Organization on a dime

Have you ever heard of Cansolidators? They look pretty handy, right? When I first saw them I thought that they would be the perfect tool for organizing our food storage. The problem is that the smallest ones cost about 30 bucks.
Each. Yeah.
I'm cheap. No, I mean really, really cheap. I've never spent more than 12 dollars for a pair of jeans. All of the furniture in our apartment was either gifted or thrifted. There's no way I'm going to spend 30 dollars for a little platic thing that organizes canned goods, no matter how handy it is. So, instead, I 'organized' our closet like this:

looks nice, right? Heh.
And then, one day I came across this amazing istructable about making furniture out of cardboard, and the wheels started to turn in my head. A quick Google search later, and I was looking at a tutorial about making your own cardboard can rotation system. Awesome! Adam made three of them for us. We didn't follow the diagram on the tutorial, instead using the measurements that worked best for us, but we did like their idea of using a tube of caulk (which we had on hand) instead of elmer's glue. The caulk dries much faster and leaves the finished product a bit sturdier. We also doubled up the cardboard to make sure that it didn't buckle under the weight of our canned goods. So now one small corner of my closet looks nice and tidy. Now I just need Adam to make about a dozen more...



While Adam was making food storage solutions, I made myself a shoerack. And because I just can't resist a chance to turn ANYTHING into an art project, I mod podged scrapbook paper onto it, and then painted it.

So an old diaper box went from this:

To this:


And the pile of shoes behind my door went from this:
to this:
Ah. Much better. As I was making it I had the idea of modifying it a little to make a doll house. You could mod podge pictures of furniture and art from magazines onto it, and make pretty rugs out of scrapbook paper... Anicka and I might be doing something like this together, soon.

And, lastly, here is my progress on my knitting:


It's coming along, slowly but surely. I've made a few mistakes, but overall I'm pleased with it. Hopefully I'll have myself a nice little scarflet in a couple of days.

My new obsessions

• Knitting!

I tried to pick up knitting when I first got married. I hated it. I wasn't coordinated enough to work two needles at a time! So I stuffed my knitting needles into the back of the closet and tried crochet, instead. I loved crocheting. But I was always jealous of the people who could knit cool cables and lace. last week, when I cleaned out my closets, I found my knitting needles and decided to give them another chance. This is my progress after two hours and many, many slipped stitches:

Why yes, I AM ridiculously slow. Thanks for noticing. But, yay! I can knit!

• Mod Podge Rocks

Yes it does! I love mod podge. You can do so many things with it! I can't hotlink the photos from their blog, but that just gives you more of a reason to click on over to there and check it out. Because who doesn't need a pair of modpodged shoes?

• Wardrobe Refashion

The members of this blog take a pledge to make their own clothing for a specified amount of time. You can also buy handmade or used items during your pledge, so many people take old clothes and thrift store items and refashion them into something totally different. There are some awesome ideas! like turning a man's button-up shirt into a little girl's dress


or embellishing boring tanktops with crochet collars.Sign ups for the next round of pledges start this Thursday, and I've decided to add my name to the list, since I just cleaned out our closets and I have a giant pile of clothing that needs to be repurposed. This should be fun.

• Crafty Nest

This blog is rife with ideas for the do-it-yourselfer. I only wish that I had a house to decorate, so that I could attempt some of these projects. look at these awesome ideas!

We got our little glue ghosts hung up yesterday. It took them an entire day and a half to dry completely. My guess is that we did them a little thicker than they needed to be. But that's okay, because I figure they're less likely to tear now. Don't they look cute, haunting my center piece?

And this is the vase that I talked about in my last post. It was a graduation gift to my brother from our high school art teacher, Mr. Jones. Eric asked me to keep it safe for him, since he has nowhere to store it. (Oh, I'll keep it safe for you alright. Verrry, verrry safe.) Isn't it awesome?

I mean, of course I have my own vase from Mr. Jones, but... I want this one too. It's so pretty. The picture doesn't do it justice.

We've done a couple more Halloween crafts this week, too. Anicka did a cute painting of a tree using apples as stamps. I don't remember where I first saw this idea, but it's floating out there all over the Internet. And it turned out really cute. I'm going to frame it and hang it on the wall for the fall season.

I found some fuzzy black yarn in my stash and tied a spiderweb up in the corner of our living room.

It was super easy to do, and if anyone wants instructions I can tell you how I did it. I think it has a cool, graphic look to it, and I like it better than the cheesy cobwebs that you can buy at the dollar store. (But anicka loves the cobwebs, so we'll probably be putting some of that up, as well.)

Super cute crafts

Today while Ryker was napping Anicka and I decided to get our craft on and decorate the apartment for Halloween. We don't have many decorations, and can't buy much because... erm... we're poor. But there are a ton of cute Halloween ideas here, and I think we're going to be busy testing them out for the next few days.

First, we made a couple of kitty pencil holders. Anicka made the first one black, for me, because she knows that I love Halloween. But she had to make a second 'pretty' one, because... well, the girl is a diva, and she likes her crafts to be as pink as possible. Seriously, look at how excited she is about these things:
Do you like her belly-shirt? It's one of her favorites. Because it's pink. But today I decided that I'm going to add some long sleeves and some fabric at the bottom to give it a layered look for winter. I've never attempted a refashion before, so I'll let you know how that goes.

Our second craft of the day was this sheet of glue ghosts. Aren't they cute? The little one on the bottom left corner is supposed to have "lots of mouths to make it scary" but I think it looks like she needs to wax her upper lip. Just sayin'. They're supposed to dry overnight and then you can peel them off of the wax paper and hang them up. I think they'll look pretty awesome hanging in our oh-so-stylish vase-full-of-twigs. (Seriously, Eric. You're never getting that vase back.)

Why I've Been Gone - an Etsy preview

Some of you have heard me complain about how busy I've been lately. Well, it's my own fault. I've been working like mad to get some merchandise made for my upcoming Etsy shop. So, I thought I'd give you all a little preview:

Those are a few of the things that I'll be listing. I'm expecting to open the shop at the end of this week. I'll let you know for sure when I get things up and running!

Adventures in Motherhood , or Disjointed Rambling

Sorry for neglecting my blog! I've been busy over at my other blog, because of Book Blogger Appreciation Week. But, that's over now. So it's time for a bit of catch up. And pictures.


First off, there's a picture of Ryker blowing out his candles, because I just realized that I never put that up. (Pttthhhhbbbt!)And then a little bit of mommy-bragging: Anicka is desperately trying to learn how to read and write. She has started asking me how to spell things, so that she can write 'stories'. This picture is actually sideways, but I'm too lazy to put it into photoshop and flip it, so, you know, just tilt your head to the right. I'm not sure if anyone but me can make out the letters, but it says "Hmert(heart), rimg(ring), married". How cute is that? I'm not sure what's up with all of the 'm's, but we'll work on that.


The kids are obsessed with blanket forts. They make one nearly every day. And it almost always results in one or both of them collapsing in a fit of hysterics because 'Ryker is messing it uuuup!'

Speaking of Ryker, THIS is why I have to bathe him after every meal:


And THIS is why we had to spend the weekend shampooing our carpets:


On my way to bed a few nights ago, I stopped to check in on the kids, as I always do. The first thing I noticed was an empty bed, a sight that can stop a mother's heart.
After a split second of sheer panic, I noticed a knee sticking up out of what I had mistaken for a pile of discarded stuffed animals. But, in fact, it was a cleverly disguised fortress:

I guess the floor was more comfortable.


And, lastly, after five years of marriage, I finally turned something pink in the wash! Nothing spectacular, like a dress shirt, but only a sad little dishtowel and a pair of old socks. Better luck next time!

Now back to our regularly scheduled program...

We spent the labor Day weekend up in Kolob, at a cabin with Shane and Dusty. It was one of the best vacations I've ever had. There was no stress, no worries, nothing to trouble us during our four days in one of the most beautiful places on earth.

We spent the days playing shuffleboard, ping pong and pool.





Adam and I were introduced to 'around the world' or 'round robin' ping pong, which is one of the funnest games I have ever played! Unfortunately, we were having too much fun to remember to take pictures of the game.

The kids were so well-behaved the entire time (except for one nearly-sleepless night with Mr. Ryker) and they both had a blast.

We even got some good exercise in, chopping wood. The boys tried to get the chainsaw running, to no avail.

So, we chopped it up the old fashioned way. My back is still a bit sore from swinging that axe!
It looks like Dusty enjoyed it, though...
We decided to take advantage of the beautiful scenery and tried to get some nice pictures of our little family.


Anicka wasn't very interested in cooperating, though. She was too busy dancing around in her underwear, like a heathen. A really cute, wild haired, tiny little heathen.

For some reason, she now refuses to smile normally in pictures. Ah, well. One of these days we'll get a good family portrait taken. Anyway. I wasn't exaggerating about this being one of the most beautiful places on earth. Check out this amazing scenery. This was the view from the deck of the cabin:

I started a painting of that scene while we were there, but wasn't able to finish it. I will post a picture of the finished painting here, if I ever do get a chance to complete it. Here are a few more of my favorite pictures from our weekend. Some of these were taken by me, and some were taken by Adam.

*sigh* I warn you, this post is going to be a tad bit rambley. (brambly?) Feel free to comment if you have an opposing view, as well. I want to know what people are thinking.

I am not, generally, a very politically active person. I have never been involved with, or even interested in, politics. But these days I just can't help but feel involved. It seems to me that there are some very strange things going on in our country, and I cannot justify my apathy any longer.
For example:
-When you have a tax-payer-funded federal agency that is enlisting artists to 'push the president's agenda', is that not called propaganda? I did not believe this sort of thing was possible in the USA.
- If the president speaks to school-aged children and then teachers create a lesson plan to help him push his agenda, is that not called indoctrination? Now, I obviously don't know exactly what Obama is going to say to these kids. I don't think that there is anything inherently wrong with a president speaking to the children, as long as there is no political agenda attached. Tell them to work hard, and to stay in school. Tell them that they can be whatever they want to be when they grow up. That's it. Stay away from everything else. If it's not okay to push a specific religious view in school, then neither is it okay to push a specific political view, because the two are inextricably linked in many minds.
- When an ad featuring celebrities who 'pledge to be a servant to Barack Obama' is shown in schools, it worries me a little. When did people gain this mindset that we were supposed to serve the president? Wrong. It just sounds wrong.
-When I find out that one of Obama's advisers wrote a book about sterilization and population control, it worries me.
-When starving, struggling people are deemed less important than endangered fish, it worries me.
-When a congresswoman praises communist leaders, it worries me. Actually, it makes me angry.

Those of you who are acquainted with my family know that my mother is one of the most patriotic people you will ever meet. She was born in Cuba, and lived for 16 years without many of the freedoms that we take for granted here. I have never met anyone who was more 'proud to be an American'. But that sentiment no longer seems to be politically correct. For some reason, it's not okay to say that you think America is the greatest country on earth, that it is the land of the free, the land of opportunity. No, to say such a thing shows arrogance and narrow-mindedness.. Do Spaniards not feel that Spain is the very best place to live? Do Italians never boast that their homeland is the most beautiful, or the most interesting? If they do, I don't fault them for it. And if they don't, why not? Shouldn't it be a good thing to have pride in your country? I read a comment somewhere today saying that the world should come first, America should be second, and the individual should be last. I don't understand it. It seems backwards to me.

I don't know. Am I wrong? I don't even know if this post makes sense. I'm tired and I'm frustrated, and I can't seem to wrap my head completely around a lot of these ideas. Am I being one of those 'sensationalist right-wing nut jobs'? I don't think that Obama is the AntiChrist. But I do think that he has the potential to be very dangerous, and I think that Americans need to start paying very close attention to what is going on in the government. Because, if we don't, we could very easily have some of our most precious freedoms voted away. Is it really so difficult to believe?