It's me again! Still here!

Hello glorious followers out there! I just wanted to write to tell you that I am still here and I have not given up on blogging or sharing fun things. I am transitioning to a new website that will also include links to my etsy shop!! I am very excited about all that, but it does take time, and I want to do a good job. So hang in there and I'll share as soon as everything is all ready (likely mid-October). In the meantime I will give you a sneak peek of what I've been working on and what's to come!

Bathroom towel bar

I love to revive or restore something I found for cheap (or even better, for free). I picked this shelf up at a thrift store (75¢) and I decided that I could change it a little and definitely put it to use. At first, I spray painted it with some bronze paint that I already had, and it was immediately looking much better.

I knew I wanted it to go in our upstairs bathroom, but we were doing some work in there, so I put it aside for a few weeks.

Once the bathroom was repainted and ready, I decided I wanted it to be chrome to match the other fixtures. I just spray painted it again. Again, I already had that spray paint, but it usually costs about $5 for a can. Then I picked up a small bottle of white craft chalk paint at WalMart ($3) and lightly painted the wood shelf. I have already used that paint on two other projects! 

I bought the glass bowl at the Dollar Tree, already had the moss, and got the succulent at WalMart at the same time as the paint ($1.77). 

It love it! It is a great alternative to a traditional towel rack and I can display a couple of pretty things while keeping the countertop from getting too cluttered. Pretty and functional. And cheap! That is my kind of project.

Banana Bread

We eat lots of bananas here, and they usually get eaten long before they get too ripe! Over the long weekend, though, I left a few at home and they were too mushy for our taste! 

I looked up a banana bread recipe and it turned out to be delicious, so I thought I'd share. I am so far from a good cook, but this recipe only had ingredients that I already had in my pantry, plus it was extremely easy. This recipe was from www.simplyrecipes.com.

BANANA BREAD

• 2-3 very ripe bananas, peeled
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 3/4 cup sugar (1/2 cup if you would like it less sweet, 1 cup if more sweet)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

Preheat the oven to 350°F and butter a 4x8-inch loaf pan.

In a mixing bowl, mash the ripe bananas with a fork until completely smooth. Stir the melted butter into the mashed bananas.

Mix in the baking soda and salt. Stir in the sugar, beaten egg, and vanilla extract. Mix in the flour.

Pour the batter into your prepared loaf pan. Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour at 350°F, or until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean.

Remove from oven and cool completely.

I actually added a little sugar and brown sugar on the top before I put it in the oven to give it a crispy topping, and it was yummy!

My middle son especially liked it (probably because he is our biggest banana fan). It's a delicious way to use those over ripened bananas! Give it a taste!

Have a wonderful day!

Grout Renew

Hello Friends, and Hello Friday!!
We have only 5 days left until the end of school and we are all looking forward to summer fun over here. I have several things on the agenda to share with you, so check back often!

Today I'm sharing how I updated our kitchen tile's grout. Our home has a pinkish tile throughout the kitchen floors, with a very dark grout. Since completely replacing the tile is not in the game plan right now, I thought I'd give this a try and I have been very pleased.

First off, because it was a large area, it took me about 2 weeks to finish. I would work for about 45 minutes most nights after the kids had gone to bed. I used a tiny little craft brush and just painted this stuff over the old grout lines.

I had to go slowly (not easy for me) and it was also tough on my back. That being said, the bottle cost me $12.50 and I used right at half the bottle for the kitchen, which is a pretty good size. It has been 8 months since I did this and it has held up great. I haven't noticed it chipping much or anything, but when I feel like any areas may need to be touched up, I still have plenty of it to do just that.

Before:

After:

If replacing your tile is just not an option, but you want to brighten or clean up your grout, give this a try! I only found this brand at The Home Depot and nothing really similar at Lowe's.

Here are links to the brand and color I used. There are several choices out there:
Polyblend Grout Renew - The Home Depot - $12.47
Polyblend Grout Renew - Amazon - $33.64

And links to some others who have done this as well:
Snapguide
Young House Love

Have a wonderful weekend!

Welcome Spring! Weed Killer

I have been MIA for quite a while now! Oh well.

I'm back again and sharing my super secret {obviously not!} homemade weed killer just in time for the dandelions to take over. 

Of course I found this on Pinterest and it is one of the 1647 things I have tried that actually works. I knew I was going to need quite a bit of this, so I mixed it in a separate container and then poured it into my spray bottle. The soap does bubble up quite a bit, so keep that in mind.

Recipe:

2 cups white vinegar

1 tablespoon salt

1 tablespoon dish soap

I try to save old spray bottles for things like this, so that's what the Resolve bottle is all about. Also my kids love to spray water out of them in the summer. Endless entertainment. Any spray bottle will do the trick. Even if you just have a bowl, you can pour the liquid into the weeds. Do be careful, though, because this will kill grass and anything else it touches, so don't get it near something you don't want dead! It helps speed the process to spray it on a sunny day.

Exhibit A

(Weeds before)

(After)

Exhibit B

Happy Spring!

Book photo artwork

Here's a little tip for saving money on some unique artwork. I love thrift stores. I love sifting through and finding things I deem valuable or interesting or pretty in a junky setting. It's not for everyone but it is definitely a hobby of mine. I especially love to find old books. I knew I wanted to change our boys' room from an airplane theme to more of an outdoors theme when I took the crib down and our youngest officially moved into his "big bed". I probably change the "theme" of their rooms entirely too often, I admit. Anyway. I was on the lookout for some good pictures for their room and also for another room in our home. I ended up using this book for the boys' room and here is my technique.

First of all, this hardback 9x13 book was 25¢ so I knew that even if I totally messed it up, it wasn't too much of an investment! I scanned through it in the store and decided I liked several of the photos in it. Even at just a quarter, there is no reason to buy something unless you are fairly sure you'll use it.

I disassembled the book with my exacto I knife, taking care to be gentle and not rip pages.

Once I got the cover off, it looked like this:

I cut off the strings that bound the book and was left with single sheets of paper -- just what I was looking for.

Most of the pages I did not need to keep, so I went through and tossed out the pages I didn't plan to use for anything. I like to keep things I think I will need and find great satisfaction in discarding things that I know I will not use.

I just replaced the airplane photos that were already in these frames. The plane photos also came from a book--this was a different room, when I was pregnant with our middle son, so about 5 years ago. I moved these photos into a different room when the two youngest joined rooms. TMI...

...and we have a whole new look in there for 25¢ and a little bit of time.

This idea can be used for so many purposes in so many areas of your home, so if you're looking for some new artwork, check the book section at your local thrift stores! The books are not always that cheap, but it's a good start. And how cute is their new room!? Mostly decorated with items I recently got at my grandparents' house. Win/Win!

Important Papers/Tax Prep

The new year means it's the start of tax season. I do our taxes here (well, Turbotax helps a little..) and it is so helpful when it's time to get that done if I have prepped ahead of time throughout the year. Even if someone else does your taxes, this little filing system helps you find important papers much easier than thumbing through desk drawers. We do have a safe deposit box where birth certificate copies, SS cards, etc are stored. This box is more for things that don't need the security of some documents and that need to be quickly accessed..

I picked up this file box at Target several years ago. It is very sturdy and cute, so it met my needs.

Since it's been a few years they did not have the exact one anymore, but here were some great options in my local Target last week. I will also include links at the bottom.

I use the labels (I should use my label maker to make it even cuter! Soon..) and have folders for Bills, Pay Stubs, Cars, Dogs, Each Child, Other, and Tax Stuff.

• Bills - I keep the paper copies of all our bills. I know that is not necessary, and many things are done electronically, but I just keep them, ok?! I do take them out of the envelopes and unfold them so they take up less space in the file box. And eventually I get rid of them.
• Pay stubs - same scenario with the bills
• Cars - I keep the receipt and information from when we have car work done, as well as any paperwork involving our cars and the purchase of them. This helps me if I need to go back and look at the last time we had any kind of belt replaced/tires rotated/etc. because I have a bad memory.
• Dogs - obviously, vet visits and things pertaining to our puppies are filed here
• Each Child - each child has a folder that holds their blue immunization form, and the extra copies of their birth certificate. This is not where I store their keepsakes.
• Other - there are some things that just don't fall into another category, so that goes in this file
• Tax Stuff - this is my most helpful folder this time of year. Throughout the year, I put papers that I know I will need when it's time to work on taxes into this file. This includes receipts for medical expenses, donation receipts, and since we are diligent about tracking our checking accounts, the hard copies of our account registries are filed in there. It's so nice to just grab that file out when the W2 and other tax papers are available and get to work.

I have a separate folder that holds things that have to do with housework, like garage door work, painters, tree trimmers, estimates, so I can get to those numbers and receipts easily when we need work done around the house. It is stored on the shelf next to this file box. It's blue and I should turn in around so it looks a little neater :).

Alright, this is my technique:

I keep all these papers for an entire year. I keep it in a place that is easy to get to, but obviously out of children's reach.

When it's time to start working on taxes, I put all my papers that have anything to do with taxes in an accordion folder. It takes me a few sessions of sitting at the computer for 20 minute intervals to actually finish. Also I have to print some forms online and some papers come in the mail. The accordion folder makes it easy to just grab and store in a drawer without the risk of someone (a mischievous two year old) getting his hands on it and me losing something. I keep all tax related papers in this folder while working on taxes. Once I'm done filing, I print a copy of what we filed, and add it to this folder.

Once taxes have been filed, I take my little folder upstairs to the guest room closet and put those papers into my long term tax box. Remember when I talked about my plastic boxes here? This is what one of them is used for. Our tax papers since 2002 are in there! Once condensed, they don't take up too much space.

That's when I purge out my important papers box and shred the papers from the previous year that I won't need anymore. Most everything is cleared out, but I just go through each section and decide what I need to keep and shred the rest.

I know it seems tedious, but we've been doing this for five years and the little bit of effort on the front end has proven to make life much easier for me. And if something happens to me, I know my husband could pick right up and find what he needed in there. This is obviously not the only way to store your papers, and if the box was fire proof that would be wonderful, but it is a suggestion that hopefully will help someone come up with a system that works for you!

Here are link to some file boxes. Anything that makes doing your taxes less tedious is nice! Have a wonderful weekend!!

 

Nate Berkus Hanging File Box ($19.99 Target)

Vaultz Locking File Chest Storage Box ($39.87 Walmart)

Staples® Large Open Top File Box ($8.49 Staples)

Bigso John Canvas Paper Laminate Desktop File Box ($27.99 Amazon)

Cargo Atheneum File Box ($20 Amazon)

Realspace™ Hanging File Basket ($29.99 Office Max)

Espresso Parker Desktop File ($29.99 The Container Store)

Bigso Kate Stockholm Desktop File ($19.99 The Container Store)