I heart baking soda.  It is the epitome of a multi-tasking tool.  If you didn’t know this already go here and be enlightened.  My problem was not finding uses for baking soda but finding a way to use it easily.  Enter the parmesan cheese shaker.  I let this sit in my fridge to absorb odors and pull it out for a quick shake when I need to clean something.  No hassle cleaning on the cheap works for me.

Works-For-Me-Wednesday is hosted by Rocks In My Dryer.

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Brother insists on playing Parcheesi.  It’s his favorite game and yet in all the times we’ve played we have yet to make it to the end of a game in one setting.  It just takes too long and the attention wanes.  Neither child seemed to mind the lack of closure but it was driving me nuts.  So here are some game time strategies I’ve started using to keep me sane. (not just with Parcheesi but with almost anything we play)

Set a timer - We play until the timer goes off (usually 15 to 20 min) and whoever is “ahead” at that point wins.  Be sure to establish what “ahead” means before you start.

Play with fewer pieces - In the case of Parcheesi we often only play with 2 pieces each which automatically speeds the round.  This principle can be easily applied to Candyland (remove the picture cards), Battleship, Uno (deal fewer cards) and a myriad of other games.

Use House rules - If the real rules say a piece can only be played on a roll of five then house rules might allow you to play on fives or ones. Or house rules might allow play on even numbers or multiples of 3.  Besides speeding up the game this is great way to sneak math into everyday fun.

Take a break - If you absolutely must play by the rules consider taking a break before fun turns to frustrating.  Sometimes we break for a few minutes but more often than not around here it’s a few days.  For that kind of break you either need a phenomenal memory or a digital camera.  Here’s a picture of our current Parcheesi game taken over a week ago.

Finally,

Pick short games - Gamewright creates terrific age appropriate games. (We love Rat-a-Tat-Cat and Hiss.) while classics like Connect-Four and SET move so quickly that you can easily play more than one round at a sitting.

Click on over to Shannon’s for more Works For Me goodness.

You’ll remember, of course, that we put up a pool this year.  It has been wonderful for the children to swim on hot afternoons.  Sister has taught herself how to go underwater and do flips (front and back).  She has also learned that you can open your eyes beneath the surface and that you only have to hold your nose if you want to.  Brother is learning how to deal with all of Sister’s antics and how to give orders safely perched upon the ladder.

We learned about something else around here too - something not so wonderful.  Swimmer’s ear.  Sister complained of pain in her ear so we went to the doctor who prescribed heavy-duty ear drops to clear the infection - which they did.  It was a somewhat unpleasant experience with crying and pleading and a few angry words (That was just me; you can only imagine how Sister took it.)  so we are not keen on repeating the experience.  To that end we put  2-3 Swim-Ear drops in Sister’s ears each time she gets out of the pool.  I could have purchased some at the store to the tune of $4 per ounce but chose instead to make my own with equal parts rubbing alcohol and white vinegar and packaged them in this pretty container.  Cheap solutions work for me.

For other great tips check out this list.

  I love a burning candle - the soft glow of a flickering flame, a light scent wafting through my home.  My kids love candles too.  At least they like blowing out my candles when they think I’m not looking. :)  I used to be a candle Scrooge, for lack of a better term.  I would buy candles galore or receive them as gifts and never burn them.  Happily I’ve mended my ways and discovered a few tips in the process. 

*Trimming the wick to 1/4″ before lighting is critical to candle life and prevents smoking but if you can’t (or don’t want to) buy one of these, use a spare pair of toenail clippers instead.

*A coffee cup turned upside down makes a good enough snuffer.  Of course you can always blow out your candles but watch for flying wax.  A wick dipper is the best choice for candle snuffing and you don’t even have to buy one if you have a wire hanger and a little imagination.

*Candles have a memory of sorts and will “tunnel” unless you let them burn long enough to create a pool of wax to the outer edge.  Also, most the the scent release comes from the melted wax so doing this can provide a stronger fragrance.

*Save yourself time searching for matches by placing small boxes or matchbooks near each of the candles you light most often.  (I use the candle on my piano almost every night so I’ve hidden a box of matches behind the sheet music stand.)

 *Candles made with paraffin are essentially made with petroleum and burning them releases carcinogens into your home.  Yuck!! Soy or beeswax candles are a cleaner (and healthier choice.)

*Soy candles though more expensive combine more readily with scents and will add fragance to a room even when they are not burning. 

*Beeswax candles though more expensive tend to burn longer and cleaner than any others and make the best choice for an emergency kit.

Other candle resources:

http://www.naturalhealthweb.com/articles/Nelson6.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beeswax

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soy_candle

http://www.candles.org/about_tips.html

Click here for more Works-For-Me-Wednesday ideas.

Here’s an odd problem.  You know those cute shirts that have hoods attached.  They come in two varieties:  The kind zip that up the front and work more like a jacket and the kind that go over the head like a shirt.  They make a great Fall/Winter top.  Especially for a busy, little boy who might not have time to slip on his jacket before heading out into the cold.  Unfortunately, this second kind which goes on smoothly and works well to keep little ones warm has a serious flaw.  They are next to impossible to remove from said busy boy.  More than once I have started to pull one off only to have it get stuck at the point where Brother’s face is completely covered and his arms are pointing straight to the sky.  We pull and tug and Brother yells a muffled, “Help! Help! I stuck!”  After much ado, Brother always escapes but the whole scenario can be avoided with one simple trick.

Put the hood up first!

For more handy dandy tips click on over to Shannon’s place.

  Long ago in a life far away, I needed some contact cards for my doula business.  Now anyone who’s ever been a doula knows it’s not a particularly lucrative field (though the intrinsic rewards are outstanding).  Anyway, I was looking for inexpensive business cards that I didn’t have to buy by the thousands.  A little bit of searching led me to VistaPrint.  Since that time I’ve used their service for address stamps, more business cards, notepads and most recently postcards (of the “We have moved” variety)    The quality is great.  The service is outstanding.  Any product can be personalized with ease and best of all, I got everything for the price of shipping.  Cool, huh?

In case you were wondering, this is not a sponsered post.  I just found a print company that works for me.

Click on over here to find out what’s working for other bloggers this week.

A set of keys for the new house, a set of keys for the apartment, a key for the car and a sundry sort of membership/discount cards conveniently designed for travel, these are the current contents of my keyring.  I have even more keys.  The parents’ houses, other people’s cars, safety deposit box, an office.  It seems my circle of friends is a very secure lot. I wish I could scale down but every key I own is necessary in some way so I have developed a few rules for managing them all.

1. I do not need every key all the time. This means I only carry keys that are used daily.  Ones that are called into service less often remain at home until I need them.  On occasion I have been somewhere that I wished I had a key with me but these times have been few and don’t justify lugging around those extra ounces in my purse.

2. Keys that are not used every day must have a label.  A few weeks ago I saw that the key cutting station at Lowe’s had some custom key designs available.  (flowers, a college logo, or even the word “home”)  This is a good idea IF you can remember what designs signify what locations.  I try to be specific enough with my labels that anyone ”in the know” can find the right key quickly but vague enough that they mean little to a stranger (eg -”Grandparents 9410 back door”, “Will’s Cutlas trunk”).

3. Purge excess, out-of-date, or unknown keys annually.

4. Each set of keys has its own ring and each of these mini rings is stored on a carabiner. Here’s a visual for clarification.

This has been soo helpful.  Dropping my car off for maintenance, I can easily hand the mechanic what he needs while safely keeping the rest in my possesion.  On a hot day, I can start the car cooling and still keep house keys in hand to lock up. 

5. Finally, all of my membership cards are on their own ring and also get purged periodically.  This keeps them from getting in the way of my keys and from multiplying out of control.

This is probably more than you ever wanted to know about keychain management but it works for me.

Works-For-Me-Wednesday is hosted by Rocks In My Dryer.  You should go there.

We’ve done the final inspections on our new house (Yes, I know you’ve heard nothing about this until now.  I’ll fill you in when I’m a little less preoccupied.  Say… when we’re moved in. )  Anyway, it’s simple little place that will suit us well for a year or so except for one big thing.  The walls are white….ALL the walls.  It’s not “antique white” or “off-white” either.  It’s bright white.  I know I want to paint before we move in but a visit to the local paint center completely overwhelmed me with color.  I know some people consider wall color as easy to change as curtains but I am not one of them.  I stood baffled in front of the rainbow display.  I know what I like on the paint chips but how can I be sure that it will look good on the walls?  At home, I found the Behr ColorSmart System and Sherwin Williams Color Visualizer.  The confusion is gone and I am having so. much. fun!  I’ve tried combinations I’ve never considered before and been pleasantly surprised.  I’ve tried “sure things” and realized they were not what I thought.  Most importantly, I now know what I want to do in the house.

If you’ve got a painting project ahead of you, skip over here and here.  It worked for me.

WFMW is hosted at Rocks In My Dryer.  You should go there.

A couple of nights ago Will came to bed with a neckache.  I tried to massage out some of the knots but didn’t have much success.  What I needed was heat… something to loosen the muscles first.  I thought of the electric heat pad sold at our last garage sale (”We never use this!”)  I thought of various creams that might help.  Icy Hot (among others) came to mind but I quickly dismissed them each in turn.  Nothing like the smell of menthol to give you nightmares.  Hmm, what to do….?  I stumbled through the dark toward the kitchen to see what inspiration I could find there.  On the way, I was almost bowled over when a stray laundry basket attacked me out of nowhere.  (Okay, it didn’t really “attack” me.  It was sitting in the middle of the room waiting for someone to empty it of clean socks.  What?  You have this problem too, right?)  Anyway, I made it to the kitchen but there was no chocolate inspiration to be found until I opened up the “carb” cabinet.  “Noodles, beans, rice….. Hmm, rice.”  I snagged a package of brown rice, returned to the basket of unmatched socks and found a large one suited to the plan forming in my head.  Back in the kitchen once more I emptied the rice sack into the sock and sealed it with a hefty knot.  My creation went into the microwave for a minute or so and voila… homemade hot pack.  I suppose if one had a sewing machine or an inclination to sew, one could replace the knot with a neat seam or some pretty ribbon but for a late night, need it now solution this worked for me Will.

Skip on over to Shannon’s for more inspired ideas.

This is a skill that I guess I take for granted because I am always surprised when people ask, “How did you do that?”

This is your fitted sheet waiting to be folded.  (Not that you would throw your clean sheets on the floor intentionally but if you had a little boy that liked to pretend to be a superhero or a little girl that loved making tents and such … or if you were taking pictures for your blog, then this is the way your sheet would look.)

Step1:  Find a corner of the sheet and slip it over your arm (inside out) until your index finger is in the corner.

Step 2:  Repeat with the opposite corner.

Step 3:  Bring the two corners together.  Your index fingers will be touching on the inside of the sheet.

Step 4: Allow one side to slip off your arm and over onto the other arm.  You should now be looking at one corner (right side out) inside the other.

Repeat Steps 1 to 4 with the remaining two corners.  You will need to drop your first set to do this but don’t worry: they will stay together. 

Step 5: Once you have two corner sets slip one set onto each arm. 

Step 6: As in Step 3, bring the two corner sets together until your index fingers touch from the inside.

Step 7:  And then, as before, Allow one corner set to slip off your arm and over onto the other arm.  You will now have all the corners tucked neatly into one another and hanging from one arm.

Step 8:  You can run your opposite hand down the edges or give the whole thing a little shake to smooth out any strangeness before the next step.

Step 9:  Lay your sheet on a flat surface like so.

Step 10:  Fold the top third down (Don’t worry that it’s a little bumpy.)

Step 11:  Fold the bottom third up. (You’re in the home stretch now!)

Step 12:  Fold the right third in….

Step 13:  and then the left.

 Isn’t it lovely? … Ok, maybe “lovely” is a stretch but it works for me. 

Skip on over to Shannon’s for more Works-For-Me-Wednesday tips.

Also - Sister took most of my pictures for me… Didn’t she do a great job?