Jenn Tries...

Happy almost December all! So since we are on the eve of December and all, it means it finally time to reveal my November Upcycle Project. For November, I decided to finally use all the Rubbermaid Totes I have around the house. My mom used them to pack up my stuff when I went away to college and I've used them in every move since. (And they are a great thing to use when moving!) However, since I've moved in with Mike almost 4 years ago, we haven't moved. And we really have no intention of moving anytime soon. So I decided to start actually going through my things and start reusing them too! Project 1: Outdoor Cat House Instructions From  Catster So to make my cat shelter. I simply took my tote and cut a hole into on side of it  Easy enough right? To make it a little more homey and a lot more comfortable, I took two old towels and used the no sew blanket  technique to create a couple of blankets for the house. One on top of the house and one inside

November is quickly coming to an end, so I wanted add a little something to the end of the month. I thought it would be fun if I gave a little update on my garden. I find that out of all the projects I try, starting a garden is the longest and hardest project to do. But also the one I want the most to be successful at. So here's how my garden looked near the beginning of the month.  At that time I had a couple of pepper plants sprouting and my pumpkin's were just beginning to sprout. And all my avocado pits were still to go soup cups. And here's how everything looks presently: My pepper plants seem to lose their leafs and grow new ones. I can't seem to get them to grow any bigger than that. The pumpkins are really starting to vine. I think pretty soon, I'm going to have to look into replanting them outside (and try some ways to keep the various wildlife away  And as for the avocados, they either know they are being grown in the

All right, I'll admit it. I've been dreading this post all week. It seems that while I was off playing with pumpkins and getting Santa Alf ready for Christmas, I forgot to take the time to think out a topic for today. So instead of a long free write, I thought I would just share something that made me happy this week. To end October, I shared an easy way to start upcycling was to start reusing food containers.  And this week while my mom came to help me with the Blue and Lion, she brought some left over chicken chili stored in left over ice cream containers! (Which I plan to use as cupcake cup storage after I'm done with it) I know it may not seem like much, but it means somebody's listening (even if it is just my mom) and its a start. And that's how revolutions start. One person at a time.

I'm about to let you in on a little secret. Most of the stuffed animals we have for the boys were either mine or were gifted from my mother. That would be all but one, actually.  Alf .  That funny looking Alien Life Form belongs to Mike. And he protects Alf like a third son, too. So Alf actually doesn't get played with a lot and spends a lot of time up on a shelf (and if he should make it down, Blue demands he goes back up). So since Christmas is right around the corner, and since Mike and I haven't gotten into Elf on the Shelf , I thought it would be fun to dress Alf up for Christmas. And thus have our very own Alf on the shelf! (And depending on how this goes Alf may be getting dressed up for all holidays from now on) The Project Dress Alf as Santa pattern from Feahter's Flight Results I think I searched pinterest for every version of Stuffed Animal Santa Pattern and I came up with nothing. So I decided to just rework the pattern fro

All right here we are at part 3. I like to call this the hidden part, that I really wasn't planning on doing. But after I made my pumpkin pie , I had a little pumpkin leftover and I decided it might be nice to make pancakes out of it. (And It hgought it might be a fun Thanksgiving tradition to start!) And so began the third (and final!) part of my pumpkin overload The Recipe Pumpkin Pancakes recipe from  Somewhat Simple Results So since I only had 1/2 cup of pumpkin puree left, I had to half the recipe. (Well most of the recipe, I didn't have a 1/8 tsp for some of the spices). So if you are wondering, 1/6 cup of sugar is equal to 2 tbsp and 2 tsp of sugar. (Thank God for Google!) And naturally the second I started mixing Lion was there to help me! So I mixed everything together. And while it sat for ten minutes, I went to enjoy my coffee. And Blue got ready to help me cook the pancakes I guess he though it was going to be hard work and

The Hack from  The Simple Home Results So while I was cooking my pumpkins, I froze my second batch of pumpkin puree. And luckily around this time I was able to save the lid off the peanut butter jar. So I decided to put this hack to the test. After a few twists I was able to get the peanut butter lid firmly on my mason jar . And once I was ready to use it, the lid came off fairly easily (after I defrosted the jar a little) and there was (obviously) no sign of rust

All right remember back in Part 1, where I was talking about how great it was working in a restaurant because I can often take home spices when I need them. (I'm not going to lie that is pretty nice) Well, as I was asking one of our chefs for the spices he misunderstood that I just wanted to make pumpkin pie spice and not that I was making pumpkin pies. At first I just laughed it off. Because really, I hadn't even thought about making pies. It just seemed like something I wasn't ready for. But the more I researched it and the more I thought about it. The more I realized that I could handle it. The only trick was to find the right pumpkins. And as luck would have it, Target started selling pie pumpkins right after halloween.  And so I knew, I had no choice, but to make some pumpkin pies for Thanksgiving!. The Recipe Cooking pumpkins in a slow cooker from One Good Thing by Jillee Pumpkin pie recipe from Frontier Natural Products Co-op 's infographic used

When I was looking over the November Project list, I realized that for most days of the week I have bi weekly projects and monthly projects that fall on them. But for some reason on Wednesdays I just have decorating and organizing projects. Which is fine, but I generally only make small projects to add to a room. Or just redecorate a project I've already started.  And there's nothing wrong with that. Its all stuff that helps make our house into a real home.  But part of this blog is about transforming my life. And there is no bigger part of my life that needs a change more than where and how I store my stuff around the house. That's write I'm talking all about real organization and finding the perfect place to store all this clutter we have. So to start I thought I would begin with my baking/ coffee/ crafts cabinet. Here's how it looked at the beginning of the month, As you can see everything is just kind of thrown up there without any real rhyme or reas

I'm so excited to finally be writing about this because since June (what is that like 5 months now?), I've been trying different ways to clean my cookie sheets. And well I've come to two different conclusions. Either my cookie sheets are too far gone and I should just buy new ones or all these magic cleaners, don't really work. And the more I tried different mixtures, the more I started to believe that both were true. The Project Deep Clean Cookie Sheets! Best Cleaning Solution From Clean & Scentsible Results All right so here's how bad my cookie sheets was And after trying vinegar and baking soda (and even heating the vinegar first), oven cleaner (Don't do it. I'm pretty sure this is why cookies sheets rust easily now) and steel wool scrubs, this was as clean as I could get it. As you can see I was able to clean most of the middle, but corners remained black or mostly black. And by this point I was worn out and didn&#

If I actually titled my free writes I would call this one Mike's Master Class On Using A Drill. Yup that's right. I finally decided to learn to use a drill. And Mike was more than happy to show and tell me everything he knows. (Even if I didn't need to know that much!) So here's basically how it went. (And yes we went outside because Lion was sleeping and because that's just where we ended up). So lesson 1 was that the two stands make up a horse. He had to clarify that it was not a horse you ride on (and I added not a pommel horse to do gymnastics on either! He didn't think that was funny or he just wasn't paying attention. So I let him know I knew what I saw horse was!) Next he put up a spare piece of wood to show how to do some test holes in. And really there is nothing to drilling a hole. All you have to do is pick the right size bit for your hole, pick the right speed (the higher the speed the faster it routes, so slower speeds are u

Here's how this all started. I spent a little time in October trying to find pumpkin pie spice for my coffee. And then once I found it,  I realized that it was about $4 for a little 1.12 oz container. So I was all set to give up, when on a whim I search Pinterest for pumpkin pie spice and came up with a full page of recipes. And my favorite is this beautiful diagram from Buzzfeed Life: (And Buzzfeed life has a whole list of charts to get you through Thanksgiving here:  Buzzfeed Life Thanksgiving Charts ) So I decided to give it a try! Results Really there is nothing to the recipe. The hardest part is getting all the different spices. Luckily I have a lot of cinnamon (and apparently when I run out my mom has plenty to give me!). For the rest, I thought I could take a little from work. (Yeah for working in a restaurant!). However we only have all spice and ground nutmeg. We're supposed to have cloves, but for some reason or another no cloves came in over t

Winter is coming... and getting a little closer everyday. (Yes even done here in Florida, things are starting to cool down). So for my monthly crochet project, I decided to make a hat. (or at least try to) The Project Make a Cat Hat Instructions from Persia Lou Results So I knew early on that I was going to need more yarn than I started with. But I figured since it was making a cat hat, that it would be all right. I mean cat's are all sorts of colors, right? So I started making my hat with black yarn  and mixed in a black to white ombre yarn to create some spots. And so when I switched over to the cream yarn , it would blend a little more evenly together. Here's how it looked once I finished it and stitched the sides together. As you can see, half of the the front is blackish and the rest is cream colored. And because I was wearing it, Blue had to try it on as well. I crocheted the brim. But I really wasn't feeling it. I think wa

So after taking a little break, I found a little bit of creativity to help finish off the rest of the book. And naturally it all happened after a trip to the craft store. I went intending only to get glitter, but in the same row as the glitter there were also craft pom poms. I knew I needed white ones for a future project, but decided to pick up a multicolored package because I knew it would be perfect for the activity book. The more I looked at the package, the more I knew that they would be perfect to create a texture page. And I created a Reef page for Blue, so I knew that to be fair I needed to add a Lion page for Lion. So that's exactly what I did! The Page L is for Lion Here's What You Need: Assorted Felt Sheets Lion Pattern Craft Pom Pom Balls Needle and Embroidery Thread Scissors Stuffing (or cotton balls) Here's How You Do It: Step 1: Create and Sew Down the Lion To create my lion, I searched Lion Coloring Pages on Pinter