A few things for Friday

Happy Friday everyone!

I feel like sharing things today, so I'm ending the week with some things that I very much enjoy.

* One of my favorite blogs, Enjoying the small things. Kelle writes and shares her story so beautifully. I want to share This post though. You don't need to know her, or her friend to let this post sink to all the places you need. I love this quote from her post  as she is talking about how their friendship is so good, despite them being 'so different'.  She hits that nail on the head, a good reminder for us all. 

 "I think most of our "I bet they think they're better than me" assumptions have nothing to do with them and everything to do with us.  And no one can make us feel crappy about the way we parent, what we eat, how we tend to our marriage, where we shop, how we spend our money or what kind of person we are--no one but ourselves."

Check her out. She`s the bomb

*This video is hilarious. From Huffingtonpost.com: "Matthew Clarke has launched a new series called "Convos With My 2-Year-Old" where he takes actual conversations he's had with his daughter and reenacts them with an adult man standing in for her. The result is hilariously creepy. Watch episode one above."

* And just because, HERE are some great tips on how to clean your house in 2 hours and keep it like that. I found the idea of moving from room to room so that you don't get carried away in one spot really helpful.

I hope you all have a beautiful weekend! Feel free to share some of the things that you enjoy :)

Bye-Bye Laundry Piles: Sharing my tips on how I stay on top of the load

 We all have it. For many of us, it's on our floors, scattered on random surfaces, or piled on favorite seats that never get to be sat on. It can be tedious, and some have piles that fill rooms!

Laundry.

 I have tried many things in my laundry experience, to try and make things run more smoothly. Labels, 8 baskets, you know. I think I finally have something that works REALLY well. No more piles of clean or dirty, no more sorting for an hour. It might not work for your family, but I think it should work for very near everyone. I always forget to share cleaning tips and whatnot, and especially since we are eco friendly/no chemicals, I plan to do my best to share more on this topic.

 Anyway, laundry. So it's actually insanely simple (maybe that's why it works so well). Here is what I do:

Each family member has their own basket (I use the colorful 5 dollar rubber totes with handles from walmart. We all have a different color.) I also have a basket for my linens/towels and one for my 'extra dirty' (clothes I use to clean bathrooms, rags, Cody's work pants, anything that touched something that came out of a dog..) 

 Everyone goes about putting anything they wear in their baskets, and anything else goes to their proper baskets. 

When a basket is full, I throw a load in. I wash everything in the basket. No sorting colors. It all goes in. *gasp*(don't worry, there is more.) I wash on cold to accommodate our clothing type and also to be more green. 

To keep colors from running or fading, put 1/2 a cup of vinegar in the rinse cycle. It's really that easy! I promise you it works and everything stays it's own color. And Mackynzie and I recently went on a big shopping trip so our clothes are very new. THIS is the big secret. Eliminates a whole bunch of steps!

  I wash towels/linens in warm with a cold rinse, and my 'gross' in hot (but usually change it to warm mid fill up because  it's hot enough.)

  I also  wash nearly everything inside out. This keeps color better and protects things like designs and buttons. I highly recommend it. I don't flip jeans or socks/underwear. 

 I have 6 wool dryer balls that knock my dryer time easily in half. They also eliminate the need for dryer sheets and keep clothes fluffy, wrinkle-free and soft. In the summer I try to line dry often, but don't care for that crunchy feeling clothes get, so afterwards I pop them in the dryer for 5 minutes with the dryer balls and they feel normal.

Got wrinkles? No need to iron. Throw everything that is wrinkled in the dryer (preferably use balls, but you don't need to) along with a damp cloth and turn on for something like 10 minutes. Take out and hang immediately  Hang up the ironing board ;).

I wash with an Eco friendly soap called Ecos. There are tons of great Eco options out there. 

I also make a home made linen spray for my whole house. I spray on clothes (once put away. I'll even open drawers and give em a spray.), carpets, furniture... anything with fabric. It both disinfects, calms and smells great!

Linen Spray:

-Spray bottle filled with warm water 

-1/4 cup (I just leave the neck empty and fill it up or put about and inch or a little less depending on bottle size.) of vodka or peroxide/rubbing Alcohol.

- 10-25 drops of your favorite essential oil. Lavender is great. I have a sweet orange in mine right now.

-shake up and spray away!

Add a couple drops of essential oil to your drier balls for added scent as well. OR spray rags with vinegar/essential oil and throw a sheet in per load. Bam. Natural dryer sheet.

One of my biggest tips? Do an ENTIRE load at once. Wash it, dry it, and put it away right away. It keeps things easy and doesn't seem daunting at all. Keeps your house free from crazy laundry piles and stops you from collecting baskets of clean laundry. Try it. You will feel so much better, I promise!  

The one basket thing also allows each family member (even toddlers!) to easily put away their own clothes.

I hope this helped someone. 

Happy Laundering! 

Mom Therapy

 I am a crazy ball of restless energy today. Mackynzie is asleep on the couch as I type this and the house is silent apart from the comforting hum of the fan.

 Cleaning is a fantastic anxiety reliever. How I am only just discovering this, I have no idea, but I am so glad the light bulb went off. Mackynzie did not want to go to bed last night, so bedtime happened when two tired parents climbed into bed, turned off all the lights and told her we were going to sleep. It worked, she slept, but it was not an ideal night. With that being said she, of course, woke in a foul little mood. It wasn't that bad, but very noticeable. I kept my cool, and with a cup of green tea in hand, started buzzing around the kitchen, mad at the day-old mess. Before I knew it, the kitchen was clean and I had moved to the bathroom. I was frustrated that the upstairs bathroom is just never clean enough. I scrubbed with lightning speed, checking on Mackynzie in between jobs, who was happily watching a show and munching eggs. I left the bathroom only to decide that the floors were grossing me out since it's shedding time, and thought it would only take a second anyway. I put the vacuum away, loaded my arms with everything that needed to be downstairs, and sat on the floor to color with Mackynzie. It was there that I allowed my self to relax my shoulders and breathe. I felt so much lighter and my mind was much more clear. Mackynzie seemed to be in better spirits, as she peeled crayons and chatted with me about the coloring page.

 I have done a lot of cleaning in my life, but very few times have I put my anxieties and frustrations into my work. Today I vowed to do it every time. I wasn't particularly frustrated or anxious, but I have days where I over think and over analyze and it can get out of hand. I figure if I put anything negative or worrisome into whatever I am cleaning, then wash that crap away, I'm going to be a pretty mellow mama in no time!

  It is an incredibly beautiful day today. Our first double digit of the year and we are going to soak it up as soon as this little one wakes up. We even went out in T-shirts yesterday to play on the steps. The taste of spring is in the air and boy, did I miss it's sweetness.

Kitchen Command Center

I decided to finally update our little family notes/important stuff wall. I made a little 'kitchen command center' and it's working fantastically already. Being able to mark off things as I go is a giant help.

We will add more as we need it, but for now it's a huge sigh of relief for my brain. This is much better than the old system.

Finally doing stuff around the house and seeing you around

 Last weekend Cody and I got our butts in gear and finished a few things around the house. The list looked something like: Make Mackynzie's room into more of a room (worry about really decorating etc later.), get some more storage in the bathroom, mount herbs on the wall, put some sort of headboard on our bed, clean up the disaster we made doing said things.

There (of course) are still small cosmetic things to be done around here, but alas, we are close.

We needed more storage in our small-ish bathroom, so we added some shelves. They make a world of a difference.

Before:

After:

To see before's of the house (taken last month) check out my video tour.

We were playing with quite a few ideas for our bed. Originally, the plan was to make a sort of canopy bed so we would have shear curtains all the way around. I loved the idea, but then after scoping out pinterest a bit, we got some inspiration for something a little more practical for our current sleeping arrangements and went for it. It's different, but we are really happy with it. I still need to add some more art to the room which will also happen when it happens. I think it will make things look a little more balanced.

Cody also mounted my herbs to the wall for me. I was super excited (over herbs, I know.) and I love  how it looks.

Like always, please excuse my iPhone photography.

 Something I am super happy to be done with (for now.) Is Mackynzie's [play] room. (you should seriously check out what it looked like before. I say this is a big improvement.

 There are a couple things to do in her room still, like hang those purple letters on top of her kitchen, and we are brainstorming something to put around the wall of her little coloring corner. As you can see she has drawn a couple of pictures on the wall. She loves it and its so much more practical. I also have to add how big of a relief is is for me. It's so much easier to clean now.

Oh ya, we also switched sectionals from the basement and main floor two weeks ago. Huge improvement.

before: (yes, this was mid move and mid Mackynzie mess.)

 After:

Probably one of my favorite adjustments.

 We had a busy weekend! But i'm so happy to cross all those things off of our list.

 I am going to apologize now to friends and family who use this to keep updated on us. I'm going to step away from the blog a little bit to put my efforts into other things. I am still going to update as often as I can (which who knows, may not even be different to how often I update now.), but if things get a little slow around here, now you know.  I just can't predict how much time I will have to devote to everything.

See you when I see you!

When A Little Artist Spruces Things Up

 OR what to do when crayons leave the paper and find themselves decorating your furniture and walls.

It's going to happen. Probably a lot, but I have learned that it really doesn't matter, because almost anything can be stain lifted/fixed and even re-bought. If it can't, well maybe I should have rethought the purchase or placement!

 With Mackynzie's room actually looking more like a room now (pictures to come), she is enjoying things like her coloring station. When I was puttering around, she decided to decorate a little. Totally understandable. Blue is a great color and she is keeping with the developing color scheme of the house, so even better!

Despite good choice of color, I wasn't really going for  the crayon look.

Crayon is the horror story of parental stains. Everyone tells you its impossible to get off and you need to repaint, should any little one decide to add a bit of taste to the walls or furniture. We have learned from those times though, and we now know that crayon is super easy to remove- If you didn't you do now! :)
 All you need is a white/light colored cloth (preferably microfiber) Or even a white sponge, and a little bit of coconut/olive or even baby oil (I use coconut). Dab some on and rub.

So simple. You don't even have to break a sweat!

Now your little artist can help you decorate your abode all the time... Okay, maybe not. Yes, please let's not.

Camping Prep and how we made life a little easier for our trip

 I almost forgot to share a few things from June. Ya, It's already a week  into July, I know! eek.  One thing was from camping. I took some measures to help make our trip as smooth as possible with a toddler and two dogs. We were able to pack and unpack the trailer in about 10 minutes due to a few simple things!

 First, I handled clothes. We tend to over pack when it comes to bringing extra clothes, because when you are outside all day and far from home, you do not want to be without an extra pair of whatever it is you need an extra pair of. To save tons of room, we packed all of our clothes military style. We rolled them up.

 We were able to fit our clothes in one basket rather than have huge individual bags. Oh, that's another thing. I pack a lot of things like clothes, blankets, toys, and dry foods into laundry baskets. That way I can just pop them in the trailer and put everything away easily and quickly once we arrive. They also stack up perfectly, and then I can use the basket stack as a place for dirty clothes.

I took some extra measures to pack our food too. I cut and prepped everything I could the night before. All our days were meal planned, so we knew exactly what we had to bring. we did this loosely and gave ourselves some options since we tend to snack a lot when we are camping. With our diet, that meant the majority of prep went to our fruits and vegetables. I then placed everything in zip lock bags to save room (containers take up double or triple the space!)

 It all went into our cooler easily. To save more room, I froze Cody's meats so they could act as ice packs as well. They would thaw by the time he needed them, but we didn't have to bring as much ice. We also kept the ice in bags to avoid the nasty cooler swimming pool.

 I took everything I could out of boxes and cans and placed them in bags or a simpler packaging if it came in both a box and a bag. Even soup went into a bag! Saved us having to bring a can opener and find room for more cans.

The prep work was so worth it! Cody thanked me multiple times over the weekend, because meal prep was basically non existent. We packed almost  nothing that couldn't either be eaten raw, or cooked over a fire/on the BBQ. So we just grabbed what we wanted and ate. It was fantastic. 

When we got there, everything went into cupboards and nooks and within a few minutes we were ready to camp!

  Now you can see why we call it the 'Hillbilly Hilton'! haha

To see our camping trip click here.