Paint Tips for the DIYers

As I have mentioned, we are preparing to sell our home, so I am painting like a mad woman.  Mad, I say.  Stark raving.  To the point that if Mason falls asleep too near me, he may wake up with a newly sanded, textured and painted tail.  Stuff like that happens at my house.  I’m just sayin’…

Yesterday I had a SuperWoman lunch hour, which turned out to be actually two hours.  During said lunch break, I did my grocery shopping and flew home to stock the pantry and fridge.  Knowing Mom would be visiting this morning to help me with painting, I decided to get a jump start on today’s project and spray a texture onto the bathroom walls I had recently bared.  Yes…me…on my lunch hour…spraying a can of oil-based wall texture.

I am not, as one might say, the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

Five minutes and three sneezes later, the can was empty, my eyes were burning and my dress clothes were speckled.  I brushed at my clothing and my hair and ran to wash my hands, which looked like I had been in a marshmallow food fight.

Those of you who are smarter than I am already know that water will not clean oil-based paint products off of your skin.  I finally caught on, thankyouverymuch.

I read the can and learned that the suggested cleaning agent is paint thinner.  On my skin?  AS IF!!  So I reasoned to myself: if water cleans water-based paint, then oil should clean oil-based paint.  Makes sense, right?  You bet your boots it does! I reached for a bottle of almond oil, put about two drops onto my hands and began to rub it in to the white paint residue I was wearing.  And voila!! That almond oil gave new meaning to the phrase “gone in sixty seconds.”  It worked like a dream, and my hands were moisturized too.

I had to share that with you – just in case you ever need to use oil-based paints on your lunch hour.  😉

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Herbivore Vacuum

As you know, I have two dogs.  Two incredibly lovable, sometimes frustrating, slobbery, in-your-face and on-my-furniture, 60- and 80-pound…fur balls.  One of our pet peeves (no pun intended) is for a pile of dog hair to scurry across the floor when we pass.  We often look at the culprits and ask in desperation, “Can’t you keep your fur to yourself?!!”

As you may not know, I also have an awesome vacuum cleaner.  Dom and I sprung for it as a Christmas gift to each other one year, ‘cause we’re way romantic like that.  It’s the Dyson Animal, and it rocks.  Experience with the bag vacuum cleaners taught us that dog fur sitting in a vacuum for any period of time makes the next use of the vacuum quite STANKY!  So when we bought the bagless Dyson we agreed that it is to be emptied each and every time it is used.  But even then, with two dogs (and now two rabbits) vacuuming doesn’t always leave a noticeably clean, fresh smell.

We have used the carpet deodorizers which leave a nice powdery residue in the vacuum, and are filled with a ton of chemicals I don’t want, not to mention fragrance.  Sure, it smells really good, but knowing how many toxic chemicals can make up “fragrance” makes me steer clear of any product with fragrance on the ingredient list.  Oh, and then there is the added frustration that household cleaning products are not required to list their ingredients on the label.  Hello.

Now, to get to my point…Since autumn is upon us and cooler nights are (hopefully) in store, I brought two of my potted herbs and my lemon tree inside.  One night this week when I got home to let Mabel outside, she was so excited that she stood by the backdoor wagging her tail hysterically, BEATING MY BASIL TO A PULP!!  By the time she crossed the threshold into the backyard there were three sprigs of basil littering the floor near the pot.  I only realized that because suddenly my garden room smelled like an Italian restaurant, and I started looking around to see who had food.  Imagine my disappointment.  Whatevs…I needed to vacuum the garden room anyway.

And that’s when it hit me! Fresh herbs in the vacuum cleaner would be a welcome air freshener.  I tore the beaten basil leaves, vacuumed them up and continued on to the den.  I’d like to say I had the fresh smell of basil all over the house by the time I was finished, but let’s be real.  Two dogs, remember? BUT – when I was finished vacuuming, I emptied the canister and then tore some sage leaves to vacuum up.  The leaves are the only things in the canister now, where they will sit for a couple of days before the next round of vacuuming.  With any luck at all, that will give us a nice little sagey breeze to enjoy while we clean. If not, I’m going to see about using essential oils.   I think this puts my green cleaning at a whole new level!

Greening My Grout

OK, ‘member how I said I would pick one green thing and work it like a Vegas call girl?

Done…and done!!

A week ago (maybe two…who’s counting?) Dom was greeted downstairs on a weekend morning by a whole bottle of merlot crashed on our kitchen tile.  It happened sometime during the night.  A large platter scooted from its precarious position on the top shelf of a built-in hutch, nudging a bottle of wine to the edge of the shelf where it was able to escape because I had not secured the door shut earlier the day before.  The wine fell six feet to a cardboard box, which I assume broke its fall, and it bounced off the box to fall another fifteen inches and crash on the ceramic tile.  I guess this is why no one, including our two award-winning watch-dogs (har, har), heard anything at all during the night.  The purple wine-stained mess was waiting for Dom when he awoke at 6-something with the dogs, and it had already mostly dried.  (Ironically, NONE splattered on the nearby walls. I’m sure stranger things have happened.  Just not to me.) Dom spent a fair amount of time cleaning the broken glass, etc, before waking me to alert me to the purple grout under our table.  Lovely.

Confession:  I don’t know what else I had going on that weekend, but I’m sure I was super-busy, and whatever occupied my agenda was obviously waaaaaaay more important than wine-stained grout.  Don’t judge, ‘k?

So, like I said, that was a week or two ago.  I could say that I spent all that time researching the safest and most effective way to eco-clean my grout, but I’d totally be lying.  I honestly thought we’d be chiseling it out and refilling it with new grout so I didn’t give it much more thought.

But then I realized I was middle-school nesting and all, and well…suddenly one of the only things left to clean was my grout.

So here’s my news: You can clean two-week-old merlot from beige grout with baking soda and peroxide.

Yes, really.

I’m not such a fan of scrubbing my teeth with the smile-whitening combo, but grout I can scrub!! I let it soak for probably 30 minutes before scrubbing it up and seeing the resulting sludge turn a purple-grey color.  Because of the spill radius, and because I worked on small areas at a time in case I faded the original grout color, in just under two hours we went from this

To this

The next day when the area had dried sufficiently I could still see some baking soda residue, so I used our Shark Steam Mop to clean it all up.  I was so completely enamored with my new-found discovery that I tackled the kids’ bathroom grout next.  That took an hour and a half and included me dismantling the toilet to scrub under the seat screws.  When will this nesting dementia end, I ask you?! (FYI, if you have one or more sons and you suddenly have the desire to dismantle the toilet seat for a pure and proper cleaning, DON’T.  The seat screws open up a portal to the Seventh Dimension of Hell. I couldn’t call myself a friend if I didn’t warn you.)  I tossed the entire toilet seat into the bathtub, sprinkled it with baking soda and filled the tub.  I am honestly amazed at its power.

All in all this weekend I scrubbed and cleaned and un-disgusted the kitchen and bathroom with nothing more than castille soap, baking soda and hydrogen peroxide.  And the best part of it all was that since I was using completely harmless cleaners, Victoria joined me and began scrubbing right beside me.  Considering that the bathroom grout started out a funny brown color, the end result is worth sharing.

Yeah, that’s the floor.  My photography lessons have obviously been put on hold so I could sharpen my cleaning skills.  😉 Now, if only that 1967 Avocado Green would come back in style…

Don’t Mind Me…I’m Just Nesting

Without a single clue as to what this morning would bring, I over-snoozed for 32 minutes before tossing contacts into my eyes and climbing into the shower.  While my hair over-conditioned I decided what to wear today.  By the time the Hubster stumbled in for his shower, I was mid-way through makeup with my hair air-drying.  He commented that he meant to wake up earlier, which prompted me to look at the clock.  Previously, I had fully intended to LEAVE THE HOUSE twelve minutes from the time the clock displayed at that moment.  I looked in the mirror.  No.  Freaking. Way.

So what do you think would be THE MOST NORMAL thing for a person to do upon realizing he/she is running about 10 minutes behind schedule on the kids’ last day of summer, with a forty-five minute drive ahead?  Why, clean the house and do laundry, OF COURSE!!!!!

Yeah, I know it was totally wrong for me to try to add tasks to an already delayed morning.  On any normal day, my reaction would have been to cease all preparing, yell for everyone to get in the car NOW, and frantically rummage for my keys as I sprint out of the kitchen, spilling coffee on the garage floor and cursing my snooze button.

Oh, but today was not going to be that day.  No, for reasons I could not previously explain, I have been doing things completely out of character…I’m cleaning things (the Hubster probably has not yet noticed, and will likely furrow his brow if he reads this, but yes, honey, it’s true…go look at the bathroom mirror and the shower tile).  I’m making my bed each day.  I’m making my bed.  Let me say again, I AM MAKING MY BED.  (This is something even my mother will tell you is simply not me.)  To make matters even more bizarre, I am LINT-ROLLING MABEL’S FUR off of my comforter.  EVERY. MORNING.  I must be sick.  Do I have fever?

This morning, half-dressed with wet hair, I decided to multi-task filling Mason and Mabel’s food bowls with doing a load of laundry.  SIMULTANEOUSLY.  The project was a success in that I only dropped about 15 pieces of kibble on the laundry room floor. One of the kibbles bounced under the dryer.  Bon Appétit, little dust-bunnies!

Next I made coffee (despite the fact that I knew it would be completely UN-enjoyable because of the burn on the roof of my mouth from last night’s pizza).  Can’t effectively “swoosh” a coffee pot in a sink full of dishes, so I decided to empty the sink.  And finding the dishwasher full of clean dishes, I began to remedy my obstacles one by one.

Eight minutes later, the coffee pot beeps as Dom is coming down the stairs to leave.  I decide he needs a cup…to-go!  (Awwww…yes, I can be sweet like that.  He likes to pretend it never happens.  Hmpff!)  I rifle through the cabinet for an appropriate travel mug, hoping to find one that will not result in coffee all down the front of that nice, white, dry-cleaned shirt he is wearing.  Cup handed, kisses swapped and he is out the door, totally distracted by my random act of kindness.  That’s when I realize I am STILL half-dressed with wet hair.  O. M. G., Lori!  Get it in gear!!

Finally “ready” fourteen minutes later I grabbed my purse and keys from the kitchen counter and noticed Dom’s phone sitting there.  Damn!  See??? He was so distracted by my coffee kindness that he forgot his phone.  Normally, I would call to let him know his phone is at home (as if he didn’t realize it already) and he would fetch it during lunch.  Today, I took it with me, then called him at his desk and offered to BRING THE PHONE TO HIM on my way to work, which was going to be a late arrival anyway, so what’s one more stop??

As I drove to deliver the phone, I thought of all the things that caused my tardiness.  Mostly, it was the cleaning and voluntarily taking care of other people’s business that drove (no pun intended) this hour-late ETA at my own office.  And even though I knew I was totally late and not accomplishing the tasks I am paid to accomplish in that hour, all I wanted to do was go back home and clean some more.

Me.  Wanting to clean.  Instead of doing anything else.  Somebody call a doctor.

And then it hit me.  I’m nesting!!!  Just like a pregnant woman with an insatiable need to sanitize her home before the baby arrives, I am preparing to birth a middle-schooler tomorrow.  And the fear of the unknown is making me manic.  So I focus on what I can control…my home.  (Which is presently out of control or there wouldn’t be so darn much to clean, no???)  I have shopping lists and to-do lists and make-this-list-next lists, most of which are focused on the first day of school.   The same first day that will come and go whether I am ready for it or not…whether any sink is clean or tub tile is scrubbed…whether laundry is folded or pencils are sharpened.  With no regard for my desires, it will happen tomorrow at 7:30 a.m., Central Standard Time.  I will drop Aaron into foreign middle school territory while Vic enjoys the familiar comfort of our elementary school for two more years.  I will need Kleenexes, for sure.  (Add that to my mom-preparedness list.)  I have to be sure I hold back the tears until after I have dropped Vic off, so as not to upset the delicate balance of her own first-day-jitters.  Oh dear.  So much to do to keep my mind off of tomorrow.  And so I distract myself by nesting.  I think I’ll go scrub their lunchboxes…again.

 

Day 244: Here Come the Chores…App Addicts, UNITE!!

You knew I’d eventually find something like this, didn’t you?  Apps that track chores and payout rewards.  And you had to know I’d share it with you.  I apologize if you are not an app lover like I am.  I just get so darn excited when I have a new way to track and chart things, especially if it comes with cumulative reports and cool sound effects. 

I’m a mom geek.

Oh!  Speaking of mom geeks, that reminds me of a story.  We have time for a story, don’t we?

My mom has always been casually up-to-date on the trends I have been “into.”  When I was in high school she knew as much about MTV as I did. (Side note: I hope my kids never watch MTV.  It’s so very different from when it first came on.  Oh crap…there’s my age showing again.)  Anyhoo, Mom is awesome-cool, and was always able to recognize the songs of all the hair bands I liked even from two rooms away.  I loved that she “got” my kind of music.  I was not, however, a fan of rap so I nearly busted a gut when I saw my mom put her glass up to the fridge door for some ice, shimmy-shake her shoulders, bob her head and say, “Worrrrrrrrrd to ya muhtha!” 

She’s more hip than geek.  But still…

Oh yeah, the apps…

Chore Pad ($2.99 for iPhone) and Chore Pad HD ($4.99 for iPad) and Limited Trial Version (Free): Where was this app two years ago?!! Fully customizable chore charts for multiple kids.  Assigned chores have point or “star” values, and customizable rewards have corresponding values.  The overall theme is cartoon-ish, so the kids love it. Complete a chore, touch today’s square for that chore, and a big checkmark appears while the appropriate number of stars fly onto the chart.  My favorite part?  You can add extra stars for additional effort, and take stars away, regardless of a chore’s original star value. (So yes, you can have a negative star value!)  Chores can be arranged in any order, and can be assigned to any number of days in the week.  If a chore is not applicable for a certain day, like homework on Saturday, it’s just greyed out so no checkmark can be put in its Saturday square.  When enough stars are earned for a reward, a trophy shows up on the screen.  When the child is ready to cash in his or her stars, just hit “payout” and the star-bank resets itself accordingly.  I’m loving this.  “Hey, you emptied the dishwasher for me?  Three extra stars!!…Oh, is that your jacket laying on the floor of the entry hall?  Minus one star!…Wow, you’ve reached 50 stars already?  Do you want to have a friend come over, or do you want to keep working toward that iTunes card?”

Mama’s got it goin’ on!!

But don’t think for a minute that the kids are the only ones with chores around here.  Aren’t you starting to figure me out yet?  I have another app that is helping to keep ME on track: Home Routines ($4.99). This helps me keep track of all the little things I need to remember in a day, and allows me to assign different chores to each day of the week, focused on cleaning the house. (Bye-bye, Excel spreadsheet!!)  (( Yes, I’m that Type A!))  The app divides your house into zones (well, you divide as you see fit.  The app allows you 5-7 different zones, depending on whether you want to clean on weekends or not. Each day focuses on only one zone for cleaning.) It comes loaded with presets for rooms in a house and common tasks associated with each room.  But the rooms and the tasks are fully customizable.  I cracked up when I saw “Clean cobwebs from corners” as the first chore in every room.  You mean I’m supposed to be looking at the corners of the room??? 

Heh, heh, heh…DEE-LEET that task!!

Home Routines also allows you to set morning and evening routines, and comes preset with a “15-minute Focus Time” for meditation, which I desperately need.  They even included a 15-minute timer in the app – the idea being that if we just spend 15 minutes in the morning and evening focusing on certain routine items, we can free up our time, increase our productivity and decrease the clutter in our minds and in our homes.  I love that concept!  Oh, and so adults don’t feel left out of the fun, this app even has stars to click when each task is complete.  It also keeps a handy list of accomplishments for the day, so I can see just how productive I’ve been.  I set the app to gently remind me twice a day to check on my chore list. So, it’s not screaming all the things I forgot to do, and if I choose to ignore it the app simply resets itself the next morning with no hard feelings. 

Someone should pay me to write app reviews, don’t you think?  I rather like this. 

Worrrrrrrd to ya muhtha!!!

Day 230: Scrubbin’ Kiddos

I guess it’s time to introduce you to my love-hate relationship with cleaning the bathroom.  Most people probably just subscribe to the “hate” side of that equation, and believe me, I understand your point.  But I have always had a unique way of looking at it. 

My home, while not grand or estate-like by any stretch of the imagination, is roomy – enough so that  four people can simultaneously get away from each other when they need to and still stay at home.  And I suppose if I were the only one living in it, it’s small enough for me to maintain cleanliness on my own.  But it is, quite frankly, too big for me to clean while three other people mess it up.  And then, there’s the share of messing up that comes all from little ol’ me.  Yes, I’m guilty too. 

So, you see, sometimes the thought of having to clean “the whole house” is just a tad overwhelming. That’s where the bathroom comes into play.  A bathroom is generally manageable all on its own.  I can walk in, close the door, and begin cleaning to my heart’s content within those four little sub-walls.  Because our bathrooms are relatively modest, the task of cleaning one from top to bottom never lasts more than an hour, and then I congratulate myself on having cleaned “one whole room!!”  Yaaaaayyyy, ME!

See?  That’s the love side of the equation.  For just under an hour, I get to lock myself away in a room no one else cares to be in, take out my frustration on the countertops and floors, and walk away feeling totally accomplished.  So I admit that I have been a bit stingy with the task.  At least, until last week-end. 

I finally decided that it’s not enough that the kids be conditioned to keep their stuff off the floor of our home so that I’m not constantly stepping over Legos and dirty socks.  It’s time they learned to scrub.  Plus, I’m no longer using harsh chemicals in my cleaning, so there’s nothing to say that they can’t get right in there and do the job themselves.  I spent last Sunday teaching them how to clean a bathroom thoroughly.  Victoria is a natural!  She fearlessly crawled around on the floor to scrub the base of the toilet while Aaron scrubbed out the sink.  This was all done in THEIR bathroom, by the way.  After getting the sink to sparkle once again, Aaron announced to Victoria that they both needed to aim their toothpaste spittle more toward the drain hole so that he wouldn’t have so much to scrub the next time. 

Now, remember, while he says this she’s cleaning around the base of the toilet.  If you have boys, you know what Vic was dealing with.  She calmly looked up at him and asked, “Dude, really??”

Ahhhhhhh….they finally see my point!!!!

Day 183: The Wheels Keep Turning

I’ve been out of touch for a couple of days, but I haven’t been too far away.  We have three parties scheduled this week: one that I’m decorating, one that I’m hosting, and one to which I am bringing a cheese ball.

You would LOVE this cheese ball.

For the decorating, I get a chance to be creative – resulting in my hands hurting from an hour of making paper cutouts.   But the decorations are as cute as I wanted them to be, so it’s all worth it.  Plus, I get to step back into my role as cake decorator (I do this on very limited occasions when I consider the event too special to trust to anyone else’s cakes.  I’m a wee bit territorial like that!)  Some people – um, that would be Jessica – are special enough to warrant the extra work.  Suffice it to say that this will be a rockin’ baby shower!

For the party I’m hosting, I have scheduled a carpet cleaning for tomorrow afternoon, amid the cake decorating and party-favor-fashioning.  I will face myself in the mirror tomorrow and wonder what the hell I was thinking when I scheduled this.  But then evening will come too soon, and by then I hope to have clean, dry, fresh-smelling carpets ready for Thursday’s party. 

And then I’ll make the cheese ball. 

See??? It’s all about schedules.  Heh heh heh…

Day 136: Recycling Blues

Whaddaya say we talk some trash?

Our city got curbside recycling a couple of years ago.  Since then, my family has been fully on board with the whole idea of recycling and reusing.  (We’re not so good at reducing just yet…it’s a process.)  I have a special trashcan in the kitchen that has two sections – one for recycling discards.  We graduated to the dual-purpose trashcan after having a single waste bin while our recyclables went into a super-sized gift bag stored under the kitchen sink.

But, no matter the particular room of the house, if you choose to recycle you will encounter recyclables in every aspect of your home/day/life. 

Like the bathroom.  There are a ton of recyclables in the bathroom!!  Paper Dixie cups, boxes, bottles, toilet paper rolls.  I had the bright idea one day several months back to have two trash cans in each bathroom.  In the master bath, I bought two identical cans.  Problem solved, right?

Yeah, except that I noticed a few weeks ago that Dom and I keep getting confused over which trashcan is for recycling, and which one is for actual trash.  (Do toothpaste tubes get recycled?  I vote no, but feel free to chime in.  And what about Kleenexes that I have blotted my lipstick with?)  Anyway, I notice that our confusion over what to put where results in us essentially having two trash cans. 

So I think that either I need to put some decoration on the recycling can or we need to settle once and for all whether trash goes into the left or the right, and what constitutes an appropriate bathroom recyclable on the questionable items. 

I’m guessing it would be rude to interrupt the baseball game to discuss this with him.  😉

Day 111: Reviews and Results (Again)

Time for another weekly review of things we’re changing and trying.  Here goes:

• The Shoe Basket, which Mabel considered her personal toy box is now relocated to the foot of the stairs.  Now she is no longer able to dig out our sandals and hide them under furniture.  We pile all the shoes into the basket to get them out of our way and – ideally – everyone would collect his/her shoes from the basket on the way up the stairs.  We don’t quite have the hang of distributing the shoes upstairs, but the basket is a lovely collection piece downstairs.  (Day 55)
• The kids’ water bottles are a great success!  Each night they get out their water bottles to put in their lunchboxes.  We’ve only had two spills, and since it was just water all was well.  I got the bottles on Ebay for about $10 each.  They are the Camelbak BPA-free bottles, all decorated to suit their personalities.  Bonus:  the kids drink more water! Great hydration tool.  (Day 41)
• Cleaning the car.  I am amazed that I have actually followed through with this.  We get all our daily messes out of my car each evening, and I’ve been much cleaner with my vehicle than I ever have before.  We even vacuumed the Cherry Bomb to keep her pretty.  Not too shabby a plan.   (Day 21)
• ECOS laundry detergent.  I’ve been using the new eco-friendly chemical-free laundry detergent for two weeks now, and I really do like it.  It has coconut oil in it, which it claims is a natural fabric softener.  So I have stopped using the Snuggle, and I have noticed my towels are just as fluffy and soft.  The magnolia and lily fragrance is very subtle, so we’re not overpowered with a detergent smell.  Overall, I have to say this one’s a keeper.  (Day 95)

Even though each new thought and change initially seems pretty overwhelming, I can now see that so much has become habit and contributed largely to a more organized family.  We still have a long way to go, but seeing progress is a real morale booster!

Day 103: Shower Power

It’s time to clean the shower again.  I hate that chore.  I’d rather scrub baseboards.  Or toilets.  Really. 

I have a sliding shower door attached to the tub in the master bathroom.  The tub sits right up next to the toilet, leaving hardly any room between the two.  And when I clean the shower, I have to wriggle in between the tub and toilet, try to kneel down, and lean over the tub in order to scrub, somehow smacking my head on the door every time.  How uncomfortable does a single chore have to be, I ask you?

I found a new suggestion that I am willing to try.  Once I get the shower all spic-and-span with the last remaining dollop of chemical-crazed cleaner, I am going to begin the habit of spraying the shower down every morning…with hydrogen peroxide. 

Can you think of a more natural, cheaper cleaner?  $1 for a liter of product.  Way to go, right?  I mean, this is the same stuff that can make a dog regurgitate fifteen Zyrtec tablets (as seen on Day 29), so it must be pretty potent despite its blasé appearance.  We shall soon see.  I’ve already tried it a little to see if it would work on the tile grout that I noticed needs some attention.  By the way, I hate those little shower tiles…the ones that are only slightly bigger than a post-it note, with grout the thickness of a cross-stitch thread.  And mine is a beautiful Harvest Gold.  But before you think I got the better of those designer colors from the 70’s, you should know the kids’ bathroom is Avocado Green.  Jealous? 

Back to the cleaning: I spritzed and sprayed my shower this morning, and heard the faintest fizzing noise for several minutes afterward.  Ahhhh…peroxide at work.  Fizzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

I’ll give this a try for the next couple of weeks and report back on the grout of my Harvest Gold.