The before photos are approx Autumn/Winter and the after photos are Summer. (Before/After Spring)

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

8/365

Originally uploaded by WalkerWhanau

First trip to the library in a long time today. See if you can guess by the book titles what my current interests are…

Also, I am so into this Project365. Having the motivation to get the camera out and take a photo a day is good. It helps me to take a few photos each day because I take the camera where I think we will be.

The instructions that come with them say to use a cup of soap nuts to a litre of water and simmer for 20 minutes, which I followed. Oddly enough, the result was a liquid that looked like dirty water (and smelt like concentrated mulled wine).

I poured it into a bottle and tried it in the shower – the liquid was way too runny for shampoo, and the bubbles from shaking it up did nothing much either. After the shower, however, my hair does feel a lot better

I then put half a dozen of the used nuts into a calico bag and put that in the washing machine with a load of clothes – the water felt extremely soapy, which I hadn’t expected, and the resulting greywater was a lot blacker than normal.

Overall, I recommend Soap Nuts for in the washing machine and that, but am yet to find a good way to use it as shampoo. I also think that the liquid, when well diluted, could be a really good general garden spray (soapy water can kill some pests, discourage others and in some cases help stop fungi and diseases).

I’ll update later when I have played with them and the “recipe” a bit more..