Maintain a Clean Home

 

About a month ago, I got my act together and after a few days of hard work my home was clean. I knew that if I did a few things each day it would stay that way. The sad thing is that I know when our lease is up I will have to start all over again, since Casey’s new job is in Frisco living in mid-town Dallas makes for an interesting commute. I decided now that I have it at the level where it just needs to be maintained that I would make myself a cleaning schedule. I figured that if I kept it to a few task each day it would be easier on me and my family. It would also make it possible to get out and run errands in a timely manner if needed.

Cleaning:

Everyday:

Pick up living room
Make Beds
Kitchen
Have Ian help pick up his room.

Monday:

Laundry- Sheets & Towels
Vacuum

Tuesday:
Laundry-Bobbi
Bobbi and Ian’s Bathroom
Laundry Room

Wednesday:
Laundry-Ian
Casey’s Bathroom
Dust

Thursday:
Laundry-Casey
Vacuum
Office

Friday:
Laundry-Catch up
Kitchen Floors
Sunroom

Saturday/Sunday:

Maintain

What do you think? I think I made each day manageable with out feeling overwhelmed, does it seem like I am leaving something major off? Do you have a home maintenance routine?

Thou Shalt Not Worship Thy Yahoo! Calendar

I am definitely not an early adapter when it comes to technology.  I held out for a long time using my leather-bound Franklin planner to keep track of our family’s calendar. But my attachment to paper became increasingly troublesome because my husband couldn’t see what the kids and I had going on unless we sat down together for a calendar meeting. In our house, chances for such a civilized activity are few and far between.

One day, I decided to experiment with the calendar feature on our Yahoo! account. I entered a few recurring activities and watched them autofill through every week. Instead of having to write “ballet” and “horseback riding” by hand on little squares for every week in my planner, I could set those up to repeat automatically. Then I started adding one-time events, family birthdays set to auto-fill every year, vacations and appointments, all color-coded for each family member. With the speed and convenience evident, I was hooked. I even have a color code for supper menus. It’s addictive.

Now I am greeted each morning by a rainbow of activities and commitments, events and appointments. I can see at a glance what each person has going on that week. I even have a handy place to enter those random events, like when your cousin tells you she is getting married 14 months down the road and you’d better save the date but you’re afraid you will forget if you just write it on the back of a gas receipt. Now I can choose “Add event,” enter the details, and the date is officially saved.

This handy electronic system gives me a feeling of calm and peace, an organized sense of success as the family manager and the illusion of control.

But there’s the problem.

Thinking I am in control of my life or anyone else’s is dangerous. I believe our loving Lord is all for making good use of your time and planning your activities. However I have to fight to keep my calendar from becoming an idol in my life and not forget who is really in charge. I should be looking heavenward for the calm and peace I am seeking.

 Besides, sometimes my calendar is wrong.

I forget to enter an activity and double book myself. Or someone gets sick and the day’s plans go out the window. When life happens while I am making other plans, I am reminded that I should be saying each day, “Lord willing, this is what I plan to do.” Then be ready for whatever comes my way, even if it is not on my calendar.

I love my Yahoo! Calendar and its organizational capabilities, but it does not love me back. I shalt try not to worship it.

“In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.”
Proverbs 16:9

Shopping without spending any money

My living room desperately need some changes, but with recent life events this was not in the budget. So I decided that I would go shopping in my own home. Yes it takes time, but it didn’t take any money out of the bank. After a couple of hours of digging in our back room. I found everything I was looking for to transform the large barren wall from drab to fab.

I am a huge fan of being surrounded by photos of my loved ones, yet in our current apartment I didn’t have that many on display.  I had never had a photo wall in any of my homes before, after seeing them on numerous other blogs and in a few friends houses I decided I needed one. I knew I had enough frames and pictures to start one… where I would find them was a whole other story. Once the finding was complete the work really started. How was I going to display everything I had found…. they all were of different sizes and shapes. With a little time and patience (and keeping the hammer away from the toddler) everything was finished.

So how can you spruce up your home by using things you already have?

I can spruce up my living with ease…my toddlers room is another story. Any advice on how to decorate a 15 month old boy’s room without breaking the budget?

Cherry Blink Cookies

Doesn’t your mouth just water, looking at these cookies? Writing this recipe for Cherry Blink cookies down makes me want to make more right this very second.

I just learned how to make this particular recipe when my Aunt Kathy flew to Texas for my birthday this week…

INGREDIENTS:

* 4 cups Wheaties® cereal
* 1 cup sugar
* 2/3 cup shortening
* 2 tablespoons plus, 3 teaspoons milk
* 2 teaspoon vanilla
* 2 egg
* 2 cup Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
* 1 teaspoon baking powder
* 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
* 1/2 teaspoon salt
* 1 cup raisins
* 1 cup chopped nuts
* About 36 candied or maraschino cherries (they come in green & red!)

DIRECTIONS:

1.	Heat oven to 375ºF. Crush cereal; set aside. In large bowl, mix sugar, shortening, milk, vanilla and egg. Stir in flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir in raisins and nuts.
2.	Drop dough by heaping teaspoonfuls into crushed cereal; roll gently until completely coated. Place cookies about 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Press cherry into each cookie.
3.	Bake 8 to 10 minutes, or just until set. Immediately remove from cookie sheet to wire rack.

vase crafts

Looking for an easy way to decorate your house for the holidays? Try this at home:

You will need:

• A clear vase
• Ornaments, plastic fruit, cinnamon sticks, pine cones, acorns, or any other small decorative thing that you can fill the vase with.

Directions:

1. Wash and dry the vase thoroughly.
2. Fill the vase with one of the decorative items from above – keep it consistent (either all the same size or all the same color schemes).

This is great way to get the kids involved in decorating the house and you can display the vase anywhere – from the middle of the table, to the coffee table to the bathroom counter.

Get creative and tell us what you’d fill your vases with!

Elevating the Holiday Table Centerpiece

I am always searching for ways to create a table centerpiece that does not impede dinner guests’ line of sight.

Most decorations which are scaled large enough for a big dining room table are too tall to keep on the table during dinner.

This hanging holiday table centerpiece solves that problem!

By hanging the decorations from the chandelier, it creates height without limiting table function.

This arrangement is created out of plastic Christmas ornaments hung with curling ribbon. I recommend leaving the ends of the ribbon uncut until you are satisfied with the ornament placement. It took me a little readjusting to make it feel balanced.

Last year I did a similar centerpiece using dainty glass Christmas balls hung by a clear thread. It turned out very pretty, but due to lack of coordination on my part several ornaments were broken.

I am a big fan of plastic…

Designing on a Dime

I can’t sing.  I can’t dance.  I can’t play any musical instruments (despite the fact that I took piano lessons for 6 years, but that’s besides the point).  One talent that I do have is taking things that are not great – sometimes even meant for trash- and turning them into things that make our house a home.

My husband and I are committed to living on a pretty tight budget so that doesn’t always leave money for decorating so I’ve had to become pretty creative and resourceful.  One of my bigger feats was lugging four dining room chairs that were set out for bulk trash pick up across a big play ground to my car and home.  You can read more about that here.

Once I got them home I asked Hubs to refinish them for me.  We have a very common butcher block dining room table that we bought at a garage sale when we first got married (which we’re planning on refinishing too).  I didn’t like 2 of the chairs that came with the table so we chunked them and built our own benches- on casters. Trouble is one of the benches is really really hard to move.  It’s been like that for years.  When I saw those chairs I knew that they were the answer to my problem.  I could replace the 2 chairs that we currently had and take out the bench and use all four of the chairs that I recovered.

Here’s the before and after:

I’m not going to lie.  If I had unlimited resources that’s not the chair I would pick out in a furniture store, but if it looks 100% better than what we currently have so it works for me.

Next up we have our master bedroom.  We had a huge white dresser that I had had since high school.  The thing was probably 15 years old.  When we moved into our house I painted it white (it was a murky brown color) and swapped out the hardware so it looked decent, but it was just too big for our room.  I saw this picture in a magazine and wanted to see if I could copy it with furniture we already had.

I feel like I came pretty close.  I still need to buy some glass knobs for the smaller dresser, but I’m happy with how it turned out.  I also decided to do my nightstand while I was at it:

And yes the ugly lamp is on my to-do list.  I saw one at Target that I really like, but it’s $50 so I’m waiting for it to go on clearance.

The last project that I want to share if for those of you out there who think that you can’t do this sort of thing.  Start small.  Really small.  I found these frames (there were two) at a garage sale and knew that they’d be perfect for my kid’s rooms.

I spray painted them with left over paint from previous projects, put the mats back in with pictures of my kids with their friends and now they’re hanging up in their rooms.

Garage sales, second-hand stores, flea markets, Craigslist are great places to start looking for those little treasures that can really turn your house into a home.  If you need help find some frugal decorating blogs (they’re a lot of very talented women out there) to help hone your eye and expand your mind as to what’s possible.

When Candace isn’t dumpster diving she blogs at Mama Mia.

Making The Holidays His Own…

Last year, I found some little turkey place card holders on clearance & I pulled them out for our Thanksgiving dinner this year.

Reese was really excited about making the place cards with everyone’s name, & I was shocked when he worked through all of the writing! Needless to say, he was very proud of his work, & Mommy took a picture of every single one like a Mad Woman. And then I dated the back of them, and put them in his Memory Box. Obsessive with capturing everything much?

Fun in the Tub with Bathtub Paint

Kids love to painting.  Moms don’t love to clean up the mess.  What if you could combine painting with cleaning the bathtub?

This is bathtub paint.  You can make it thick and use it as finger paint, or you can dilute it and use it with paintbrushes.  This “paint” is washable, does not stain and will help you clean your tub.

…..

Ingredients:

• 1 Cup of Dish Detergent
• 1/2 Cup of Cornstarch
• 1/2 Cup of boiling water
• Food Coloring (liquid kind is best)

I used antibacterial, scented hand soap.  Know whatever soap you use, your kids will coat themselves with it – so be sure to pick something that won’t cause a reaction.

Directions:

Mix the cornstarch into the hot water until it is dissolved and the consistency is pasty.  Add the soap and mix until there are no chunks.  Add food coloring.  Store in an airtight container.

The paint may separate slightly when stored, stir before use.  Test the paint on a patch of your tub to ensure that your food coloring does not stain – and have fun!

This post was written by Rachel, mommy to three under three.  Bathtub time is fun time for the kids and quiet time for me!  Want more activities like this?  Check out my blog Quirky Momma!

Kitchen Remodel by Mom

I did it!  I remodeled my own kitchen using nothing but a few hundred dollars and a boatload of sweat equity.It started with motivation.  First by finally being in my house for a year and knowing I wanted to do SOMETHING to mark it with my personality.

Next came inspiration.  This was realized in various forms.  Via friends’ houses [like best friend Sarah, and super woman Texas Holly], via magazine pics, and lastly via kitchen remodel books.

The painters quote was the third step.  A wee bit out of our price range–which considering we had NO budget for this project was not hard to reach.  $3500 was the magic number that led me to YouTube and cabinet painting videos.

Finally, a visit to the paint store [Sherwin Williams in Flower Mound on 2499--SUPER nice and helpful]. Husband took cabinet doors off for me.  Kids carried drawers to the garage.  From there, it was up to me.  I donned my green latex gloves, and armed with a sander, primer, beaucoup paintbrushes, paint, glaze, and varnish, I set to work while husband was away on a business trip.

I started with DARK, and I do mean DARK cabinets that made my mood DARK.

I ended with vibrant, colorful cabinets that make me feel HAPPY!  Color is a mood enhancer, and boy does it work.  I love my new cabinets, but more than that, I did it myself.  I’m proud, I’m fearless, and I’m motivated to see what else I can tackle.

Tell me what you think!  Do you like my new kitchen?

Next Page »