Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Good Clean Fun!

Sooo... a few years ago I decided to stock up on soap.


Because of my allergies I have troubles with just about anything other than clear unscented glycerin soap, but it makes me a little bit crazy that you can only buy the stuff in small 4 ounce bars wrapped in plastic. I don't like the fact that it comes in plastic, I don't like that the bars are so small, and I don't like that it costs twice as much as the cheap smelly stuff.

Anyhow, I found a big box of the stuff online a few years ago and it worked out great... well mostly great. It was still in small bars that were wrapped in plastic, but it was much cheaper than buying the bars individually and I didn't have to worry about running out.


Well... for a few years anyhow, But since I'm down to just a few bars left, I decided it was time to go stock up again.

But this time, I discovered that I could get a significantly better price if I bought the stuff in a big block. So I compared my options and did my math and ended up ordering a 25 pound box of soap.

Sooo... it arrived today and, well... 25 pounds turns out to be um... a tad bit bigger than I had been anticipating!


Oh my. So I spent my morning chopping soap and wrapping it in some old butcher paper that I had been saving from some other stuff that I ordered online. And here you have it:


Holy Moly! I hope soap doesn't go bad! Well, I never claimed to be sane.

Now y'all can laugh if you want to, but when the zombie apocalypse comes and people are fighting in the streets over that last bar of soap... who'll have the last laugh then?

Well anyhow, at least the zombies won't have to clean me off before they make lunch out of me!

So has anybody else out there ever gone a tad bit overboard when stocking up?


25 comments :

  1. That is an ENORMOUS bar of soap! I had a similar soap situation a couple of years ago- not one enormous bar, but lots of normal sized bars that I had acquired over the years- mostly presents, but some that I had bought myself. I decided that I really needed to actually use them up, and after about 18 months I finally got through the backlog!

    I tend to end up with huge amounts of dog and cat food in sacks in the cupboard, as it is much cheaper to buy in bulk. I am contemplating feeding them a 'natural' (though probably not raw) diet, though, which would see the end of sacks of pet food. I'm not completely sure though, as I am not sure how easy it is to feed cats especially a balanced diet..

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    1. Yup... it's a lot of soap. When it arrived this morning it was one of those OMG what have I done moments! But I have no doubt that I'll eventually use it up. If worse comes to worse perhaps I'll experiment with making my own laundry soap!

      Good luck changing your pets' diets. I imagine that dogs are less finicky than cats, but getting a cat to eat something different can often be a real challenge!

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    2. I had a cat once that wouldn't eat a different food because the kibble was a different shape. Yes, cat's can be finicky.

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  2. What are most people intending to use that much soap for? Is there another use other than cutting it up and slowly using it?

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    1. Most people are buying it to melt down and add their own scents and colors and then pour it into cute little molds. It's like soap making without actually making the soap! I thought about melting it and pouring it into molds, which would have made my bars a more consistent size but I decided it wasn't worth the bother.

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  3. You are so funny! It reminds me of a story my neighbor told me. When she first moved out here, she wanted to have a garden with tomatoes. She had never grown them before and she planted over 30 bushes. Those of you who have grown tomatoes can imagine what she was in for!

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    1. Oh my! I did that one year too - well, it wasn't quite that many but it was close, I think it was 24. It was the first time I ever planted them from seed and I hadn't expected them to all live. Then when they did, I didn't have the heart to sacrifice any of them. The harvest was rather incredible. I literally had boxes and boxes of them. I gave them away to anyone who would take them and then filled my freezer with marinara sauce & tomato soup. After a few months CatMan was like - Stop! I can't eat another tomato!!!

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    2. My parents had 81 tomato plants the first year after they retired...

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  4. I once bought 20 pounds of asparagus at a Mennonite produce auction

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    1. Wow... that is a lot of asparagus! It's soooo good, but it sure doesn't keep long. That must have been an adventure in asparagus eating!

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    2. I've had terrible luck freezing asparagus - it all came out mushy. Of course, I think the frozen stuff you get at the store is yucky too, so perhaps I'm just too picky about my asparagus! :-)

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  5. At least you won’t have to chop soap for quite a while! Having the butcher paper on hand makes a good case for saving potentially useful items. My tendency is to get rid of things if I have no immediate need for it – and then regretting it.

    I once bought a package of disposable razors at Sams Club. It took me ten years to get through the entire bag.

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    1. I fear I am terrible about throwing out stuff like that. I finally made a deal with myself. I have a cabinet in the basement and I allowed myself to keep only the amount of packing supplies & boxes that could fit in that cabinet. But then I decided I could use cardboard as a weed-stop in the garden so I'm afraid the boxes are piling up again. OY! But at least I had a box to put all of my cut up soap in! :-)

      And 10 years worth of razors! You must be better at making them last than I am. My skin is so sensitive that I have to use a really sharp blade or else I'm covered with little red bumps!

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  6. That is awesome - I can totally relate, and now you've got me wondering if I can find a huge block of soap too :) I've gone a bit overboard in the past buying things from the food coop. They mostly come in 5kg (10lb) bags, which are hard for me to eat up by myself.

    I bought a 5kg bag of organic cocoa powder for cheaper than it is to buy the non-organic stuff at the supermarket. I've managed to get through about half of it in a year, but I'm worried it will go rancid. I also bought a 5kg bag of pink salt, but that should be good for years :)

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    1. Ha! So you want to join me in crazy-land? At least we'll both be clean for the zombies!

      I actually ordered mine on Amazon but you can get them at a variety of places. You want to look for "melt and pour soap base" and be sure to figure in the shipping costs when you're comparing prices!

      And I've never heard of cocoa powder going rancid. It usually takes me several years to get through a small container and I've never had a problem, but if you're worried about it you could keep it in the fridge or freezer.

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  7. Hilarious! That's a lot do soap. I have come to love Dr. Bronners. Since I stopped using conventional soaps, shampoos, and conditioner, my face and back and scalp are so happy. I always have a big container of DB, baking soda, and distilled white vinegar. :)

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    1. Yup... I should be good and clean for a good long time! I bought some Dr. Bronners years ago but I haven't really found anything to use it for... maybe doing dishes by hand? I'm just not really a liquid soap kind of a girl. How do you use yours?

      And I so agree about shampoos and the like. My skin, and my hair are sooo much happier since I took the "no poo" plunge 6 years ago.

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  8. Ugh I'm not getting my emails telling me when you add a new post again. Glad I decided to see what you had been up to.

    I Love it! That's a lot of soap but if the price is good I'd do the same. I was trying to think of things I bought in excess but not many come to mind. I grew up with a basement full of things we used in large quantities because they were on sale and didn't want to turn my house into the same. But little by little I am opting for larger containers to avoid packaging. I buy my toilet paper by the case online which lasts me more than a year at a time now. When my boys were growing up people thought I was crazy because I would buy things like potatoes in 50 pound bags, but the thing is we went through that in a months time.

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    1. Hmmm... not sure what's up with the emails! I'm coming to the conclusion that it's imperfect technology at best!

      I have made a few bulk purchases that I regret - mostly food that I couldn't eat before it went bad. It's a balancing act for sure! But holy moly, 50 pounds of potatoes in a month! I guess growing boys are hungry! :-)

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  9. When I first started reading, I thought I was going to be able to help you out by telling you about the company we buy 12 packs of unwrapped soap from, but it looks like you helped yourself just fine! (and then some, haha) :)

    And I've never heard of soap going bad so I think you'll be fine. :)

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    1. Well... maybe in 10-12 years when I use all of this up, I'll come asking for info on that company! :-) I sure hope soap doesn't go bad!

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  10. Toilet paper! I decided to "get organised". I do my food shopping online and have it delivered and I spent ages working out a menu and making a detailed shopping list so that every week it would just be "open the list and click on just about everything", a week's shopping done in 15 minutes and a nice man brings it right into my kitchen every Tuesday evening. However, I only realised when toilet rolls had taken over both bathroom cabinets and the airing cupboard that even a family of 4 doesn't need a pack of 9 toilet rolls every week!

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    1. Ha! Now... online grocery shopping is something I've never tried. I just have a "thing" about wanting to pick out exactly the "right" pieces of produce - yadda, yadda, yadda. But I do order cases of ridiculously expensive cat food online (Weruva) because it's the cheapest option. I know I could save a bit more if I were to use the Amazon automatic thing... but we don't use up quite a case of each flavor each month, and I fear that the cat food cabinet could grow even more out of control than it already is! Of course, at that point they'd decide that the flavors they currently love were "blick" and there I'd be with a cabinet full of ridiculously expensive cat food that nobody would eat! Sigh.

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