*GIVEAWAY* Personalized Games for the Kiddos

Kids LOVE personalized things.  Zach loves anything with his name on it.  And both boys LOVE looking at pictures, especially of themselves, of course ;).  That's why I was sooo excited when my cousin Angela offered to do a giveaway for one of her AWESOME custom kids' games.  Angela runs an Etsy shop called Angela's Images, where she has personalized games and items that are created using pictures you send her.  She also has some handcrafted things like camera straps, and crayon rolls, and nursing covers.  In short, she is spectacularly crafty :).

She is giving away reader's choice of EITHER her personalized Memory game or the personalized dominoes.

Here is her description of the Memory Game:

Make photos a part of your child's everyday fun! Create a "Memor-ME" game of your favorite photographs! A great way to introduce family members (grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.) that children don't see often! Available in a 28 piece (1.25"x3" rectangular pieces) 30 or 40 piece game (2" square pieces), it's sure to be a hit around the household! 

These Games make great gifts! Choose 14 photos and send them to me and I will create your very own Memory Game! 28 pieces, ages 3 and up. Kids love these games and play with them for hours! Made from photgraphs and wood, sealed with a non-toxic coating and packaged in its own vinyl pouch for storing with your very own customized label, these games are sure to be a hit with everyone who sees them!

And here is the Domino Game:

Make photos a part of your child's everyday fun! Create a Domino game of your favorite photographs! Available in a 28 piece game (1.25"x3" rectangular pieces), it's sure to be a hit around the household! 

These Games make great gifts! Choose 7 photos and send them to me and I will create your very own Domino Game! 28 pieces, ages 3 and up. Kids love these games and play with them for hours! Made from photgraphs and wood, sealed with a non-toxic coating and packaged in its own vinyl pouch for storing with your very own customized label, these games are sure to be a hit with everyone who sees them!

Zach has the Memory game and he plays with it all the time.  Not only does he love doing memory-type games, but he LOVES looking at all the old pictures of himself.  He got it shortly after his first birthday, so they are all pictures of him when he was a baby.  

How awesome would it be to give one of these games as a gift?  Or even just keep it for your kiddo?  Entering this giveaway is EASY.  If you win you will get to choose which game you want.  Shipping to the U.S. lower 48 is covered, but Canada, AK/HI are welcome to enter, you will just have to cover shipping.  The winner MUST send pictures via email to Angela within 10 days of contest end.

*Disclaimer: I did not receive either of these games for this post.  I did receive the Memory game as a gift a couple of years ago.  All opinions are my own and not compensated. 

Enter via Rafflecopter below:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Healthy, Delicious, Lentil Soup

I LOVE the cold(er) weather months.  I'm fully aware it doesn't *actually* get cold here in AZ, but I'll take what I can get.  It's an excuse to wear long pants, long sleeved shirts, maybe even a jacket or sweater.  At night we can cozy up under a blanket, maybe even around a fire pit if we're lucky.  And it's a great excuse to make some soup!
Soups are the EASIEST, and CHEAPEST way to feed your family IMHO.  AND they are healthy, assuming you don't pick the soups with loads of cream or cheese and no actual veggies.  This post is about a pretty healthy soup I love to eat and make, and it's so very easy to do. You can make it vegetarian by withholding the pork products I mention, it will still be tasty, but the pork does make it extra delicious. I make mine veggie heavy, and hearty because Mr. G thang enjoys the veggies straight from the soup and he's not quite ready to feed himself with a spoon :).  So, take inspiration from this recipe and tweak as necessary for your own needs.

chopped up carrots

- 8 large carrots chopped approx. 1/4 inch thick pieces
- 1 stalk of celery chopped, approx 1/4 inch pieces
- 1 full bulb of garlic minced (it's a lot of soup and I like to taste the garlic, if you don't, then use less or none, it's up to you!)
- 1 medium/large onion chopped
- 1 bag of lentils
- 1 bag of prewashed spinach leaves
- optional, either ~6 slices of bacon, chopped or 1 ham bone you smartly threw in the freezer after Christmas dinner :)
- olive oil, salt, pepper

Get out your large stock pot, if you're like me, you don't know how to make a little bit of soup.  Add some olive oil* to the bottom and saute up your garlic and onion until the onion is translucent.  

sauteing the garlic and onions

Add your celery and carrots.  Saute all that for about 5 minutes.  Add your ham bone and lentils, salt and pepper as you see fit.  Add water to coat the lentils.  

the beginnings of a great soup

Bring to a boil and let that pot of yum simmer all afternoon, checking on it 
frequently, adding more water if necessary, stopping when the lentils and carrots are tender.  Throw in the spinach leaves at the very end and take out the ham bone.  

the finished product!

Scarf it down with some crusty bread and save the leftovers in the freezer for that day when you need an edible hug.

*If you go the bacon route, then cook up the bacon on your stock pot, remove the bacon, leave the delicious grease.  Use the grease to saute your garlic and onion, put the bacon back in when you get to the part where you add the lentils

Nothing like some Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

Today was cold (by AZ standards) and rainy.  And after yesterday's events with the horrible tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary, it seemed like a good day to hunker down with the family and just enjoy each other.  
I love the colder weather, coming in from outside to some hot chocolate and eating some warm soup for dinner.  Nothing says love and family like homemade chicken noodle soup.  And since the kiddos have the sniffles (again!) it was the perfect meal for everyone.  
It is SOO easy to make and SO much better than that canned stuff.  I'm sure everyone has their own special way of making it, here's mine.

Get yourself a whole roasted chicken, either roast it yourself, like we did this time, or buy one of those roasters in the store if you're looking for a short cut.  Enjoy 75% of the meat off of that bird, but SAVE THE BONES!  And save a bit of meat to throw in the soup too.

I tend to make A LOT of soup, some to eat now and some to stash away in the freezer for when we need some soup but have no time to make it.

1 whole roasted chicken, 75% consumed, bones and last 25% of meat saved
6-7 garlic cloves, minced
2 small shallots, minced
1 stalk of celery chopped, about 1/4 inch thick pieces
8 medium carrots chopped
Fresh parsley, chopped
olive oil
salt and pepper

In a stock pot with the bottom coated in olive oil, saute the garlic and shallots until the shallots are tender.  Add the carrots and celery, saute until the celery just starts to get tender.  Add about 12 cups of water and the chicken bones, the best way I've found to do this is to get a brewing bag and throw the bones in that, and then put the bag in the water.  This way you don't have to hunt for the bones when the soup is done.  Tried this when the hubs was into brewing beer, it worked wonderfully :).  Bring this all to a boil and let it cook for about 2-3 hours.
Taste the broth, add salt as needed.  When you're satisfied with the broth, add the chicken pieces and some noodles.  I use some fideo noodles my aunt sends from Spain, IMHO they *make* the soup, but some angel hair noodles broken up would work too.  Throw in the chopped parsley at this point.

Eat with some crusty bread and freeze the leftovers.  So easy, so cheap, and tastes like home.

And do me a favor, hug your babies tight, and appreciate them.  Even when they are exhausting and you are exhausted, you just never know.

P.S. I know it's been AGES since my last post, I promise I didn't forget about you.  My baby thinks napping is optional these days unless he does it in mama's lap after nursing.  This does not lend itself to lots of mama time to be doing the blogging.

Easy Thanksgiving Turkey Kid Craft

You gots to respect the TURKEY people.  I can't believe how early we saw Christmas stuff in the stores, I think it was after Labor Day.  I love the Christmas season but that is just effing ridiculous.  In all honestly, Thanksgiving is far from my favorite holiday.  I'm not a fan of most of the food, and the day itself doesn't contain memories of anything fun and exciting for me as a kid.  But nevertheless it *is* the holiday between Halloween and Christmas and it deserves respect as such. 
Since Z has been in the mood to do crafty things on his full days home with me I knew I was going to have to come up with something for him to do.  He's VERY interested in all the holidays and things coming on the calendar lately.  And he says he "LOVES turkey", so I went with a turkey craft. This one is all mine, inspired from a variety of posts on Pinterest, but I came up with this one on my own.
This, as usual, is super easy, and kid friendly.  I used 2 toilet paper rolls, one whole one, for the body, and one I cut in half for the head.  I had him paint them brown completely, mostly to keep him busy.  

Then I took some rectangles of craft foam, I got these at the dollar store, you could use construction paper instead, whatever you have around the house.  I traced Z's hands on the rectangles, we used orange, red, yellow, and green.  We both cut out the hands (Z wanted to do it all himself and then after one hand declared it "too much work" and asked for help).  By the time we got the hands cut out, I used 8 rectangles because Z's hands are kind of big, the paint was dry.

Z glued the hands on the back of the "body", kind of spread out to look like the turkey feathers.  Then we used our jar of googly eye balls and glued a couple of those and a beak I cut out of yellow card stock to the "head".  I saved a small strip of red craft foam to be the waddle of the turkey. And Z insisted that the turkey also have feet, so I used the yellow card stock and free hand cut out some feet.

 As soon as the glue was dry on those pieces we glued them together to complete the turkey.  Super cute Thanksgiving decoration!  Z is very proud of himself, and I am too, he did a great job!

BOO! Another easy Halloween decoration craft

We have been busy making Halloween decorations over here.  I have no idea what has come over me but we have the cutest, cheapest, and easiest decorations now :). 
This one I actually did see a variation of on Pinterest.  But with most things Pinterest, I took inspiration from the picture and didn't actually read the instructions.  If you haven't guessed by now, I'm a very visual person with somewhat of a photographic memory.  So I see it, remember it, do it. The point of all that explanation is, I have no idea what pin I got this idea from, so if it's yours let me know so I can give credit where it's due.
Anywho, I wanted some more inside decorations for Halloween to make us feel all festive and since the crafty bug already bit me I decided to go with it. I got 3 paper mache letters, B-O-O, from Jo-Ann's, they were on sale for $2 a piece.  I also bought some black acrylic paint, I have a few things in mind I want to do with that besides this project, so it was a good buy, and use a coupon when you can!  I happened to notice in Target they had packs of themed scrapbook paper for $1 each, so I snagged a couple of Halloween ones, at the time having no idea what I would do with them, but I knew I would do *something* with them :).
Paint your letters with the black paint, completely, even in the insides, and tops/bottoms.  Let the paint dry.
Trace the outline of the letters on the scrapbook paper like so:

  

I did both sides of the letters with scrapbook paper, because you can see both sides of the letters where I display them, your craft, your call.  Cut out the letters from the scrapbook paper, glue them on with Mod Podge.  Let the glue dry.  

Now Mod Podge (yes I'm verbing that bad boy) over the paper and coat the whole letter (do this in parts so the glue doesn't stick to whatever you put it on to dry).  Repeat said coating, so you have 2 coats.  

Marvel at your crafty-ness.  Display with some stuff you find in your box of Halloween decorations like so:

Save money on your eats with a little planning

Meal planning is something we've done in this house since before we even got married 10+ years ago.  We started doing it initially to try to eat healthier, less take-out, less frozen meals, more home-cooked deliciousness.  It has since taken on an added purpose in that it saves us some serious coin too.  I've had a few people ask me what I do to meal plan, how I go about it, and if I have any tips.  To be honest, I really had to think about it, we've been doing it so long I'm not sure I know another way.  I figured this is probably a common dilemma that families/moms have.  How to get dinner on the table, and what to serve.  So here's what we do.

First some rules to follow.  Do NOT make more than one trip to each store/place you buy food at per week.  Let's face it, every time you go in the grocery store you come out with more than you went in there for, and if you don't, you may be the freakish exception.  So, don't go in there more than you have to! We buy food at SuperTarget and the farmer's market.  I usually go to Target on Thursday when it's just G and me in the morning so it's easier.  The farmer's market is on Saturday mornings, the hubs usually heads there solo.  I keep a list on our bulletin board for both places, throughout the week as we realize we need something, it gets added to the list.  Before my hubs heads to the market, we do a little meal planning and figure out what we're having for the next week, dinners AND lunches. Don't forget lunches! The ingredients for those plans get added to the list.  STICK.TO.THE.LIST. as much as possible, if they don't have something a quick swap out may be needed.  But don't buy things because they look good or because you think you may eat them.  You're just wasting money and wasting all the time you spent on your awesome planning!

our lovely model Z holds up our plan for the week

Now the meal planning itself.  If you're not already, become okay with leftovers, they can be just as tasty as the first time around, and they really make your life a lot easier.  

For lunches we do a lot of leftovers, I usually make a big batch of something on Sunday, or we get all the fixings ready for salad.  Rice dishes like beans and rice, or pasta dishes work great for lunches to pack.  

Dinners are cooked fresh more often. We tend to make 2-3 things per week for dinners and eat leftovers in alternating patterns.  

Cook Monday and Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday have leftovers, cook Friday, and cook either Saturday or Sunday, leftovers the other day.  When you're coming up with what to eat, be creative! Get inspiration from all the fresh foods available at the market!  And think of how to get the most mileage for what you make.  

the first part of a base, I added bitesize chicken breast pieces, one night it was over brown rice with soy sauce and sriracha, the other night it was in a tortilla with salsa verde

One thing that has served me well is making a "base" that can work for multiple, different meals.  For instance, I may cook up some ground beef with minced garlic and onions on Monday, and save half of it in that form for a meal on Wednesday.  On Monday, I'll take that ground beef and make what I call "deconstructed stuffed peppers" by adding some tomato paste and rough chopped peppers.  Pair with some brown rice and top with mozzarella cheese, BOOM, you've got a tasty meal!  On Wednesday I'll use the other half of that ground beef, heat it up with some cumin and chili powder and put it in a tortilla and some taco fixings, easy, tasty, different dinner.  And there are lots of things that work like this too.   Or there are often times where I just make enough of a meal on Monday to feed us the exact same thing on Wednesday, no big deal, because we have found our happy place with leftovers. 

zucchini lasagna made on a Sunday afternoon, make a double batch of sauce and freeze it!

Also, in the winter, we tend to do a lot of soups, stews, baked pasta dishes.  I usually make a HUGE batch of this on Sunday afternoon, and freeze half of it to have on hand for those weeks that cooking just isn't going to happen at all.  It's nice to have good food to fall back on rather than calling for pizza or using a store-bought frozen meal.  

quick meal thrown together, tomatoes, zucchini, onions, garlic, used to top corkscrew pasta

Sometimes the plan doesn't work, don't let this discourage you! There are times when Zach is super hungry and all of the sudden the food won't stretch for 2 days.  That's OK.  That's what your staples are for.  There are things I *always* have on hand and can make a meal out of quick and easy.  

1. Pasta noodles of some sort, corkscrew, macaroni, angel hair, penne, whatever your favorite is.  Always have a box on hand in the pantry.

2.  Every week I ask my husband to get garlic, onions, and tomatoes from the market, I can use those in a pinch and I always use them in my meals anyways.  Throw that together with your pasta and you have a meal!

3.  Eggs, an omelet will feed you in a pinch any day of the week.

4.  Cheese.  Enough said? We LOVE cheese, and we can do so much with it, quesadillas, omelets, grilled cheese, pizzas, the possibilities are endless.

5.  Tortillas, I usually get frozen ones from Costco, you throw them in a dry skillet to cook them and you can do tacos, quesadillas, enchiladas. WAY better than the preservative laden ones next to the bread on the shelf.  Ideally we'd make our own, but that's a different blog post ;).

I'm no Rachel Ray, but nothing I make for dinner takes more than a half hour if I do it day-of.  Something like lasagna or a soup definitely does, it simmers all afternoon on a Sunday but it requires very little attention from me after the initial prep.  

Making only one trip to the store, having a list, and eating in will definitely save you money, especially if you have a budget you stick to for food.  It's also healthier to eat your fresh homemade food instead of eating out, getting take-out, or eating frozen store-bought meals.  AND you're being green and supporting your local economy by eating fresh from the farmer's market.  Win, win, win!

I love to get new ideas! What are your favorite meals and ways to save money?

Get your crafty on: Bulletin Board

The hubs and I are BIG wine fans.  Before the kiddos came into our lives we were wine club members at a few wineries. We took trips to Napa, and Temecula and had a huge wine fridge.  So obviously we enjoyed a few bottles of wine at home ;).  And as a result we had a bunch of corks that we saved, they're interesting and I figured we could do something with them, I just didn't know what at the time.  I'm probably a borderline hoarder because I'm always saving things that I think I can do something with, BUT 90% of the time there IS something I do with that stuff!  Since I've been staying home with the kiddos I've been trying to get the house more organized.  As a result of the organization I determined we needed a bulletin board to pin all the papers that keep cluttering up my counters.  Enter: wine corks!

I'm sure you will all be shocked to learn, I did *not* get this idea from Pinterest :).   (It's ok, take a moment to pick yourself up off the ground).

It could not be simpler to make a bulletin board though.  Find a cheapy frame, This is one I found on clearance for $2, and keep an open mind, you could paint it or add embellishments if it's not what exactly what you'd like.  Remove the glass and paper, so you just have the backing and put it back in the frame.  Use your handy-dandy hot glue gun to glue the corks on to the frame backing.  

bag of corks, and the frame/backing

The pattern is up to you, I tried to mix it up a bit but only did vertical and horizontal.  Keep the corks pretty close together so you can't see the backing, it's kind of like a puzzle.

starting to arrange the corks

At the end I had to trim the tips of a few corks to get them to fit in the frame, I just did that with scissors.

the finished product!

 TA DA!!  Super easy project that looks interesting and nice as opposed to those store-bought dorm room cork boards.  You are recycling used corks, very green, and what better excuse to drink more wine?!

  

Baking Mixes on the cheap

I've said before, I am a *terrible* baker, I really can't handle exact measurements and specific mixing instructions and everything that enables one to make edible food when baking.  That said, like most, I love me some fresh baked brownies and chocolate chip cookies.  So, I usually just use a store bought mix, add water, eggs, maybe some oil and I'm good to go, I *rarely* eff that up.  


The store bought mixes are relatively cheap, but it adds up!  And they have an assortment of "extra" ingredients that we are really trying to avoid.  So, of course, I turned to Pinterest!  (Everyone close their mouths from the shock, I'm a well-known addict).  I found this site that has an assortment of "fake-it" Betty Crocker mixes, PERFECT for me!  The standard ingredients, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder are CHEAP.  Add in some chocolate chips, butter, vanilla, and you're still at less than half price of the store-bought mixes!


So far I have tried the chocolate chip cookies and oatmeal raisin cookies.  They were delicious!  Although I will say softened butter != melted butter (that's does not equal for those that are not uber-nerds like myself).  That is how much of a non-baker I am, I used melted butter and got greasy, enormous, flat cookies the first time.  Baking FAIL.  


I highly recommend putting both the recipe for the mix (so you can refill when you use it up), AND the instructions to make the recipe on the jar, like so:

           

    

We use either mason jars, or glass canisters from IKEA to store the mixes.  I prefer glass storage to plastic bags because I try to avoid plastic whenever possible.


It's my favorite kind of money saver, one that saves you $$ AND keeps yucky ingredients out of your house.  Not to mention, BROWNIES, YUM!

Car toy/book organizer tutorial

finished product

Lately I've been feeling very... crafty, I blame Pinterest.  And my cheapness.  There are so many good ideas on Pinterest and I always think "*I* could do that".  So, today I have a quasi-tutorial on how to make an organizer for toys, books, random junk, whatever, for the car.  You could use this for lots of things, even if you don't have kiddos, maps, notes, tissues, wipes, snacks, books, things that are currently strewn about your car that you might like to have in some sort of order. I based it off of this pin.  And of course, I mixed it up a little to suit my needs.  

First thing, that organizer wouldn't fit in my car as she described it.  The middle seat has a cup holder thing that comes down making the available height pretty short, and Zach DEFINITELY uses the cup holder, so I made it to attach to the back of the seat instead.  Added bonus, Z can get to it easier and the boys can each have their own, which I suspect will be better as they get older.  As always do what works for you, this is what I did... (also I should mention, I am *at best* a novice seamstress)

I used cotton superhero fabric, and thick felt, both from JoAnn's, use your coupons! And if you didn't know, they have an app for your phone that gives you coupons too, so no need to always remember to cut them out and put them in your wallet!  I would say you could get by easily on a 1/2 yard of each, also check the remnant bin, that's where I found the felt :).
  
For the back panel cut the cotton and felt to 11 inches x 24.5 inches.  For the 3 pockets, cut the cotton and felt to about 10 inches x 11 inches.  Pin the felt and cotton together for each piece, with the "right" sides facing each other, like so.

All 4 pieces cut out

Pinned square, perpendicular pins at the top, leftish in this picture

Sew the pieces together leaving yourself a little unsewn segment to turn the piece around.  See where the pins are facing differently than the rest?  That's your cue to not sew that hole shut.  *IMPORTANT!* For the pockets, leave the hole on what you want to be the "top" of the pocket, you'll see why in a minute.  I sewed at about 1/4 inch in from the edge around.  BEFORE you turn your little square inside out, trim the corners so that there is not excess fabric there.

back stitched

trimmed corner

NOW turn the square inside out using your handy dandy hole.  I read somewhere that chopsticks are great to push the corners out, and we always have those lying around because I love take-out Kona grill (don't judge me!).  I highly recommend doing all the back-stitching at once and then pressing (ironing) the cotton side of the fabric down, including ironing the folds in the open hole.  This will make your life easier, I promise, and I *hate* ironing so I wouldn't do this if it didn't.

Now is the top-stitching, this part is a little tricky the way I did it, but I think it's a good method so listen carefully :).  First the easiest one, top-stitch all around the large back panel, making sure you pin the hole so it gets closed with the top-stitch. That one should be easy peasy.  Now the pockets, the easy part first.  Hopefully you were following directions and left the hole on the top of the pocket?  If not, go ahead and do an expletive rant now, it's ok, we'll wait.  Good now?  Ok, for the pockets, just top-stitch the top edge for now, so it should look like this.

only the top edge is top stitched right now

Once all of those are top-stitched comes the interesting part.  Arrange the pockets on top of the back piece how you think you want them, play with them, get them right, because you're about to make it permanent.  I put the first pocket about 2.5 inches down from the top of the back panel, and then had the next pocket overlap it on the bottom by about the same amount, repeat for the 3rd pocket, with the bottom of the 3rd pocket lining up with the bottom of the back panel.  

pockets arranged (this pic is pre top stitching so use your imagination)

Now, leave the top pocket laying on the back panel where you want it, and take the other 2 off, pin the top pocket in place. Sew the sides and bottom of it onto the back panel, essentially top-stitching it to the back panel.  This is 4 layers of fabric for your machine to go through, so you may have to coax it a little bit, but just wait, later you're going to have to buy it a drink and rub its shoulders.

Once the top pocket is sewn on then pin the middle pocket in place, the top of it should overlap the bottom of the top pocket by about 2.5 inches.  Now you see what I'm talking about, in that spot there are 6 layers of fabric to sew through.  Be nice to your machine, go slow, don't rush things, let it do what it needs to do, trust me.  I managed to break a needle on this step because I tried to jackhammer it through, not wise.  Anyways, sew the sides and bottom of this pocket on.  

Now the last pocket, the bottom of it should line up with the bottom of the back panel.  Again there are 6 layers, you will have to rub your machine's feet and buy it chocolate when you are done, don't just use and abuse it.

When you are done with that you almost there, now you just need to attach straps.  You could do this step before the attaching of the pockets, up to you, I thought if I did that the straps would get in the way and irritate me, but perhaps you are far more patient than me :).   

The construction of the straps are up to you, I did it with leftover scraps of the cotton and felt, and it was easy to sew, kind of a pain to turn inside out, I used about 2 inches wide by probably 15 inch long fabric, measure your "attachment point" to see how long you need the straps to be.  Same procedure as before, back stitch, trim, turn inside out, although I did go ahead and fully top stitch these before attaching, then I attached to just the back panel, sewing in two places, about 1 inch in and again at the edge for extra strength.  You could use velcro or snaps or just tie it to your car if you want to.  I used snaps because I didn't want to figure out how to sew velcro, and I didn't think tying it would stand up to use from my 3.5yo.

Straps sewn in 2 places, in about an inch, and at the edge

snaps, I did two for stability

When you are done just attach to the back of the seat in front of the car seat, TA DA!!

in the car

Any questions?  I'm sure I missed something, feel free to ask! Go forth and craft!

Monday Meal: Zucchini

Monday Meal

So as to give some motivation to go get some wonderful fresh veggies from the farmer's market and healthy meats from your local ranchers I thought it might be good to start a semi-regular series called "Monday Meal".

The feature this week is a zucchini side dish, easily paired with pork chops, chicken, fish, it's light, fresh, and perfect for summer!  One thing you should know about my cooking and thus recipes in general, I'm not very exact.  I like to think I'm a pretty good home cook, but I fully admit I am the world's WORST baker, too much precision required for me :). So, if you have questions please ask!

Zucchini tomato saute
  
2-3 medium zucchinis
2-3 handfuls of cherry/grape, whatever small tomato you prefer or have at the market
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
Cut the zucchini lengthwise in half, then cut the halves lengthwise again to end up with long skinny quarters, then chop up ~1/4 inch wide pieces, set aside.  Quarter or halve the tomatoes (depending on size), set aside. 

In a skillet, saute the garlic and onion in olive oil until the onion pieces are translucent.  Add the zucchini, salt and pepper, and cook until just starting to get soft (5-10 minutes). Add the tomatoes, cook those for 5-10 minutes until they are soft and stewed looking. Put on your plate and NOM.


Easy, delicious, healthy, and so cheap! What's your favorite dish to make with the summer market bounty?

DIY hand soap

We use an obscene amount of hand soap in this house.  We're not crazy clean people, by any means, but we have a 3.5yo little BOY and a baby, so we are all constantly washing our hands.  My 3.5yo is finger painting, and snacking on sticky things, and going potty (all.by.himself.) And the baby is obviously dirtying his diapers and the changer of said diapers definitely wants/needs to wash their hands, often.  I'm obviously not interested in spending at least $3 every week to replenish our soap supply (helloooo the name of this blog should give you a clue I'm super cheap, ahem, frugal).  So, I took to pinterest to find out how to save money on hand soap, and it did not disappoint.

I know the first thing you're thinking, "just by the refills, that's cheap!".  Yah, it's not NEARLY this cheap, although I will fully admit, it's easier, so if you're supah lazy (like I tend to be on occasion) then this isn't for you.  It's just a question of how much you want to save, and how green you want to be.  I've said it before I'm just a shade of green, by no means the queen of green, for me, sometimes convenience wins.  But not this time :).  We made a GALLON of hand soap using this method, for essentially the cost of a bar of good bar of soap, so like $4-$5.  A GALLON people, it's lasted us a few months now so I will be doing this again.  Truth be told, the hubs made the first batch, but I observed and it wasn't hard at all.

Almost gone, this was full when we made it though!

re-use one of the bottles for hand soap you have

We used the pinterests and followed the method outlined in this post by The Farmer's Nest.  We actually used Mrs. Meyer's Lemon Verbana and it smells great, very clean.  Like she says in her post, save the jug from the distilled water and put your homemade soap in there for storage.  And make sure you keep the bottles from the hand soap you bought before you knew you could make it to refill with this MUCH cheaper version ;).

These are the supplies, you can get easily from Amazon, and this will give you MORE than enough to get started!  You can make like 6 batches with this stuff for under $40.

Truth?  She mentions this in her post, but it kinda does look/feel like snot, but it does the job, so really can we be so picky?  Keep in mind when you buy it pre-made from the store you are paying for WATER, I mean really, when she put it like that, I was fully motivated to try it out.  So I already mentioned, it's cheap, it's green because you are not buying all kinds of plastic bottle packaging and and soap that potentially has an assortment of chemicals in it.  You know exactly what is in this.  I say, try it out, what's the worst that could happen?  You don't like it, and go back to buying soap.  OR you could love it and love saving money ;).

No-Poo Part III

 

Week 3 of No-Pooing has been pretty uneventful, in a good way :), I actually stopped noting day-to-day differences because there weren't any. I think my hair has assimilated to this new way of cleaning.

I have been following the same strategy I was using at the end of last week, with very minor tweaks.  I am still using the standard 1 Tbsp baking soda and 1 cup of water mixture for the "shampoo", and the 1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar, and 1 cup of water mixture for "conditioner".  I added a few drops (like 2 or 3) of lavender oil to both mixtures.  I added it to the "shampoo" to combat any potential itch, I mentioned I was having previously and for it's antibacterial properties.  I added it to the "conditioner" simply to add a nice scent.  Like I said before, my hair didn't smell like vinegar, it smelled like... nothing, and I was missing that nice scent after cleaning it, so I added some drops, I'm good now :).

I'm still using the Burt's Bees stuff on my wet ends, I really want to try the coconut oil still, but I can never seem to remember (I shower at night before bed, so I'm usually a bit tired).  

Other than that, I can't see anything changing with how I care for my hair.  I'm THRILLED with the results, so I'm calling it.. I'm SOLD.  Officially a no-poo-er over here :).  I most likely won't post a week 4 update because if it's anything like week 3, there's nothing to update you on.  I will update if I ever remember to use the coconut oil, AND pretty soon I'm going to need a hair cut, so I'll update on what my hair stylist thinks of all of this ;).  

No-Poo is a SUCCESS!  Super cheap, better for my hair, and EASY, what's not to like?  Are you ready to "call-it" yet?  What are you doing differently?

Previous No-Poo Diaries:

No-Poo Part I
No-Poo Part II