How to Freeze Fresh Tomatoes

I like to eat fresh tomatoes. When my friends and neighbors have an overabundance of tomatoes growing in their gardens and ask me to take some of their extra tomatoes off of their hands the correct answer is always “yes!” because I only have room on my patio for one hanging tomato plant.

Luckily, a generous soul gave me a big ol’ bag of tomatoes this summer. Unluckily, it was two days before I planned an out of town trip. I knew if I left those fresh red beauties in my refrigerator while I was on vacation a week later I’d come back to a bunch of spoiled tomatoes, ready for the compost bin. I don’t have super duper canning skills, equipment, or knowledge. Time was also at a premium. What do to do? I sent those tomatoes to the deep freeze. Yes, it’s true. You can freeze tomatoes.

Here’s how.

How to Make Moth Repelling Lavender Sachets

I love the look and smell of the lavender growing in my front yard. I also love that lavender is a natural moth and pest repellant.

This year, I had a good crop of lavender and decided to make sachets that I could hang up in my closets to keep the moths at bay.

First, I dried the fresh lavender. Once it was dry, I removed the flowers and cut the stalk and leaves into tiny bits.

Save Travel Time and Money with a Zero Waste Road Trip

Husband, Blitzkrieg, and I took off for an 8-hour road trip from Ohio to a tiny mountain town in Northern Georgia. When we travel with our dog, we bring a picnic lunch because we don’t want to leave the dog alone in a hot car for health and safety reasons. I wondered if we could do it as a Zero Waste or Low Waste road trip beause depending up whom you read on the Web or watch on TV (hello Planet Green!), doing something the Green Way is always:

· More expensive
· More time consuming
· More difficult
· but better for the environment

Long story short – we did it! And guess what?

Make a Denim Beaded Cuff Bracelet From a Coffee Cup Sleeve

Here's another idea on what to do with those leftovers when you make a pair of shorts from a pair of pants. Grab a cardboard coffee cup sleeve, some thread, and some beads and create a bejeweled cuff bracelet!

Beads by Lilli uses denim for her bracelet but I think any fun scrap fabric will work for this project. In fact, you could wrap some tin foil around two of those coffee cup sleeves and make yourself a set of Wonder Woman bracelets for Halloween!

Is it too early to think about this year's Halloween costumes?

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How to Plan For/Survive an Extended Electrical Blackout

I’ve experienced quite a few short term and long term weather related power outages and blackouts. The worst one was in 2004, when an ice storm took down power lines and left most of my city in darkness for a week. Christmas week. With a big plan for the worst and hope for the best, I give you five things to consider and plan for when the power lines go down and electricity is out for an unknown extended period.

1. Consider Shelter

Staying at Home
· If it’s a summer blackout, it may be too hot to stay inside your house. The easiest thing to do may be to just grab an extra chair or blanket and step outside. Chances are your neighbors are doing the same. This may be a great time to get to know your neighbors a little better and do an impromptu block party, or play a game of Frisbee, baseball, or cards.

· Even if you use natural gas to heat your home, you may not have heat during a winter electrical outage. Some natural gas furnaces use an electrical fan to blow the heat through the ductwork to heat your home. Therefore, even if the heater may still be working, without electricity you’re not going to have the little fan that. And without a working fan, you may have a cold house. (I found out about this one the hard way.)

Ike Sends Hurricane Force Winds to Central Ohio

Sunday night I just went through my first hurricane and didn’t even know it.

Because I live in Central Ohio.

Yes, Ohio.

In Ohio, we have a saying, “if you don’t like the weather wait a few minutes and it will change.” It should be the state motto because it sums up how often and how wacky weather events in our area can change from good to Bad and from Bad to Worse, and Worse to “Head for the basement! It’s a tornado!” We didn’t get such a warning last Sunday about the windstorm and its Category 1 Hurricane winds (very strange for us because we’re Tornado Country not Hurricane Country) that Hurricane Ike decided to share with the rest of the country after he battered the Gulf Coast. Thanks Ike, but that’s one gift that’s just not as fun to share, as say, a box of chocolates.

Why didn’t I know until much, much later that Hurricane Ike was going to send Ohio 75 MPH winds instead of the usual really freaking bad rain, wind, and thunderstorms that eventually make their way to Ohio after a hurricane hits the southern US? This, in a city where a weather forecast of frost covering the ground in winter will send most of our local weather people into predicting Armageddon? Where the local weather forecasters literally freak out and give out weather warnings, watches, and advisories like it was candy at Halloween when we get a piddly three inches of snow? So why didn’t I find out about the possibility of this high windstorm and what not to do (stand outside with the neighbors and talk about how bad the wind is blowing) until I was in the middle of it?

EcoSmart Organic Insecticide Review

I have a little agreement with nature. As long as ants, spiders, bugs, and the like stay outside of my home, they get to live. Once they come inside The Condo, I will squash them like a bug. End of story.

For the first four years of Condo living this arrangement worked out very well. Until now. Some sugar ants decided to test my theory and infiltrated my kitchen via the threshold of a sliding glass door. Oh, I could squash all I wanted but more came. I tried caulking up the crack under the baseboard where those itty-bitty ants entered The Condo. That worked for about a day until the ants ate through the caulk laughing at me all the way- ha ha HA!

So why didn't I just pull out the bug spray, you say? One small problem. His name is Blitzkrieg. My dog likes to pull sentry duty right in front of that sliding glass door. Any bug spray that I use to kill the ants on the floor by the door will probably get on or in him, since he likes to lick his paws. And while I want to kill bugs I don't want hurt my dog.

Therefore, when EcoSMART Organic Insecticide contacted me about sponsoring a contest on my blog I jumped at the chance to try a free sample. I tried the EcoSMART Ant and Roach killer. It is made from organic plant oils (rosemary oil, cinnamon oil, wintergreen oil, mineral oil, and canola oil) and is supposed to kill bugs naturally. It is safe to use around children and pets.

But does it work?

My New Blogging Gig!

Capessa Blogger
Sustainable Style I write
my new blogging gig

Today is Friday and no one is singing the blues in this Condo Today. For three very wonderful reasons:

Happy Reason 1: Next week, I'm running my very first contest here on Condo Blues. It's sponsored by a great company (no relation whatsoever to the entities I will touch on in Happy Reason Number 3) and I hope that everyone comes back to me September 12-19 to get in on this great giveaway. I hope that this contest is the first of many yet to come.


Happy Reason 2: It's raining! My parched plants are very grateful for today's rain although I hate that it's at the expense of my family, friends, and readers that are in the path of Hurricane Ike. I'm especially concerned for Forced Green whose hurricane survival plans include either lashing herself to a big tree in her yard or moving to the moon because she's so sick and tired of hurricanes and hurricane season. I only hope that if she chooses the tree option that the hurricane (or possible resulting tornado) doesn't blow her and the tree to the Land of Oz. If it does, then I hope she brings us all back sweets from The Lollipop Guild or a pair of swanky new shoes. I hear Oz is a great place for shoe shopping. Just ask Dorothy Gale.

How to Make Old Doc Martin Boots into a Hip Flower Pot

Husband and I spent at weekend at the Dublin Irish Festival. We saw the sights, we ate some pretty good haggis (yes, it’s a Scottish food, but we Celts in America sometimes have to have Scottish stuff at our Irish events because we don’t have access to 100% Irish entertainment or food vendors all the time like they do in say, Ireland), listened to great bands such as The Tartan Terrors (friends of ours from our Renaissance Festival days), Gaelic Storm (you might recognize them as the steerage band in that tiny film about a boat that sank), and spent quite a bit of time at the Celtic rock stage listening to The Prodigals, and yes, Bad Haggis.

After that I got the itch to make something creative and yes, a little bit rock and roll. Even, dare I say, a little punk rock? I decided to dig out my very first pair of Doctor Martian boots and make a flower planter out of them.

First I made a self watering planter from a plastic water bottle Husband got after running a road race and a bit of leftover t-shirt material.

Strappy Leather Drawer Pulls

Sometimes it's the little details that can turn a potentially blah set of drawers into a wow set of drawers. I think these leather drawer pulls from Spinneybeck do just that.

They come in a wide range of Bauhaus-inspired colors (kudos to you if you recognize that I'm taking about the Bauhaus design movement and not the punk rock band) and are designed by Emanuela Fattini.

Yes, these drawer pulls are on the pricey side. I suppose that's what you get for good design and the company earning a Greenguard certifification (meaning that the company is certified that it uses environmentally friendly manufacturing and shipping processes.) However, if you're handy, I'm sure you could come up with an inspired-by design or two made out of strips of leather or rubber (if you don't like the look or use of leather) and some screws.

This type of drawer or cabinet pull would be a great finishing touch to either an industrial or country style kitchen. What do you think?

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Environmentally Friendly Low VOC Wood Glue, Who Knew?

Good things come to those who blog, or in my case, those who are lucky enough to win a contest because I won a nifty tool bag and two bottles of environmentally friendly wood glue called EcoGlue Premium Wood Adhesive from The Handyguy’s Podcast. Thank you Brian and Paul, you're the best!

Now I have to admit that not until I got the bottles of low VOC EcoGlue in my hot little hands did I ever think about the ecological or environmental ramifications of glue. It never crossed my mind. So I wanted to know what made EcoGlue so special. Well, it turns out that most wood glues contain Volatile Organic Compounds, which are also know as VOCs. In the case of wood glue, it’s generally formaldehyde.

Um, OK. That made me ask myself, “What actually is a VOC? What does it do? How much exposure to it is bad? And why the heck should I care?”

Put Away the White Shoes, It’s Labor Day!

Labor Day is here
should I keep wearing white shoes?
Serial Mom says no

Ah, Labor Day. Time to say good-bye to summer (my favorite season), hi to fall, and a big HELLO GORGEOUS to the Labor Day sales at the home improvement stores!

I also say a little sad good bye to kicky summer sandals, even the white ones. Now, I was taught that you shouldn’t wear white shoes after Labor Day. Apparently, arbiters of What Not to Wear fashion Staci and Clinton disagree. They say you can wear white shoes after Labor Day.

Fashion, like home decorating and design ebbs and flows. Things change. Over time what’s in goes out, what’s out is in, up is down, black is white. I get it. Therefore, I’d be willing to give the white shoes after Labor Day thing a chance if it weren’t for one thing. The movie Serial Mom.

The woman scares me to bits. Come on. You have to remember how John Water’s seemly sweet and perfect homemaker Beverly Sutphin (played by the amazing Kathleen Turner) was really a raging sociopath who humorously and violently offed her neighbors for such heinous offenses as not recycling. She bludgeoned a woman with a leg of lamb for not rewinding a rented videotape (hey, the movie was made in 1994 way before Netflix.) And then Beverly gets even with a juror who commits the sin of continually wearing white shoes after Labor Day during her trial.

Remember?!!

How to Hem Pants Into Shorts

A recent closet clean out revealed that I had three, count them three pairs of khaki pants. What I am going to do with three pairs of khaki pants? After looking through some photos from last summer, I had a What Not to Wear moment that gave me the answer to the pant overpopulation problem.

I needed some new summer shorts. Bermuda shorts in fact. So, I made a pair of shorts out of a spare pair of khaki pants. I cut the legs of the pants to my knee and hemmed the pants into some much more fashionable summer shorts. (The demo plays twice in the following video.)

Growing Miniature Sunflowers

I tried to grow miniature sunflowers on my back patio from seed this summer. For the longest time my flowers looked like this:

I wondered if they ever would bloom into sunflowers. Maybe they weren’t sunflowers after all. Maybe they were really some sort of mad man eating plant?

Growing Upside Down Tomatoes: Watering Schedule

I thought it was time for an upside down tomato plant update.



I’m happy to say that I have five green tomatoes growing on my plant and several flowers that I hope will turn into tomatoes. Keep your fingers crossed.

“What a minute”, you say, “You planted two tomato plants in your topsy turvey upside down tomato planter, not one. What happened to the other plant?”

Easy. I overwatered the planter and lost one of two tomato plants to root rot. Oops.

Upside Town Tomato Watering Schedule Old and New

4 Natural Ways to Kill Japanese Beetles

Last summer, after losing several bushes in my front yard to grubs I tried to plant a grub resistant garden. This summer, I thought that I had the grub problem licked. I was wrong. I still had grubs in my soil. The grubs grew up to become adult Japanese beetles. The Japanese beetles started to munch on my new plants.

I may have lost that battle but I am determined to win The War on Grubs and Japanese Beetles. In addition, for the sake of my dog Blitzkrieg and his habit of walking through my garden bed, I’m going to kill those grubs and Japanese beetles using natural and organic methods even if it kills me (which it just might.)

According to Gardens Alive

insect problems are always worse in non-organic gardens, where the balance of nature is out of whack. Chemical fertilizers cause lush, weak growth that brings in pests by the droves. And, as many listeners wrote when telling us about their beetle woes, toxic chemical pesticides like Sevin don’t work well to control
these (and other) pests, but are excellent at killing and driving off beneficial
insects, birds and other predators that DO—not to mention limiting your happy
and healthy lifespan on the planet

Four Methods for Killing Japanese Beetles in the Garden

Allergy Free Apple and Banana Dog Treats

It was a fine day for agility class when tragedy struck The Condo.

We ran out of dog treats!

OK, honestly, if you’re a human, this is not a tragedy. However, if you’re a food motivated Pekingese that really looks forward to earning good treats during dog training sessions it is paws for concern. (Pause, paws. Punny heh, heh. I kill me.)

Buying dog treats for Blitzkrieg can be difficult. It’s not that Blitzkrieg is a fussy eater. Oh no. My dog will eat anything put in front of him, even if its human food that is poisonous to dogs. I’m sure that this is a carryover from the Bad Old Days when Blitzkrieg lived on the streets as a stray*.

Food allergies make it difficult to buy treats for Blitzkrieg. Wheat and corn make my dog itch and chew bald spots in his fur. As long as I keep Blitzkrieg from eating anything containing corn and wheat, he’s itch free and happy. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to find dog food and treats that are corn and wheat free because most of the grocery store “junk food” brands as well as many of the healthier premium pet store brands use corn and wheat as fillers in their treats. This makes shopping difficult but not impossible. However, when you’re out of treats and you have a training session that day, running a crossed town to buy one bag of dog treats is a bit of a pain. But it’s not much of a pain if you decide to bake a batch of homemade allergy free apple and banana dog treats!

Allergy Free Apple and Banana Dog Treat Recipe

A City Girl's Guide to the Kitschy Ohio State Fair

Once upon a time, because that’s how stories start, Husband spent a summer singing in The Ohio State Fair Youth Choir. He lived in a dorm on the fairgrounds and sang with the choir everyday for the public’s enjoyment. Many years later Husband meets Lisa. They fall in love. They get married. Husband finds out that Lisa has never in her fabulous life been to the State Fair.

Husband drags my city girl butt against her will takes me on a date and allows me to experience the sights, sounds, and kitsch of the Ohio State Fair.

The Ohio State Fair had everything I blog about and more:

*Crazy kitschy crap to buy
*Crazy kitschy crap to see and experience
*Kitschy insane food guaranteed to melt your eyebrows
*Environmentally sensitive exhibits and waste disposal

• We went on the last day of the fair so most of the animals were already home frolicing at their respective farms (this is what I want to believe, so don’t tell me any differently.) That means that this City Girl didn’t smell a lot of stinky animal poo in the hot sun and I was happy about that (even though there weren’t many animals there to pet except for the petting zoo.) However, the kitsch was a sight to behold!

Zero Waste Road Trip - Can It Be Done?

Its funny how receiving one little blog comment or email can create a huge new idea. I was all hopped up on caffeine and chocolate (the two great tastes that taste great together and fuel the Condo Blues creative writing machine) all set to draft my Haiku Friday post when I got a nice comment on from Almost Mrs. Average about my wine glass chandelier. I checked out her blogs The Rubbish Diet where she's trying to make her household zero waste and Bin 101 (a wonderful play on Room 101 from George Orwell's book 1984.) She describes Bin 101 as

Things that are too good to be condemned to landfill, but not good enough for
recycling... or silly things, annoying little things, frustrating big things
that shouldn't be thrust on us in the first place.

What was in Bin 101 at the time I peeked at it? Condiment packets. I have a few of these in my refrigerator. Not a lot because Husband and I try to be health conscious, cut out hydrogenated oils, transfats, and high fructose corn syrup from our diets - there's a lot of that in fast food. But I will not lie; sometimes I must heed the Syrian call of Taco Bell. I don't' know (and honestly, I don't' think I want to know from a health standpoint) what it is about their Fire Sauce or taco seasoning that sends my tummy into a happy tizzy but it just does. Therefore, I have a few condiment packets in my fridge. Maybe you do too. I keep them around because they're convenient when we take food with us on road trips. 

It's confession time gentle readers, I'm planning a road trip. Me, Husband, and the Blitzkrieg (but don't worry, I've thought of you and scheduled lots of wonderful, wacky, and helpful posts to appear on Condo Blues, while I'm officially MIA from my computer) are hitting the road. Since we've got the Blitzkrieg with us and Husband's training for a half marathon relay, it's easier to do picnics with healthy food at a rest stops than leave the pooch in a hot car and duck out for fast food on the road. (And suffer the very real possibility of having bad things happen to the dog in an empty car in the hot sun - a definite pet safety no no!) As such, I was going to take those soon to be trash condiment packets with me on the road. Then I stopped and thought, "What if I followed Mrs. Almost Average and Green Me's example and tried to do a Zero Waste Road trip?"

Twenty Percent Home Energy Reduction Challenge – Summer Update

I conducted a DIY Energy Audit using the using the Energy Star Home Energy Yardstick to determine my home’s Energy Performance. My home energy performance grade was Below Average with a score of 3.7 out of 10. The Yardstick suggested I cut my electricity and natural gas consumption by 20%. I decided to do it.

I gave myself the additional goal to make the reductions as sustainable and inexpensively as I could, meaning that things like changing habits, light bulbs, and sealing air leaks with caulk and insulation were in. Replacing everything I own with the newest most expensive Energy Star equivalent or installing an array of solar panels on The Condo were out.

“It can’t be done!” many people cried, “You need to replace those three-year-old appliances with Energy Star equivalents! You need to install solar, wind, geothermal to get low green energy bills!” (Personally, I’d love to install such alternative technologies but it’s not going to do much good until I reduce our energy consumption first.)

So how am I doing? Pretty darn good. The Condo’s electrical use is down for January through July of this year, in some cases I cut our electrical use by 50%.

How to Dry Fresh Lavender the Lazy Way

I have fresh lavender growing in my yard. Every summer, I cut and dry it by wrapping ribbon or strings around a bunch of lavender stalks and hang it upside down in a closet to dry and to protect my clothes from months for the coming year. Lavender is a natural month deterrent.

7 Budget Friendly Kitchen Cleaners

Vinegar, vinegar, vinegar. Clean your house with vinegar. The folks over at The Dollar Stretcher have been giving this advice out this nugget of advice for years as a cheap alternative to buying an array of expensive house cleaners. Honestly, I wasn’t convinced that vinegar cleaned and disinfected my house as well as any number of commercial cleaners that I could buy at a closeout or dollar store.

Then the environmentally friendly folks started touting the benefits of using vinegar. Again, I was skeptical (yes, I’m a skeptic. However, gentle readers you do benefit from my skepticism because I actually test stuff out before blinding blogging good thoughts about anything. If I like it, I tell you why I like it. If I don’t’ like it I’ll tell you why it didn’t work for me.) Because, again, there are a whole host of environmentally friendly (but not so cheap) commercial cleaners I could use to clean my house.

Then Blitzkrieg entered my life and that all changed. My vet told me that many commercial floor cleaners contain chemicals that are toxic to pets! In the United States, unlike food and health and beauty products, manufacturers aren’t required to list the ingredients on the labels of household cleaners. That makes it very difficult while standing in the store to determine whether a cleaner (environmentally friendly or no) is going harm my dog if he licks it off of his paws. As a last resort I tried cleaning my kitchen floor with vinegar and a squirt of dish soap in my automatic floor cleaner. It worked.

“Hello, my name is Lisa and I’m a reformed cleaning with baking soda and vinegar skeptic.”

“Hi, Lisa!” you say.

As part of Retro Housewife goes green What under your sink challenge I give you the Condo Blues Kitchen Cleaning Arsenal.




OK. I admit that the fire extinguisher isn’t a cleaner. However, it doesn’t hurt to be prepared in the case of an emergency, does it? If you don’t have a fire extinguisher in your kitchen, I suggest you buy one. Or put it on your Christmas list. You never know when you might need it. Hopefully never!

Natural Kitchen Cleaners and How I Use Them


Dish washing 

1. Powdered phosphate free store brand dish washing detergent mixed with a box of baking soda (in the milk jug.) Mixing baking soda into powdered dish washing detergent gives it an extra oomph when cleaning the dishes in your dishwasher. It’s also an excellent way to reuse that expired box of baking soda you put in the freezer/refrigerator as a deodorizer.

2. Vinegar in the Jet Dry container of the dishwasher. Vinegar works to keep spots off the glasses just like Jet Dry, Cascade, or a store brand-sheeting agent. Actually, I think vinegar has better sheeting action and keeps water spots from forming on my glasses. Who knew?

3.Store brand phosphate free dish detergent. For those rare times I hand wash dishes. I also use a mixture of dish detergent, vinegar, and water as a floor cleaner.

Counter Cleaners

1. Store brand cleaning wipes. Husband is The Man Who Makes My Dinner. Husband doesn’t like the smell of most spray surface cleaners because most of them are heavily perfumed. And honestly, I don't want The Condo to smell like a fake flower factory after I clean it. We compromise and clean the counters with wipes. This isn't the most environmentally friendly cleaner because we can't compost the spent wipes.

2. Cellulose sponges. We use sponges to clean up quick spills instead of paper towels. To extend the life and reduce the grungy funk factor of the sponges, I run them through dishwasher. There are some sponges are made with recycled materials, however these aren’t those. I'd love to try the cellulose sponges made with recycled materials but I can't find them locally so I use what I have. When it’s time to replace the sponges, I use the dead sponges to make self-watering potting soil by cutting them up and burying them in the dirt of my potted plants.

3. Baking soda with a spot of vinegar. To clean baked on crud off of my stove I sprinkle vinegar on the crud and add a spot of vinegar. The mixture bubbles up, loosens the baked on gunk, and allows me to easily wipe up the mess better than any commercial cleaner I’ve tried.

Floor Cleaners

1.A solution of half vinegar, half water, and healthy squirt of dish washing soap for a little extra cleaning oomph. I use this in my automatic floor cleaner. I also used it in the Swiffer that preceded the automatic floor cleaner with excellent results.

There you have it. The Condo Blues kitchen cleaners. Some of these cleaners are considered green, some are not. Some are homemade cleaners, and some are not. Nevertheless, all of these cleaners are budget-friendly and will easily help you keep your house FlyLady clean.

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Four Ways to Repair a Beeping Smoke Alarm

It is night. All of The Condo residents are nestled all snug in their beds, except for Blitzkrieg, the one-eyed wonder dog who is snoring like a buzz saw in my ear because he is sleeping under my side of the bed. Out of the darkness it comes.

“Eeeep!”

“Eeeep!”

"Bow-rowr- -rowr- -rowr- -rowr- -rowr- -rowr!”

Eeeep!

Groggily Husband and I investigate the noise. There is no smoke. There is no fire. However, one of the hardwired smoke detectors is beeping and it will.not. stop.

  Pin this post to your Pinterest boards for later! Share it with your friends!

The first time this happened, I called 911 just as I learned to do in case of an emergency in Safety Town. The firefighters came. Fortunately, they confirmed that The Condo was not on fire. Nor did we have an electrical fire in the walls. The firefighters said that I’d know if an internal electrical fire was the culprit in the The Case of the Beeping Smoke Detector because the walls of The Condo would be hot to the touch (good to know.) That was a relief! They said that my smoke detector is chirping intermittently because either it needs a new battery or it needs repair.

Four Ways to Fix a Falsely Beeping Hard Wired Smoke Detector or Fire Alarm

Election 2008 is Going to the Dogs, Part 2

This isn't a political blog and I usually don't blog about politics. It's not that I don't have political opinions oh, trust me, I do. Political discussions and debates are typical dinner table fodder here at The Condo because all of its residents are free to express their own personal political opinions. Sometimes we agree and sometimes we don’t.

“Hang on, wait a minute. All of the residents of The Condo are free to express their political opinions?! “ you ask incredulously, “Including Blitzkrieg?”

Yes, gentle reader, including my dog Blitzkrieg. Take a look closely at timestamp 1:50 in the election 2008 Jib Jab video I posted yesterday and you will see that Blitzkrieg is exercising his right to vote – just as every good Pekingese American should.

40 Flower, Plants, and Trees That Attract Japanese Beetles

The natural predictors that keep Japanese Beetles from ruining plants in their native Japan do not exist here in the United States. That’s what makes Japanese Beetles so difficult to control and kill. 

One of the best and most organic and natural ways to keep Japanese Beetles from eating and killing the plants in your yard is to simply remove the plants that attract Japanese beetles from your home and landscaping. If you have a Japanese beetle problem in your garden, you might want to thing twice about keeping or planting the following flowers, shrubs, vines, plants, and trees in your yard.

Eighteen Flowers, Shrubs, and Vines That Attract Japanese Beetles

How to Make a Wine Glass Chandelier

I’m on the hunt for a pendent fixture for my dining room. There are so many designs (and subsequent price tags) to choose from to get the Mid-century-Bauhaus -Contemporary-Found-And-Funkified-Retro- DaDa-Danish style (bonus points to you if you know that DaDa is a design movement and not just what babies call their fathers) that I’m going for in The Condo. I found a fun overhead pendant light in the Chandelini. I love that it’s a ball of martini glasses – a fun addition to any room in the house.

However as much as I love the Chandelini right now I’m not sure if this is a piece that I’d love forever. At $6000.00, I know that Husband would insist that I love it forever.

Fabulous Flamingo Front Porch

During the first summer in our Condo, I wanted to sit on our front porch and watch the world go by. (That is, until the temperature hit 90+ degrees, then I’d watch the world go by looking out of the window from the comfort of my air-conditioned Condo.) For that, I needed chairs. I didn’t know what I wanted other than:

1. Something pretty
2. Sturdy enough not blow off the porch during high winds
3. I wanted them now

At the time, I was working on painting and decorating our bedroom. I didn’t have time to search for The Perfect Set of Porch Chairs. As a cheap and easy stopgap, I repainted Husband’s ugly bachelor dining room chairs (once upon a time these heavy monsters may have lived in a doctor’s waiting room) green to coordinate with the green shutters on the house. I also did a little staple gun upholstery to upgrade the fabric on the seat and chair back. The revamped chairs looked better. I didn’t hate them with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns anymore.

Hippies, Festivals, and Dogs, Oh My!

The last weekend I went to Comfest, a huge three-day local music, art, and food blowout. A lot of people refer to Comfest as a big hippie festival because for three days Goodale Park looks a little like Height Ashbury in the 60’s with lots of people hanging out and listening to the bands, getting carpel tunnel from signing political petitions, and smelling patchouli in the air. At least I hope that was patchouli I smelled…

Oh and there’s tie-dye. Lots of people wear tie dye. And dogs. People like to bring dogs to Comfest. Sometimes the dogs wear tie dye too.
Not my dog. Blitzkrieg wisely opted to stay home and wear the air conditioner during warm Comfest weekend.

Turn a Picture Frame Into Raised Dog Feeder

I wanted a raised feeder for Blitzkrieg’s food and water bowls in my kitchen because my boy is a sloppy eater. As long as I filled it with food and water on a regular basis, I knew Blitzkrieg wouldn’t care what his new feeder looked like.

However, since I have to look at it, I wanted something that looked good. Most of the feeders I found were functional, but ugly.

That being the case, I decided to make one myself.

How to Make a Raised Dog Feeder

Materials
Measuring tape or yardstick
Shadow box picture frame large enough to hold your pet’s food and water bowls
A thin piece of wood that fits into the backside of the picture frame (optional)
Paint
Four napkin rings
Hot glue (because what is a craft without a little hot glue action?)

1. Measure your dog from the paw to the shoulder. If a dog uses a raised feeder that's either too high or too low it could hurt their back after long-term use. After measuring your dog from paw to the shoulder, divide the measurement by two. This is how high you should make your dog's raised feeder. For example, my Peke Blitzkrieg is 8 inches from his paws to the top of his shoulder. That means Blitzkrieg's feeder should be 4 inches tall.


2. Paint the wooden interior of the shadow box picture frame or, if your frame has a cardboard backing, paint the thin piece of wood that fits instead your picture frame.


3. Watch the paint dry. Crafting is so exciting!


4. Insert and secure the painted backing or piece of wood into the picture frame after the paint dries.


5. Hot glue a napkin ring each corner of the bottom of the picture frame for the legs. Fortunately, my napkin rings were 4 inches high, the perfect size for a Pekingese.


6. Turn the feeder right side up, fill your pet’s bowls with food and water, and put the bowls in the feeder.


7. Puppy chow time!

3 DIY Coffee Drink Recipes

Coffee isn’t just good for your plants; it’s now a health food drink!

To celebrate that my java habit is no longer a vice (thank you researchers! I’m adding you to my Christmas card list!), I give you three coffee drink recipes that will help you achieve your heart-healthy RDA of coffee goodness.

Nintendo Decorate My Walls!

Oh blik how I love you! Your big fun graphic wall decals go right in line my with my retro-modern-Bauhaus-contemporary-found and funkified-Da Da-Danish decorating style. (Bonus points to you if you recognize that I’m referring to the Bauhaus design movement and not Jello Biafra’s band.) The only problem with blik is trying to pick one design to use. Personally, I’m leaning towards the Keith Haring dogs for our guest room.

If I had a hard core gamer in da house, I’d go with the old school Nintendo series.

Space Invaders!

Husband’s Homemade Orangina Recipe

We’re not big soda drinkers. It’s not that we dislike cola (especially with a shot of rum) or soda in general; we just don’t buy it much.





 However, on those rare occasions when I’m in the mood for a soda, I prefer to quench my thirst with a frosty Irn Bru which you can't get easily in America since it is a Scottish orange soda.

After running 9 miles a day, Husband likes to quench his deep down body thirst with an Orangina.

This can get pricey at the quantities Husband’s been sucking it down on a weekly basis. So he came up with a recipe for a not-so-pricey homemade Orangina equivalent.

Six Strange Things You Can and Cannot Compost

We have a new kooky little game we play here now that we know that the covert  composter works. We call it Will It Compost?

Six Weird Things That Will Compost

1. Dog fur tumbleweeds from Blitzkrieg’s hairbrush.

2. Dryer lint.


3. Dirt from the Roomba.


4. A 100% white cotton sock.


5. Corn-based plastic coffee lid from a paper take out cup of coffee. Husband and I threw it into the compost bin just to see if it would compost - it did!

6. Wine Corks. Obviously, I'm talking about composting wine corks made from real cork instead of the fake corks that are made from plastic.

Six Weird Things I Will Not Compost

Easy Tote Bag Revamp or, My Stab at Punch Needle Embroidery (Literally)

I like the mindless Zen of doing needlepoint. However, I’m not a counted cross-stitch kind of gal. Stitching, counting, and stitching never appealed to me. If you’re out and about in the craft world, most of the
not overly trite or Granny nicer needlepoint kits available are counted cross-stitch. When I came across this fun little punch needle embroidery kit, I thought it would make a nice gift for someone who is hard to by for. I hadn’t done punch needle embroidery but it looked easy to pick up (it was), so I thought I’d give it a stab.

I did. Several times, in fact.

Inherited Bathroom Décor That Works

One of the nice things about being the first buyer of our newly built Condo is that I didn’t inherit any wild and wacky or otherwise tacky decoration from the previous owner. ThatNanda of Craftster wasn’t so lucky. She writes:

When we bought our house, it had all the original decor from the late 50's -
awful shag carpeting, chandeliers, orange and brown appliances, the works. We
were able to fix all but one room - the horrible, pink, and black tile bathroom.
Since it's too expensive to redo at the moment, we decided that, rather than
fight it, we'd just go with it. So we painted the upper walls teal, a la retro
50's diner, and I made a pink, frou-frou poodle curtain.

I think going retro with her bathroom decoration is an excellent example of the Tim Gunn, “Make it work!” edict in action.

Personally, I’d be sorely tempted to keep the retro design as it since I’m going through a retro-modern-Bauhaus-contemporary-found and funkified-Da Da-Danish decorating phase of my own. What do you think?

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