Upcycle Baby Food Jars: Spice Bottles

So I have tons and tons of empty baby food jars that I hate to throw away but am not willing to drive an hour and a half to recycle.  I also have a ton of spices that are in a bunch of different sizes and shapes and take up tons of room.  So I copied this idea of using baby food jars as spice jars.

Source: davisongoons.blogspot.com via Leslie on Pinterest

Now she made hers into magnets on the fridge but I just stuck mine back in the cupboard and saved so much room.

Also now I can buy spices in bulk and Winco and not worry about trying to get those dang spice jars open!

I used the basic sized baby food jars.  Cleaned them and then boiled both the jars and lids in water for 15 min (my dishwasher is unreliable at best so I went the old fashioned way).  I dried them off and went to work.

For my paper I used DCWV Nana's Kitchen stack so they would all be coordinated easy without stress.  I cut the pages into 1"x8" strips.  Now the girl I copied used mod podge to attach the paper to the jars, and if you are going to have them on the fridge I would do that as well.  But since mine are staying in a cupboard most of the time I chose to leave them a little more textured and just used hot glue.  Also if I really hate the paper I can start over much easier.  Then I wrote the spice name on the jar and filled it up.

A side note, what did I do with all those empty spice jars?  I tossed them in D.J.'s toy bucket of course.  Why pay for toy food when you can give them their own versions of the real stuff.  My mom put stuff like that is a drawer in our kitchen growing up that we could play with while she cooked.  I think it played a huge role in all of her children loving to work (well cook) in the kitchen.

Quiet Book page: Noah's Ark

So I am in the quiet book co-op where we each do one page but you do it for 12 people and then they each give you a page in return.

My page was Noah's Ark.  I got some of my ideas from this girl.  But really went my own way with it.

Source: laurathoughts81.blogspot.com via Leslie on Pinterest

I did the animals as finger puppets (much like my earlier nativity post).  I did lions, tigers, bears, elephants, and turtles.

The ark opens at the top (like a jean pocket) and all the animals fit inside.

Because I didn't want to do 120 animals I only did one of each but if you are doing it just for you you could easily do two of each.  Create your template my drawing you tomb stone shaped bodies on paper the size you want them. Mine are about 2 1/2 inches tall and and inch wide.  Then cut out the paper and use it to cut out your felt.  Remember you will need two for each animal.  For the elephant the ears are actually one piece with a middle that threads through the body.  The turtle legs and head are the same way.  Actually with the turtle I didn't cut out two bodies I just used the shell as the other side of the puppet.

I am really happy with my page.  Hopefully I'll be able to share the other ones we did soon as well.

Any good ideas for scripture quiet book pages.  I want to do an all scripture one on my own and need ideas for which stories and how to do them.

Book Review: Freedom Road by Howard Fast... Aka the 5th book to change my life

When I was 16 my father introduced me to Freedom Road by Howard Fast and my life changed.

Source: goodreads.com via Leslie on Pinterest

It is a book about a community in the South during the Reconstruction period (the era after the civil war when the north was punishing the south for the war).  The community of former slaves and poor whites work together to create a flourishing town with educated children, and even a congressmen.  But as the North decides to stop their efforts to create equality outside people come in and in an apocalyptic moment burn the community and all of its members to death ending the era of peace and prosperity.

Yes this is a book about equality, and yes it is about race.  But the thing about this book that changed my life was how it showed to me more than I had every before seen that education is power.  That what the people bringing down the people feared and hated most was the fact the the blacks and poor whites were lifting themselves up through learning and college education.  For the first time I truly realized what my goals were really for, and what they meant.  That I didn't want to go to college just so I could get a good job but so I would never be under the power of others because I didn't know how to learn.

This is a great (and rather obscure) book that I think every one should read.  Look for it and check it out!  I read it every time I started to hate school and all the work I had to do, it reminded me just what my education meant, and why I needed to stick with it.

Cleaning a stove/grates

So I have a nasty old gas stove.  I may have mentioned before how much I hate this thing but if not let me say right now, IT IS THE BANE OF MY CLEANING LIFE RIGHT NOW.  No matter how hard I scrub.  No matter how fast I get to it I can not get the black burnt circle off one of the dang thing.  So I thought I would try this remedy for the grates on the whole stove top.  I did exactly what she did (except I put my stove top in a garbage bag instead of zip lock) and put them on my patio over night.

Source: pinchingyourpennies.com via Leslie on Pinterest

 In case you don't want to look at the blog she put her stove grates in zip lock bags with a 1/4 cup ammonia for 12 hours and then the scuz just wiped off.  So I did that, and then did it bigger with my whole removable top in garbage bags tied up.
.... 
Well it worked on the grates.  It helped on the stove top but not by much.  Oh well.  Any ideas?  I'm about ready to throw in the towel and except defeat. 

Detox diet... i don't know if it works but it does suck if you are trying to cook for others

So I wanted to try the detox diet I saw on pinterest a while ago.  I really liked the look of it because you could eat as much as you want of the foods on the list and it lasted a week.  Each day was a little different.  Now if I had a whole week where I only had to worry about feeding myself and keeping the 'good foods' in the house I might have been able to stick to it.  But having to cook yummy food (aka carbs) for my husband every night did me in.   I mean I stopped and started this diet 5 different times.  And never made it past day two.  I might try it again and just make him fish (which is one of the 5 things I don't eat) every night for a week.  Ah well.  Maybe I'll just do a detox shake thing instead.

Source: justinandashleyrefresh.com via Leslie on Pinterest