Fighting the recession

Lately I've noticed how expensive things have gotten. I paid $8 for an average sized container of hot chocolate recently.

So meet the new Frugaltails. I've decided to at least investigate ways of trimming our cost of living. We're kind of picky and I'm sure some of these things will not work for our family but at least I'll be able to say I tried.

Experiment 1: Dog Biscuits

Sydney eats Milk-bones. Actually she eats anything, but we buy her Milk-bones as snacks. Milk-bones are pricey and she gets 3-5 a day - one every time we leave her alone, and very often, one to get her to come inside and stop yapping.
I scanned the web and found this recipe (Basic Dog Treats). The result - 250 very tasty little heart-shaped biscuits. I haven't actually calculated the cost, but I'm sure it's MUCH less than Milk-bones. (And Gavin claims that, if I added a little salt, he would eat these too.)


Experiment 2: Laundry Detergent

If you scan the web you will come across many, many "recipes" for homemade laundry soap. Some are dry mixes and some gooey stuff you have to store in LARGE buckets.
I chose to try a dry mix.
The ingredients are:
1 bar Fels Naptha soap, grated
1 c Borax
1 c Washing Soda
1/4 c OxyClean
It says to use 1 tablespoon per load, but I've been using 2.
I've only done 3 loads using this and haven't determined the long-term results yet.
I estimated the cost and it doesn't actually seem cheaper than the big Costco buckets of detergent, but I don't have the exact results yet.
Stay tuned.
(After taking the photo I put everything in the food processor because the yellow soap didn't seem to mix well with the other ingredients. It helped a little.)