Oi vey!

I haven't post much, for various reasons. I am sure you all understand. With a new month looming I thought I best get my fingers moving!

I know we have a bunch of promised posts in the works so I will try to get those done, soon. I hope everyone has been having a good August. Mine, not so great. But that is life.

Thrifty Thursday: Chair Redo

Over a year ago, we discovered we have an attic. As renters, we knew we couldn't store stuff up there (some kind of hazard...), but we decided to see what was up there.

We found an old wrought iron bed. Which once we figure out how take apart, we are taking! And this beauty!

Seriously, it is GORGEOUS!!! I love it. It has so much character.

I have been refurbing furniture for almost 10 years now. It is so much fun. Even in the last few years, when I have had no space, I have been making plans.

The weather is finally nice, and looks like it will stay for a while, so the two chairs that I have had sitting around in despirate need of some deep love an attention are going to be work on!

This chair needs a LOT of TLC.

It is missing the cross supports. When looking at the construction of the chair, I believe that they MUST be replaced.

A little bit of wood glue, some primer, paint, and some new fabric is going to turn this chair into our piano chair.

This is the fabric I picked out for this chair, last Thanksgiving!! I am going to paint the chair off white to match the white. The chair will also get covered with some vinyl over the fabric, for some extra protection.

I hope to be able to finish it next week, and the get started on chair number two!

Recipe: Beans

Happy AUGUST everyone!! I am so excited it is August, because August is going to be a great month!!

I was going to give you a really yummy bean recipe, but I don't have all the ingredients, and I don't want to make it... And I am an advocate of using dry beans, so I thought people might want to know how to cook them first.

There are a couple of ways to cook dry beans. There is a fast and an over night process. THEY DO YIELD DIFFERENT TEXTURES!!!

I like to cook my black beans fast, but my kidney and pinto beans slow.

Cooking Beans Slowly (Over night method)

Take about a pound of beans (about 2 cups)
Rinse and check for rocks
In a large pot with lid, cover the beans with 6 cups of water. Add 2 TBSP of salt.
Refrigerate for 8-12 hours (over night!)

In the morning, drain the beans and rinse the beans.
Using the same pot add the beans and enough water to cover the beans by about 2 inches.
Bring to a boil and simmer covered, until desired doneness.

Crock Pot/Slow Cooker:
After refrigeration and rinse, cook for about 6-8 hours on low. (With some water of course!)


Cooking Beans Fast (One day Method):

Rinse and sort beans
In a large pot with lid, cover the beans by about 2 inches of water. (You might need to add more water as the cook) Add 2 TBSP of salt
Bring to a boil, and simmer with the lid on a wooden spoon holding the lid slightly open. Cook for about 2 -3 hours until they reach desired doneness.


Tips:
Beans that I am going to cook longer, in soup for example, I don't cook as long.
2 cups yields about 4 cups.
Cooked beans can be frozen and stored in the freezer for 3 months. Freeze, while still hot and with some of the cooking water. This will keep the beans from "drying out"/freezer burn.

The Bathroom Experiment: FAIL!!

I was all excited about starting the experiment this morning and Wonderful Man said it was a good set up... But when I got in the shower after him, I realized what he meant...

My water tight set up, is not water tight... So experiment is on hold, until we find some thing to replace the picture frames with... I really thought it would work... Wonderful Man suggested locker mirrors...

The Bathroom Experiment: The Set-up

Maybe it is just me and my dirty bathroom mind, but this is NOT about poop!

It is about Showers!!

I hate cleaning our shower, it is a tub shower... HATE IT!!!

Anyway, I still have to clean it. (Well, technically Wonderful Man cleans it... That is why he is so wonderful!)

I have seen for awhile those daily shower cleaning spray things, you know the kind you can just spray when you are done, or the ones that even spray for you with the touch of a button.

They have always scared me. Maybe it steams from when I was little, and mom would always warn not to use Comet and bleach, or is it Comet and ammonia together... (I can't remember! Vinegar and baking soda is always safe!)

To the experiment!

I wanted to see if these sprays I will make are going to make any sort of an impact. So this experiment is going to last 3 MONTHS!!! Yikes! But that gives them time to build up some grime!

First I got some picture frames from the Dollars Store, attempted to make them water tight, and them hung them in the shower. I also got some clear soap holders to use also.

Now to make the two sprays! I can not remember what site I got the recipes from, so I am a) not sharing, and b) hope to find them soon so I can!!

For the next 3 months the bathroom is going to be cleaned as normal, and we are going to bathe as normal, only adding in the shower spray to finish. We will also keep a record of the number of times we shower.

I hope you are excited to see results, I hope there is a difference!

What a Summer...

Last month, I promised to get those car maintenance post done... Well, if you noticed, that didn't happen. This has been a really crazy summer for us, and a very emotional one.

In the middle of June, my grandfather passed away. Then a month later, my wonderful mother.

Me with my Mother and Father, and my wedding.

This summer hasn't been all bad news, although it feels like it.

Some days, I consider it a victory if I get motivated enough make dinner. Yesterday, was defiantly a success.  With the help of Wonderful Man, we did a full load of dishes, vacuumed, and made lunch and dinner!

It is baby steps, and the grieving process is going to take time.

I am going to need to keep my self busy! I was planning on just a post or two a week until September, but I need to have a couple of goals for each day. You readers should feel proud, that y'all made the list!

The plan for this week is to for Homemaking Tuesday, start the Bathroom Experiment. I think I have everything, I just need to set it all up.

For Focus Wednesday, I have a bean recipe for you. This is one of three that I want to share.

Thrifty Thursday, I have a couple of chair refurbishing that need to be done. Re-purposing or refurbishing furniture is a great project, and if you know what you are doing, can save you some money!

Finished Friday, we will talk about how our garden has exploded this year!

Lastly, a Saturday post! I have been frequenting my farmer's market, and a friend said I should let people in on the secret of farmer's market shopping!

There is the plan for the week. I hope to get that all up for you. Thanks everyone for their love and support.

July!

The year is half over! And it is finally starting to feel like summer here! It is summer, and schedules changes some much. I have a couple of things I have been trying to get rolling to post about but, life keeps getting in the way! Not to complain, but sometimes I wish I had more time.

I hope you all had wonderful 4th's. We did! We smoked a ham and ate good food. We even watch fireworks will some super cute twin 4 year olds. They would go back and forth between loving the fireworks and being scared.

I have been training for a huge race that take place on the 20th and 21st this month, plus I want to get a few posts I have really been wanting to get out, and I have some huge projects around the house I want to do. So this month, will be a slow month. Actually, posting might be slow until the fall.

I like to take Monday's to align my week, but I am going to take today to align the month. I try to post my weeks goals for the blog, because I want you to keep me accountable. I really do feel like I am giving knowledge to people and I want people to feel like their opinions matter. So if you see a post and you want to see it go in a different direction OR you want more information, post a comment or Email me. There is a link on the side with my email. I want reader feed back!

So for this month, I want to finish the car maintenance series. There are four more topics that I feel are important and hopefully I can find time to do them!

I hope everyone is having a great summer and is enjoying some sun!

In other notes, I just made a little bit of heaven in my kitchen, and I might share...