purple flowers.

I was tickled to find that these two cucumbers are so close to eachother. It'll be interesting to see how they grow like this.

I don't think I covered this previously either. How you identify a Squash Vine Borer infestation.
At the trunk you can see green & yelowish sawdust looking mounds. It look mushy and pasty. Your plant will then begin to wilt, then die. The Vine Borer does just that...bore through the trunk of your plant. I ain't getting it out, it can stay or hubby will just have to get rid of it.

So sad this part look healthy despite of...

Vine borer sawdust.

Organic Garden Update 6th Week

We finally harvested our first ripe tomatoes this weekend...makes the whole gardening so satisfying when you finally get to eat the fruits of your labor.

Little under a pound.

He's watching the plants grow.

 My son checking out the garden. This is definitely one of the reason's I wanted to grow a garden, to show my kids how food grows, and how they can take a little part in taking care of themselves & the earth.

This is the watermelon plant. Seed was from a seeded watermelon we bought from a local grower.

About 2 feet of vine now.

The birds ate up the other five, bet this sunflower feels lonely.

Nearly 6 inches tall.

Big sigh....the Zucchini just can't take it anymore. It's succumb to another vine borer and all the squash bugs. We've decided to just let it go, leave it as the trap plant. We only got three Zucchini out of it. Next year we'll just have to be better prepared.

Wilting away

Vine borer damage

Drying out & dying

Cantaloupe plant thriving.  
Three melons are maturing. Still waiting on the first large melon to ripen.

Still waiting on this melon to ripen. As you can see under the tan netting of the melon, the skin is still green. It'll be ripe & ready when the skin color is greyish.

Second largest melon.

There are about a dozen peppers on the pepper plant. Aside from adding to a salad what other way can I eat all these peppers?

The pole beans are getting bushier, at the top of the trellis. We still have a few more weeks to go till this plant matures & starts giving us beans. We started this from seeds.

Our Burpless cucumber, our prolific producer.

Finally some ripening on our peppers. A friend who visited the other day was amazed to see the pepper laden plant.

Gypsy Pepper

Karma Bell Pepper

I find a dead one of these every other day now. Hmmm wonder why?

Another one bites the dust.

Oh Sweet Corn, the storm damage hasn't stopped them from growing. So glad because I thought there may have been too much root damage.

An ear of corn.

Even despite being bent at the top, some of the stalks have managed somehow to straighten back up.

 

The Topsy Tury tomatoes. 

Roma on the left, Hybrid on the right.

Roma tomato bunches.

Grow bag of Fingerling potatoes.

We had two containers of potatoes & sad to say we discovered that the other (not pictured) contained NO potatoes despite the foliage already flowering. When we turned the container out and sifted throught the dirt, we discovered very little roots, no potatoes & lots of dissapointment. Here's hoping this container of Fingerling potatoes are actually growing potatoes. We will definitely will be waiting till the foliage has died off.

Strawberry pot.

Baby Carrots

Earth Box tomato.

So that's our garden this week.