It’s starting to get cold out.  I find it surprising since last winter was extremely mild, but I am embracing the season change this year!  It’ll mean a lot to our gardens as well as my mental stability!  It’s just not winter without snow, you know?  Ah, spoken as a true displaced Minnesotan.

With that cold weather, I’m sure you’re starting to notice that the heat is slowly starting to be used in your home.  It is in ours, but to a minimum.  We tend to leave our thermostat at around 65 degrees during the winter.  It’s a comfortable temperature and means your furnace will be running less frequently.  There are several other ways to keep your house warmer this winter that I’ve thought of, so here they are.

Seal Up Your Home
-I’ve noticed in our house that there are a lot of places where cold air leaks in (well, really it’s the heat escaping) that are easy fixes. Some examples where I’ve found unwanted cool breezes are around outside doorways, doors to the basement and attic, and holes or cracks in the foundation. That last one probably isn’t entirely common, but we have a 70 year old house that just got it’s foundation supported, thus cracks and holes. The doorway example is very real. Our solution was putting up a weather sealing around the doorway. It has helped significantly. With the attic, of you have a hatch at the top of the stairs like we do, close it for the winter. That will keep the cold air from the attic falling to your warm living spaces. Finally, if you can seal around the basement door in any way it can keep drafts from coming in (it doesn’t make complete sense to me since hot air rises and cool air sinks, but I definitely felt a draft from our basement door). As for the cracks or holes anywhere in your home, fill them up! It’ll keep the cold and pests out of your house.

Insulate
-Another idea is to re-insulate your house. We found when we built our kitchen some of the walls still had the old balsam wool insulation. Unfortunately with the balsam wool, it had been corroded and wasn’t any use at all. We speculate our bedroom has the same problem. Having insulation with higher R-value in colder climates will seal the heat in your home more efficiently. Find out more about this for your area here.

Window Treatments
-You can of course find window sealing kits at the stores. You stick up the plastic around your window then shrink the plastic to create a tight barrier. Another option is to get some energy efficient window treatments. You could also make them. These energy efficient curtains are simply thick lined curtains that keeps the cold that is transferring through your pane from coming in. Plus, it adds a to the look of your living environment.

Fireplace
-If you’re lucky enough to have a wood or corn burning fireplace you can save a lot on gas or electricity. Growing up we had a decent size wood burning fireplace in the basement that we would have going. The heat would rise through the floor and warm the living space above as well as the basement. In our home now, we have a small fireplace that we plan to use this winter. We also hope to rig up a blower system that my dad gave me so that the heat can be moved around the room more efficiently. If you don’t have a wood burning fireplace and live in a place where wood is easily accessible, you may want to invest in the future.

Layer Up
-You can always simply layer your clothes and blankets when in your home. You’ll stay warm but not have to use excess heating to stay warm. We do this most of the time. If the room is too cold at night, we simply throw on another blanket!

Other ideas could be changing your heating system. We are looking into geothermal some day and then would hook up the electrical for the blower to solar panels. It’s an investment, but would get you off the energy grid and make yourself more self-sufficient. For now, that’s all I have for you. A simple, yet effective list.

What other ideas do you have to save money on heating costs?

I am having a huge exploratory stage in my life right now. I’ve quit subbing as a teacher for at least the year. From where I see it, I have 5 official years to find a job in my field and after that I’m pretty SOL and would probably just need to settle for a sub licence. We’ll see, I have time and for now I’m finding out new things I like to do and am good at!

Enough digressing.

You probably know what this post is all about: Etsy. For those of you who don’t know what etsy is, I’ll tell you. Etsy is an online site where you can sell or purchase handmade items, materials/patterns, and vintage items. It’s actually really awesome and you can search around by going to the Etsy site.

Here’s how I got to actually selling on Etsy. I have been dabbling with knitting for a little over two years now. I would practice the basics, get frustrated, and quit for months on end. This past summer I decided I would knit a gift for a friend who was going to have her first child. I had never done a whole project before, but found some patterns and gave it a go. I found out I was really quite good at the craft and thought, “Hey, I could come up with some of my own patterns and sell them.” Please don’t ask me how I do it, because I am quite bewildered at my abilities as well!

Anyway, one thing ran to another and I decided the easiest way to send out feelers in the market, without putting down too much money like in a craft show, would be to try an online site. I had heard of and looked at Etsy a few times in the past. I knew you could sell there, so that’s when I started looking into it (which wasn’t very long since I already had my mind set on it). Right now I offer knit items, sewn items, and other crafts.  So far, I’ve had no sales, but lots of positive feedback from viewers. Maybe you’ll be my first sale! Here are a few of my favorite items.

You can find my Etsy site at Miss Niss Craftworks

Below I am outlining some basic information about Etsy for seller and buyers alike as well as highlighting some of the interesting aspects of the website!

Signing Up
-Creating an account for Etsy is pretty simple. All the basics are there: Name, email, address, billing info, username, password, ect. Things you need to give in order to at the very least buy something from the site. With this you are simply a buyer. You also have an option to open a shop. This process involves you adding items to your shop, setting up payment method, your billing, and then finally opening. I wish I had some pictures to detail this process, but didn’t think of writing this article until much later.

Profile
-Your profile can be as simple as your gender and the day you joined. You can also write a short biography about yourself. Your profile page will list that information along with your favorite items, shops, circles, and treasuries.

Payment Options
-There are several options Etsy provides as payment. However, the shop owner will be the one to set which methods he or she accepts. The most common and easiest methods are Credit Card and Paypal. The credit card is basically the same as Paypal for the buyer. As a seller the credit card payment goes directly to your bank account while the Paypal goes to your Paypal account which you then have to transfer to your bank account. In both cases a transaction fee and percentage of your fee are taken from your sale. Note: these two fees are only pertinent to the seller.
Other methods of payment include personal check and money order.

Search
-Etsy actually has a couple search options. One is a search bar for specific items like this:

The other is a browsing option where you can click on a category found in this box:

Which will then take you to a page like the one below which will continue to narrow down your search and look through items available.

Etsy has featured items on it’s main page and in searches. Below is an example of what it would look like for what they call ‘hand picked items’ as well as offers of similar items based on what you previously looked at.

In the searches, those items are items in which a seller has paid for advertisement through Etsy. Depending on how much you budget per week for promoting in search ads on Etsy depends on the number of impressions you will get on your shop and items. I haven’t set this up, but below shows the steps in creating your shop’s promotion.

Activity
-Activity is traced on Etsy specific to your account and people in your circle can be found with the swirly icon (or first icon next to the Etsy) on the bar at the top of the screen. The number of updates or new items is shown in a little blue circle that shows up on the upper left of the icon. The activity updates much like facebook does. Whenever you favorite something or create a new treasury the activity button will notify you. Similarly, whenever someone in your circle updates or when someone favorites your shop or item it will appear as well.

Messaging
-You can contact shop owners or your friends on Etsy through the messaging button located on the bar at the top of the screen. It’s shown as the envelope icon. Etsy will let you know if there is a message by creating a blue circle pop up with the number of messages you have in the circle. From there it’s like a mini email. You messages are shown, who they’re from, and a blurb of what’s in the message.

Circles
-I think the circles thing is a bit silly, but it’s mostly just who are your ‘friends.’ However, I’m not really sure that you have to wait for your friend request to be accepted. You simply can choose people to be in your circle — shop owners you like or other users.

Favorites
-Etsy also allows you to ‘favorite’ items that you like. These items will be saved in the favorites area of your account. This is fun, because you get to share what you like with others as well as possibly keep an item in your peripheral in case you choose to buy it at a later date.

The favorites button is found on the top toggle bar and on the left hand site of a shop owner’s screen

The favorites button is shown as the HEART.

Or you can find favorites here by simply clicking on the ‘favorites’ word

Like I mentioned before, all your favorites will be congregated in one place. Here’s an example of mine.

You can see there is a tab for Items, Shops, and Treasury list. The items and shops are self explanatory. The ‘items’ tab shows your favorite items and the ‘shops’ tab shows your favorite shops.

The Treasury
-The treasury on Etsy is a unique aspect of the website. It is a place where a member of the site can be a curator, much like Pinterest. However, you don’t have to be invited, you just need an account to Etsy. In the treasury you can find lists that other people have made or make your own. Each list is made of 16 items of the same genre. It’s actually asked that you only use a shop owner once in your treasury so that the treasury is not about just that shop owner but the actual items. Here’s an example of one of my treasuries.

Policies
-As a shop owner it is important for me to outline some basic policies for my shop. You can find a shop’s policies on the side bar at the near the bottom of the list. There should be ‘policies’ in blue that is clickable. Not all shop owners do, but it’s sort of a fail safe. If the seller deliberately tries to scam you or whatever may be the case you as the shop owner can always point out that you have policies. It actually protects you and the buyer. Here is a snippet of the policies I have for my shop.

Listing an Item
-Listing an item is actually super easy and clearly spelled out for you as a seller. Here is the information you need to give to list an item: Who made it, is it a finished item, when was it made, what category can the item be put in, picture, title for the item, a description of the item, price, quantity, and shipping. Additional options include variations (if you offer different colors, sizes, styles, ect.), shop section (you can create sections in your shop making it easier to for buyer to browse through category), recipient, occasion, style, and tags/materials (for search). To me, it is nice that the seller gets to decide price that will correspond to material cost and shipping that corresponds with the shipping method you use.

Shop Stats
-Shop stats are for the seller. It compiles data about the views of your shop, when, and where viewers came from. I find it’s a nice way to see what activity attracts buyers to your shop and also what they are looking at. Here is an example of a day’s stats in my shop (very quiet that day).

Social Media
-Along with the social network found on Etsy, facebook and twitter are also connected with the site. You can log those accounts into Etsy and share updates as a seller or buyer. You can automatically post on facebook or twitter new items that are in the shop. As a buyer you can share items and shops you like as well. It’s a nice aspect as a seller, I feel, since it allows you to connect to potential buyers that have not yet heard of Etsy or found you via Etsy.

You can find my shop’s facebook page at Miss Niss Craftworks Don’t forget to ‘Like’ the page, too!

Well, I think that’s probably about as much basic information about the Etsy website as I’m willing to disclose right now. Ha! Actually, it’s plenty to sink in. Enjoy the site and visit my shop as well! Send me a message on Etsy or Cents to Share. Remember, I am a new user as well, if you have any additional information or fixes to misconceptions I have please, please, please leave a comment below!

That’s right, jelly without fruit. No, it’s not sugar gel … well, not completely. This is for you flower lovers! I recently made a batch of rose jelly and peony jelly. Sounds a little odd, but it is SO good. I have wanted to make rose jelly for a long time. Actually, ever since my mom bought some while we were in France for a school trip. I thought it was neat and so exotic. Of course I had to make it some day.

While researching a little about how to make the jelly, I got distracted by lists of edible flowers and other flower jellies. Here‘s a nice website where you can learn more. That’s where I discovered you can also use peonies as well. Luckily, my rose bushes and peony bushes all were abundant in flowers. I also grow my bushes organically (no harmful pesticides) which made the flowers acceptable to use. *It is very important that you use flowers that are not sprayed with pesticides or anything else that may be harmful to you for this recipe*

I bet you’re all interested in how I did it, right? Here you go! –Be sure to have sterilized jars ready before you begin and use the most fragrant flowers you have –

Rose Jelly — adapted from Martha Stuart’s Rose Petal Jelly

Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups Water
4 cups Rose Petals
2 1/2 cups Sugar
1/4 cup Fresh Squeezed Lemon Juice (or from the bottle)
3 oz liquid pectin (one package)

Directions:

1. Prepare your rose petals. They should be pulled of the bud with thick white ends removed (the part of the petal that attached to the bud).

2. Rinse petals with cold water to remove any insects, dirt/dust, and pollen that may be stuck to the petal. Set aside in a large heat resistant bowl.
*Pollen is an allergen and is important not to have pollen or pollen producing parts of the flower in your recipe*

3. Bring the 3 1/2 cups of water to a boil. Pour over rose petals and let steep for 30 minutes or longer if you desire.

4. Strain out petals from liquid using a colander or cheesecloth. You do not need to squeeze petals of extra liquid, it should measure 2 cups once strained (well, if not go ahead and give the petals a little squeeze!)

5. Add rose water, sugar, and lemon juice to the pan you boiled the water in. Bring this mixture to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly.

6. Boil for 2 minutes, then add liquid pectin.

7. Boil for 2 additional minutes, or longer for a firmer jelly.

8. Remove from heat and pour into sterilized jars.

9. Seal as you normally would — using paraffin wax or water bath canner.

Peony Jelly — adapted from Imperfect Urban Farm

Ingredients:
4 cups lightly packed peony petals
5 cups boiling water
Juice of 1 lemon
1 package of pectin (powder — not instant)
3 cups sugar

1. Rinse petals with cold water to remove any insects, dirt/dust, and pollen that may be stuck to the petal. Set aside in a large heat resistant bowl.

2. Bring 5 cups of water to a boil.

3. Pour over prepared petals, cover, and let steep for 6 hours.

4. Strain out petals from the liquid using a colander or cheese cloth. You will probably have a clearer jelly with the cheesecloth or towel.

5. Pour 3 1/2 cups of peony water into saucepan used for boiling the water. Add lemon juice to liquid.

6. Bring mixture to a boil. Whisk in pectin, bring to a boil again.

7. Whisk in 3 cups of sugar and bring to a hard boil. Boil for one full minute.

8. Pour into sterilized jars and seal as you normally would.

There you have it, the whole process for both recipes. I realize I don’t have pictures for every step, I kind of forgot to continue taking pictures after the process started. It was only me at home with no extra help, and I was a bit too excited!

I promise the jelly tastes wonderful, albeit not everyone will like it at first. Jonathan didn’t. However, I think it taste like a bouquet of deliciousness. It will definitely be something to get you through winter!

I’ve been doing a lot of planting and transplanting lately, but one thing that always gets me is the labeling. There are of course a lot of different ways you can label your garden and pots. One that I find to very fun is writing what’s in a terracotta pot is using chalk. The chalk goes on well, like a chalk board. Use white or color! The only downside to this method is if you’re setting your pots outside the writing will probably wash off in the rain.

What are your favorite planting labels?

One day I was thinking up of ways to dress up the pies I make. There are tons of cut outs, braids, pinches, and other crust ideas I was looking at. Fact is, I wasn’t in the mood for something intricate or used a cutter I didn’t have. Sometimes I get very lazy. Then it hit me! Why not paint the crust for a little show.

I had read recipes in the past about painting cookies before baking them and figured it should also work for pie crust. So, this Easter if you’re not in the mood to die eggs, go ahead and dye your pie! It’s fun, easy, and super easy for kids.

Here’s what you’ll need:
Pie crust (bought or homemade)
Food Coloring (for natural dies go here)
Pain Brushes
Water

Directions:
All you have to do is mix up the colors you want (I watered mine down, hence the water in the list) and paint on the color scheme or design you want on your crust. I would stick to the end of the pie crust since the rest you really wouldn’t see in the end. You could cut out some eggs or other shapes to put on top of the filling to paint as well. *You won’t need a lot of dye, a little goes a long way.

Have fun! What are your favorite Easter projects?

We have this tall table and chair set we received for free from Jonathan’s neighbors before we got married. It ended up being our first ‘dining room table.’ Of course, it did only seat two! Now that we’re in our house and have a real set of table and chairs along with our bar seating on our peninsula, we started using the original set as outdoor furniture. They work great, but the look was very drab.

As you can see in the picture of the chair (the table and other chair carried the same theme), the paint was worn and dull and the cushion was pretty dank. I just couldn’t handle it anymore! The set didn’t invite me outdoors to enjoy the fresh air and nature, it simply looked trashy and didn’t fit our (mostly mine) personality. So, I got online to do a bit of research on how to re-upholster the seats. I found out it was pretty easy, below will be how I did it.

Before I get onto the tutorial, I wanted to say that you can do this very inexpensively. I found my fabric at Hancock Fabrics in their bargain bin. Everything was posted as $5 a yard which is great considering some were originally priced upwards to $40 a yard. So, save money and brows the sales bins/racks! It’s great if you’re not too picky, and you can usually find for what you are looking.

Steps to Re-Upholster Seat Cushions

1. Have all your materials ready.
You will need your chair, new fabric, a scissors, a screwdriver, a pliers, and a staple gun. Yes, I’m missing a few things in the picture. :/

2. Flip the chair upside down to remove the cushion.

3. Unscrew the cushion from the base of the chair using your screw driver. There should generally be four screws that need to be taken out. *Trick: store your screws in a plastic baggy for safe keeping until the end of the project.

4. Remove chair so you only have the cushion to work with now.

5. Have cushion sitting with underside up. You should see some stables.

6. You will need to remove the staples with your pliers at this time. On my cushion I had the black fabric to take off along with the rest of the upholstery. This step probably takes the most time and can be a little tricky since the staples didn’t always want to come out for me.

7. Once all the fabric is off you should just have the cushion and base board left. *If you’d like to add more cushion at this time, go ahead. Be sure you made the decision ahead of time and measured your chair so that it could be cut the correct size for you. You can find extra cushion padding at almost any craft store.

8. Now is the time to measure out your fabric. Before you cut, be sure that there is enough fabric on each side of where you are cutting to fold over the side of the cushion and over lap onto the base board at least an inch and a half. You should have about three inches on each edge of the cushion as a general rule of thumb. *If you have patterned fabric like I did, make sure your pattern is lined up the way you want it before cutting as well!

9. Double check that everything is lined up, and you are ready to begin stapling! You will need to start by stapling one staple in the middle of each side. Make sure you pull the fabric taut each time you staple.

10. Start with one side and staple all the way across on each side of the beginning staple until just before the corner starts rounding. Pull fabric taut every time you make a new staple keeping the sides even and from bulging out between staples.

11. Do this to the rest of the sides, being sure not to do the corners yet!

12. Now you can do the corners. Gather the fabric together so that there aren’t and folds showing on the upper side of the cushion (the part that will be facing up once done).

13. Staple down the extra fabric, neatly.

14. Repeat for the remaining three corners.

15. Cut excess fabric off with your scissors.

16. For this step I stapled the black fabric on the bottom so it looked nice. You don’t have to, but it was aesthetically pleasing to me.

17. You now should be done! All you have left is to screw your cushion back onto your chair.

So, there you go! It really is simple even though I listed a lot of steps. I’ll be doing another post on how to spray paint metal furniture later to go along with this post (since it’s obvious I did that, too). If you have any questions or if I missed/forgot something, please comment!

Our House a Few Months Before We Bought It

The outside, however, is a little more difficult to change. New siding is very expensive, new shutters is costly … new anything cost quite a bit of money to be honest. So, work with what you have. If you don’t have it, look for sales or online like craigslist, just don’t pay full price! You don’t really have to. The following list are a few simple ways I spruced up the outside of our house or will be planning to.

1. Do a Little Lawn and Garden Care

-The best way to make the outside of your house to look nice is to keep it neat. Pull the weeds out of your flower beds and dead head any spent flowers. Keep your lawn mowed and clear up any leaf piles that may still be around from the fall or whenever.

2. Add some Flower Power

-Not everyone is into gardening like me … willing to go the extra mile and tend all my flowers. However, a little color doesn’t hurt anyone. Big box stores often have their garden materials on clearance racks after a few weeks due to the plants fading in their tiny pots, varieties going ‘out of season,’ or new varieties coming in. I’m sure if I spent full price for everything I bought last year I would have spent thousands, luckily I got it all for 90% or more the tag price. Some great plant it and leave it varieties include daylilies, hosta, and many varieties of bushes (with some pruning at end of season).

3. Clean Your House

-Spring cleaning doesn’t have to just be about the inside of your house. Easily was your house with a hose attachment cleaner and spray that dingy dirt of your house. If you really want to, grab a ladder, rag, and bucket and clean my hand. The removed dirt will most likely brighten up your siding (if you have it) making it look fresh. Don’t forget the outside of your windows either. Clean windows look great from the inside and out.

4. Add Some Easy Color

-Think you want a color change for your house, but don’t have the money to reside? An easy way to completely change the look of your house is to change the shutter color. Our house had some terrible green shutters that I hated. I wanted to go with a bright blue, because our house is a blue gray color. So, I picked up some inexpensive spray paint and primer and changed the color. Be sure you wipe down the shudder before you paint and follow the directions on the can.

5. Change your Light Fixtures

-The lights on your house may be rusted, chipped, or simply outdated like ours are. An easy way to fix them would to give them a fresh coat of paint. If you want to completely change the fixtures, go ahead! You can find new ones cheap, for around $20.00 a pair and some big box stores, or hold out for a sale in the future. The new fixtures will give your house a new aura about it and make you feel good about the look of your home.

Our house A Year Later

As you can see, there are still quite a few things we are working on in reference to the outside of our house. However, it looks a lot happier and brighter with the easy changes we’ve made. With the five easy ideas above, you could quickly turn the outside of your house into something of which you can be proud (like us!). What other ideas do you have to brighten up the outside of your home?

It was a rainy morning here yesterday which made me in the mood to bake. I haven’t made many cookies lately, so became my goal for the day. Along with that, I wanted to find an awesome, chewy cookie recipe (or two!). The past few times I’ve made cookies I’ve tried to make them ‘healthier’ and they didn’t really turn out too fantastic in my opinion. Jonathan ate them anyway letting me know they were great, but he eats anything.

While I was baking the cookies, that I will eventually tell you about, I started singing ‘C is for cookie, and that’s good enough for me!’ from our beloved Cookie Monster. At least that is what it was when a majority of us grew up with. Now, what is it? Carrot? Granted, I have proclaimed carrots to be my favorite food many a time. Half way not to make it seem like I was a fatty when I was young (which I reluctantly admit I was), but also because I truly do love carrots. That is beside the point. I simply don’t like the change. It’s OK if ‘C’ is for ‘cookie.’ I also understand that America has a huge addiction to sugar and fats, a mindset that needs to be rewired. Unfortunately, popular culture hasn’t done too much to help. Except, I guess with Sesame Street. :/ Either way, I’m not a fan of changing words to songs. Even if it’s been done for centuries by secular and religious musicians and composers. Well, I digressed. On to the cookies shall we?

I chose two delectable cookies including chips.

The first is a chocolate chip cookie from Confessions of a Bright-Eyed Baker. In the recipe it offers the option of adding ground coffee or cinnamon. I added vanilla butter-cream coffee to the mix, mostly because I am completely out of vanilla extract (or even the imitation!). I tell you what, they taste absolutely fantastic. They are gorgeous looking cookies that are chewy, moist, and chocolate-y. The recipe yields 18 cookies, if you make them fairly large. I scooped them as 1 inch rounds and yielded 33. If you really like these types of chocolate chip cookies try her recipe found here. Opt not to put in the coffee or cinnamon, it’s OK. They’ll still taste great without that added flavor. Probably exactly what you wanted.

The second recipe I made comes from Annie’s Eats. They’re called Chewy Chocolate White Chocolate Chunk Cookies and can be found here. I like to think of them as backwards chocolate chip cookies. Chocolate cookie, white chip. These, too, are super delicious. One thing I liked about them is that they didn’t use egg. Eggs can sometimes be a bit pricey, and if you don’t have many on hand this is a good cookie recipe to turn to. When I mixed these, I made two amendments for what I had on hand. The first is that I used almond milk instead of dairy milk, and I used white chocolate chips instead of chopped chocolate. It’s all the same, though! You could ideally make the recipe vegan by switching out the butter and chips for a substitute of your choice. The recipe states it yields 12-14 cookies. Again, I made 1 inch scoops and yielded around 30 cookies. The great thing about making them smaller is that you get enough sweet with one cookie (or two), but not all the calories of the larger.

I hope you enjoy these recipes from yesterday’s rain day. What’s you’re favorite cookie and recipe? I would love to know!

I thought I would hop on board and celebrate the day commemorating 3.14 (and so on) with some actual pie! No, I don’t have my own recipe today. Here’s what I’ll hopefully be making: Peach Cream Pie

I think I’ll make some coconut whipped cream instead of dairy whipped cream, found on Instructibles.com.

So, go ahead and celebrate this seemingly regular Wednesday with pie for Pi Day! What’s your favorite pie?

Find more about Pi Day at www.piday.org

We had this old chipped up, crumby looking coffee table we got for free a while back. It had good features, just was worn and sad looking. I decided to take it and do what I could to freshen it up. For my first project, it didn’t go too badly! However, there are things I would have changed in my planning and process. Here’s what I did:

Tools
-Sandpaper
-Rag
-Drop Cloth/Plastic
-Paint Brush/Roller
-Primer
-Paint
-Accent Paint (optional)
-Painter’s Tape (optional)

1. Clear the area you’re using, set down drop cloth/plastic, and gather everything on the list to be readily available and ready to use.

2. Sand and wipe clean piece of furniture, so that it has a smooth surface that will allow paint to stick to it. If the wood was previously varnished, that would interfere with the paint’s ability to adhere.

Ready to Be Sanded

3. Prime the furniture. This gives the paint a good base to which it can stick. Be liberal and paint even strokes without spreading the paint too thin. This is something I still need to work on. Let Dry.

Primed

4. Paint on the first coat. Again, make sure to be liberal and have even strokes, trying not to spread the paint too thin. Let this coat dry, read paint can for drying time.

5. Apply second coat and let dry, read paint can for drying time.

6. Once paint is completely dry. Tape with painter’s tape around where you wish to paint accents. In my coffee table, there were lots of crevasses where I could paint my accent color. I used the tape, because my hand is not yet steady enough with the brush to paint ‘inside the lines.’ Even with the tape, I somehow painted outside the lines a bit.

Top of table taped and ready for Accent Color

7. Pull tape off before paint dries completely. I took it off a few minutes after I painted.

8. Touch up any place that you missed or may have pulled paint up with the tape. Let dry completely.

9. Voila! You have a drab to fab piece of furniture!

Done! With our kitty Buttercup in the background

There were some things I would have changed with this project. I probably would have tried spray paint for a more even coverage, plus it would go a LOT faster. I also may have chosen a different texture, I used flat, if I were to do brush paint again. I also wish that I had used another main color, mainly because when I see silver accent I dream purple! Either way it was a great learning experience and the project still turned out great.

What paint projects do you have in store. Have you done one like mine? Tell us about it with some shared cents!

*I wanted to note, please be mindful with what furniture you paint. You don’t want to paint something that has historic value, an heirloom, or something that has much value on accident.

What a fabulous leap day it’s been. I didn’t work, and not because of the snow (because there wasn’t a position open for me today — I sub in schools). Anyway, it gave me time to do things around the house, start a project and try something new in the kitchen. This will be great for those of you who were snowed in today and were craving Chinese food, albeit a little late. Next snow day, right!?

I’ve always wanted to make homemade egg rolls, but always thought buying wrappers at the store were too expensive. I knew I could do it myself! I just needed a little can do attitude and a good recipe to follow. To my surprise, it was super easy. I used Penniless Parenting‘s recipe for the wrappers. Fabulous tutorial, so easy to follow. For my nice little filling for egg rolls I used Blisstree‘s recipe, but I used brussel sprouts and shredded carrots instead of the coleslaw mix. It’s all the same! I also baked my egg rolls (as seen in picture), because I didn’t have enough oil on had to fry them. Probably a tiny bit more healthier, too.

Your options for these wrappers are bountiful. Boil them, fry the, bake them, sear them like pot stickers, whatever! If you wish not to use the whole dough, you can freeze it for another time to use. That way, all you have to do is thaw out the dough to use it for next time.

Hope you enjoy these lovely recipes from around the web. Take a chance, save some money, and make it homemade!

*Edit:
After I wrote this, I thought it’d probably be a good idea for a price break down of the wrappers. The wrappers are what will stay consistent, your fillings will change to your will. Like I mentioned, around here wrappers are pretty expensive – a pack of 24 for around $4.00. I’m sure you could get them cheaper somewhere, but the places I have available give those prices.

Ingredients for Wrappers:
2 cups Flour
1 tsp. Salt
1 Egg
1/2 cup Cold Water (just under)

Flour
Serving per Bag (cups) = 18.25
Cost/Serving = $0.99 / 18.25 = $0.05

Total Cost of Flour = $0.05 * 2 = $0.10

Salt
Serving Size = 1 tspn
Serving/Container = 122.75

Cost for Salt = $0.99 / 122.75 = $0.008 — Price is negligible.

Egg
Serving per Carton = 12
Cost/Serving = $0.99 / 12 = $0.08

Cost of Egg = $0.08 * 1 = $0.08

Water
Free from your tap! I understand many of you have water bills, so price for water will depend on where you live. In addition, we have a well, so mother nature is our free provider.

Total Cost for Recipe = $0.10 + $0.08 = $0.18

*The recipe will yield at least 24 wrappers, although I am not entirely sure of the exact yield since this is not my own recipe. Either way, it’s still way cheaper than store bought and YOU made them!

This one’s a little late, but here you go anyway! If you’re far north, you may still be able to get in on this action.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been feeling a little cabin fever. The weather is finally starting to get cooler and stay cool, which has me yearning for open skies and warm sun. With that, I’ve been dreaming of long days and garden time. In our little family, Jonathan gets most excited over the produce side of gardening while I have a wild passion for floras. Lucky for me, now is the perfect time to start some of those flowers using a method called stratification.

Stratification is basically a false winter for seeds. You trick seeds into thinking they took a winter sleep, but really it only lasted a few months. Either way, it’s what some flower seeds need in order to germinate. To stratify seeds you’ll plant the in a container with moist soil, ventilation, and drainage. Let them be until it’s time to transplant (check your zone for your last frost date here). The freeze and thaw cycle that happens in the first few months of the year will soften the seed coat for these seeds as well which allows them to germinate.

This year I’m planting echinacea and columbine for my winter sowing. You can find a large list of other florals here.

Here’s What You Will Need:
Seed
Seed Starter Soil
Milk Jugs/Pop Bottles without caps
Scissors
Duct Tape
Permanent Marker

1. Cut container in half (not completely), so you have about three to four inches for soil.

Step 1

2. Poke drainage holes through the bottom of the container. (sorry, I forgot a photo!)

3. Layer soil in the bottom of the container.

4. Sprinkle seeds on soil and lightly pat down.

5. Water soil/seed and let drain.

Steps 3,4, and 5

6. Wipe container dry (on the outside) and seal together with tape where container was cut.

7. Label container with seed name using marker.

Steps 7 and 8

8. Set outside until spring and seed has sprouted!

My Winter Sowings on the Deck

*Be mindful not to set your containers in a place where there is full sun, because when the weather gets warm the high heat inside the containers may roast your seedlings.

Not only is bird watching a pleasant aesthetic, but it is quite relaxing. My grandparents and parents always watched birds which lead to my love of the activity. Since Jonathan and I have been married, he too has admitted his infatuation with watching those lovely, flighty creatures in our backyard.

Most days I wake up to see out my back window a busy ecosystem surrounding our bird feeders. I’ll watch them, identify who’s come to feed, and record in my mind how many of each variety has arrived for the day. Lately, we’ve had at least five mates of cardinals, a couple blue jays, a pair of hairy woodpeckers, a red-bellied woodpecker, dark-eyed juncos, nuthatches, black capped chickadees, sparrows, and starlings. Occasionally we will spot hawks of many sorts, bald eagles, and turkey buzzards. It’s quite a healthy community and I’m delighted. Once summer arrives we should have added blue birds, humming birds, oriels, robbins, swallows, and many more.

For those of you who have a good ear or at least memory, identifying birds you do not see but hear is a lovely past time as well. I have found this hobby probably my favorite in relation to birds. You will always be able to hear a bird far away, in most cases, but not see it. So, with the ability to identify by ear you may be able to widen your knowledge of birds in your community. BirdJam is a website I use to look up bird songs that are unfamiliar to me.

One benefit that people do not always consciously recognize is that having a diverse, healthy community of birds is great for insect control. This means less pests to bother you while outdoors. It also means your garden can be tended for insects without your assistance. Birds will create a special ecosystem that will help you as a gardener grow a healthy garden that adds beauty and sustenance to your life.

So, go ahead and put up a feeder, buy some feed, and wait for your guests to arrive. It may take a few days to find your food, but they will come. Find homemade feeder designs, to save money or a craft for kids, from the Audubon Society and Unplug Your Kids.

I’m sure you’ve all seen our article about our garden plans. If you haven’t you can find it here. It was a lot of fun and gave us a good idea of what we wanted to plant where this spring. All we had left was to figure out when to plant everything. You see, for some plant varieties it’s more beneficial to plant them indoors before transplanting outdoors. These seeds to be sown are varieties that have a long growing season. They include vegetables like: tomatoes, peppers, pumpkins, melons, and onions to name a few.

Knowing this we needed to come up with a method that would help us figure out when to plant by seed indoors to allow proper germination for that plant to be ready for transplant in the spring. Here are a few easy steps that detail our method.

1. Gather All Your Seeds In One Place
Seems like a logical idea, right? I thought so. Getting everything together helps you stay organized and see what it is you are working with as a whole. Make sure each of you seed varieties are accounted for and if not, go track down what is missing.

2. List What You Are Planting
Have a notebook or pad dedicated for your garden work. Again, it will keep you organized and be a nice reminder of what you’ve planted in the past. Write out the varieties you wish to plant along with the suggested indoor sowing times (i.e. 4-6 weeks before last frost date) We have a nice notepad which we have been using for our garden plans. I have started one solely for perennial florals and a simple list of annuals or bulbs/roots that need to be dug each year. I also have plans for a separate notebook for our vegetable garden and a separate one for our fruit garden.

3. Find Your Last Frost Date and Decide on Planting Time
If you already know this time table, mark it on your calendar and move on. Farmer’s Almanac has a good reference on their website. Otherwise a simple search for the time in your area works well. Mark that date on your calendar. Based on this date make a decision on when you would like to start transplanting (after hardening off of course!) Our last frost date is between April 21 and 28. So, we chose to plant the first weekend of May.

4. Plan Sowing Dates
From here on it’s a breeze. Go through your list and simply count the weeks backwards from your plant date for each variety. Example: Say tomatoes should be planted 6-8 weeks before plant date, count seven weeks back from plant date and the day you land on is your sowing date. I chose seven as a happy medium, you can go with 6 or 8 if you want, your choice! You’ll most likely end up with several varieties on the same day. I find those to be the most exciting days!

5. Sow
When the date comes, go ahead and sow! Make sure you follow the depth and moisture directions on the back of the packet. It’s helpful and informative. You will also need seed starting soil, pots, water, and lights. Soil and pots or even flats are usually on sale this time of year at big box stores, because they know people are getting ready to plant. Take advantage of those sales! You may also use compost for soil. Alternatives for pots include egg cartons, newspaper planters, milk jugs/cartons, yogurt containers, or any type of small container you may have. Simply make sure they have drainage. As for lights, any type of florescent actually works (we did it in our apartment last year), but if you buy growing lights to set up somewhere out of the way it works well. Greenhouses are beneficial, too. We don’t have one yet, so aren’t able to comment on them too much.

There you go! A simple way to create seeds starting plans, with a little digression at the end. A few things to look forward to in the weeks to come are a floral winter sowing article and homemade growing stand Jonathan made for our indoor plant starts!

We noticed McDonald’s has been offering biscuits and gravy for a dollar. We normally swear never to eat McDonald’s for many reasons, but thought we’d have a little fun. We decided to find all the fast food restaurants offering biscuits and gravy on their menu, purchase one order and then compare and contrast. Fun experiment, right?!

Hardees, Mcdonald’s, and Steak ‘N’ Shake were the only fast food restaurants we found that offered biscuits and gravy. Each were significantly different in look, taste, and smell. I personally knew which one would probably be my favorite due to some fond memories and history with a particular restaurant’s offering, but I was going to be open minded!

 McDonald’s

The first we decided to try was McDonald’s. They were a dollar for us, but noticed other stores around were selling them for more. We didn’t think it’d be very good, so we really just wanted to get it out of the way. When we picked up the order we couldn’t help but notice it had an overpowering canned cat food smell. You know, the kind you get for those little furry felines as a treat. So, needless to say, the smell itself wasn’t that appetizing. When we opened the box, the food had slid all over and the biscuits were sitting upon each other in a modge podge fashion. I’m not sure if it was from the drive home, but it didn’t look very neat. Finally, the taste. In my opinion, they were OK. You could tell the biscuit was of a pre-frozen variety. It as a little dry and tough. The gravy was very salty, runny/thin, and overly seasoned. The sausage in the gravy was very crumbled and a little bit spongy. All in all, I felt McDonald’s was working too hard to disguise some not so great biscuits and gravy: health and taste wise.

Steak ‘N Shake

Steak ‘N Shake runs about $3.50 for a full order of biscuits and gravy. They smelled a LOT better than McDonald’s biscuits and gravy, so there was hope for look and taste. It had a buttery biscuit and nice gravy smell, slightly hinted with sausage and pepper seasoning. Upon opening the bag, we found a box of two biscuits each split in half and a separate with gravy in it. This made transfer a lot easier and cleaner. It was an added bonus to be able to poor the gravy on the biscuits ourselves. The biscuits were light and fluffy, with a crisp buttery outside. The gravy was good, too, but I admit a little bland. It looked yellow as well, which I didn’t find appetizing to the eyes. Sausage was delicious. Putting the entire meal together, I would say it was GOOD, just not quite great.

Hardee’s

Hardee’s was our final try. They run about three dollars, but on Sundays in some places they’re $1.25. When we picked it up it was piping hot and smelled warm, buttery, and delicious. When we opened the bag we found the container had one biscuit and a container of gravy waiting for us. The whole biscuit not split allowed it to retain more heat than the Steak ‘N Shake ones. The gravy was a beautiful white color that I enjoyed visually. The biscuit tasted warm and fresh (since Hardee’s is known to make them fresh every morning in the store!), buttery, flakey, and fluffy. The gravy was evenly seasoned with pepper and it tasted smooth and light. The sausage was in nice chunks with lots of flavor.

Out of the three restaurants, my bias won with me and Jonathan. We thought Hardee’s had by far the best fast food biscuits and gravy there was to offer in our neck of the woods. We also agreed if given the choice, we’d have Steak ‘N Shake’s again. As for McDonald’s, for the price of a dollar I guess it was okay, but there’s no way we’d order it again. It just didn’t have what it needed to get us to want to go back. (In fact, we’ve vowed never to return for any purpose)

As for making at home, here’s a great recipe I made this morning for the two of us: Babblefood

I used pork and bacon sausage as well as skim milk (set for 5 min. with 1 1/2 Tablespoons of lemon juice as a buttermilk substitute) as adaptations for what I had in my kitchen. I also think that the milk for the biscuits needs to be decreased to 1 cup rather than 1 1/2 cups to have a more pliable dough than a goop (it still worked though!). Enjoy!

Our Garden Plans (click to enlarge)

Its not even 2012 yet, and we are so excited to start planning, building and tending to next year’s garden that we decided to just start! You may recall that I talked about how to plan a garden a while back. Well, we put that plan into action this past Sunday and it turned out pretty well for the first time doing it. Last year, we just sort of threw everything together, didn’t measure anything or tend the soil in anyway. We didn’t even get all the grass dug out! Yet, we still managed to get a bumper crop of tomatoes and peppers, plus a whole ton of beans, potatoes and some peas as well. Sadly, our squash plants did not survive, but I have some plans for this coming season.

This year, we decided to try planting wide beds of vegetables, instead of planting in rows. From what I’ve seen, this is a great way to maximize the yield you can get from an area of soil. We attempted to cram in as much ‘growing area’ as possible, while still being able to reach everything inch of ‘growing area’ so as to keep up with weeds and such.

If you cannot see the picture very well, go ahead and click on it to enlarge. It’s a little fuzzy since it’s from my old cell phone’s camera, but you can still make out most of the detail.

Some Notes On The Plan

To create this plan, we took two sheets of notebook paper and taped them together so that we could draw the entire thing to scale. Our garden measures about 32 feet by 20 feet, so we decided to make the drawing to scale in centimeters, so it is 32 cm by 20 cm. Each of the squares that you see represents one bed of a specific vegetable or fruit. Different species in the same family are also in different squares. Each square was created, and once we knew where we wanted it, we used a stick of glue to glue it to the paper.

Around The Edge

To begin with the planning, we first went around the entire outside edge and created beds that are two feet wide. The reason for this is that two feet is narrow enough so that we can still lean in and tend to the plants. We could have probably gone with three feet, but we’ll see how two feet goes. We also decided to make most of the beds two feet in length as well, because we want to try as many varieties as possible. So each square you see around the edge is a two foot by two foot area. All but the larger plants will be filled completely with the vegetables, such as carrots and lettuce.

The red squares are tomatoes. The purple square is an eggplant. All the white along the bottom are different varieties of onions and on the top are Boo pumpkins, which are small ornamental pumpkins. I’ll be building a trellis for these. The brown on the top are all different varieties of lettuce. The green contains different varieties of peppers and cucumbers. The red along the left wall are beets and the orange on the same wall are carrots.

Next, we created a walking path next to all the outside beds so that we can get to them. This walking path is two feet wide as well, so we should have ample room to walk and tend to the outer beds. We will be covering all the walking paths with mulch to help with weeds and to add to the soil quality later on.

Also, note that the lettuce is all located north of the corn that we will plant. This is because it is a cool, shade crop and will thrive if not in full sun all day.

The Middle

For the middle part of the garden, we knew we would have some larger vine crops. In order to maximize growth area while still being able to get to each part, we decided to keep the maximum bed width at 6 feet. This way we could lean in from each side, and get to the 3 feet that was on each side. You’ll notice the pumpkin bed is three squares wide, which is 2X3 = 6 feet. The beds on the right side of the middle would have been 10 feet wide, so we created a walking path up the middle, so they are now each 4 feet wide. This gives us ample leaning space.

On the left side of the middle beds we planted two rows of peas and two rows of beans. Each is 2 feet wide by 6 feet long. Next over is our sugar pumpkin bed which is 10 feet by 6 feet. I hope this is enough room… Above that we have a golden water melon bed that is 4 feet by 6 feet. Across from that is an eel river muskmelon bed. South of that we have sweet potatoes and then brown potatoes.

We also have a triple play sweet corn bed that measures 4 feet by 16 feet, which is north of the peas and beans.

It will be very interesting to see what happens with the vine crops. The beds aren’t massive, but we may be able to train them to stay where they belong. If not, I will build some trellises for them to grow on.

Other Areas

In addition to that we are also planning to plant zucchini up by our house and blue hokkaido squash in our fruit garden, both of which I’m super excited to do.

What do you think of our 2012 Garden Plans? Feel free to leave a comment, we’d love to hear from you!

We’ve talked about the dangers of High Fructose Corn Syrup a few times here on Cents to Share. I just wanted to briefly show you fifteen items we ourselves would reach for in the grocery aisle, but then set back down after reading the label. It is quite astounding and a little upsetting at times where you find this dangerous sweetener hiding itself these days. We shouldn’t have to worry about what’s in our food!

1. Bread – White and Whole Wheat alike

2. Cereal

3. Breakfast Bars

4. Peanut Butter

5. Graham Crackers

6. Jam/Jellies

7. Ice Cream

8. Granola Bars

9. Yogurt

10. Juice

11. Soda

12. BBQ Sauce

13. Ketchup

14. Whipped Cream

15. Pancake Syrup

The good news, though, is that many companies are recognizing the danger of high fructose corn syrup and are beginning to offer groceries that don’t contain them. Often times when we look at a label and put the item back, there will be another product that actually displays ‘No High Fructose Corn Syrup’ right on the label. This is the way that we vote with our food dollars.

How do you feel about HFCS being in so many common products? Have you tried changing your buying habits to avoid HFCS?