Today I put a thin layer of wood ashes over my vegetable garden, trusting that the potash will enrich the soil with the winter rains. Our Arkansas ancestors did the same thing, but generations of ...

Even the most hardcore recyclers probably don't realize how many ways wood ash can be used around the house. You can even use them as a foundational ingredient to create stunning homemade soap. The ...

Our Arkansas ancestors did the same thing, but generations of Arkansas women also used wood ashes to make lye soap. So far, my wife has refused to revive that tradition. Making soap is an ancient ...

Mary Rich looked like a masked stranger in her goggles, gloves and face mask last week at Huffines Trades Day. She was stirring a bowl carefully at an outside table. She was making lye soap. Lye soap ...

Readers, this is the fourth of 12 basic homestead skills we’ll be presenting every month throughout 2019 from Kimberlee Bastien’s new book, 52 Homestead Skills. We invite you to join Kimberlee and her ...

Lye soap is made by boiling a mixture of lye (sodium hydroxide) and animal fats. Lye could be purchased, but most Arkansans seem to have made their own from wood ashes. Almost all the sources specify ...