July 11, 2012

Vinegar, Vegetable, Miracle

I’ve come across quite a few sites touting vinegar as the best cleaning product around so I thought I would give it a shot. Our shower has been extremely neglected in the past few weeks so naturally that was a good starting place to test this theory out.

I mixed 1 cup distilled white vinegar with 1/2 cup Dawn liquid soap (after heating up the vinegar in the microwave first). You combine this into a spray bottle then get cleaning. The best thing about this is that there’s little scrubbing involved. Just spray your entire shower down (the mixture will have a gel-like consistency) then wait a few hours and rise off. Tough soap scum might need a bit of elbow grease, but not much.

I must say it works and it worked well! The only downside of this was that my entire bathroom reeked of vinegar for a day and we had to keep the fan on in order to even set foot in there. And by reeked, I mean so potent you could probably pass out in there/minor eye burning. If your bathroom has a window, this will probably be less of an issue for you.

My next cleaning project with vinegar will be to freshen up the inside of our dishwasher….stay tuned…..I know this is extremely exciting stuff people 🙂

P.S. – I just impluse bought a food dehydrator so get ready for some food drying posts! I recently read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barabara Kingsolver and the book contained some mouthwatering recipes that require dried tomatoes. Since tomato season is right around the corner here in the Pacific NW, I thought it was time I got crackin’. Cherries are also in season so those bad boys will also be dryin’ up in no time. And hello? Fruit leathers? Sign me up!

Check out her website below – it contains those recipes too.

http://www.animalvegetablemiracle.com/index.html

July 9, 2012

EA WA Road Trip

Friends

We took a quick jaunt over to Cle Elum this past weekend to visit our preggers friend whose due in less than a month. Come on July 31 birthday – momma needs a new pair of shoes! (we’ve got a betting pool going)

Soaked up some sun on the patio, drank a tad too much Malibu, roasted marshmallows and took in the sights of Eastern WA.

Hit up the Roslyn Cafe for breakfast the next morning then raided the local farmer’s market where I picked up a huge ole bag of Rainiers for cheap. Soon-to-be-mamma sent us home with lettuce plucked right out of her garden too. Overall, a lovely and relaxing weekend.

July 7, 2012

4th of July Fun

4th of July, Friends

I’m hooked on these photo collages. I just need to get a smidge better at them – there’s a bit of a fine art skill needed – I’m still a work in progress.

Made chocolate cupcakes, picked tons of raspberries out of my mom’s garden and spent the 4th of July down at Clear Lake with the Pitch Family per usual. Overall, a lovely mid-week holiday.

June 21, 2012

FullCircle Farmin’

I finally got around to using a Groupon for 2 weeks worth of FullCircle Farm produce boxes. I had snagged the coupon back in the winter but wanted to wait until the weather was a bit better and the produce options were more diverse. I love me a good potato, but was really craving those late spring veggies!

There’s a pick up location a few minutes away from my house so I went with that option – delivery seems to always be a pain in the arse at our condo. Here’s what I got:

Isn’t it so colorful and inspiring? It just screams “you better eat healthy yo!” I immediately consumed 2 organic plums (delicious!) and decided to make a great little salad for dinner tonight with the baby lettuce and carrots. Not sure what I’ll do with the rest of the veggies but I suspect there will be some taco action and some veggie roasting action up in the hizzle very soon. I can’t wait to see what next week’s box holds!

June 18, 2012

Hein Baby Shower

Baby Shower, Events

I admit, I’m not fond of baby showers. I love me a good party, but showers just don’t do it for me. I don’t like pastels (they don’t suit my complexion), I despise those games (c’mon ladies, that candy bar/diaper game – ick.) and there never seems to be enough booze flowing (I know she’s pregnant, but I’m not!). I wouldn’t consider myself anti-baby, I’m just anti-showery stuff. (Friends, take note – no storks at my shower!)

One of two ‘games’ we played – something fun for Mom for those middle of the night changings.

So when I decided to co-host my best friend’s baby shower with Megan and Danielle, I knew this was my chance to create a ‘non baby’ baby shower. We went with a mod, colorful feel with turquoise, royal blue and lime greens. I guess if you had to nail me down with a theme, it’d be ‘baby clothes line’? I know, I know…that doesn’t sound right….

I’m so sick of Evites – I never seem to get them and I, for one, enjoy getting fun things in the mail so we went with these paper invites via www.paperstyle.com and snail mailed them to our fab guests.

A new venue, besides all our our houses and parent’s houses, was desperately needed so I kindly asked my sister’s boyfriend’s parents, who own a lovely cabin on Lake Sammamish. Thankfully, they said yes and we had a perfect, waterfront location!

Gift time!

Decor is always high on my list, so we took inspiration (aka pin-spiration) from the invite and created all sorts of lovely things to spruce up the place.

Hello diaper wreath!

Hello cute baby clothes line courtesy of Danielle!

Hello baby cupcakes – Megan did a bang up job on these!

We also picked up a bunch of bouquets from the Redmond Farmer’s Market and used canning jars to make these loose n’ lovely arrangements, which brought more color ’cause you always need more color!!

We didn’t go too crazy with the food since the party started at 2pm and stuck with easy and tasty apps. We also included some fav treats of the mom-to-be. Although it did end up raining, I’d say the party was a huge success! Way to go gals!