Baking soda. NOT POWDER but SODA. I t will take of anything stuck to glass, ceramics and the like. It does not scratch. Cheap and easy. Works great on baked on yellow stuff on those glass baking pans too.

To those of you who have been using these "home made" detergents, are you experiencing any odor, mold or mildew issues? The reason I ask is because castile soap builds up into a gooopy, gel-like gunk if not properly rinsed. This could potentially cause problems in washers. Every home-made product I've tried - from detergent to fabric softener - has proven unsatisfactory. Either the products don't clean well, they risk building up in my machine or on my clothes or they just don't work. Price is not the only consideration, which is what appears to be driving this homemade laundry movement.

At a recent quilt guild meeting the speaker recommended Quilter's Choice pencils. I googled them and came up with the attached article. I don't often mark my fabric before quilting but I'm going to try this. I'm sure we talked about these pencils in a recent post too but I couldn't find it when I searched. As I recall, there were some very positive comments about them. I think whatever kind you use, you would need a light and a dark for black/white fabric. Hope this helps, Kate Here is a link that might be useful: marking pencils

I have used the "White Marking Pen CLOVER" and it is as BlueBars says. The ink takes a minute to dry, but then can be seen as a fine, opaque line that doesn't rub off easily. It washes out easily with cold water. The ball point means that the line can be drawn with great accuracy. I think this is a gel pen. This makes me wonder if a glittery gel pen might be even more visible on black fabric, but I'm not sure how well it would wash out. Sounds like I'm gonna hafta run another test! ;-P Another thing I like: At Joann Fabrics, they have a set of chalks, in assorted colors, with a plastic holder. The chalks can be sharpened separately from the holder, which means less breakage and a finer point. I sometimes use emery boards (nail files) to sand the point, for an even finer line. This rubs off relatively easily, so is of limited use. I have not tried any silver pencils yet. I read that a particular brand of silver pencil is very good. I wish I could remember which brand it was. I think it was Aquarelle. It was an artist pencil, at any rate. It might be available singly at Joann's, in the section with the watercolors and paintbrushes. I'm going to put that on my shopping list, as I have been meaning to try it one of these days. I ran a search to try to find the name of the silver pencil, and this might be helpful, (if you enlarge the font!) Marking Pencilshref> It seems that more than one brand might work just fine.