• Blog - Outdoors

    T Tuesday: gardening edition

    May 20, 2014 - By 

    Hello…I’m back for T stands for Tuesday. Did you miss me?20140519_4885I took last week off to attend Little J’s all-district track meet. She did awesome! First place in her school for girls 100m run and her relay team finished a good 3 seconds before anyone else in their heat. She was the anchor, so this photo appears that she is running unopposed. What a great way to finish off her elementary school years! The meet brings together all 7 elementary schools in the district at one of the high schools…too bad it wasn’t the one she’ll be attending since that would be cool at that age. 20140513_4812If you look at the way the adults at the finish line are dressed, you’ll get an idea of the temperature that day. Real feel of 39°F.

    Anyway…I named this post gardening edition…so where the heck is the gardening?!?20140520_4894Here we have my tiny seedlings waiting to be strong enough to live outside. Notice the plastic barrier I had to erect around them…I’m sure you can guess who that is for.

    Mr. G and I worked outside most of Sunday prepping the garden.20140518_4858He built a gate for me this year so I no longer have to climb over the fencing. 20140518_4859The beans are planted…tomato cages are ready and the flags are blowing in the breeze both for decoration and deer deterrent. 20140518_4857My deck box garden is also ready for planting…my cherry tomato plants and cucumbers will live here.

    And where was Miss Gracie…20140518_4877Running from door to door begging to come out. Nope. Not going to happen. Not since she chased that squirrel up a tree. Too strong of hunting instincts for that one.

    Lots of things on the list today ending with an evening choir concert, so I better get at it!

    What are you doing today?

  • Blog - Kitchen

    Amazing life hack

    April 30, 2014 - By 

    This is going to change my life…seriously. I didn’t believe it until I tried it myself.oil cleanerDid you know the best way to clean that nasty caked on grease from the top of your fridge or other surfaces in your kitchen is with oil!! fridge top cleanI don’t have a before picture since it would have been seriously embarrassing.

    Here’s a small example of what the top was like…eww...greaseexcept think 10x thicker….ewwwwww!

    I dipped a paper towel in a bit regular vegetable oil and wiped across the icky grease.wipeOk, now your thinking well yeah it looks great because there is a film of oil on top.

    But check this out…BAM...cleanTotally clean…smooth…shiny…awesome.seriouslyAmazing…right!?!

    After cleaning all of the items on top of my fridge in the same way I now have the prettiest fridge top in town. clean and prettyI did end up using a Pampered Chef scraper in a few spots with the oil where it was really stuck on.  Again….ewwww.  But now that I know this trick I plan to wipe it down on a much more regular basis so it doesn’t get to that stage again.

  • Art - Blog - Kitchen

    T Tuesday: change in the air edition

    January 21, 2014 - By 

    So glad you came to visit today for T Stands for Tuesday where we share a beverage and a little something from our week.

    breakfastI’m doing my best to eat a healthy breakfast each morning. It takes some time and effort but I think it’s worth it. Fuel for the day. Today is 2 eggs scrabbled up with yellow pepper, onion. tomato, mushroom and spinach with a little bit of jalapeno salsa for kick. Only 265 calories.  I couldn’t even eat the last 2 bites!

    bookWhile eating I skimmed through this library book. Truthfully, I’m not sure that I got much from it. However, I was reminded of a technique that I have yet to try. Printing on tissue paper with a printer. I have to see if our old printer still has ink since it has to be a straight feed printer not the kind that loops the paper through. *Fingers crossed for ink.*

    Jan 20 journalYesterday, I worked in my kira-kira journal a bit. I had started cleaning up my desk and the journal sucked me in. Or perhaps it was just procrastination.

    changeChange is a theme that we are seeing a lot around here. We are making some healthy changes in our life…slowly. Our children are changing into young adults. I’ve made the change of working very part-time after being a SAHM home for 13.5 years. We are wishing for the weather to change to Spring.

    Change can be scary…or exciting…or devastating…or uplifting. Change can be methodically planned or come up and smack you in the face. One can embrace change or flee in terror or perhaps slip into denial about it. But change is an integral part of life. I’m choosing to embrace these changes and am looking forward to what it will bring to our lives.

    Wow…I guess a healthy breakfast gave me a mental boost as well!! I don’t usually get so deep and introspective in the morning.

    What are you doing today??