DIY: Glittery Leaf Garland

It's finally autumn which means it's finally almost winter, my favorite time of the year. To celebrate, I took on a DIY project that took me way longer to get done than I thought it would. But it was super easy and super cheap and anyone can do it! 

All you need is:

• Artificial leaves
• PVA glue (e.g. Elmer's)
• Glitter in autumnal colors 
• Ribbon
• Hole punch
• Paintbrush 

I got my leaves from Dollar Tree and I used about a bag and a half ($1.00/bag), hole punch from Dollar Tree and I don't recommend getting it from there, it broke a couple of leaves in ($1.00), Elmer's Glue came from Target ($0.99), glitter came from Hobby Lobby and I used two packaged ($1.50/package), ribbon from Hobby Lobby and I used two ($1.99/roll), and the paintbrush was one that I confiscated from my son's arts & crafts supplies but I'm pretty sure it came from Target in a package of five or six for a few bucks. Bringing my grand total to only about $11.00 + tax. (Not including the brush 'cause I already had that.)

All you have to do is brush the glue onto the leaves, sprinkle the glitter on, shake off the excess, and then set aside to dry. Also, you should be warned that the bottoms of your leaves are probably going to get gluey so I used aluminum foil to set my drying leaves on, so they didn't stick to my table or something. 

After your leaves have dried, punch holes into the bottoms of them, then, with the ribbon, just tie the leaves to whatever your want--a longer piece of ribbon, a string of twinkle lights, the ceiling, anything. I tied them to some string (seen in the photo above) and then strung them up with a string of twinkle lights.

It was only supposed to take an hour or so but it ended up taking me three days because I'm so stinkin' lazy and procrastination is my forte. However, I'm glad I didn't give up and that I finally finished it because I'm so in love with these leaves and I can't wait until night falls so I can see them in action! I hope that some of you take a stab at this, I wanna see what you can do with them!

DIY: Gifts for Kids

Instead of spending a bunch of money on toys and junk for my kid and my friends' kids this year, I'm going to try something new: I'm going to make fun stuff for them! Doughs and slimes and masks, oh my! I'm super excited, not only to see how the kids feel about their fun ooey-gooeys but I'm also pretty darned excited to make them! {I don't need a life, you need a life. Shut up.}

Doughs:

• cornstarch & baking soda play dough
• candy play dough
• softest play dough
• moon dough
• moldable sand
• ice cream play dough
• glitter play dough
• blueberry foam dough
• jelly play dough

Slimes & the like:

• glitter slime
• glow in the dark slime
• rainbow slime
• make-time-for-slime
• edible slime
• flubber
• floam
• oobleck
• sludge

Paints:

• sand paint
• bath tub paint
• glitter chalk paint
• erupting chalk paint
• snow paint
• finger paint
• sparkle paints
• spray paints
• rainbow flour paint
• erupting water color paints

Toys and other fun stuff:

• cardboard tube car garage
• comfy corner
• rainbow rice
• sky blocks
• bouncing bubbles
• firefly night light
• bouncy balls
• animal storage lids
• spoon friends
• super hero masks
• animal masks
• sidewalk chalk popsicles

DIY: Swiffer WetJet Solution

**Note: To get the cap off of the container, boil some water and put the container into the boiling water, just far enough to submerge the cap. Hold it there, in the boiling water for about a minute. Take it out and it'll twist off. (Cover it with a towel before you grab it 'cause that sucker will be hot.)

I've refilled my Swiffer WetJet with this solution a couple of times and it does actually work! I prefer to refill mine with a Mr. Clean + water mixture because I feel like it works better and I have nothing against chemicals but, for those of you that like to live green, this is definitely for you!

DIY: Kid Table Revamp

This table has gone through many identities, I wouldn't blame it if it came to life and confessed a need to see a shrink. I bought it for Pokey for his 5th birthday last year, December '13, and it only lasted a few months before he'd ripped up the top. Instead of throwing it in the garbage--it was a perfectly good table, still!--my mom just took off the top, took off the Mickey Mouse plastic and the slight padding that was under it, and recovered it. Voilà! New table! 

Supplies:

• The table
• Something to cover the table with--the first time (bottom left photo), we used a cute shower curtain; every time since then, I've used fabric for the cute part and then I put a clear shower curtain over that, to protect from spills and for easy clean-up.
• Scissors
• Screw driver
• Marker (optional)

How To:

1. Flip your table over so it's laying on the top.

2. Find the brackets that keep the top of the table onto the frame and unscrew them. Mine had three brackets on each side.

3. Take the top off of the frame and, if your kid(s) is (are) anything like mine, you'll have to wash the frame 'cause hello sticky!

4. Once you have the top separated from the frame, spread our your fabric or shower curtain or whatever you're using. Lay the top of the table onto the whatever-you're-using and figure out where to cut so that it's big enough to be wrapped around the bottom of the table-top. This is where I used the Sharpie marker but I suppose you don't have to mark it if you don't want to, you could just cut the fabric while the top is on there and use the table top as your guide.

5. Cut the fabric.

6. This is where it gets kind of tricky and en extra set of hands would be helpful. Pull the fabric up over the table-top so you can put the frame back into place. Like this:

7. Then you can screw the frame back to the top, right through the fabric. That will hold the fabric in place 5ever. But be sure to pull the fabric tight before you start screwing or you'll have a loose, lumpy mess on top when you're done and who wants that? No one, that's who.

8. You'll probably have a lot of extra fabric when you're done, hanging down and being gross, so you can just cut that off.

9. There ya go! Like a brand new table!

Eventually, I want to repaint the frame a more neutral color but that costs money that I don't have right now so it'll have to wait. There are a lot of things I want to paint, actually, but money. Darn.

Make-Your-Own: Shamrock Shake

Back in March, I was really obsessed with the Shamrock Shakes from McDonald's but there was no way I could afford buying one (or two or five) every day so I took to the internet!  As it turns out, you can make your own and it's really easy!  This way, I can have my beloved Shamrock Shakes all year 'round AND I don't have to sell everything I own to afford them!

• 3 C. vanilla ice cream
• 1-3/4 C. milk
• 1 tsp mint or peppermint extract
• green food coloring

1. Blend.
2. Top with whipped cream and a cherry.
3. Consume!

Meal Planning

I was once asked for a post on meal planning so here it is!  But you need to be warned that I didn't plan this month because I was going through a personal crisis up until about two days before I made the original post so everything you're about to see is a fake month that I just threw together for this post, lol.  {This is not what an average month looks like--we eat a lot more pizza, sandwiches and Hamburger Helper and I always have way more Crock Pot meals! I absolutely love Crock Pot meals and you can find a few posts with recipes here, here, and here.}

I go grocery shopping on the 5th of every month so, on the 4th, I sit down with my notebook, my recipe box, and my computer and I plan out dinners and weekly deserts for four weeks--I only allow myself one desert a week. If I don't set some sort of boundary, I'll bake way too much and so much will be thrown away.

After I have those four weeks planned out, I write out what will be needed for each one. Partially because it'll help me make my grocery list and partially so I'm prepared when it comes time to cook. {And another "partially" to account for my obsession with lists.}

Then, I start on the grocery lists for every week, working down the meal list, until I have everything I'll need for each meal. After that is the basic needs (breakfast stuff, milk, juice, bread, eggs, etc.), anything I'll eat while Logan is at school, and the extras. A lot of my meals and almost all of our extras depend heavily on the coupons I have at the time. {The stars next to some of the things on the list mean that those are things I have coupons for. My coupons come from the Sunday paper, coupons.com and my local grocery store has a digital coupon program where I can go on their site, select the coupons I want, and they're added to a card that I swipe at checkout.}

After that, I'm basically done. I print and/or gather my coupons and I paperclip them to the grocery list and then I put that, the meal list for each particular week, and whatever recipes I may need into each week's own folder.

And each folder gets put into my folder holder on the counter next to my microwave:

Each week, I'm ready and prepared! I just grab the week's corresponding folder and I go to the grocery store! Then that folder sits on my counter all week and goes back into its place in the folder holder at the end of the week, to be used again next month! Easy peasy!