Moving blog

I got a spam comment on my old blog. I realized that I had a lot of cool stuff on it. There are aspects I like better in Blogger and likewise in Wordpress so it's hard to say which is the better platform. But in the end, it's much easier to import another blog into Wordpress so I will be posting there from now on. All my posts from here have been moved to -

Love in the home

DIY Pocket Protectors

Why did I never think of this before? I guess my idea of pocket protectors were smart guys trying to protect their shirts from a leaking pen or sharp scientific instrument. I was reading about using aprons on Large Family Mothering. I had heard of doing this before but it seemed a chore to keep things from falling out of your apron or damaging your pockets much less the time to move everything from one apron to another. Then I read her solution of making a simple canvas drawstring bag to keep scissors, pens, nail clippers, etc without damaging the apron pockets.

How brilliantly simple! Then I thought of my husband. His box cutters, pens, keys, etc destroy his pockets on a regular basis. I get why they make pockets out of thin fabric to keep from adding too much bulk but those pockets are not made for working men. What if I made two smaller drawstring bags from a sturdy fabric for his pockets? I thought about making it as a gift but since his birthday is months away, I just told him about my idea. He liked it.

I didn't have any canvas in my stash but I did have a strong denim. I used some squares that were already cut to about 8-10 inches. I folded them in half with right sides together and stitched an L around the open side and the bottom. I used a straight stitch and then a zig zag stitch over it to make it strong. I turned the bag inside out so that the denim blue was showing.  I checked to see how it fit in my husband's pocket and folded it down a couple inches so it wouldn't show. I sewed a drawstring channel. I cut an opening and used a safety pin attached to the end of my ribbon to feed the ribbon through as a drawstring. The ribbon came from a couple sets of bathcloths that I had bought on clearance. I brought the ends of the ribbon together and tied a sturdy knot.

Not only will this protect his pockets but it can also be pulled tight before sitting in a recliner. You have no idea the amount of box cutters and markers that have been fished out of our recliners. It also saves a lot of time of moving all his manager essentials from one pair of pants to the other. It makes it easy to pull out and put on his nightstand so he can spend the evening without all that weight in his pockets.

Here are the two drawstring bags. I am still in awe. Why did I never think of this before?

Babystep #25 Ditch the table salt

Babystep #1 - Add kefir daily or at least several times a week.

Babystep #2 - One batch of broth and subsequently soup a week.

Babystep #3 - Introduce fermented veggies.

Babystep #4 - Streamline kitchen

Babystep #5 - Add detox baths

Babystep #6 - Add omega 3 supplements

Babystep #7 - Purchase some more local raw honey.

Babystep #8 - Ginger tea - My day doesn't feel complete without it.

Babystep #9 - Magnesium supplements - James needed the inhaler when RSV went through the house. I was able to use Mucinex and sinus rinses and forgo the inhaler.

Babystep #10 - Sourdough starter - I reduced it to one starter after holidays but then my one starter fizzled out for some reason. Will be getting one started back up shortly.

Babystep #11 - Drink water first thing in the morning.

Babystep #12 - Work on creating a natural bath set for the children  - The soap savers are working great!

Babystep #13 - Menu planning each week - I am actually emptying the fridge throughout the week. Every meal has been planned. Extras go in the freezer and very little ruins in the back of the fridge. Once shopping day comes, my drawers are emptied and ready for fresh meat and veggies. 

Babystep #14 - Exercise daily - One of the productivity recommendations is to Eat the Frog. It comes from the idea that if you ate a frog in the morning, everything else would be easy after that. Your frog is the hardest thing for you to do. Exercise is the hardest thing for me to follow through with but I want to be productive so my frog is getting to the gym or on the Wii Fit. I must eat it before breakfast.

Babystep #15 - Glucosamine for arthritis - We've had some major Artic chill. I have had no joint pain and my husband has had minimal. 

Babystep #16 - Homemade yogurt

Babystep #17 - Avoid food dyes

Babystep #18 - Fresh and frozen over canned veggies - My pantry looks a little strange and we've gone through bags of carrots like never before. Looking forward to summer and the farmers market.

Babystep #19 - Be calm

Babystep #20 - Enzymes

Babystep #21 - Avoid MSG

Babystep #22 - use sinus rinses proactively  Especially after vacuuming or any decluttering project. Dust is my nemesis. I clean, get sick, don't clean, dust piles up more, get worse next time I clean, etc. It's a vicious cycle. Working on cleaning regularly and minimizing clutter but dust is really hard to escape. Looking at getting a face mask for when I clean like Nony. 

Babystep #23 - Extra Vit C and Vit D3 during flu season

Babystep #24 - Gluten free pasta

Babystep #25 - Ditch the table salt - Making soup every week and cooking with whole foods is really making us go through the salt faster. Not much has been preseasoned so I need to add adequate seasoning and sodium is required for our bodies. But the chemically processed stuff in the stores isn't very healthy. After reading some on different salts, I learned sea salt is misleading because every salt is the result of a sea at one point of time or another. Although I do like my Celtic sea salt especially for Salted Caramel Mochas. The color is apparently what indicates the mineral content. I found some dark pink Himalayan salt on Amazon and it came in the mail today. It can have up to 84 trace minerals and elements. Very fascinating!

$100 grocery challenge - Week 2

I did not have to make any extra trips to the grocery store this past week. I shopped on Sunday last week and 3 gallons of milk fit in the fridge and lasted until Friday. Since I'm shopping on Friday, there may be a milk run later next week.

This morning, I checked for meat sales at Winn Dixie and Publix but to be honest, I really didn't have time for multiple stores and nothing was impressively marked-down anyhow. So I asked my husband what he was in the mood to eat this next week. He wanted BBQ and pizza. Wednesday is our regular pizza night. I decided to look for something to BBQ in the slow cooker.

I went to Walmart because my husband had to be work in 2 hours so I needed to get done and get home. I found some beef back ribs to make beef stew and a pork shoulder for BBQ.

I price-matched red delicious apples for $.79 per pound. That was a 50% savings.

Since I got apples this week, I decided to continue the citrus habit and get orange juice with calcium. That may help make the milk last til Friday.

I need a new batch of yogurt so I got Horizon's organic whole milk with extra DHA.

I was so proud of my shopping cart. If I had time, I would have taken a picture. I had shopped the perimeter of the store except for BBQ sauce, cereal and Tinkyada pasta. I am so grateful for the idea of babysteps. Shopping the perimeter seemed so hard just a few months ago. Now it seems only natural way to do things. I even contemplated finding a BBQ sauce recipe so I could skip that next time.

My menu this week

Saturday - Turkey Dressing and Sweet Potato Casserole
Sunday - BBQ, Baked Beans and Apple Cake
Monday - Beef Stew
Tuesday - Full breakfast for supper - Eggs, Sausage, Biscuits, Fried apples, Grits and Fall plum jelly
Wednesday - Pizza
Thursday - Red Beans and Rice w/cornbread
Friday - Crabby Patties (Salmon croquettes), Mac and cheese and biscuits.

This menu cost just $133. Still well under $25 per person. I am loving this challenge.

You mean you're still celebrating Christmas?

I did keep the Christmas tree up. It is still rather sparse with ornaments (a few were broken this year) but I've enjoyed the lights. We've enjoyed continued Christmas music and movies.

After spending four weeks preparing our hearts for His coming anew, the actual Christmas season seems rather short if you don't take it at least to the celebration of Epiphany when the wise men came. Some mark the end as January 1st with the end of the Christmas Octave. Some mark the end with Epiphany and the completion of the 12 days of Christmas.

I am intrigued by the significance of the 40 days of celebration of the Presentation of our Lord on February 2nd. This culminates 3 epiphanies. Jesus was revealed to the shepherds, then the wise men and then to Anna and Simeon at the temple. The numbers 3 and 40 are very important in the Judeo-Christian world with 3 being the number of the Trinity and the days in the tomb. The number 40 reminds us of the days of rain for Noah and the number of days that Jesus was tempted in the dessert.

As a Catholic convert, I'm still learning the different traditions and how we want to celebrate them as a family. But there is a practical reasoning for extending the celebration of Christmas. January is well-known for seeming to be the most depressing time of the year. It's cold, dreary and we're crashing after all the festivities of December. I wonder if establishing a tradition of extended Christmas celebration would help protect my children and future generations from the susceptibility of depression in these winter months.

To be honest, I'm not sure what exactly I want the extended Christmas season to look like except for more Christmas music, movies and joy. That is the key. Find ways to extend the Joy of Christmas. Don't rush back to ordinary life quite so quickly. I think next year, I want more emphasis on St Nicholas Day and Epiphany for gift-giving and more emphasis on Jesus for Christmas Day.

The tree is probably coming down this weekend. I'm ready for the fresh start of the year. But I'm making notes in my planner for next December and January. It may be a long process with layers of tradition added each year. But for now, I feel joyful and that's enough reason for me to keep the celebration of Christmas extended well into January.

$100 grocery challenge - Week 1

I accepted Meet Penny's challenge to spend $25 per person per week for everything from groceries to diapers to soap and toothpaste. So for my family, it ends up being $175 a week. But guess what, I came in under $100!

The grand total for week 1 is $93.50. The two things that helped keep this total so low was Santa Claus bringing new undies in stockings so we are using less diapers. I didn't need diapers or wipes or meat (other than pepperoni). I had two packs of smoked sausage left over from last week. And no I didn't go way over last week to skew the numbers. Last week's grocery total was $170. I also had a 19 lb turkey that needed to be used.

So I used the sausage in White Bean and Kale soup on Sunday and Breakfast Burritos on Monday. Today, I'm cooking the turkey in my huge slow cooker. Tonight I will pull all the meat off the turkey after supper. The bones will go back into the slow cooker for bone broth. The meat will be divided into three parts. One part will be for lunches. One part will be for soup. The last part will be for cornbread dressing. I will make pizza on Wednesday and blender pancakes on Friday to break up the turkey meals. With such a big turkey, I should be able to end up with two gallons of soup and two pans of cornbread dressing. This will give me freezer meals that I am stocking up on for sick days and busy days out when the weather warms up.

My grocery budget went to frozen and fresh veggies for the soup and sides for the turkey, cheese for mac and cheese and pizza, pepperoni, fruit for breakfast and snacks, 3 gallons of milk, and a few things like bay leaves and children's ibuprofen that we had run out of.

I'm sure next week I will not be able to come under so low but it was really excited to start off strong.

The Flow

A woman was telling me about her current organizational challenge and if she could just get that straight, maybe everything would stay that way. But I've learned that is a myth. Nothing stays in order without maintenance. Even if you're single and living alone, dust still collects and things must be put back where they belong. With kids, it's never-ending. The maintenance that is consistent takes less and less time but consistency is the key.

I think we are in this desperate search for "the flow." This mysterious place where everything is easy. Sounds great in theory. If only we can declutter, organize, plan enough to get to that place. But is that really where we want to be?

My exercise routine was sporadic last year but I did go enough to strengthen my muscles. So much so that I needed to up my weights to feel any resistance. I thought about how we don't want easy in exercise. The burn and the occasional soreness is a sign that our muscles are rebuilding to be stronger. What if we applied that same logic to other areas of our lives?

Now, I'm all for working smarter and not harder. I also don't think we should make things unnecessarily difficult. But what if we applied the consistency and ever-increasing difficulty of exercise to other areas of life? Faith? Homeschooling? Homemaking? Hobbies? Fellowship? Parenting? What if searching for the easy way has resulted in flabby characters, minds and souls?

I wonder.

So how do we up the ante in these other areas? Establish a new habit. Expand an existing habit. Learn a new skill. Get out of our comfort zones. Feel the burn.

If we discount "the flow" as a mythical and undesirable place, does that change the attitude with which we tackle the work of today? Work that is necessary. Work that will be there 10, 20, or 30 years down the road although in a more efficient pattern as we grow stronger. Would I feel less defeated when things don't go as perfectly as I think they should? After all, I have a lifetime to make it better.