oh what a pinteresting day

so, 2, yes 2 hours ago, i sat down to write about a couple of pinterest goodies....and i am finally just now doing it.

why?  because i was on &(#$^@# pinterest!

you know you are addicted when you pull up a new tab every hour or so, so that you can go back later and check out what the latest pins were so you don't miss anything!


a couple of weeks ago i showed my mom the hows of pinterest and now if i do not see any pins from her i begin to worry!   in a couple of weeks she has pinned 1,962 items.   in nearly a year i have only pinned 5,329.  at the rate she is going she will have out pinned me in about 6 weeks!

my hubby takes the computer from me and goes on my pinterest for hours sometimes.  i had to start a board for him, called vvvvvrrrrroooooommmmm, because he started messing up my boards and pinning neato cars and such all willy nilly on me!

i have a diy and yummmmmm pinterest board a mile long and have decided i need to start trying some of these projects.

how many neato projects have you pinned with good intentions?  probably about as many as i have.    

i worked on two at the same time yesterday and they were both successes!


when bath and body have sales on their scented candles, and only when they have sales, we buy a few.  their candles are awesome.   right now paying for a recycling bin is not in the budget, but i really hate throwing away the glass container.   after i saw a pin on how easy it was to get the wax out of the container i just had to give it a try, totally expecting a fail.

step 1......put your jar in the freezer for an hour or so

step 2....poke it with a knife.   if it has been in the freezer long enough the wax will crack.  you can see i had several test pokes and found the wax was not yet ready.

as long as it has been in the freezer long enough, the wax comes right out!

if these doo-hickeys get stuck in the bottom of the container, just run hot water over them and the glue un-stickies itself and they pop right off.  

i take them out of the wax so that i can save the wax.  when i have enough wax i will melt it down and make emergency candles.  all i will have to buy are the wicks....that is if i can not find a way to make my own in the interwebs!

step 3....wash your container and it is good as brand spankin' new it is!   i think this one will be a holder of cotton balls it will. 

the beginnings of my wax collection for future emergency candles candle making.  oh lawdy this has the makings of a hoarder.  yipes!

a little over a year ago a big ole door closed, and while we are waiting in faith for an even bigger and better door to open, i have needed to find ways to cut expenses.  

several months ago i started making my own laundry soap.  it saves us 75 bucks a month.  i will post my recipe soon for that one. 

i have found that by sticking a large DRY  fluffy towel in the dryer  it only takes 1/3 of the time to dry my clothes.

i cut my dryer sheets in half, and can use them twice, sometimes 3 times! 

food has been a biggie, and i have to admit we have gotten in quite a rut when it comes to eating and that becomes depressing.

i have also been looking for healthier ways to eat and clean.  fortunately healthier ways to clean are also much cheaper than the store bought cleaners.  if you have dawn, peroxide, vinegar, and baking soda you can pretty much cure and clean just about anything.

when it comes to food, eating healthy is expensive.  we are starting small.   i hope to get my family free of a majority of processed foods. 

pop tarts are not exactly healthy, but the home made version is healthier.  there are no preservatives and what not in this version.  

i have always made my own pie crust.  for the pop tarts i added sugar.

my mom's pie crust recipe i have always used:

1 stick of butter
1 1/2 cups of flour
1/2 tsp salt
5 - 6 tbs of very cold water

i added about 1/3 cup of sugar to this. 

after combining the ingredients i shape it in to a ball and put in the fridge to chill it.  it rolls out much easier.   you want to have a marbleized look to your dough, leaving tiny pieces of the butter visible.  this will make for a flakier crust.

gather your pop tart inerds.  yup the inerds. 

i used smuckers strawberry jam and a cinnamon brown sugar mixture.


when i researched the gazillion pop tart recipes many people added cornstarch and water to their jam and boiled it.   blech....too much work.  i just plopped my jam in there and it worked beautifully!   

i will tell you, when i first started researching this i almost said for-get-it.  one guy wrote an essay.  miles of chitter and chatter on how to make a flippin' pop tart.   a woman gave exact measurements...like 3 x 4 1/2 and after she managed to roll her dough out in a perfect rectangle she used a ruler....yes a ruler..... and measured out perfectly perfect pop tarts.   aw-hell-no.  i just happened to find my handy dandy tool at the back of my baking tool drawer. 

the cinnamon mixture i used was:

1 cup brown sugar
1 tbs cinnamon
8 tbs flour.......don't ask why, but every recipe i found said to add it....so...ok.  i did. 


a blob of strawberry jam...

top on.....

this photo shoulda come first.  this is the handy dandy doohicky i used to cut out my pop tarts dough.  after the filling and second layer of dough are added you put this a top of the pile and push the lever and the inner thingy-ma-bob seals it.   

many of the recipes said to brush egg over the dough to help seal it.  i kinda forgot to this and it worked just fine.  there was no oozing of inerds during the baking process. 

this photo was suppose to show the neato seal that the neato tool above did, but my hands were all doughy and gooey and it was hard to work the camera.

a bit of butter cream icing and whaa-laa!

i am hoping soon that i can top strawberry jam pop tarts with drizzled dark chocolate.  

i will never ever ever ever ever buy a store bought pop tart again.  

so i am off to figure out what it is in life God destined for me to do.  that means i will go stand in my studio and stare for a bit.   all i can say is God...remember i am blonde, hearing impaired and i sometimes miss the subtle hints.   speak loudly.  i need to hear ya as i am feeling kinda lost.

hope you have a beautiful day.  much love to you.   smooches.

a box of curiosity and a pinterest diy win

i am so happy that this weekend has ended better than it started, and for that i am so grateful.

at the end of my last post i predicted the pms would most likely leaving me sobbing in a corner for no real reason, saturday i was a doing just that, but mostly because the beast (meniere's) was really, really being naughty in a bad way.  just an hour in to my day i was not able to walk by myself, it messed with my ability to swallow and read and hold things, reading a book or text on the computer was not happening. 

most days we joke and make fun of the beast and how sometimes, when i get spinny i can look like a bobble head, according to my youngest.  when i lose my balance i tend to throw my arms in some goofy direction trying to catch myself and who ever might be in the room does it too.  we are a bunch of goof balls....probably funnier to be here.  

the only days the beast can bully me to tears is on days like saturday...and that was not even what one of my more challenging days can be like....without my guest, pms, i can usually shut the bathroom door so no one has to see my give in and cry....but the pms enhanced the boo-hoo process and i fell apart in the kitchen in front of everyone.....i hate that. 

today started off better.  i am not back to my normal less spinny self, but i am better and was bound and determined to make art....the soldering bug has bit me something awful this past week and that is what i did.

it has been a couple of years since i have done a reliquary and i started playing around with ideas last week using a match box, some very old watch maker vials, vintage beads, fish bone, coyote toe bones, and peridot chips....oh and vintage german book text in the background. 


i used double sided tape to secure the vintage book text down, but later you will will not enough. 

you can also see  that i have a wire running through the box....i have wanted to do this for a long time.....and

it was a good excuse to play with this....squeeeeeeeee!

at first i was going for the abacus look with some vintage trade beads....nah.....not how i pictured it.

like a dork i double stick taped the vials to the inside of the box....the beast causes me a little air headed at times, not like i don't already have that problem anyway!  i had to yank the bottles out and that caused the paper to be ripped to shreds so i had to cut a new lining out.

now that is more like it.

uh boy.  i got this all taped up and if you look at the left hand corner....part of the vintage book text is haning down.  i did not tape it corner to corner, just a bit in the middle and somewhere in the process of putting the foil/tape down for soldering i jarred the corner loose. 

so, i can just leave it...who will notice...does not matter.  i will know. 

i took just the top bit off and adjusted the paper the best i could with an exacto knife and sealed it back up. 

it was a pain in the butt, but worth it.

i use a bone folder to make sure the edges are smooth and all sealed up.

wah-laa.  ready to solder.  here is where i realize i did not plug in the soldering iron and decide to take a potty break upstairs and check in on all the peeps to kill time to let it heat up.

notice the vial on the left of the screen, the little one.  see how the cork is in nice and tight....just wait.

here it is all soldered up. 

i have mentioned in previous posts that i have decided i might just not be one of those pretty, super smooth solderererers....that i have decided to call this my 'style'

this evening i decided why not give it a bit more of that ancient dig site, or antique look and make it look as though it has been sealed or nailed or screwed shut.

it took a good hour experimenting, and inhaling lots of steamy stinky flux, not sure if that is a good thing, and found that if you make a dot and really really really quickly move the soldering iron and shove a bamboo skewer in the center and push down you get that sealed, nailed, screwed shut look! 

did i mention the beast was still being naughty....and that my sense of aim was a bit off?!?!  so this was pretty darn good.  not that i got it 'right' on the first try for each one, but i did it!

i am so happy!  squeeeeeee!

here is the back.  i experimented with another process for large areas like this and i almost have it figured out and when i do i will play show and tell.

when i told my hubby that i made this from a match box he was blown away.  he thought i used one of my vintage metal boxes.  he is my biggest supporter and without him i would have never gone as far or done as much as i have.   i am a lucky girl.  he thinks i am a genius....

remember a bit earlier i said to look at the bottle on the left of the screen....see what happened to the cork....it is no longer snug as a bug on the tiny vial.  during the soldering process condensation built up on the inside and it must have loosened it.   note to self:  secure the corks in the next on i do.

i was hoping that once it dried out a bit the cork would stay stuck, but no such luck.  thankfully the bar of beads are keeping the cork from coming all the way out and the contents of the tiny vial from spilling all over. 


on a different note....PINTEREST....my addiction.  there are so many neat ideas, arty, household, cleaning, holiday....the list goes on and on and on and i have become, like so many others a pin hoarder.  i decided i was going to try some of the diy/tutorials i was pinning.  i have tried a ton of them and figured i would share my personal experiences on posts here and there.

the first one i will share with you, but not the first i have done, is the milk jug watering can.


i have several vintage ones that i don't use, and i also always seem to have at least one empty milk jug a day.  

on the pin it showed the watering can with holes in the LID.   when i first saw this i thought what total genius, and then realized at some point you would need to turn the jug almost completely upside down to get the water out.  so......................

i pokes them here, and it works great.  now i just need some plants that need to be gently watered. 

it is only midnight and i am a bit pooped, thanks to the beast, so i am going to say nighty-night for now and see if i can settle down. 

hope you had a beautiful weekend.  smooches to you.