Bird Houses

These are my new birdhouses my hubby made me last month.  They are made of old railroad ties.  He is so talented!  We even made a smaller set and donated it to a church auction.  I love them!

Here is a close up of the holes and the old rusty nails we used as perches.  Everything we used was recycled, we found most of the items in our yard/garage.

This is a cute old washtub Lloyd found while rock-chuck hunting.  I love it for my flower-bed.  You can see the small Ivy we put 4 in each flower-bed, hopefully next year they will have filled out a bit more.  Lloyd faithfully 'miracle grows' each one every week.

Another tub that was found while hunting.  We also planted a vine that should grow and latch onto our chimney and cover the whole thing eventually.  Can't wait!

This used to be all grass, we killed it, tilled it, and filled them with dirt (each side of our porch) and planted the ivy.  I found some rock in the garage and we put it around the edges for a border.

Here is a close-up of the rock/stone that we used to edge the beds.  I love the look, but I also love the price of FREE! 

Freezer Organization

I woke up this morning and my freezer was calling my name.  I opened it up and this was the mess I saw.  It has been driving me crazy, but I haven't taken the time to take care of it.  I decided TODAY IS THE DAY!

I knew what I had been wanting to do in there, I emptied it out, wiped everything down, and gathered 3 shoe size totes from the basement.  I always like to keep some spares on hand for different things, and to get them for only $1 at Walmart you can't go wrong. I have a ton of fruit that I had frozen before it went bad.  Then I used another one for my breakfast items (french toast, pancakes, etc. leftovers I had frozen.)  And in the 3rd tote I put hamburger, and other meats I had packaged and frozen. Now if I need anything I just pull out the tote instead of digging through it all.      I LOVE IT!

No More Trampoline!

The wind took our Trampoline across our garden and here is where it landed.  All busted up.  I didn't think it was that windy, at least my garden wasn't too far along, nothing was damaged there.

Even though the kids are smiling in the picture, they were NOT happy that we no longer have a tramp to jump on. They thought it was crazy where/how it landed.  If anyone knows of someone locally who is getting rid of one for cheap let me know!  These things are expensive!

The poor thing was mangled beyond repair.  As soon as my husband got home we took it down and put it away.  I have no idea when/if we'll get another one.  It was a favorite activity outside.  Guess I'll have to start saving my pennies for a new one!

Wordless Wednesday

Woke up to this one morning last week.  Isn't nature amazing!

Wordless Wednesday

Here is the Rock-Chuck who was trying to live in our garage....lol what a day!  If you want to see one of the funny videos of us trying to get him away/out of our garage, you can check it out here: Rock-Chuck Video

 

New Do For an Old Pup

This is our shaggy mutt named Donut.  He loves our cats, and usually they love him.  He's the best dog ever!

How could you not love this face!  My Mom calls him her 'luck dragon'  he reminds her of 'Falcor' on Never Ending Story.  He is great with the kids, and besides his attraction to chasing red trucks, we love him!

Here is Donut last summer, he would get so hot w/his huge coat.  Lloyd had tried to cut him with clippers, but his fur was too thick.  So we got out the scissors and cut him ourselves.  It was super choppy, but he seemed to feel better.

This year we took him to someone locally who cut him professionally and he looks like a new dog!! When Lloyd went to pick him up he wasn't sure it was our dog...lol.  Isn't he handsome?!

 

No wonder he is so fast when he chases his red trucks!  He is skinny and lean.  I always thought he was fat, but it was just his coat.  He seems so happy, but the cats do not recognize him, they've attacked him twice since he's been home.  Poor guy just wants his friends!

What Month is it???

Today is the last day of school for our kids, this is what it looked like at 6:45 am outside.  However, I missed the flurries w/my camera, but we woke up to it snowing!! It's warm enough it mostly didn't stick, but it was blizzardy when I opened the blinds.  Oh, and I got sunburned yesterday while mowing my lawn?!  Such crazy weather we're having!  I can't believe it is the end of May! 

Wordless Wednesday

Donut

Homemade Laundry Soap/Detergent

I LOVE to use this because I have to buy the 'free and clear' stuff for my husband's sensitive skin.   Plus the Fels Naptha has a great scent and the lavender is great too (or whatever essential oil you use).  I have not quite figured out the cost, but I think it is about .02 cents per load.  That is if you don't get anything on sale or with a coupon! Can't beat that!


The Recipe

2 full bars of soap (Fels Naptha, Ivory, or Zote) I use one Ivory and 1 Fels Naptha.

1 C Arm & Hammer Washing Soda/Sodium Carbonate/Soda Ash (this is NOT baking soda - can be found in laundry section or on Amazon)

1 C 20 Mule Team Borax/Sodium Borate powder (Now has a new box, see other pic)

1/2 oz. Essential Oil, if desired, any scent you like!

water

 3+ gallon bucket for mixing and storage.  (Mine is an old 'ice melt' bucket I cleaned out.) 

I know, looks like cheese doesn't it!  But it's not.  It smells good though.

Grate the soap and add to a sauce pan with 6 cups of boiling water and heat until the soap melts.

Add the washing soda and the borax and stir until it is dissolved.  Remove from heat. Pour 4 cups hot water into the bucket. Now add your soap mixture and stir. Now add 2 gallons of water and stir. This batch I added some Lavender essential oil for some scent. Let the soap sit for about 24 hours and it will gel. The gel will be the consistency of egg noodle soup.

After it has gelled.

I like to use my hand mixer and mix up the soap after it has gelled.  It makes it much easier to use without stirring every time you need some.  Just mix it once and it stays.  AND it's much smoother!  I use 1/2 cup of detergent for each load. 

Where have I been???

I can't believe it's been 10 days since my last post!! I am so shocked!  It didn't seem like that long ago.  I've been busy with sick family still.  I think that the weather is finally cooperating and we're getting better.  Between nebulizer treatments and Dr.'s appointments I haven't even turned on my computer some days, I know SAD!  Here I am though, getting back on track! 

Computer Armoir Finish!

Before

After!

 

I do realize I still need to touch up a few finger spots on this armoir, but I wanted to get my vinyl sticker up before I stained it again, and now I can do that (to help seal the sticker on).  My Amazing friend Jodi from Signs By Jodi patiently helped me to find what I was looking for and let me look through all she could find to send me.  I kept asking for more and she'd send me more.  I found a few that were my favorites and with the help of Lloyd (my fabulous husband) we picked two and sent them to Jodi to have her blow them up bigger.  Jodi sent them back immediately  and we knew this one was the one we wanted!  I finally ordered it.  Jodi let me know I had 'blank' space that would waste vinyl and asked if I wanted to fill the space with other things I wanted printed. I decided on my address to put on our siding outside.  I'll post that another day. 

I am so thrilled with this, it finally looks complete, nothing is missing!! LOVE IT!!

Self Hairdo

 As you can see from about 3 posts ago we've had the sickies at our house.  We STILL are not over everything, but FINALLY on our way!  I now can truly say that we are on our way with new projects and posts!  Thanks for sticking in there with me!
 

My 3yr old came to me so excited because she had done her own hair.  She was so proud of herself.  From the front you can't really tell how sweet it is.

She had gotten into the clippies container and put about a dozen clips randomly in her hair.  I told her it was so beautiful we needed pictures of her hair.  She wore them all day and told everyone she talked to about her self hairdo (on the phone...lol...we never left the house).  I just love my girls!  This age is so fun to see what they come up with.

Easter S'Mores in a Jar

These are the cutest Easter Gifts EVER!! I found these at Tip Junkie (LOVE this Blog!)  She called them 'Bunny Brownies' or Easter S'Mores in a Jar.  I decided to try them out.  She had good ideas too on how to put them together, a little different from mine.

Here are all my supplies gathered for the project.  I decided to try a few different variations of this to see what I liked better.

Ingredients and Directions:
1. Reduce 1 sleeve graham crackers to crumbs. Layer the crumbs in a 1 qt jar.
2.On top of this pour 1-1/4 cup Easter M&M’s.
3. Place 8 marshmallow bunny peeps standing up, facing out around the inside of the jar.
4. Press them up against the glass, but don’t squash them.

OR just put the silly bunnies/candy/crumbs in the jar anyway you want!  I even have a few ideas on how to do it differently next time, but there will be a next time because they were fun and EASY!

TIP: I used my AMAZING 'Ninja' to blend up the graham crackers, I also added the brown sugar in there too.  SOOOOO much easier than trying to smash/roll the crackers in a bag with a rolling pin.  I'll NEVER do that again! lol  

Attach A gift tag to say:
EASTER BUNNY S’MORES (or Bunny Brownies)

1. Empty the jar contents into a bowl. Snip the bunnies into bits with kitchen sheers or cut up with a knife. Return the bunny bits to the mixture. Mix well.
2. Melt 1/2 cup butter; add 1 teaspoon vanilla. Pour this over the dry ingredients, mixing well. Pat into a greased 9″ square pan. Bake at 350 degrees F for 15 minutes. Cool and cut into bars.
(Makes 9 to 12 bars.)
*Option – leave bunnies whole; combine remaining ingredients and place the bunnies on top; then bake as directed.
*This gift jar may be created to suit any holiday for which marshmallow candies are available. (LOVE this tip!)

Here is my finished product!  I first made them with the M&M's on the bottom, placed the bunnies inside, then tried to fill in with the crumbs.   Next I tried crumbs, M&M's then marshmallow bunnies instead of Peep Bunnies.  And last I tried crumbs, M&M's then bunnies.  Maybe next time I'll try crumbs, M&M's, bunnies, crumbs.  Who knows....but it was fun anyway.  My hubby took these for his 'Home Teaching' Families, I hope they liked them!

Head on over to Tip Junkie and check out all the AMAZING Easter Ideas and Mother's Day and every other Holiday Ideas you can think of over there.  This is a FABULOUS site to find anything you're looking for, or didn't know you were looking for, but love!

Shrimp W/Penne

Our VERY FAVORITE meal has to be this Super Easy Recipe of Shrimp with Penne.   Here are all the basics, 1 pkg of Penne Pasta cooked, 2 zucchini quartered and sliced, two good sized garlic chopped,1 red bell pepper chopped, and 1 lb of shrimp w/o the tails. 

I defrost my shrimp (not all the way, so there is a little bit of ice still left on them for some liquid) then place in a pan w/1TBS of oil and the garlic.  Saute until shrimp start curling up, about 5 min.

Then add your pepper and zucchini, I also add season salt, and salt n pepper to taste.  Saute for about 5-7 min depending on how cooked you like your peppers and zucchini.  I have used orange and yellow peppers, but they're just not as beautiful as the red.

Once your veggies are done add the penne pasta.  It is so yummy!  My kids ask for this as their 'Birthday Dinner'.  I always like to keep these ingredients on hand since it is quick and easy.  I serve garlic/cheesy/french bread along with it.  Some days we add cheese on top too.  Another variation is, my Sis-In-Law likes to put Italian dressing on hers when it's a little dry (which is why I like to keep the shrimp a little frozen for extra liquid).

Sick Kids

We've had lots of yuckiness at our house. You name it the kids have had it, my poor 3 yr old got Pink Eye, an Ear Infection, Sinus Infection, UTI, and the Flu (all at once!). She also smashed her fingers in the bathroom door (she's my accident prone child). The other two got colds and 1 more had Pink Eye and the Ear Infection.  I've been so busy washing 'sick' laundry and sanitizing everything (along with all the 'regular' stuff) I haven't had a chance to blog.  I've missed it terribly, but when your kids are up late/early being sick, I try to get to bed as soon as they do cuz I know I'll be up in the middle of the night w/them. Hopefully the weather will warm up here and we'll all get fresh air to get us better!

OH, and I have a new Church Calling!  I'm in the Primary Presidency and still doing my job in The Relief Society, so things are extra crazy around here.

  I have a bunch of fun stuff and yummy recipes planned that I just need to get put on here.  So I'll hopefully be back in the swing of things soon! 

Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

I got this YUMMY recipe from my friend Andrea.  She brought it to a Ward party and I knew I had to have the recipe.  It is VERY simple and EASY which I LOVE! 

Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

2-3 chicken breasts                                 salt & pepper to taste
1 C chopped celery                                 4-5 cups egg noodles
3 grated carrots                                    2 cans cream of chicken soup
2 Tbsp chicken bouillon                             1/2 C sour cream
                                       7 cups of water

Simmer cut up/diced chicken, celery, carrots, bouillon, salt and pepper in water until meat is cooked. Add noodles and soup. Cook until noodles are tender. Add sour cream; heat through.

Let me know if you make this and how you liked it/and/or if you made any changes and how it turned out!! 

p.s. I just chopped my carrots instead of shredding them, so do however you like them.

Wordless Wednesday

Our First Spring Day!

Birthday Waffle Bowl

For My Dad's Birthday this year My Mom decided to try something different.  A Birthday Waffle Bowl.  Since Grandpa Loves waffles, and ice cream sundaes we put both together and made him this!! I should have taken more pics of the building process, but didn't think about it.  

First you need 2 quarts of different ice cream, we had vanilla and black cherry.  You place all the ice cream (in scoops) in the bottom of the bowl (it's prettier if you use a clear bowl, but we didn't have one big enough). You layer waffles (we used Belgian) around and on top of the ice cream.  We layered on sliced strawberries (you could use any fruit) then drizzled caramel and chocolate ice cream topping on.  My Mom whipped up some real whipping cream, then sprinkled with dark chocolate M&M's (another favorite of Grandpa's)

All the kids (that were there) crowded around Gpa for singing. After Gpa blew out his candles he asked the grand-kids 'Where's your dessert?  This bowl is mine!'  The kids got a laugh out of that.

They couldn't wait to dig in!! We dished up a waffle for everyone with the ice cream and toppings.  What a fun new dessert for everyone!  It was sweet, but not too sweet.  I think the waffles were a better choice than cake, very yummy!

Shadowbox Tutorial

This is my post that was featured at Not Just A Housewife last Friday!  My first FEATURE!! YAY!! 
 
I am so excited to be guest posting here at Not Just a Housewife! What an honor! My name is Clisty, and I blog at Rural Grace 

I am ecstatic to be featured for my first time!! I haven't been blogging for very long, but love it!  I love trying new recipes and sharing old favorites.  Giving new life to old furniture. I do a little quilting, crafting and love doing fun things with my girls.  I am the mom of 3 beautiful girls ages 1, 3, & 6.  I also have an amazing husband who helps me with my projects (just another way to spend time together).  We live in rural Idaho, our little valley is beautiful and peaceful (and an hour away from any 'real' stores).  I can't imagine living anywhere else!

I decided to do a tutorial on this cute shadowbox.  My husband and I have made several of these, I gave mine to a friend for her Birthday, so I got a new one.  Then I gave that one to a church auction and I haven't gotten another one since.  So to get mine done I decided to do a tutorial on it then I'd have a deadline for mine.  My front porch is empty and missing the shadowboxes that once hung there, so here we go!

To get started you need a 1x8x8 piece of pine or MDF (if you'll be painting it), you will use the whole piece if you make it a 2 foot  shadowbox.  You will also need 10-12 feet of molding (that should give you room for a few little mistakes).  Any molding will work, just find a cut/design that you like.  For this tutorial I will be using some antique molding, so if you're buying new stuff and are planning to paint it the MDF is the easiest to work with.  We have made them with all real wood and with MDF, and with Pine sides, but MDF molding.  It all works fine.

This is the molding we're using, it was in my MIL's house. A few years ago she got new carpet and my husband decided she needed new molding to go with the carpet, so we took out the old stuff and he saved it.  The molding was put in when his Grandfather remodeled their house in the 1930's.  I love old things, especially things with family history.  This is the 2nd shadowbox that has been made out of this really cool old molding.  Lloyd made one for his sister a while back, and now I get one for my house too!  The pine1x8x8 is here too ;) See the old carpet stuck to staples in the wood?  A wonderful orange and brown shag lol.   It was also super dirty from sitting in our shed for so long.  I wiped it off and pulled all the staples out.  It was very holey after that.

We used this spray on paint/varnish remover.  It's safe to use indoors, no harsh smell, it smells like oranges, and works really well too!  But no matter what always remember to use gloves!  Safety first! lol

We sprayed the wood with some stripper to get some of the paint off.  The stripper is orange color, which is nice so you can see where it has been sprayed.  We let that sit for 1 hour.

Scraping off the old paint with a putty knife, I didn't want all of it gone though.  I think it adds character to it when there's a little bit of old paint oil seeping through the new paint.

I like the size of a 2 foot square shadowbox, but you could make it whatever size, it could be a rectangle if you choose to do so.  If you have a specific spot in mind for the shadowbox, you cold always use painters tape and tape off the spot in the size you desire to see if it works. It might need to be smaller or bigger, these plans are easy to change, not much math goes into it.

We chose a table saw to cut the 1x8 pine, you could use a chop saw/miter saw, a hand saw (not recommended) or a circular saw (just whatever you're comfortable with or have) lots of options.

All the 1x8 pieces are identical, I just love the smell of freshly cut pine!! It's beautiful too!!

We used a brad-nailer with 1" brads to attach the 1x8 pieces to form a square.  You could also use finishing nails if you don't have access to a nailer.

Here is the finished box, the molding is up next!  We don't use backs on our shadowboxes I like to see the color of paint through the box. You could definitely add one using some wainscoting/bead-board, that would be really cute!  Also if you can see one side of the box is longer than the other from butting the pieces together, so it's not actually a perfect square, but pretty close. 

Measure inside corner to inside corner to get the measurement for the molding.

The chop saw/miter saw gets turned to a 45* angle to cut an end of the molding, then flipped the opposite way 45* for the other end so the pieces can butt together, do the same for all 4.

Before nailing the molding on we always run a thin bead of glue along the edge.

Sophie did NOT like the sound of the brad-nailer. My other two girls don't mind the sound of tools, but Soph must have sensitive ears, because she covers them or runs away.

Before nailing you might want to set all the pieces of molding on the box to see how they fit together.  Sometimes you have to switch pieces to get them to fit right.  And don't worry if you have some small gaps.  It won't be perfect, and we'll putty them later, I'll show you how to make it look almost perfect!

The box has two sides nailed on, if you look close you can see the small gap in the corner, easily hidden.

After I puttied all the holes and gaps in this old molding I let them dry. If you use some new molding from the hardware store, you should just have to putty the brad-nail holes and the gaps.  Once dry I sanded the molding making sure it was smooth, then wiped it all down with a damp cloth to get all the dust off.

Here is the final product!! I love it! I'm trying to decide if I'm going to scuff the edges or put a stain on it to antique it a little bit and make the details stand out more.  I think I'll look at it for a while on my wall before I make that final decision, plus I want to see how the old paint oils seep through the new paint.  (I know my candles have seen better days, I think I'll replace them soon.)    Here are a few other projects I have done.

Check out my wall plaques tutorial here

Here's a Shoe Cubby Redo

Yummy Mini Pineapple Upside-Down Cakes Recipe

 Thank you, Stacy, for letting me share my project with your readers! I hope you all will come see me sometime and check out my other fun stuff!