“Go Beach or Go Home!”

I love that title. In fact, I lifted it from my friend’s summer travel scrapbook. Obviously, I have no shame. Actually, as I told my pal, I think the title is so clever it deserves to be shared with the world. Travel scrapbooks are my favorite to design, and with spring break in full swing and summer just around the corner, I thought it apropos to share some of my favorite tips for spicing up layouts that spotlight trips to the beach. One of my favorite pages features photos from our recent trip to Hawaii. I used pictures I took … Continue reading

Great Home Tips

I’m always searching for great tips that I can use around the house. Sometimes the simplest solution is the most ingenious. When faced with a common problem, little household tips can come to the rescue. Here are some ideas that I have been thinking about or practicing lately. I keep a spray bottle with a half vinegar and half water mix under the bathroom sink, along with some soft rags. The spray bottle and rags make it easy to clean up the shower doors, the sink and anywhere in the bathroom in just a few minutes. Plus I know that … Continue reading

Tips in the Kitchen 3

Don’t you just love it when you find a tip that makes your time in the kitchen so much better? I’ve been sharing some of my best kitchen-related tips and strategies. While melting chocolate in a microwave can be more convenient than using a double boiler, it can quickly become a disaster. Chocolate burns easily. To help reduce the chances of this happening to your chocolate, use a clear glass bowl that will allow you to see the progress of the chocolate in the microwave. Heat it in 30-second intervals, and always stir it between heating times. Sometimes what looks … Continue reading

Tips in the Kitchen 2

Whether you want to spend more time in the kitchen or less, having an array of great kitchen tips on hand can make your time go by smoothly. Here are some more handy tips that you can use in and around the kitchen. You can reduce the sting in your eyes when cutting garlic by a number of ways. If you store your onions in the refrigerator, they will become sweet instead of stinky because some of the starch will convert into sugar (this will change the taste a bit, too). You can also make sure that your onion is … Continue reading

Tips in the Kitchen

Whether you are Betty Crocker or Mrs Take Out, kitchen tips can make your life easier. From cooking shortcuts to cleaning dilemmas solved, isn’t it nice to know that help is on its way? If you are cooking anything that contains milk, eggs and flour (such as pancakes or a sauce), rice or pasta, and things get sticky, here is a tip to clean those pans up easily. First soak the pan in cold water. Hot water can set the starch in these foods, making cleanup tougher. The easiest way to make pie dough for a pie crust is by … Continue reading

Kitchen Cleaning Tips

For a clean, bacteria-free kitchen without a lot of work, use the following tips. They will ensure that you have a safe, easy to maintain clean in one of the most important rooms of the house. Get them while you can Clean up little messes as they are made. It doesn’t take much more effort to put dishes into the dishwasher as it does to put dishes in the sink. If something spills, wipe it up right away. This will ensure that you don’t have sticky messes or overwhelming dishes that are much harder to deal with later. Clean in … Continue reading

More Clever Household Tips

Do you know the best way to vacuum or how to keep the roll of plastic wrap from falling out of it’s box? Sometimes it is the clever little tricks that make daily keeping of a home so much easier and more effective. Here are plenty of clever home tips that I bet you didn’t know about. On a roll Did you know that from the very beginning, those boxes that hold plastic wrap and aluminum foil were engineered to prevent the rolls from falling out when you are trying to rip off a piece of wrap or foil? It … Continue reading

Clever Household Tips

Do you know how to treat an underarm stain or stop the pain of a paper cut? Here are some clever household tips for you to try out at home. Underarm stains Underarm stains can be so frustrating. You’ve tried all sorts of cleaners, including bleach and Oxyclean, right? Here is a little trick that seem to get the job done for t-shirts and other cotton shirts. Dissolve nine aspirin into a cup of warm water. Saturate the stain with the solution and allow it to sit for at least 30 minutes. Then launder your shirt as usual. Pencil stains … Continue reading

Clever Ideas Around the Home & Yard

Sometimes you have a problem around your home that can be fixed with just a little bit of ingenuity. How many times have we lived with an issue or paid for an expensive solution while wishing for something better? Well, most families are pretty smart and creative about coming up with great ideas. For example, in a previous blog I posted about How I heard that you could use your solar pathway lights for indoor lighting in the case of losing power. There is a magazine that we get called Living The Country Life. (livingthecountrylife.com). It is a magazine devoted … Continue reading

Is Your Home Ready for Company?

Yesterday, we were having a quiet day at home. The kids were playing, my husband was puttering around, and I was trying to catch up with writing work that fell behind because of the holidays. We were just about to get the younger kids down for a late nap when my husband got a phone call. His best friend that he hadn’t seen in a long while was in the area. Could he stop by with his girlfriend? This was a rare chance, and there was no way that we could say no. We also would really enjoy seeing him. … Continue reading