sincerely yours, dena

In my previous house (with no stairs) I clocked how many steps I took in a single day and it turned out that I walked on average 5 miles a day just in my daily activity. Now on top of that, I’m training for a marathon and my new house has two sets of stairs. So needless to say, I get enough exercise in a day, no need for unnecessary trips up and down stairs. To keep my house organized, I put baskets at the top and bottom of the stair cases and it’s expected that passersby’s grab anything within the basket and take it either up or down with them. It saves mucho time and mucho steps.

Because I NEVER throw anything away, I save all my back issues of the 5 magazines I subscribe to. I always say I’m going to go back and look thru them but I rarely do. So I copied my friend Vanessa who copied her Mom… start ripping out what you want and recycle the rest.

Using a exacto knife, I cut out all the articles that interest or inspire me then I put them in clear protective binder sheets and organize them in a binder by subject. I’ve got a binder for decorating ideas (divided by room), a binder for holidays, a binder for recipes and a binder for crafts. The best part is getting the satisfaction of finally being able to throw something away!

Over the weekend I went to my first estate sale. The furniture and the artwork were phenomenal. I wanted everything! This chair that would have looked perfect in my bedroom sold for $40 but I just couldn’t pull the trigger and raise my bidding number in the air. So finally when this table was at $10, out of nowhere my natural instincts to buy took over and my arm raised itself. I am a proud owner of a kitchen table (finally) and I only paid $10 for it.

I have a dog. I have a black dog. With owning a dog comes the piles of dog hair that I endlessly sweep up around my house. Being the suckers that we are, the dog sleeps in the bed. Keeping the bed clean from hair is a useless battle. I should have bought stock in those lint rollers. I gave up and got smart. Now I roll an extra bed sheet at the foot of the bed. When it’s time for bed, I roll the sheet to cover the bed spread and the dog and the dog hair get contained on the sheet. When I make the bed in the morning I roll the sheet back to the foot of the bed. It’s so much easier to wash/shake a bed sheet than the comforter not to mention less expensive!

A few jobs ago the company I was working for was doing some cleaning (aka laying people off) and they threw all the extra office supplies in a pile for people to pillage. I grabbed these metal mail inbox/outbox trays. They have been collecting dust in my closet for years until now. Using craft wire I secured the two trays together making sure the openings lined up at the bottom and secured to the wall in my pantry. Now it’s perfect for holding plastic shopping bags.

It’s a pretty simple concept actually. Companies best marketing tool is word of mouth, so what they do is pay marketing firms with members to try out their stuff and talk about with people around them. BzzAgent is one I belong to. They from time to time send me invitations to join a campaign and I get the opportunity to be involved or not. (The more involved you are, the better the campaign) The best part is the free stuff. They send you the campaign product and you use it in front of other people. So far I’ve done the Pledge Multi Wipes (which are gifts from god) and the Scrubbing Bubbles automatic shower cleaner dispenser. If you take the questionnaires on the site they try to get you involved in campaigns that similar to your tastes and lifestyle. They must deduct that I clean a lot, hence all the cleaning products.

While on vacation we visited Echo, lake aquarium and science center in Burlington, VT. In the resource center found brochure filled with recipes using household items to clean.

Fabric softener – Vinegar: add 1-2 cups of vinegar to rinse cycle to deodorized & soften fabrics.

Tub & Tile cleaner – 1 2/3 cup baking soda, ½ cup liquid soap, 2 tbls vinegar, ½ cup water, a few drops of essential oil. Mix soda and soap. Then add water, then add vinegar. Store in a squirt top bottle and shake before using. Rinse thoroughly to avoid leaving a residue.

Wood floor polish – ¼ cup olive oil, ¼ cup vinegar, 10 drops essential oil: Mix and apply. Wipe clean.

Glass cleaner – ½ cup vinegar, 1 cup water, 2 drops liquid soap. Mix in a spray bottle. Shake and apply. Wipe clean.

Like everyone else in the country, we got hit by this week’s winter storm. Some places got snow, we got nuttin but ice. The city of Boston is one big ice rink. I personally saw my neighbor wipe out 2 times. (I shouldn’t be laughing but oh, I am.) In my fight against evil ice build up on the sidewalk I started thinking about salt and wanted to know if it truly was the fastest and safest way to combat my enemy. Why does salt melt ice? Salt is some pretty nasty stuff. There are different compounds that are better than others. It seems that Calcium magnesium acetate (CMA) is the best of the worse. Ice Melter is a commercial product that uses this compound. The Salt Institute (yep, I’m not kidding) brags there are more than 14,000 uses for this wonder rock and provides a list of a few.

She who must not be named’s new book Homekeeping Handbook weighs at least 25 lbs and costs $45.00. In fact, the first 114 pages are dedicated to the kitchen. Being the dork that I am I read the whole thing. Even though it was all great information it was way too overwhelming.
Here’s the cliff notes:

• To clean almost anything in your kitchen use a mixture of several drops of mild dishwashing liquid and warm water. Always try this first before moving harsher products and chemicals.
• To clean your garbage disposal: Make vinegar ice cubes and throw them down the drain while rinsing with cold water. BTW: always use cold water when running your disposal because warm water could heat grease that will just end up sticking to your pipes.
• Stack everything to conserve space but stick a paper plate, coffee filter or paper towel in between layers to prevent chipping.
• Every once and awhile give your wood cutting boards a little TLC with this cutting board cocktail: coarse salt and lemon juice. Scrub for a few mins and then rinse thoroughly.
• The FDA has outlawed the use of sponges in commercial kitchens. So with that being said, I immediately threw out all my sponges. If you use sponges keep them separated. The dish sponge should just be used for dishes and should be stored in a clean soap dish away from his nasty cousin “counter sponge.”
• Got Dirt? If you’ve got a particularly dirty pot (baked on food) bring to a boil ¼ cup baking soda and water then remove from heat and let soak for an hour. Scrap off the dirt and wash per usual.
• List of her favorite cookbooks: Joy of Cooking, Mastering the Art of French Cooking Vol 1 & 2, Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, Italian Food, French Country Cooking, Cafe Boulud Cookbook, The New Making of a Cook, La Varenne Pratique, La Technique, La Methode, On Food and Cooking, Beard on Bread.