Love Thy Neighbor

Easier said then done. Am I right?

I believe now more than ever people need to know that they are thought about, cared for and loved. I’m sure we can all agree that 2020 has kinda stunk. People are feeling isolated and alone and that’s not good for anyone’s mental health.

And neighbor doesn’t necessarily mean the house next door. It can mean anyone that is put on your heart to reach out to. Even that grumpy person that never smiles when you wave to them. Especially that person. *smile*

I just thought I’d share a few easy ways to reach out to people without being a freak.

But first a quick backstory. I started walking my street just over a year ago as a means to get more exercise in. Long story short, I have gotten to know a lot of my neighbors this way. So in light of how 2020 is going I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to show God’s love to these people. To show them that not everyone is bad. Which is what you start to think if you listen to the media too long.

So here’s what I’m doing. I am crocheting little pumpkin treat bowls and making handmade cards and handing them out to a few of my neighbors that I’ve gotten to know over the course of this year.

Here’s a few that I have ready to go. I’ve already handed out one and I’m making a couple more.

Now if you don’t know now to crochet, that’s okay. Here are a few simple ideas that don’t involve being crafty at all.

• A card and a just a cute bag of candy tied with pretty ribbon.
• Pumpkin spice coffee and a mug
• Special Autumn flavored tea and a mug.
• A card with a $5.00 gift card to a nearby coffee place.
• Or you could simply give them a nice card or even just a treat bag of candy. One or the other. 

The idea is to not overthink it and to not make it too expensive that you can’t afford to. Simple is best and I believe that even the simplest gesture will not go unappreciated. AND here’s the bonus part, it keeps YOUR mind off all the garbage that’s going on in the world and helps you focus on others, which in turn makes you feel a lot better!

So what do you say? Are you going to reach out to someone around you? Even if it’s ONE person. That one person matters.

If you do something please come back and share. If you’ve already done something please share and kudos to you! Also if you have ideas to add please do so in the comments so others can see. :-)

HUGS!

Kim

 

My Daily Physical Activities!

Let me go ahead and give you a little personal information. I’m 6 feet and weigh 165lbs. I can’t compare myself to anyone because I am unique and so are you so don’t you either. I used to get jealous of those little 5 ft 2in 100 lb gals that made push ups look easy. I’ll be honest with you. I can’t do one push up. Does it mean I’m weak? No. I’m 6 foot and 165lbs and apparently not obsessed with being able to do a push up. LOL!

I’m also a stay at home mom to my 2 teenage boys and grandmother to my daughter’s 3 beautiful babies. My life can have a tendency to be sedentary if I’m not careful..

Here’s what a typical daily activity log looks for me. Minus Sundays. I’m pretty much a slug on Sunday. (Except going to church. Work that spiritual muscle too. Ha!)

I’ll do a short 7 minute total body workout around 10am. No equipment needed. I discovered this gal  Lucy Wyndham-Read on Youtube and have really felt positive results doing her routines. If you can get past her sometimes not so on point editing, it’s wonderful. You can totally go at your own speed. She has something for everyone but I enjoy the quick 7 minute ones. Here is one of my favorites.

Then around 4pm I’ll do a short walking video. I like the walking workouts by Leslie Sansone. She has a ton of free videos on her channel as well. Sometimes I pick a mile, sometimes 2. Depending on the day and how I’m feeling.

And then, weather permitting, I’ll go outside around 7pm, because that’s the only time you can go out in Florida and not die, and do about a mile walk in the hood.

I personally am all for breaking up my workouts throughout the day. One reason is because I don’t have an hour all at once in the morning and two, I believe working out is a lot like eating. You don’t eat just once and expect your body to keep going so I believe that doing short spurts throughout the day will keep your metabolism up and running so you have more energy and burn calories all day. But ultimately, do what’s best for you and your schedule.

Tomorrow I’ll post about some things I like to do for fun that burns calories in the process.

Tell me what you do to rev up your metabolism.

HUGS!

Kim

Check out my earlier post about The Being the Best Version of You Challenge!

My Favorite FREE Indoor Workouts!

I don’t know about you but it’s cold!!! Even for Florida it’s cold and there is no way I’m going outside to workout. No way Jose.

So today I thought I’d share what I personally do on a regular basis to stay fit and healthy INSIDE the comfort of my home. Aside from my diet and stuff. Cause I don’t know about you but I like to switch things up and get new ideas.

New for me last year was starting yoga. It was suggested to me by my chiropractor, but as a former gym snob, I thought yoga was for people who didn’t know how to work out. Ha! BOY oh boy was I wrong. Yoga is quite the challenge. But not knowing where to start I looked on youtube for some inspiration.

I came across Lesley Fightmaster and took her 30 day beginner class. She does a great job of telling you how to do things the proper way so that you don’t get hurt and I’ve stuck with her ever since. She has a nice pleasant voice (which is important to me since I’m going to be listening to her for 20- 30 mins). I love doing this in the morning so I’m all flexible and warmed up.

Normally in the afternoon my sons and I go for a walk outside, but I ain’t doin’ it. It’s cold remember? I missed my walks though. Again, I went to youtube and found Leslie Sansone’s Walk at Home workout. Apparently if you’re name is Leslie, I’ll find you on youtube. Ha! Ha! Anyhoo, I love it. It helps get my steps in without any extra equipment and you don’t need a ton of room. Plus she is so inspiring and fun to listen to. It’s been great!

And for an extra arm workout I do wall push ups. I’m 6 foot tall and even in my fittest of years I could never do a push up or a pull up. So I do wall push ups and I can still feel the burn. Always look for an alternative to a workout, don’t just give up and say you can’t do it. Just do it differently. Make it personal to fit your fitness needs.

So there there you have it. Nothing fancy but it’s working for me right now.

What are you doing to stay fit in this cold weather? Share you ideas. I’d love to hear them!

HUGS!

Kim

Homemade Vanilla

Today I’m going to show you just how easy it is to make your own vanilla. Like sooo easy.

The hardest part is convincing yourself that walking into a liquor store is okay and that you aren’t going to go to hell because of it and that the chances of running into someone from church is probably not going to happen.  The second hardest thing was convincing the cashier that I was buying it to make vanilla. When I finally did get the nerve to walk into the liquor store I seriously announced my intent as soon as I walked in. “Hello, I need some vodka. I’m making vanilla.” But seriously, he so didn’t believe me and kept telling me all these mixed drinks I could make out of it. “I’m making vanilla people. VANILLA!”

But enough of my story. I got me some vodka and ordered some vanilla beans and made me some vanilla. Well I should say, making vanilla because it has to steep for a few months.

Here’s just how easy it is.

When you go to buy the vodka. Don’t get the cheap stuff, get a midrange vodka. I also like it in the glass bottle since it’s going to be steeping for a few months.

Also buy some good quality vanilla beans. This was a pack of about 30.

The next thing you do is empty a little over a 1/3 of a cup of vodka out of the bottle for displacement caused by the beans. Do what you want with it.

Next you’ll want to slice your vanilla beans in half so as to expose those luscious beans. I started just about an inch from the curly part at the top and sliced through the rest. Keep the top part attached.

Then you just plop your vanilla beans in the vodka. Give it a good shake and let it steep in a cool dark place for at least 4 months but up to 6 is best. If you think about it, giving it a good shake weekly would be great but if you forget it will turn out fine.

Now let’s do some math. First I’ll tell you how to figure out how many vanilla beans per cup of vodka you need.

1 liter = 4.23 cups

You need 4 beans per cup.

This bottle was 1.75 liters which is = to 7.25 cups.

That means I needed between 28 and 29 beans.

Now let’s do the cost.

To buy from the store, I bought a 2 oz. size bottle of Publix brand vanilla at $6.59.

If you multiply that by how many oz. are in this bottle of vodka it would cost you approximately $185.00 to buy this much vanilla.

Now I spent about $15.00 on the vodka and about $45.00 on the vanilla beans. So my cost to make this is $60.00. That’s like half the cost of buying it in the store.

And let me note that as I was researching vanilla beans today I have seen that the price has almost doubled since I bought mine which would make the beans about $80.00 and your cost about $95.00 total. Still a lot cheaper than buying it at the store. Plus they make great gifts. I buy those little 4 oz. brown bottles and fill them when it’s done. If I love ya and I mean really love ya, you might get a bottle from me.

So there you have it. You gonna give it a try? Have you already tried it? Let me know.

HUGS!

Kim

Line Drying Pt. 2

Okay so it’s been 6 years since my first post about line drying but better late than never right?

If you missed my first post about line drying it basically gave you a run down on how much money we saved. You can find that HERE!

But today I’m going to tell you other reasons why it’s good to line dry, besides saving money.

1. It’s therapeutic. Consider it free therapy. Being outside and soaking in some sunshine and breathing in fresh air is just good for the soul. It is I tell ya!

2. It motivates me to buy cuter underwear. (You never know what the neighbors might see. Give them something fun to look at!) Plus, cuter underwear may improve marital bliss. That is if you’re married. If you’re not it will still put a spring in your step just knowing that you got some super cute underwear on. Go on, try it. I dare ya!

3. If you have children you are setting the example of how to be frugal; a different way of doing things. Plus when my 11 year old was younger he loved to hand me the clothes as I put them on the line. Get them started young in helping with chores and they’ll be more prepared for life when they go out on their own. Which can never happen because they’re my babies.

4. It’s a good workout. Especially if you’re trying to hang them out on a super windy day and you start laughing so hard your abs hurt. Here’s a video my husband recording of one such line drying experience.

Here’s Pt. 1, when I’m actually getting them hung up. This is older video because our house isn’t that smurf blue any more.

And here’s Pt. 2 after they’ve been hung awhile and I go to check on them. You’re welcome!

Now I know a lot of you just can’t line dry because of one reason or another and that’s okay. I hope you enjoyed this post any way.

Have a lovely day my friends!

Kim

Hosting Thanksgiving- What I’ve Learned

Since the year my hubby and I got married I’ve hosted Thanksgiving. Mom had informed me that she had put in her years and was handing it off to me. I being full of myself thought, “How hard can it be?” Then on Thanksgiving morning my mom got a phone call at 6 am of her crying daughter because she couldn’t get the turkey to cooperate.

A lot of years have passed by and I pretty much have it down. Each Thanksgiving looks a little different. Sometimes we have a bunch of people and sometimes we don’t. This year we do and I’m very excited about it. We will have about 18 people here.

Through the years I’ve learned to delegate when I can and not try to do things all by myself. It makes it a more enjoyable time for me. I’ve also learned that you can change things around. Just because my mom always had Thanksgiving at 1 doesn’t mean I had to. I changed that about 5 or so years ago and never looked back. By eating later, I could enjoy the day more. I wasn’t rushed and had plenty of time to complete my tasks. I only regret not doing it sooner.

Another thing you can do is prep. Do as much as you can ahead of time. Pies can be made ahead, potatoes can be peeled and covered in cold water ahead of time. Cut up your celery and onions and whatever else you can. Doing this helps so much.

I’ve also learned to keep my table settings simple AND that it’s okay to use paper plates. Gasp! I know right?! But at the end of the day, no one cares. Paper still looks pretty on the table and as long as you get the nice sturdy ones, you won’t have a problem.

I mean after all it is all about the food right?! Go on, admit it. Yes it’s nice to get together with friends and family but if you’re honest with yourself you know you start drooling over that favorite pie of yours as soon as Fall arrives.

And if you’re blessed enough to have a cousin with a sense of humor that can also carve a turkey you might end up with this little creation.

The best thing you can do for your sanity is to plan ahead. I start planning my Thanksgiving by mid October. It really is a life saver to have all your recipes ready, your grocery list made, side dishes delegated and your extra things like place cards made. Speaking of place cards, I’ll be blogging about this years easy peasy place cards soon. That way if you feel so inclined you can whip them up for yourself.

And let me share with you one of my favorite FREE Thanksgiving planners that I love to use. Sylvia is such a blessing to offer this great planner for free. Make sure you thank her.  

Well that’s it for now. I hope you found a little encouragement for hosting your next Thanksgiving dinner.

Tell me? Do you usually host, go to someone else's home or eat out?

Have a lovely day!

Kim

The Post Where I Talk About Going to the Bathroom.

So when I thought about writing this post I was like, “Seriously? You’re going to write a post about the one topic that most people try to avoid? I mean it ranks right up there with religion and politics.”  Then I said. “Why not? These people need to know this?” To which I replied. “Let someone else tell them!”  To which I ignored and started writing this pot.

Yes, my friends this post is about going to the bathroom and I don’t mean walking into the bathroom and brushing your teeth. I mean “going” to the bathroom. More specifically, #2. There I said it. Sheesh.

Now if you’re like “most” people when you go in to do your business it probably doesn’t smell all that great. In fact it’s down right unbearable sometimes. But I’m here to help. I discovered something and I knew I had to share my findings with my peeps no matter how embarrassing the topic.

I had heard about some stuff that was actually invented for this purpose. You spray it in the toilet before you do your business and it will absorb the odor of….well……your bm, but the price was a little steep for this gal. So while shopping at BJ’s the other day I stumbled across these all natural air fresheners for around $10-15.00 for 4 of them. And upon further investigation I realized they are 100% natural oils. This was about the time the light bulb came on.

I grabbed one of the cans, more specifically the orange scented one and made my way to the bathroom. I sprayed it into the toilet BEFORE I did my business and I didn’t smell a darn thing. Nadda. Nothing. Zippo. It was about as awesome as it could have been under the circumstances.

I’m pretty sure this will revolutionize the world. Seriously. Like world peace and everything.

You’re welcome.

And for those of you who don’t live near a BJ’s, they do have them on Amazon here. (affiliate link) But they are a bit more expensive. However I’m sure they will last a long time as they are 7oz. 

Plug It In! Quick Tip

You see how one prong is shaped different than the other? Well your outlet is made so the plug can only go in one way. You know for safety reasons and stuff.

But if you’re like me you successfully put a plug in an outlet about 50% of the time. I don’t take the time to look to intently at the plug first and too many times I try to put it in upside down. Well no more my friends, no more.

I wanted a quick way to identify the top of the plug so I decided to place a dot of fingernail polish on the plug. So now all I have to do is see the dot and I know it’s upright and will go right in the outlet.

 This is great for appliances that you plug and unplug a lot. (vacuum cleaners, toasters, blenders, mixers etc.) Do this one time and it will save you a lot of aggravation. Unless you don’t get aggravated at misplugging your plugs, but I know I can’t be the only one. Can I? Tell me I’m not. *smile*

Have a lovely day my friends.

OXOX,

Kim

How to Grow a Pineapple

So you’ve got the top of a pineapple, now what? Well the answer to that question is easy. You plant it.

Any time you purchase a pineapple or in our case grown one, make sure you cut the crown off about an inch down from the top so you can grow your own out of it. It really is simple.

(If you live in colder climates you may stop reading now because pineapples like/love the warmer weather.) For the rest of us, this is what you do.

First of all let your crown sit in water for a couple of weeks. You want it kind of rotten. I know it sounds gross but just let it sit there. If you’re like me you have no problem ignoring plants in your home and watching them die a slow and painful death. Embrace this and just let that pineapple sit there.

 

After a couple of weeks it should look something like the picture below. Yummy huh?

Now simply dig a hole a couple inches deep and then bury it just over that rotten part. Pineapples LOVE dry, sandy soil but we’ve had success in richer dirt as long as there is proper drainage.

Place your rotten and in my case moldy crown in the ground and just bury the yucky part. Leave the rest sticking out.

Voila! You’re done. Easy Peasy right?

It’s not hard. They take little to no maintenance and if you’re lucky, in a year or so you’ll get the best pineapple of your life. I say if you’re lucky because you know who else likes fresh pineapples? Raccoons, squirrels, armadillos etc. So sometimes you have to fight for what’s yours and that could mean putting wire around it when it starts to ripen. It worked for us and we reaped the benefits of one of the best tasting pineapples on the planet.

I’d like to thank my supper fabulous husband for planting this and taking photos for me. Yeah, he’s good like that.

Have a lovely day my friends.
OXOX,

Kim

How to Fold a T-shirt Like Mom

 You know when I first thought about writing this post I was like “No one needs to know how to fold a shirt.” But then the more I thought about it, even the simplest of tasks can be improved upon.

I watched my mom fold my dads t-shirts like this my whole growing up life. There is even a perk to folding this way. If you happen to leave clothes in the dryer a little longer than anticipated and you have wrinkled shirts, (Not that that has EVER happened to me.) this folding method will actually help eliminate some of those wrinkles. Bonus!

So here is my simple tutorial on how I fold my hubby’s shirts like my most excellent mother.

Step 1: Grab your shirt. (You have to start somewhere.)

 

Step 2: Fold the shirt in half and line up the shoulders. Lay the shirt with the neck end toward you.

 

Step 3: Fold the sleeves in toward the shirt.

 

Step 4: Fold the shirt in half away from you.

 

Step 5: Flip the shirt over and fold in half again.

 

I then flip it over so that the print of the shirt (if there is one) is showing so it makes it easy for my hubby to determine what shirt is what.

 

See how neat and tidy that is?

My hubby has A LOT of t-shirts and I’m able to store them more neatly when folded this way.

Well what do you think? You gonna give it a shot?

Have a lovely day my friends.

OXOX,

Kim

Top 10 Ways I Save Money!

I believe that in being the keeper of our homes, saving money is one way we can bless our husbands. And with my hubbalicious’s job coming to an impending end I thought I’d review some of the ways I like to save a little moolah.

It’s easy to forget these things when all is well and you are living in the land of plenty but when times get a little tougher they’re what keeps us afloat. (That and trusting in the Lord of course.)

Here they are in no particular order.

1. I line dry our clothes. (Weather permitting) I’ve said it quite a few times how much money this has saved us.
2. Planning and making meals at home. Eating out with the whole family is expensive so we usually save it for special occasions.
3. Working out at home. Gyms can be expensive in membership, time and gas.
4. I use Vitacost to buy most of my dry goods, shampoos, soaps etc. I save tons of money. I explain it more in this post.
5. When we have to run the air I keep it turned up to between 80-81. Any lower and it will run forever to try to keep up with this Florida heat.
6. We grow a lot of our own veggies. Even if you don’t have a big yard, you can do a small plot and plant a few of your favorites or you can put them in pots. Tomatoes do great in pots as do peppers.
7. Staying home. I’m a homebody and actually enjoy being home all day. Yup, even with the kids. If I’m not in the stores I can’t spend money or waste gas.
8. Make a list. If you do need to go to the store of some necessity, make and take a list and stick to it.
9. Budget. We have used the Envelope Method since the beginning of our marriage and it helped get us through a job loss 6 years ago. I HIGHLY recommend system.
10. And last but not least, buy second hand if you can. That goes for clothes, furniture, books etc. Some of my favorite places are Craigslist, Amazon (free kindle books) thrift stores etc.

What do you do to save money?

Feel free to .

OXOX,

 

Easy Shredded Chicken!

Some of you may or may not have already seen this little time saver, so this is for the have nots.
If you’re like me, in the past you shredded your chicken using to forks and and pulling it apart slowly and dreadfully. Well hold onto your hats girls because shredded chicken just got easy. That is if you have a stand mixer.
First of all you want to cook your chicken thoroughly. Then while it’s still hot, cut it in half and put it in your stand mixer. Probably no more than 4 pieces (8 halves) at a time. You don’t want your chicken flying out of your bowl. Trust me on this one. Start out on slow and work your way up to medium high speed.
Watch the video to see just how quick and easy this is. It took all of 34 seconds.

Have you seen or tried this tip before?
Have a lovely day.
OXOX,
Kim

Spring Cleaning Made Easy!

I’m really hoping that the title is true. (Of course easy to me would mean someone else actually doing the work for me.)

I don’t look forward to Spring Cleaning (I’m not sure who does) but I know it’s a necessary evil.  With that said I’ve decided to join in with Home Your Way and their Spring Cleaning Made Easy series. It starts today. Please join me so I know I’m not alone. *smile*

Have a lovely day!

OXOX,

Kim

Facebook Spam and How to Handle It

If you’re a blogger chances are you have a Facebook page too. I’m not talking about personal pages but ones that you can “like” if you so choose.

Well over the past couple of weeks my page has been hit with spam. Someone “suspicious” will “like” my page and then shortly after I’ll have a link on my page from them. I know there are others suffering from this as well so I thought I’d let you know how I personally am handling it.

After doing a little detective work on my page I realized there is a setting that you can limit your outreach to certain countries and since most of the spam was coming from Eastern Countries I thought I’d give it a shot.

Here’s what you do.

Go to your page and in the upper right hand corner you have “Edit Page”. Click that. This will bring up a drop down menu.

Click “Manage Permissions”.

That will bring you to this page.

Do you see where it says Country Restrictions? You can either ban certain countries (which would take forever) or you can set it to where only certain countries are allowed.

I chose to set it to where only certain countries are allowed. I know by doing this I may be cutting off a few (very few) people from over yonder but most of my readership is from North America and Australia and from what I can see so far that is not where the spam is coming from.

So as you can see below you just type in the countries you want to add and then hit save at the bottom of the page.

Now let’s control the spammers themselves. I like to keep track of my new “likers” because I can usually tell if they are spammers or not. And wouldn’t you know it, this morning I woke up and this guy had liked my page. I can tell he was a spammer because of his page. So what do you do with the people you don’t want perusing your page? Keep reading, it’s simple.

Just click on “See All” where your new likes are. If you do this regularly like I do the person in question will be close to the top of the page.

Click the X by their name.

And then check the box that says Ban Permanently and save. That’s it. I do this to any questionable persons.

I think it’s sad that I have to limit my page like that but for the sake of those that read my page I want it to be a safe place to visit.

I hope this helps those of you struggling with the same problem and feel free to Pin it to Pinterest if you think it will help others.

Have a lovely day.

Kim