January 1, 2013 · 8:09 pm

Starting Off The New Year Right

I was in bed last night long before the ball dropped. I rang in the new year the same way I do every year, fast asleep.

There was a little excitement when I woke in the morning at the thought of a new year. It is the same feeling I used to get at the beginning of a school year when I had a new blank notebook. I wrote so neatly in that notebook, until it wasn’t new anymore. As the year progressed my handwriting would get worse and worse. Eventually a new school year would come and I would get another blank notebook. And the cycle continued…

So it is pretty much the same now, except instead of a notebook I get a new calendar. Another chance to make this year even better than the last. And I wanted to. I really did. But..

I had a headache all day at work today. While I was walking though the snow my shoe popped off and my sock got soaking wet. I got home exhausted and ready to crawl back into bed. Had it been any other day of the year that is exactly what I would’ve done, but I really wanted to start the new year off right, so I did a quick project instead.

I pulled out all my tools that were scattered on a shelf:

toolsbefore

I used a pegboard that we already had and hung them up inside the exercise room closet door:

tools after

I feel so much better now. 2013 is going to kick the crap out of 2012.

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December 30, 2012 · 1:32 pm

Christmas Is Over

Yesterday AJ and I took down the Christmas tree. Usually I am ready to toss the tree out the door, but it was a little sad this year. The holiday seemed to pass so quickly.

We all had a Merry Christmas, except that Robert got really sick the day before Christmas Eve, so he was feeling pretty rough all the way through Christmas. We still managed to have a nice time and the kids were very happy with their gifts.

Belle bought the family a dartboard, which is actually really fun as long as I don’t look at the wall around it. It seems hitting the actual dartboard is a little difficult for some of us. I will have to come up with a solution to that problem pretty quickly or there will be more holes than wall.

AJ had his first piano lesson on Friday. He was practicing all day yesterday and he seems pretty determined to learn.

I have been cleaning and organizing all week. Last night I finally got my spice cabinet finished. I installed an extra shelf and it matched perfectly:

spice cabinet

I even have extra space now, so I will be able to store my tea there as well.

I am looking forward to the new year. I am going to have a huge ass garden, we are going on a cruise in June and before I know it, Christmas will come again.

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· 12:38 am

Organizing Herbs and Spices

As you know I have been experimenting with medicinal herbs and have a cabinet stocked with herbs for healing. During my research, I have started noticing that when it comes to my cooking spices, I break some important rules. While I did store them in a cabinet out of the light, they were pretty disorganized and located in the worst cabinet of all…over the hot stove. When I started looking through them, I realized a lot of them were old, really old.

I have started to clear out a cabinet that is not above the stove that will be the future home of my spices. I got rid of old spices and replaced the ones we will actually use from My Spice Sage.

While searching online for different ways to organize spices online, I fell in love with the idea of cute little uniform spice bottles. Necessary, no. Did I obsess about it anyway? Yes.

I found these bottles at World Market and went back and forth, but finally made a purchase for 36 of them when I found a $10 off $30 coupon.

emptyspicebottles
My plans for the labels changed a bit when the taper in the jar make it impossible to have a vertical label. I picked this font called Wizard Magic and I decided using kraft paper would make the labels look exactly how I wanted. I bought a roll and cut it into 8 1/2X 11 sheets and printed my labels.
kraftpaper
I cut each one out:
cutting labels
To stick them to my jars, I used a Xyron sticker maker. I picked this up at Michael’s with a 50% off coupon, so I ended up paying $8.

labeltosticker

I tried my hardest to put them on the jars as straight as I could:
labeledemptybottles
Finally they were ready to fill:

finishedspices
It makes me a little sad that these have to be stashed away in a cabinet, but at least I will be able to look forward to opening the cabinet from now on.

I am in the process of getting the cabinet ready for them. I have 2 lazy susans to use and am adding an extra shelf in the cabinet to make the most of the space. I will post the pics when I finish.

I also got around to making new labels for my medicine herbs. Here is what they originally looked like:

DSCF2292
Now I have all the internal/external uses for each herb listed, so I will instantly know which herbs to take.

newherbs

I loved doing these projects and can tell already that me and that sticker maker will be good friends.

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December 21, 2012 · 10:17 am

It’s The End Of The World And I Feel Fine

This week Belle has been all about preparing for the end of the world. She has her bags packed and filled up all the plastic bottles she could find with water. She thinks the events of today will be Revolution style, with the grid going down. She even requested a crossbow like the girl on the show has and made a bucket list.

I humored her even though I was a lot less certain that the end of the world would occur. But then…

AJ decided he wanted to make cookies for all his teachers. He worked all night and shaped each cookie perfectly:

ajcookies
And then…

I walked into Belle’s room and found her cleaning her room without being asked. She even vacuumed behind the furniture:

room1

And took apart her bed to clean it out and vacuum under it:

room2
That got me thinking. AJ doing something sweet for others and Belle cleaning her room without even being told. Maybe it is the end of the world.

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December 15, 2012 · 12:58 pm

Herbs In My Hair

Over the past month I have completely changed the way I take care of my hair. The first thing I did was to say goodbye to conventional shampoo and conditioner. I now use my shampoo bar instead. The bar is so rich in oils that there is no need to even use conditioner, although I do a final rinse with a tbsp of apple cider vinegar to restore ph balance to my hair.

The shampoo bar is a little weird to use at first, but I have grown to love it. The lather is actually way better than any shampoo I have ever used. It is worth noting that my hair did go through an adjustment period when I make the switch. Since most shampoos strip the hair of natural oils, your scalp produces excess oil to make up for it. When you switch to a shampoo bar that isn’t striping the oils, your hair will be on the greasy side until you begin to adjust to the new product.

In addition to the shampoo bar, I have also starting using tea in my hair. The tea I make is made with nettle, rosemary, sage and horsetail. I use 1 tbsp of each in a quart jar and fill with boiling water. After it infuses for a couple hours, I strain it out, put it into a spray bottle and drench my hair with it before every hair washing. I allow the tea to dry on my hair and then shampoo my hair like normal. Leftover tea goes in the refrigerator for later use.

All of the herbs contribute to hair growth, strength and health. As an added bonus, the sage colors gray hair for brunettes.

That is all I do. Nothing else. No spray, gel, leave-in conditioner. Nothing.

The results? Pretty good so far. Obviously it is too early to tell if there is any hair growth, but my hair looks and feels so much better.

Here is a picture of me and my hair at the beginning of October:

before
And yesterday:

after
My frizzies have turned to curls and my hair is a little darker and so much softer and shinier.

And yes…I am wearing the same shirt in both pictures. If you don’t wear gray a lot, you probably don’t have dogs.

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December 8, 2012 · 12:01 pm

Making Stuff

This week I am closing in on being ready for Christmas. The soaps I made to give away have been ready for a few weeks and I have been testing them all out. Last night I finally got them all labeled.

soapslabeled
For my first attempt I made a lavender shampoo bar (far right). I then made a lemongrass hand soap and an exfoliating grapefruit bar. I am so excited that they all came out so well and have learned some things to make my future bars even better. I have a new batch of vanilla and chocolate soap curing on the rack, but they won’t be ready for the holidays.

newsoap
The kids worked on some crafts this week. I bought them each a Christmas foam kit. I had to help Belle a little with hers.

santahouse
AJ, the artist that he, takes all crafts very seriously.

gingerbread1
He even broke out the glue gun to piece his together perfectly.

gingerbread2
Today is AJ’s birthday and last night, instead of a cake, I make him chocolate birthday cupcakes with peanut butter frosting.

cupcakes
The frosting on these cupcakes is quite possibly one of the most delicious things I have ever tasted. The cupcake couldn’t quite live up to being topped with something so good, so next time (there will be many next times) I may try adding chocolate chips to the batter.

This week I also got my new car seat covers installed.

seatcover
The installation was a little harder than I had hoped. I had to mail back my front covers when they didn’t quite fit. After calling the Subaru dealership to find out how to remove the back seat bottom, they (thankfully) told me to disconnect the battery first since there are airbag sensors under the seat. It was simple to get the seat out, but getting it back in proved to be a challenge.

I ordered these leatherette seat covers from GT covers. They are custom fit to my vehicle and overall I am pleased with the way they came out. The days of lint rolling daily to get the dog hair off my cloth seats are over and my original seats will remain in perfect condition.

Today I have to drive AJ to the high school for the spring musical auditions. Afterwards we will take him out to celebrate. He had been wanting to learn to play piano, so we are getting him lessons for his birthday. He starts in two weeks. I wasn’t sure how he would feel about that being his present, but he was actually very excited.

Maybe he’ll even get good enough to teach me. I’ve always wanted to learn to play an instrument.

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December 2, 2012 · 3:01 pm

Thanksgiving and the Christmas Tree

Our Halloween was a bust and had me dreading winter too early when we ended up with a foot of snow. The weather has since redeemed itself and Thanksgiving turned out to be a beautiful day. Our family came over to our house. Robert and I made the ham, sweet potato casserole, stuffing, sausage balls, and tollhouse pie for dessert. The rest of the family brought additional sides, desserts and yes, a turkey.

We set up two big tables for everyone to sit together and Belle helped set the table.

thanksgiving
The day after Thanksgiving we went to pick our Christmas tree. Usually it is pretty uneventful, so I didn’t think to bring my camera, but the place we went to this year was a lot of fun. They had animals to pet (we loved the pig) and horseback rides. They also took you on a hayride to pick your tree.

We came home and I strung the lights. The kids took over from there and put all the ornaments on. At first AJ was trying to be funny and make fun of Belle for always posing for pictures. She didn’t see the humor.

tree1
Eventually they were having a good time and there was hardly any fighting over getting to hang a particular ornament.

tree2
I have already got my Christmas shopping done for the kids and am hoping to get everyone else checked of the list by the end of the week. After that, I just want to kick back, relax and enjoy the holiday season.

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