WHAT STYLE ARE YOU?

Feel like having a little design fun today? Then take a short design quiz at Sproost and see what your decorating style is!

My style came up equal parts Nantucket and Mountain Lodge -with a little Wine Country or Cottage Chic thrown in for good measure. How's that for variety? LOL! I never really thought of myself as a beach lover - I'm more of a mountain girl. But, when they explained the feel of beach style - well, I do love pale colors, wood and comfort. Incidentally, those two styles have a lot in common; no frills, bring nature in, cozy, comfortable... This was a little surprising to me, but amazingly accurate.

This is one example of what could be considered Nantucket or beach style. I love the pale colors, bead board and wood floors. Check out that wicker trash can by the pedestal sink. It's all about light and texture. Love it!

This would be another example. More bead board on the cabinets, light colors, painted floor. Are we seeing a theme here? Both of these photos came out of my inspiration file. I don't remember where I got them from. If anyone knows and wants to tell me, I'll happily post the source.

Picture from Sproost

Then there is the Mountain Lodge. Look at that fireplace! I can't even begin to tell you how much it love it! Then there is all that wood and the built-in book cases. I love this room even though a couple of the sofas and the ottoman are a little dark for my taste. Lighten the fabric up some and white wash some of that wood and I think it would be a happy mix with the Nantucket style!

If you want to take the short quiz to find out where your design style fits in, head on over and visit Sproost.

Have a great weekend!
Pam

P.S. Check out Adventures in Homemaking to find out how to make a great herbal shampoo!

Trader Joe's Rocks!

I went to a really cool store the other day. Have you ever heard of Trader Joe's? It's sort of like a Whole Foods Market - but, waaaaaayyyyyyy cheaper!

I have been out of Castile Soap for a while. The last time I bought it I was able to get it at Meijer. They don't seem to have it anymore. Neither does anyone else in these here parts. I read somewhere that Trader Joe's carried it - and at very reasonable prices. We have one on the north side of Indy. Not a trip I'd like to make every week - but close enough for a once a month trek if needed.

I was SUPER impressed. They have tons of natural and organic foods for not much more than the prices I pay for the antibiotic riddled, pesticide ridden junk I buy at the regular stores. For instance they had antibiotic free whole chickens for $1.29 lb. I pay $.88 ON SALE for the regular kind. So, that's probably about the same as the non-sale price for Purdue chickens. They also had free-range, hormone free, antibiotic free whole chickens for $2.39 lb. I was checking out prices online at Costco a few days ago. They were glad to sell me 2 of the latter chickens for forty bucks. FORTY BUCKS!!! You have GOT to be kidding me! I'd have to sell my son, my right leg and my left kidney to shop there for very long with those prices! Puh-lease!

Check out the size of the Trader Joe's EVOO. I paid $5.99 for over a quart of it. That little 8.5 oz bottle was $2.00. The Trader Joe's olive oil is 4 times larger than the cheap little bottle I bought at Dollar General Market, yet, it's not 4 times as expensive. I'm anxious to see if the quality is better, too. It was recommended as a customer favorite.

Here's the Castile Soap with the huge bottle of EVOO. I'm not sure of the ounces at the moment and I'm too lazy busy to go downstairs and look. But, it's huge. I paid $7.99 for this bottle and it will last me until my 14th grandchild is born. The last bottle I bought was the same brand but about 1/2 the size. I paid at least ten bucks for it. So, needless to say, I was pretty pleased.

So, if you're looking for a good, wholesome place to shop - check out Trader Joe's website and see if there's a store near you. I'll definitely be a return customer.

Pam

P.S. Check out Adventures in Homemaking to find out a cheap, easy way to stay healthy this winter.

CHRISTMAS CATCH-UP

Well, this post is slightly over-due. Here it is January 7 - and I'm just now posting about Christmas! But, it still looks like Christmas outside! We are being slammed by a heavy snow and I won't be going anywhere. We've been fortunate to miss the heavy Winter storms so many others were hammered with. I guess it's our turn now. I just thankful I don't have to get out in it.

Christmas was wonderful this year. It seemed to be extremely busy leading up to it, though. Of course, there was school. I did some baking to make gift baskets to take up to Michigan with us. Though, I didn't bake as much as last year.
We made time to make a gingerbread house. I can honestly say, I've never done that before. But, I think we'll make it a yearly tradition. I found this kit for $6.99 at Aldi. I wouldn't have been able to buy the ingredients and make it myself for that price. So, this was a good way to ease into gingerbread house making.

I read where one mom always buys these kits after Christmas when they go on clearance and puts them back with her Christmas stuff for the next year. Evidently, they keep very well. I thought it was a brilliant idea and wanted to do that myself. Unfortunately, all the stores that stocked them in my little area were sold out after Christmas.

Isaac had a great time with this. It even had ginger people and trees. But, in typical Pam fashion - I somehow only got rear shots of the house - so you can't see them.

Christmas was spent with my family in Michigan. I think it was the best Christmas we've had so far. We were able to get up there in time to actually enjoy it. Last year, we completely missed the big family gathering on Christmas Eve altogether. Chris was supposed to get off work at noon and they didn't let him out of there until 6 PM. Then our 3 1/2 - 4 hour drive somehow morphed into a 5 hour drive. Needless to say, Isaac missed the gift exchange with all of his cousins. This year we got up there the night before Christmas Eve and didn't leave until the day after Christmas. There was plenty of time to spend with family.

New Year's Eve was spent with our best friends. We don't get to hang out as often as we'd like. So, that was a lot of fun.

The Christmas decorations are finally down. I'm glad for that. They seemed to feel a little more like clutter to me this year than something to be enjoyed. The outside lights still need to come down. But, I told Chris he should just wait 'till it warms up slightly before doing that. He doesn't need to be out there when it's 20 degrees. As long as we're not those Christmas in July people, I don't really care. I know that suits some people just fine - I just don't happen to be one of them.

We're getting back into the rhythm of school. We're in for a long stretch now - no more breaks 'till March.

Hopefully, it will snow enough that we can go sledding this weekend. We've been back up here for 3 years now, and Isaac has still never gotten to go. Even when we had the big blizzard - it was melted off too much by the weekend to go. So, maybe this will be our year. He's also itching to build a snowman. I think we'll be able to do that with this snow. And when we get enough, we'll make snow ice cream. We have to. It's tradition, you know?

Well, I hope you have a wonderful day!

Pam

P.S. Don't forget to check out my new sister blog, Adventures in Homemaking for all things house and home!

New Blog Launch

I have been kind of stagnant with this blog lately. My life has been very busy with what most would see as the mundane. I haven't done anything extremely stupid to blog about lately for your pleasure (thank God). And I have felt like I have been lacking direction where the blog is concerned. I love blogging - I've just been very bad at it lately.

On the same token, I have been feeling a very strong pull lately to get back to the basics - to learn the art of simplicity. I have given myself the challenge of learning the art of homemaking like women for many generations before me knew it. I am a homemaker. I am going to fully embrace that calling. I want to learn to make things from scratch that I have thoughtlessly bought from the stores my whole life. I want to hone my sewing skills. I would like to learn to knit or crochet. I want to learn many more things in the craft of homemaking. I need to get organized and on a cleaning routine. I desire to cut spending costs in as many ways as possible. My husband and I have lofty goals of raising chickens and canning all of our own veggies. That means we'll need to learn more about gardening (and leaving a butt load of tomatoes on the vine because they ripened late and I was too busy won't be an option). One day we'd love to have a cow and a pig, and be self-sufficient. And, I'll need to do all this while homeschooling. Call me crazy. I probably am.

In light of this, I have started a new blog that will deal specifically with my quest for becoming a Domestic Diva, Adventures in Homemaking. I will still blog here about my stupid antics, family life, random ramblings and goings on. I just have a feeling that I'll be spending more time at my other blog posting about homemaking - simply because I do that every. single. day.

So, let me extend a personal invitation to you to join me over at Adventures in Homemaking. I hope you'll come by and visit me often.

Oh yeah, Happy New Year! I pray this year is filled with goodness for you!

Pam

Give Away at $5 Dinners.com

Hey y'all there's a great give-away going on over at $5 Dinners.com. Click on over there to win a free copy of Erin Chase's new "The $5 Dinner Mom Cookbook". Erin is giving away 10 copies of her new book every day for the next 2 weeks. Yeah, you heard me right!

Good luck!

Pam

Christmas At My House This Year

OK, y'all - I'm hooking up with 50 billion other people over at The Nester's today for The Christmas Tour of Homes 2009.

I, like so many of you, did not put out every piece of Christmas paraphernalia that I own. It is what it is - and my house is pretty tiny. I would feel severely claustrophobic if I put it all out right now. I think I'm bordering on clutter as it is. But, I shall share anyhow. *Disclaimer - please ignore dust, glitter, crumbs and dog hair should you see any of the above. :0) Are you ready? OK! Let's go!

This is a shot of my living room - not that you couldn't figure that on your own or anything...I'm just sayin'. Obviously, we have a red, gold, and silver thing going on here. Do you think I might want to think about a larger tree skirt? You can hardly see it under there with that one lone present. Which, incidentally, I can't put out any of my kiddos presents at all. Period. He just can't take the temptation. And I just can't take all the begging and pleading that comes with it! He used to end up opening most of his presents before Christmas even rolled around back in the days when we used to put them all under the tree. Evidently, Chris and I have the backbone of limp spaghetti where saying no to gift opening is concerned. So, we wised up. We just don't put them out. Problem solved. OK, so we have a tree and a garland on top of the armoire. The garland is much prettier in person 'cause it's stuffed full of pretties. But, I didn't get a close up of that, so you'll just have to believe me.

Alrighty, I'm going to have to do this picture out of sequence because, well...I'm me. And if you ever read this blog, you'll just understand. Mkay? Are we clear as mud? Moving on then...This is looking from my dining room into the kitchen. I have a few doo dads on the bar(ish) part and then above the kitchen sink I hung a simple garland. I'm using it this year to hang my Christmas cards from with teeny tiny clothes pins. I thought about spray painting the pins red, but I'm too lazy busy for that. There are also some snowflakes hanging from the can lights above the bar.

Back to the living room...On each of my end tables I have these matching urns that I keep out year round and fill them differently depending on the season. Right now they're full of pine cones - and I tied a red and gold ribbon on for good measure. Actually, the red ribbon is stamped with gold pine cones - but you can't see that either. I'm not a very good tour guide, am I? I also hung that little angel on this lamp. She was given to Uncle Gene at the hospital to hang above his bed before he died. I love angels at Christmas time.

This is a view of my dining area, and the back of my sofa - because I live in a matchbox and all. I do love my little matchbox, though. Anyhoo...I draped a garland over my chandy and tied some red bows on each arm. I also draped some silver cording on it and tucked 2 cardinals in there. I finally get to use my Christmas dishes that I got at Goodwill back in the Spring. Since I didn't have an entire set - I mixed and matched. The 2 ends of the table are backwards from the 4 sides.

My succulents are also a year round fixture. They sit in a wicker basket tray that is lined with a piece of burlap. I added pine cones and these round, spiky things that fell off of the neighbor's tree for Autumn. Since it's now Christmas time I threw in a beaded garland, some miniature ornaments and a mini tree topper that I'm not using this year. Easy peasy.

The bar again...a silver Goodwill tray holding 3 Goodwill candlesticks that I spray painted. More pine cones and round spiky tree thingies, and a few ornaments.

Mini ornaments added to my Rosemary plant.

A closer view of the snowflakes. These are really pretty if you have different types of snowflakes. Mine are all the same, but whenever I see some different ones I plan on grabbing them.

I'm not going to show you pictures of the outside lights simply because it's daytime. I don't think they would show up too well. :0)

This concludes my Christmas tour. If you need some decorating inspiration this year - or if you're just nosey, head on over to Nesting Place .

Plant Cuttings And Chalkboard Pots

It's been a while since I've posted. Seems like I'm staying busy, busy, busy lately. So, I'll give a quick update before I get to the main part of my post. Thanksgiving was wonderful. We spent the first part of the day with family. Then, in the evening we had our best friends over for a great night of eating (again!), playing Wii and just hanging out together.

We unfortunately had a death in the family - my husband's uncle. The service was this past Sunday. I wonder why it is that sometimes it takes something as tragic as a death in the family for all of us to get together? Even still, it was nice to get to see family we haven't seen in a while - and for me to get to meet some that I had never met before. Did I mention we've been married 14 and a half years? LOL!

We've also been busy getting the house decorated for Christmas. I love this time of year! It really makes me want to hunker down and nest. We are supposed to be getting our first snow of the season this week! I'm dreaming of a white Christmas... I will post pictures of that soon.

OK. Now to my main post. I like to try to be frugal whenever possible and I also like the satisfaction of doing things myself. At the end of summer I just hated to see my beautiful geraniums die out, never to be seen again. So, I did some research. Evidently, if you took a cutting off of your geranium plant and put it in a pot of water it would send out new roots. You can then pot them and overwinter your new plants inside. Then, when Spring time rolls around, you can put your new plants in the ground and it didn't cost you a penny. The same thing is supposed to be true for many plants. I have successfully tried this in the past with rosemary and pothos or philodendron.

So, I did what I just explained to you with some geranium clippings and lemon balm (which smells divine BTW). I was happy to see it was a very successful experiment, as you will see here in a minute. But, I wanted a way to keep track of which clippings were which and didn't want to use the typical marker stake. I decided to paint out my el cheapo terra cotta pots with chalkboard paint.

You'll need your own el cheapo terra cotta pots, rubber gloves, a foam brush and a can of chalkboard paint for this project. Krylon makes it in black and green. I just happened to have a can of black on hand from a few other projects.

Following the directions for dry time, give your pots and saucers 2 coats of chalkboard paint. I didn't paint the entire inside because it won't be seen once my plants are in there. Now, you can either paint the entire pot, like I did - or you can just paint a square to write on. I have done it both ways. Just make sure that after your final coat of paint has dried and cured, that you 'break' the surface by rubbing the side of your chalk all over it before writing on it.

Check out the roots on that lemon balm!

Here I am taking one of the rooted geranium plants and potting it.

Viola! New, free plants that can go into the ground in the Spring and pots that keep track of what's in them. Or, you can shake it up and write a seasonal or inspirational message on them. It's up to you.

Now, I just need to figure out where to keep these bad daddies all winter long!