Homemade Vanilla Extract

We use real vanilla extract (as in, not imitation) for a lot of things. Homemade kahlua, homemade ice cream and much more. The stuff is expensive! So I was excited to hear that you can make your own. The first thing I heard was to stick a vanilla bean in a bottle of vodka. I went online to do some research and found a little more to it than that:
After searching several sites looking at quality and prices, I was happy to find that the best deal was also organic! I bought some bourbon vanilla beans from this site.
I then looked at 2 recipes online: the first recipe
and the second recipe.
The first seemed stronger, so I made mine closer to that one.
I mixed the ingredients all together on April 25th.
8 vanilla beans sliced down the middle, scraped and chopped, all added to a sterilized quart jar.
I did this by taking each bean half and running the knife (sharp side up) along the inside to scrape out the "caviar" of the vanilla bean, before chopping up the bean skin.
I poured 2 cups vodka on top (40% alcohol), sealed tightly and shook vigorously.
Here's the plan:
Week 1: Shake daily
Week 2-4: Shake every other day.
Week 5: Let it age, check taste.
2nd recipe says you can add 1 t per cup of dark rum to sweeten.

I came up with 8 beans because the first recipe called for 1 oz. of beans per cup of vodka.
1 oz=4.5 beans. That would be 9 beans for 2 cups. The 2nd recipe called for 6 beans/2 cups. I met them in the middle with 8. Plus, scraping out the caviar and chopping up the beans will probably make it stronger.

Above: What the vanilla extract looked like with everything in it, before being shaken.
I'll add more photos to update the progress.