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Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Use It Up


A few posts back I posted my embroidery with the saying "use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without" and I want to demonstrate one way I am trying to apply that to my daily life.  In my effort to make strawberry lemonade, I had a ton of excess lemon peels.  At first I was throwing them away.  Then I got to thinking how wasteful that is, and surely I could do something with the peels.  I hopped on the internet and found more than one way to use up the peels.  I made two batches of candied lemon peels and could have kept going.  However, its no good to gain 100 pounds by eating candied lemon peels just because I didn't want to throw out the peels, right?  Back to the internet I went... Fortunately I found more than one non-edible way to use up peels.  I always use vinegar water to clean- its green and frugal.  I now have 2 big mason jars of lemon peels in vinegar to use as a household cleaner (that smells like lemons).  I sliced up the rest of the lemon peels, added some quartered small lemons from our tree, and topped it off with vinegar.  Ill let them sit for 2 weeks and then strain the vinegar out to use for cleaning.  I love being able to use things that would otherwise be thrown out.  Especially if it saves me money by not having to buy a commercial version!  Ill post a picture of the lemon rinds later, as right now they are drying.  I love how happy lemons are!
Check out the huge lemon tree in the background!

4 comments:

  1. These are very interesting ways to use lemon peels, thanks for the tip ! When the peel is fresh I love to cut out the white thick part and use it like chewing-gum (but it depend on the tree you have, some trees give lemons with a very thin white part that is not as good as the thick ones).

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    1. Interesting idea! I would never think to chew the pith. I will have to try it next time I have a thick one. Thanks!

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  2. I Love this! I have several bags of oranges that I was gifted with and also feeling guilty about the peel waste, wonder if I could do the same thing with orange peels. I use vinegar so much in our home - cooking / cleaning / laundry and hair rinse. Wonder if the vinegar can infuse with orange scent? Hummm.... Thanks for sharing! (Visiting from Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways)

    ~Taylor-Made Ranch~
    Wolfe City, Texas
    http://www.taylormaderanch.com/blog

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  3. Thanks! You could totally do it with oranges! We also use vinegar for everything, its amazing! I am due to get some more oranges from my uncle and will have to try it too. Good suggestion! I am going to go check out your blog! Thanks for visiting!

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