crib to bench...part 2

I am thrilled how this project turned out! Last week we took apart our babies crib and decided instead of scrapping the wood, or trying to resell it (which we can't since the regulations on cribs changed this past year) we turned it into a bench. Thank goodness for Pinterest, I'm always finding neat ideas on there. 

There were a lot of holes left in the wood from the crib, so I bought Elmer's wood filler. The expert I chatted with at Home Depot said that once I fill the holes and let them dry, it would be easy to sand if I needed to. I used this stuff with ease, and it only cost me $3!

Before I started sanding the project, I looked online for ideas on how to paint wood without sanding. All of the sites I came across recommended using Glidden's Gripper Primer to use instead of sanding. A couple hours later I painted my bench in a Glidden High Gloss French Grey.

I couldn't wait for it to dry. As soon as it was, I found a perfect spot in my living room for my cozy homemade bench. 

 Not only is it a cute piece of furniture, but it's sentimental, and relatively cheap to make. 

I'm finding myself looking around our house at furniture differently now...wondering if I can repurpose it, or give it a fresh coat of paint. I definitely see more of these projects in my future. 

Crib to bench? ...part 1

Our baby boy turned two this summer. After school started this fall, we decided to make the transition to a big boy bed...aka toddler race car bed.

We weren't sure what we were going to do with the baby crib. It's sentimental since we used it for our daughter and now our son. We're not sure if we're having any more children, so we're not sure if we wanted to store it until we were sure. We found out that the crib standards have changed this year, and according to the guidelines our crib is deemed unsafe. So what to do with a crib we're not planning on using again, and we can't resell??? We decided to build a bench!  Of course, when i say "we" I mean "my husband". He's so wonderful and handy. I showed him pictures from a post I found online and he said "I can build that". So "we" ahem...."he" got to work.

Juan looked at the Cherry Crib and cherry wood changing table to see what pieces would work to make our bench! Of course Ethan wanted to help too!

When Juan started he tried attaching the different pieces together with screws. 

For it to be a sturdier piece of furniture, Juan decided to attach the crib pieces to a seat portion. That worked a whole lot better.

Looks sturdy enough for my little man. Don't you just love his shirt. It's bacon and eggs from Target!

It's starting to look more like a bench. Attaching one side of the crib to the bench.

Can you see how much help I was during this process?  I'm saving my energy for painting. haha.

Ta da!!! My new bench. I'm so excited to still be able to have our baby crib that meant so much to us, but now as a usable piece of furniture. Now I get to paint. I can't wait to go choose a color. This will be a fun project on my next day off. 

Autumn Bucket List

We first made a bucket list this past summer. It was full of wonderful ideas we would do throughout the summer before she started school.  My daughter loved it so much, she wanted us to do it again this fall.

I created an Autumn bucket list today! It's super cute. I used an empty coffee can. I got cute apple scrap book paper. I put mod podge on the back of the scrapbook paper and attached it to the can. I then, put a layer of mod podge on top of the scrapbook paper to give it a glossy finished effect. I then got clothespins from the dollar store and put all the fun ideas we'd like to do this fall as a family. Each time we do one of the ideas, we can put the clip in the bucket.

The goal is to not only complete all of the fun Fall activities, but also to be a fun way to spend time as a family.  A lot of the activities we would do anyway every fall because they're our family traditions, but this is a fun way to go about it.


Here are some of the ideas on our Autumn Bucket List:

• Pumpkin Patch
• Roast Pumpkin Seeds
• Make Pumpkin Bread
• Make Pumpkin Pie
• Make Butter Tarts
• Leaf Art
• Pumpkin seed art
• Haystackular (our local hay maze)
• Hay Ride
• Carve a pumpkin
• Paint a pumpkin
• Fall Festival at our church
• Apple Stamps
• Decorate for fall
• Take pictures in our costumes
• Send Autumn cards to our friends
• Make Caramel Apples

I love that this project is easy, cheap, and helps create family memories.

I have a confession to make...

I have a confession to make...

In all these greener living hurdles I'm conquered there's one that I'm truly struggling with. It's something small, white, delicious, makes everything taste good, makes my grey skies blue again, makes me smile when I'm sad, or comforts me when I need it....it's SUGAR. I'm completely in love with this white sparkly goodness. The love affair happened when I was little. When I was 6 or 7 I spent a week at my grandma's house. Of course my parents told her; "no sugar". Grandma had a candy jar on every table, cake after every meal and made salad that was jello with fruit in it!  I'm sure Grandma didn't listen to my parents advisement, because she loves the sweets as much as I do. A couple months later at my dentist appointment I found out I had SEVEN cavities....I know adults who have zero cavities...and here at this dentist appointment I had SEVEN! I honestly don't know how many more I received over the years...I do know I'd probably be embarrassed to share the total if I knew the total.

I have never gone without sugar in my life. The Closest I came to abstaining from it was last year when I did the Daniel Fast. The Daniel Fast is where you eat fruits, veggies, and whole grains. No yeast, dairy, meat, sweets of any kind etc for 21 days. I did add a coffee to that menu plan once in the morning with a bit of cream and 2 sugars. However, I did refrain from any fun Starbucks, or flavored fun coffees. So even in the Daniel Fast, I still had sugar. And that fast, is one of the hardest things I have ever done. Especially if I was sad, or stressed, or needed a little cozy muffin to comfort me. I had no idea I used food to pacify my emotions until this fast.

So what stirred up all this thought on sugar today???? Well one of the best bloggers that I follow is:

http://www.facebook.com/i.quit.sugar.ebook/info

She posted a video about sugar this week....It's so simple, yet so eye opening!  It explains why sugar is so appealing, yet extremely harmful to our bodies.

So ways I'm going to cut back on sugar:

• Read food labels more carefully (just because it's organic, doesn't mean it doesn't have less sugar)
• Making my own products at home
• Tomato sauce (without the added sugar)
• Peanut butter (without the added sugar)
• Apple Sauce
• Use honey, or agave nectar as a sweetener   
• Just be more conscious of my sugar consumption in general.

Will I be able to 100% let go of the white stuff? I hope so...today is definitely not my day, but I am going to consciously make an effort to cut back!

Paper, Plastic, or Responsible?

I have to admit when I go grocery shopping, I don't always take my reusuable shopping bags with me. They get all bunched up and wrinkly. They take over the trunk. I leave them at home. I forget where I put them. My hands are full with my kiddos that I don't have any hands left to carry reusable shopping bags into the store...but mostly the excuse I'm going to go with is I just forget to bring them. 

I just found these amazing reusable shopping bags called:  MY ECO SHOPPING BAG SYSTEM! 

it's 4 in 1 shopping bag system. They fit perfectly into your shopping cart. The website claims that they replace up to 30 regular shopping bags. 

There are:

- "Produce, Fruits & vegetables" (with an antibacterial liner that makes it easy to wipe clean)

- "Chilled & Frozen foods" (with insulated liner with zipper top to keep items cold)

- "Glass Jars & bottles"

- "Groceries and dried goods"

So not only will I be making a "green" choice, I'll be more organized when shopping and putting my groceries away at home. Like items will be in the same bag.

The four bags all fold up nicely in one small tote. It was $19 for the set.
I can't wait to receive them in the mail. 

Check out their website. Theres a video to learn more about these. 

http://www.getmyeco.com

How we built the Raised Garden

This is Juan (My hubby)'s 1st blog post! He shared his instructions on how to build a raised vegetable garden so I could share with you. He's so sweet:) I know a few of you had asked "How?" So here's his instructions. Please message me with any other questions you may have and I'll pass them along to the builder (a.k.a Juan). BTW: we didn't use a kit, or instructions from anywhere. Rather I showed him pictures of what I was looking for from Pinterest and low and behold we have a couple raised veggie gardens. He's awesome at figuring stuff like this out.  

Dimensions:

•  6 ft long
• 3 ft wide
• 20 inches high

Supplies:

• 2  - 2 x 10 x 18 ft pressure treated lumber (this makes the sides)
• 3 – 2 x 4 x 10 ft pressure treated lumber (for the top rail)
• box of 2 ½ coarse thread screws

Tools Needed:

•  tape measurer
• skill saw
• drill
• patience
• t square for angles

Approximate build time: an hour 1/2

Instructions:

1.  2x 10 x18 boards cut:  Four 6ft lengths & four 3 ft lengths                                                                                     
2.  Screw the 3 ft lengths onto the ends of the 6ft. Attach the other 6 ft side. (so you make your box). You’ll do that twice.
3. Stack your boxes on top of each other. Then screw them together. The way I did this was with a 2 x4 in each corner. Then screwed the boxes to a 2 x 4.
4.  Then the top rail: cut the 2x4 at 45 degree angle opposing to make a 90 degree angle for the edges.  Screw them on to the top of the box to create the top rail.
5. Fill with dirt, lots and lots of dirt. This could ruin your husband’s back…but you’ll have a beautiful raised veggie garden!

Tomatoes broccoli and lettuce are thriving in this garden right now

That cute mischievous little schnauzer is Jack. He was no help at all in the building process

There's still room for 1 more raised veggie garden way back there

The ants came marching in.

What I find to be extremely exciting about being a new veggie gardener is I have no idea what these veggies are going to look like as they grow.

I planted a cucumber plant in my raised vegetable garden. It became a vine and started growing up my fence.   It was pretty awesome to watch each day as it changed. Then I started to see little yellow flowers all over the vine. Then the little flowers were turning into tiny cucumbers. It was so neat to see. The kids were excited to see them growing too. One day after all the rain I spotted what looked like a tiny gherkin pickle. I thought we're going to have a TON of cucumbers!  I looked down at the stem of the plant and saw ants marching up and down my cucumber plant. The stem looked weak. I lifted it up and noticed the stem was hallow. The ants were eating the stem.....and within a week my whole cucumber plant shriveled up and died. Such a sad day. So we did not enjoy eating any cucumbers from my garden.

These little cucumbers were so cute.

This is as big as any of my cucumbers ever got, before the ants took over!

My poor little cucumber plant. Can you spot the tiny little ants marching up and down this vine? I'm so mad at them.

Those pesky little ants enjoyed my cucumbers...oh the life of a new gardener!

Has anyone every planted cucumbers and actually harvested cucumbers?

Maybe I do have a Green Thumb?

I have never been much of a gardener. I decided earlier in the summer that if I was to work hard at tending to a garden I would love to grow fruits or veggies I could eat. Flowers are really pretty...but with the little free time I have, it wouldn't be enough of an incentive for me to really tend to a garden.  I decided to make the flower bed at the front of the house not just a flower bed, but also a veggie garden!

So I headed to Home Depot & Lowes to look at their potted veggies that were already started. I figured growing from seed was something to try another time. So I  bought 4 pepper plants ( a green, orange, yellow & red). I bought a squash plant, a cantaloupe plant, basil, & mint. I also decided to plant the tops of two pineapples I had purchased at the grocery store.

This is what the garden looked like right after we planted the flowers and veggies in May 2012

I was so proud of my little garden

A couple weeks after planting, I discovered my first pepper! Can you see it? (above)

My first cantaloupe!  Buggies discovered my cantaloupe as well, I hope it was tasty. So I haven't eaten one of my cantaloupes yet.  I have two more growing that I hope we can enjoy soon.

                                               Our 1st Yellow pepper!                                                                   Our 1st Red pepper!

Our basil plant tripled in size since I purchased it.

We've already harvested 1/2 a dozen peppers. We really haven't needed to water the plants much since it's been raining everyday this summer!

Our garden September 2012

It grew so fast!  What a difference a couple months makes!

Homemade Tomato Sauce

One of our favorites in our home is tomato sauce.  Once a week we'll definitely have whole wheat pasta with tomato sauce. We'll also make a pizza on Thursday or Friday night and use tomato sauce. Let's just say we use a lot of it.

I ALWAYS buy tomato sauce in a jar. I LOVE it! I love having the choice of  "cheese blend", "basil" or "oregano". I just love all the choices.  My favorite place to buy pasta sauce is at Publix, because usually every other week they have a certain kind of pasta sauce on BOGO (Buy one get one free)!  I love a deal! So instead of $2.69 a jar. It works out to be $1.35.

One of the things I love about buying pasta sauce in the jar is having the jar to reuse afterwards! I save them, glue ribbon around them, and spray paint the lid. I use them to store dry goods in my pantry, or to give gifts in. I love these jars!

The jars started out in my pantry like this:

Then I got my creative and made them pretty! I love my pasta sauce jars in my pantry!

Tonight I decided to try my hand at making pasta sauce:

- 4 cloves of garlic sliced

- 1/3 cup olive oil

- 28 oz can of crushed tomatoes

- basil, oregano, salt & pepper to taste

It turned out great! I loved it, what's even better is that my family loved it! It was a hit!  Not only did homemade sauce taste a lot better, it's cheaper to make and much better for you! I looked at one of my jars of pasta sauce and it had 50 grams of sugar in it!  Why on earth would pasta sauce need 50 grams of sugar? That's roughly 12 teaspoons of sugar in that 1 jar!!!! Ridiculous. What I love about making my own sauce, is that I know EXACTLY what is in it.

We made the switch to whole grain pasta about a year ago. It was pretty tough since we loved the white stuff (even though it was bad for us). We made the switch to it during the Daniel Fast. I'm so glad we did. The whole wheat is so much healthier for you. I think if I make the switch to making our own sauce I'm going to miss the pasta sauce jars more than the actual store bought sauce. I'm going to have actually start buying mason jars.

Teaching my first Green Living Seminar

At Brownsville Assembly we had a women's conference that was full of lots of different workshops women could choose to attend. It was an incredible experience to be part of.  I had the opportunity to share with a class full of ladies who signed up to hear more about green living. Not only did I have the chance to share about a subject I so believe in, it was with ladies who were eager to hear more about the subject!


I wasn't sure if I'd have enough to talk about with the ladies for the time allotted, but once I started sharing I realized how passionate I was about the subject. Not only was I passionate, but I saw how passionate the class became the more I shared. I was sincerely sharing from my heart what I have learned along this journey thus far. I didn't claim to be an expert, but one who is constantly learning. I gave a handout with all the recipes I've tried at home and I absolutely love! Then all the ladies in the group had the opportunity to make my favorite bathtub scrub recipe.

I was so excited to have this opportunity to pass on the knowledge. Knowledge is power and I'm so excited to empower others. I'm definitely excited to walk through any doors that God opens for me to share about living a healthier green life.

How to make a Delicious Green Juice

I have made many green juices before, and some I must admit most of them turned out pretty disgusting. I have found the secret to make a good tasting green juice: it's LEMON! 

My favorite Green juice recipe thus far:

- 1 orange

- 1 apple

- 1/2 a lemon (sometimes a whole lemon if I'm wanting it to taste like sour candy)

- a big handful of spinach ( any kind of greens will do, I love spinach, or lettuce)
- another big key is to make sure its mixed really well after juicing.
- last but not least pour it over a large glass of ice. Any juice you make always tastes a million times better over ice.

There are a couple reasons why I love this juice recipe so much:

1. First of all it doesn't taste at all how it looks. I admit it looks pretty yucky, but I promise it's not. The lemon is the secret ingredient that makes it good. The apple adds the sweetness. The spinach adds the greens that you need.  And the orange of course adds vitamin C.

2.  You feel immediately energized after drinking it, like you can run a marathon, do a kickboxing workout or even do the dishes!  haha!

3. It's a great way to get a few more veggies into your life. I'm working my way up to adding more veggies to this juice, but for now I love it the way it is. 

If you're into juicing you need to try this one. Give it a whirl, use whatever veggies are your favorite. Be sure to add the lemon.

Have a favorite juice recipe? Share it. I'd love to hear:)

Homemade Applesauce

A few people have inquired about my homemade applesauce made in the crock pot.  I found a killer recipe on Pinterest.   It was SUPER easy, and extremely delicious. This is definitely something you should add to your Autumn Bucket List. If you don't have an Autumn bucket list you need to add "making an autumn bucket list" to your Autumn bucket list. haha!

I didn't follow their recipe exactly. This is how I made the applesauce.  I

8 medium granny smith apples (it made the applesauce tart, which I love! But you could use whatever kind of apples you choose.)

Zest of 1/2 a lemon - use a vegetable peeler

1 tsp fresh lemon juice 

1 tbsp Cinnamon 

5 tsp light brown sugar  (or you can use agave)

1.  Peel, core and chop the apples.

2.  Add the sugar, lemon zest, lemon juice and cinnamon stick.

3.  Set crock pot to low and cook for 5 hours. Stir apples occasionally, apples will slowly become a delicious applesauce.  (I used a whisk, which gave the sauce a nice chunky consistency.)

4.  Can and process as you would other recipes or keep refrigerated up to 3 weeks.

It was delicious! I definitely would never buy store bought applesauce again. It not only tasted good, but was so simple and easy to make!  Try some homemade applesauce yourself. You'll love it, I promise!

This is where I found the recipe for the applesauce:

http://mommymakesitbetter.blogspot.com/2012/04/crock-pot-applesauce.html 

Raised Vegetable Garden

What do you do during your 1st born's 1st day of Kindergarten? Well you build a raised Vegetable garden of course! So we did!  When I say "we" I mean Juan. He built the vegetable garden and I went to Lowes and bought vegetable plants!

Since I am not really an avid gardener (yet)...I started to research vegetable gardens online. Pinterest became my best friend.   The best advice I found was: 'To just do it. That you'll figure it out along the way'. I have no idea how long it takes for my veggies to grow. I know they need water, and sun. I know I need to pull weeds if I see them. I also know that I don't want to use any pesticides of any kind. I'm excited to grow my own vegetables, and to know exactly where they came from. It doesn't get any fresher than this!  I'll definitely post again on the status of my veggies. Hopefully they'll make it to the dinner table!

Don't you love my big gulp drink sitting the garden? I definitely was working up a sweat planting all those new plants in the new garden! Tomato plants on the left. Lettuce in the middle. Broccoli on the right. Romaine lettuce is the far back right. 

So why am I wanting a raised vegetable garden?  A few reasons.

1. Grass and weeds have a harder time growing in the raised garden, as opposed to a garden on the ground.

2. It's easy to tend when it's raised, so I don't have to bend down to care for it.

3. The dogs and other critters have a harder time getting to it, since it isn't on the ground.

My cherry tomato plants.  Do you spot a cute little boy's hand in the picture? That's my little Ethan. 

We bought umpteen bags of soil to fill the raised veggie garden. I can't wait to plant more veggies!  The rest of the veggies are going to be planted by seeds.   I'll post more on growing my veggies by seed another time.


My goal is to have three raised vegetable gardens side by side with paver stones in between them, so we don't have to mow in between the gardens. (when I saw 'we' of course I mean Juan )

Pumpkin Spice Creamer

Fall is here. I love this time of year. I'm not sure what says Fall to me more than a Pumpkin Spice latte from Starbucks. Last week Starbucks began serving them for the first time this season. I would love them all year round, but they're only available in the fall and they cost close to $5 a piece!

I thought about buying pumpkin spice creamer at the grocery store, but have you ever read the ingredient list? It's a bunch of stuff I can't even pronounce. I'm not even sure if there's even any milk or cream in it. So i hunted on pinterest and I found a pumpkin spice cream recipe. 

Tonight after we got the kids to bed. I got started making my very own pumpkin spice creamer from scratch!

1 cup of organic milk

1 cup of heavy cream milk

4 tablespoons of pumpkin puree

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

4 tablespoons maple syrup ( i prefer real maple syrup)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whisk milk, cream, pumpkin, syrup, and pumpkin spice together over medium heat. When it gets steamy remove from heat and add in the vanilla. Use a strainer to transfer the cream into a glass container! Let it cool down and chill it the refrigerator. 

The recipe was delicious! I will definitely be enjoying my pumpkin spice at home a lot this season.  The only thing I will do differently is put some whipped cream on top & perhaps sprinkle some pumpkin spice sprinkled on top.  Hope you enjoy. It was really simple to make.