Waste more time in 2012 (and 52 other little goals)
By mom4life | Category: Creating a Home, Organize Me!, The Journey of Motherhood | Posted Tuesday, January 10, 2012
On New Year’s Eve we sat around the table and pulled some questions out of a hat taking turns reminiscing 2011.
I had to answer “what was your biggest time waster in 2011?” and although this may sound surprising, I was stumped. For better or worse, I have been “blessed” with a highly productive and organized personality which struggles to waste time (I know, pathetic right? I can practically hear you gagging. Please tell me I am not alone with this strange trait!). My husband was quick to provide some examples to illustrate this point. If I am waiting for my emails to download, I will throw in a load of laundry. If I am going upstairs, I will bring up the clean laundry along. If I am folding the laundry, I will be listening to a book on CD or talking on the phone. Leaving the house before wiping off the kitchen countertop or making my bed would be a huge mental hurdle and I almost never go to bed at night before first cleaning my sink. The poor man has been subject blessed to my mental efficiency and over the last 11 years of marriage, has adapted surprisingly well. The closest thing I can typically get to doing “nothing” is reading a book or watching a movie, but I can hardly ever justify wasting taking the time to watch TV. After some good hearted laughs at my expense, it was decided that one of my goals for 2012 should be to enjoy more downtime, or said a different way: waste some time!
52 ways to simplify life
I plan to consider this goal of wasting time as the year progresses, but before I get to that goal I am having too much fun reading my newest ebook from Tsh Oxenreider titled One Bite at a Time: 52 Projects for Making Life Simpler.
In Tsh’s own words:
Merry Christmas!
By mom4life | Category: Activities with Kids, Creating a Home, Family Focus, Home Crafts, Kids Crafts, The Journey of Motherhood | Posted Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Our two oldest kids are home from school and we have been really loving the lazy days that provides us. Thanks to Pinterest, I have been inspired with some fun new ideas, crafts and traditions. I will share some of my favorites below and encourage you to see all of the ideas I saved here.
In order to spend the most time with my family, I will be taking a blogging break for the remainder of the year (my assistant may write up a post or two if we decide to have any product sales). Until I write again in 2012, Merry Christmas!
Psssst: if you missed it earlier this year, you can see the digital Christmas card that I created here. Then I linked that card to our family slideshow video (also shown below).
Activities and Crafts:
-Recycling socks with holes into the most adorable sock snowmen you have ever seen! I now have a special place to put all our socks with holes for making more snowmen 
.
-Gathering up past photo Christmas cards, hole punching them and connecting them with two book rings. Each night the goal is to pray for one family using these cards as prompts. This is a great way to continue to enjoy photo cards from year to year!
-Making peanut snowmen tree ornaments.
-Making snow globes out of baby food jars, glitter and small plastic toys.
-Making a new Christmas Card holder using a wooden embroidery hoop, wood glue and clothes pins.
-Curling Ashlyn’s hair using strips of cloth.
-Teaching Hunter how to play Monopoly (and finding out he LOVES it)!
New traditions:
-Using the free Jesse Tree advent devotional from A Holy Experience.
-I wrapped up 24 Christmas and/or winter themed books and from December 1-24 the kids took turns opening one to be read.
Purchases:
-A $12 oil pan at WalMart to make a great magnetic surface for fridge letters as well as a drawing surface for dry erase markers.
Baked goods:
-These oreo truffle balls were unfortunately VERY GOOD .
-I am wanting to make these healthy peppermint patties!
If you have not read it year’s past I will leave you with one final Christmas reflection. Wishing you peace, joy and hope this Christmas!
((hugs))
Do Together Craft: Easy Wreath Ornaments
By kristinabjornbak | Category: Activities with Kids, Home Crafts, Kids Crafts | Posted Monday, November 28, 2011
Christmas is rapidly approaching. Usually, this is the time of year that I bust out the paper crafts with my kids, but this year I thought we could make some ornaments. Enter these adorable, easy, and super cheap wreaths. This is truly a do-together craft, as some steps the kids can do, and some steps the adults or older kids have to do, such as the hot glueing. Even better, these little wreaths are fully customizable. If you have four kids doing this craft, you will have four completely different wreaths. Even better, if you are a sewer or crafter, I can nearly guarantee you have the materials needed around your house. Can you say, “Scrap busting time!” If you aren’t a crafter don’t worry! The materials for this craft are very inexpensive.
Easy, adorable, eatable, fall acorns
By mom4life | Category: Creating a Home, Kids Crafts | Posted Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Today I want to introduce you to a very dear friend of mine. She is one of those people that just overflows with fun creative ideas and has a great eye for design. We were visiting last week and I asked if she would be willing to write a guest post so that she could share a fun fall edible craft with you and she said yes! Welcome my sweet Selina! ~Heather
Hello Mom4Life readers!
I am very excited to be guest posting for Heather. Heather and I have been friends for 4 years. I actually met her through ordering a product from her website and when I saw there was tax added on my item I looked up the location of her “store” and it was just down the street! It’s a small world after all. 
Anyway, I’m Selina from Creative Juices Décor.
What you will find on my blog is lots of inspiration for all your Creative Juices! I am an interior designer by degree and LOVE home design/decorating, thrift store shopping, healthy recipes and crafting. I have 3 young kids so I also have fun crafts for them too.
Today’s craft is EASY and so much fun. (really, my kids made these, I just took the pictures!)
What you’ll need is:
* Hershey Kisses
* Mini Vanilla Wafers
* pretzel stick,butterscotch chip, or caramel bits.
* brown icing
Simply use a dab of brown icing to attach the vanilla wafer and then another dab to attach the stem which can be the pretzel piece, butterscotch chip or caramel bit!
Let them sit for 20 minutes so that the frosting can harden.
Tada! Look whatcha got. A bunch of adorable eatable fall acorns
I am going to make a little fall gift basket for the kids teachers with a candle, a small decorative pumpkin and a baggie of these treats. It would be a very fun fall snack to hand out to classmates too.
Come stop by, I have a fun pottery barn knockoff and a old map turned art piece you guys might like.
How to make your own chemical free dryer sheet alternative
By mom4life | Category: Creating a Home, Moneywi$e, Recipes & Kitchen Tips, The Journey of Motherhood | Posted Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Finding natural alternatives to chemical household products is something I enjoy so when I recently came across a recipe for homemade dryer spray to replace dryer sheets I was curious to give it a try. As I often find with homemade recipes, the ingredient list was short and it was quick and easy to put together. This frequently leads me to start out skeptical that it will even work (after all, we seem to be programed to believe we need a LONG list of unknown ingredients if we are really going to have a product that works). Once again my skepticism melted away to astonished surprise when this simple spray repeatedly proved its ability to tackle the static clean in my dryer. Want to try it yourself?
1 Cup Water (distilled or filtered is best)
1/2 Cup alcohol (isopropyl or vodka)
20 drops of your favorite essential oil combo (such as lemon and grapefruit or peppermint and eucalyptus or orange and geranium)
Add all ingredients together in a spray bottle and spritz 4-5 times over your wet clothing in the dryer and dry as usual. This mix can also be used as a linen spray or room freshener.
My mother-in-law has also been using this simple spray and loves it. Give it a try for yourself!
Another option that I have not yet tried is to simply use a clean cloth and place a few drops of essential oil on the cloth and toss in the dryer. In between loads, refresh it with a few new drops of oil. After every few loads launder it in the washing machine.
Someday I may also attempt to make my own laundry detergent but for now I am content to let Kim’s Rockin’ Green concoction work its magic on our cloth diapers and clothing. If you haven’t yet had a chance to watch the Rockin’ Green Laundry Soap review video I made with Kim, you should. In it you will see how Kim’s soap compares to some of the top competing brands of cloth diaper detergent and how effective it is at renewing the absorbency in your cloth diaper inserts.
How about you? I would love to hear if you have found something to replace your dryer sheets or if you even have any desire to do so.
