How to Fold To Towels Tutorial

A Super Tutorial on How to Wash Pillows and Get Them Extra Clean

See here

Restore and Clean Grout Product

Something to try, maybe. Check out the link here.

Source: middleclassmodern.com via Tracie @ MiddleClassModern on Pinterest

Dollar Store Organization

Source: madincrafts.com via Amanda on Pinterest

Huge link list with examples!

Free Contemporary Pantry Labels

See here.

Source: blog.worldlabel.com via Alexandra on Pinterest

25 + Tips for Using Borax

From DIY Life:

Last week, we published a story on 25 Household Uses for Borax, and the response was overwhelming! So this week, we decided to follow up with new tips -- your tips -- for getting the most out of this "miracle mineral." So, there's this stuff called Borax. You may be familiar with its full product name: 20 Mule Team Borax. 

Essentially, Borax is a cleaning agent derived from naturally occurring minerals -- meaning it's nontoxic and eco-friendly. Though it's known primarily as a laundry booster, its uses extend far beyond that -- from pest control and weed control to odor elimination. We thought we knew everything about Borax...that is until you, our readers, stepped up and offered even more uses for this powdery wonder. We really had no choice but to publish 10 of your best pearls of household wisdom. Enjoy! 

 Read more here.

Dollar Store Inexpensive Stuffed Animal Storage

I got two of these large mesh storage(laundry) bags from the Dollar Tree for stuffed animals. So far they have held up well. They hold about 20 small to medium sized stuffed animals and have a cinch hold drawstring. This is so easy for my daughter to pull along while picking up. It is also good for giving the stuffed animals a good shake out(dust) , and easily moves out of the way for cleaning. Mine are stored behind a door.

Not bad for $1.00 each.

Fuller String Mop Update

So we must be very dirty because my Fuller String mop head needed replacing in only three months time! I had to go with a commercial looped string mop which really works well and is lasting longer. It is large and heavy, and requires a professional mop wringer, but the weight of the mop does much of  the cleaning for you. I also tried a stronger cleaner, LA's Totally Awesome concentrated cleaner(ammonia and bleach free) from the Dollar Tree. This put a shine back on the painted concrete floors and got up a lot of my daughter's glue and paint. I used it on the laminate floors and got good results as well. About a four of a cup of it in a bucket with hot water is all I needed for heavy floor cleaning.

Winco 800g Blue Yarn Looped End Mop Head 32 Ounce See how the strings are looped and tied across at the end? This makes them last longer because they don't unravel and tangle. The string mops that are cut across tend to fray and disintegrate.

GJO60466 - Mop Bucket Wringer Combo, four 3 inch Casters, 26 qt., Yellow

Fun Find: Pink Rose Scented Dish Soap

On a whim, I purchased Palmolive's Classic Soft Touch dish soap at our Dollar General because it was only $2.00 for 30 ounces, and it was a happy uplifting shade of pink for a dreary winter. I had no idea it was rose scented! What a nice surprise. It really is gentle. I use it as a kitchen cleaner and as a body and facial treatment with an Asian exfoliating cloth. My skin was so soft afterwards, and the scent was very relaxing.

Now I'll have to look for Palmolive coupons.

Note: The one I found at the Dollar General had the older pull top and did not indicate that it had vitamin E added. It also had the word "Classic"  in the name, not "Ultra". See image at left. There is a more common Ultra version with vitamin E, but I haven't tried this one yet.

Tips for Keeping Your Home Secure

DIY Plastic Bag Storage

Source: creatingahouseofgrace.blogspot.com via Brittany on Pinterest

It's a coffee can! Great idea. Paint can and cut a hole in the lid. I plan to use this for plastic grocery bags which we recycle as garbage bags. I think it will work if I tie each bags together, so that they come out the hole to detach without getting lost in the can. I could tie each one by a handle and roll together inside the can. I think this will make a more compact storage option than what we currently have which is a cardboard box with bags thrown in..

How to Organize a Floor Chest Freezer

How to Organize Errand Bins in Garage

Frugal Housekeeping - Fuller String Mop

Fuller Brush Wet Mop Complete

Sometimes old fashioned is the best. I just bought a Fuller string mop for my hard surface floors. As advertised, this mop catches the dirt and cleans off easily. I use a string mop, but this one is built to last with all metal parts, and a sturdy mop head with tough non-shedding twisted string. The entire mop is about $14.00, and the mop head is replaceable.

More about the Fuller Brush Company, established in 1906.

Making Your Family Home a Haven of Relaxation with Less Stuff

It dawned on me the other day that we would rather stay home than leave the house. Why is this? Without really setting out to do so, I've realized that our home has become a sort of vacation recreation spot for us. It's comfortable, free living, simple, and open ended. The adaption happened over the years to accommodate homeschooling, and ended up producing a place of relaxation for all - a retreat from the stress and fast paced activity of the outside world. It's a world where imagination can run free, where fussiness has no place, and intensity is replaced by a softness, and a hopeful spirit. There are rules, expectations and loose structure, but there is also room to breath and be one's self.

The physical environment of a home lends itself to establishing or paving the way to an atmosphere which encourages psychological freedom and relaxation. Forget what the furnishing and interior decorating industry models as the perfect home, full of themed suites of furnishings for each room. Comfort depends on your ability to think outside the box and adapt your home to your own needs. This may mean your home decor will not look like a staged magazine lay-out, but if it works for you, that's all that counts. The goal is freedom, relaxation(sanity!), and a family centered home; not a stuff centered home.

The most important physical element to a stress free home is cleanliness and ease of cleaning. Ease of cleaning comes with an uncluttered home with open places and minimal furnishings. No one wants to exhaust themselves getting their home under control, only to have to do it all again without much rest in between.This vicious cycle only makes you want to to stay away from home as much as possible in order to get some peace. And of course, the more time you avoid, the worse the mess gets. It doesn't have to be this way if you can imagine yourself living in a home with less stuff. The trade-off will be peace, and a sense of pride in being able to take control and handle your housekeeping and home life.

Ease of cleaning can only be accomplished if you have open floor spaces. If there are hard to reach spaces throughout the house, either they stay dirty until a deep cleaning, or furniture must be moved every time you clean. Evaluate how much furniture you really need. In our bedrooms we have a bed and a night stand. A dresser is not needed if you make room in your closets for hanging clothes cubicles or storage bins. Plastic storage bins on the closet floor can be pulled out quickly for cleaning. Ours contain items that will not hang such as underwear and socks. Larger closets can accommodate self installed wire shelving for customized storage.  Living room areas need a couch/sofa(sectionals for large families), coffee table(or any low table), large deep open shelving for storage baskets/containers, and possibly a media storage unit. A dining area needs only a table and chairs. Linens can be stored in a kitchen drawer or closet.

If the dining area doubles as a craft and school area, simple low shelving with baskets for storage keep the room feeling open. High shelving closes in a small space. Keep only your most precious and useful books. Get rid of books that can be checked out at the library, or read on an e-reader. Walls of floor to ceiling book shelves hold dust and take up precious physical and visual room. Rethink whether you really need to store 600 books at home. Our family reads books daily, but we rotate the books through the house, keeping only the ones that we might need/want for later. Most of our books are gotten weekly from the public library. Easy! We can check-out our favorite books as much as we want, but they are not taking up space at our home.

Another sanity saver was taking out our wall-to-wall carpets which has freed up concerns of potential carpet stains and cleanliness issues.

A few benefits of a no-carpet floor:

-Spills wipe up quickly with a microfiber cloth. No more stress or fussing about spills or stains.
- Carpet steamers and cleaners are a thing of the past
- A heavy duty vacuum is no longer needed. A lightweight stick vacuum is all that is needed, and/or a broom and dustpan.
- Hidden and embedded dust and dirt is minimized making for cleaner air and reduced allergies.

A no-carpet floor looks and stays cleaner with minimal work, thereby reducing stress. Pulling up your carpet and replacing it with solid surface flooring need not be expensive. Solid surfacing flooring is getting much less expensive, and sales and price reductions are offered throughout the year at big box stores. If you can install it yourself, so much the better. Installation costs are what makes solid surface flooring out of reach for those on a budget. We had laminate placed in our kitchen, den and hallway years ago, but finances at the time precluded laminate in the rest of the house. Instead, we pulled up the carpeting and painted our floors. Sherwin Williams has some quality floor paint which goes on sale around this time of year. Right now there is a 40% off sale on paint at Sherwin Williams stores. If you get on their mailing list, coupons come to you and these can be combined with store-wide sales. We've had painted floors for over a year now, and they are very easy to maintain. Glue, children's paints, muddy feet, spilled juice, food, cat barf, and other messy wet stuff comes right off with the wipe of a wet cloth. My staircase is always clean, now that I can just wipe it down.

For low cleaning maintenance and a sense of breathing space:

- Solid surface flooring
- Minimize furniture to absolute basics to gain open spaces which ease cleaning and promote relaxation
- Make storage in existing closets
- Minimize collections that need floor to ceiling shelving, like books.

Solid surface flooring needs some areas of plush comfort. Small low pile area rugs are very easy to clean and provide cozy spots for children to play and spread out. Large floor pillows function as extra seating for young people. Even extra thick blankets placed temporarily on the floor are comfortable for children(and make good tents). We purchased inexpensive vintage hand-tied ethnic wool rugs off ebay for our bare floors. They are soft and very sturdy. The low pile makes them very easy to clean, almost like floor cloth, and the colors are beautiful. Some of the smaller hand-tied wool rugs are very inexpensive, are like-new, and are very comfortable for lounging on. We layer a few over the thinner carpet. Floor pillows can be handmade inexpensively with drop cloth and fiberfill. You need a lot of fiberfill for floor pillows. I'd recommend buying multiple throw pillows at thrifts and yard sales at very low prices. The fill can be cut out and recycled. If you are lucky, you'll find a big fat clean pillow that you can recovered or use as-is. We found two of these that where like-new with very heavy fill. All these open empty spaces can be used for play(think creativity!) and lounging.

For easy comfort on solid surface floors in low furniture living areas, add:

- Low pile area rugs(easy to clean)
- Assorted pillows for floor lounging
- Layer smaller heavy pile soft area rugs(for sitting) over larger area rugs
- Thick blankets or textiles for tents or cozy floor time.

Window blinds are a pain to clean, and they collect dust like nobody's business, and children and pets tend to tear them up. We got rid of ours and added sheers and drapes(thrift store purchases). If your home is cut up into smaller rooms, light and bright will keep it feeling open. Minimal drapes, ones that diffuse the light, and light wall colors enlarge a room. The only exception to light textured window coverings would be the bedrooms, where heavy drapes or light blocking coverings will keep a room dark for a good nights sleep. Hang long window covers high enough so that you don't have to hold them up for floor cleaning. Sheers get sucked into the vacuum when hung too low, as they often are.

Too many framed wall pictures are difficult to keep up with when they need frequent dusting across the tops. Limit framed wall pictures and curio wall shelves.

Lighting can be a cause of furniture overcrowding when you rely on table lamps. Table lamps require side tables. Try going with overhead lighting with higher wattage and/or add a floor lamp. Add small squat table lamps to the tops of entertainment centers and shelving units - use the space you already have. Fluorescent light bulbs put off more light and the bulbs stay cooler, which is great for floor lamps. Fluorescent lighting is also convenient for helping plants grow in darker rooms. Houseplants clean the air in a household, and promote relaxation with their natural beauty and green-scaping. Decorate with plants rather than knickknacks. Plants do get dusty, but a weekly spritzing with water seems to wash most of it off. In warmer weather, take them out for rain shower baths.

Keep it light and easy:
- Limit framed wall pictures; they hold dust which means more work running the dust rag across them.
- Keep drapes minimal and light. Get rid of blinds.
-  Limit table lamps; use overhead lighting or floor lamps.
- Add plants instead of knickknacks. Plants will work for you and promote relaxation with their natural  beauty.  

Everyone is on a budget these days, and despite financial constraints, we've managed to create a home that we enjoy as much as any vacation spot. Look to the web for creative ideas, especially places like Pinterest. Seek out home items at thrift stores, yard sales, and resale places like ebay; and/or make your own and do it yourself (DIY). If you are paring down, it may not cost a penny if you use what you already have creatively.

Keep it simple and clean, design for maximum efficiency. Shoot for larger unencumbered spaces and adaptability. Forget what it should look like - design your home to work for you, not against you. If housekeeping exhausts you, and your home drains you, it's time to let go of stuff - declutter, streamline and reconfigure.

Easy homemade sectional sofa couch - easy to clean, comfortable, sturdy for families, and easy to make.

Easy homemade platform bed with storage shelf at end.

DIY easy low pine storage shelves 

Pictured below - easy homemade shelving units with deep shelves for storage and media....a really old picture(my son is a teenager now), but these shelves are still in service. We also made the toy chests which slide on the floor below the shelves. The wood used to make these units is inexpensive construction grade pine lumber from a big box store. We no longer have those heavy drop cloth curtains. We've left the windows bare for more light and less dust.

Children's Bathroom Organization

Source: Uploaded by user via Hannah on Pinterest

I am so doing this! I'll have them use the longer space for toothpaste

General Cleaning of a Room, 1918

From Household Science in Rural Schools (1918):
"Rooms which are in constant use should be swept and dusted every day. A thorough cleaning of each room in the house will be necessary every week or two, even though the room is swept and kept in order daily. First, all cupboards, drawers, and other receptacles in which articles collect should be cleaned; then all large movable articles should be dusted and moved out of the room; those that are not readily movable should be dusted and covered. The floor should be swept with the windows open; the ceiling and walls should be brushed with a covered broom, and the dust allowed to settle. The floor should then be wiped with a damp cloth on the broom. If the floor is of unfinished-wood, it will require a thorough scrubbing. After sweeping the floor and allowing the dust to settle, a small portion at a time should be scrubbed with a floor-brush and soap. When scrubbing, the grain of the wood should be followed. The scrubbing-water should be changed frequently. For rinsing and drying the floor, a cloth should be wrung out of clear water. The woodwork should be cleaned with a damp cloth and a soap that is not too strong. Soda or sapolio should not be used. The furniture should be carefully uncovered, and everything arranged in perfect order.

The things that are highest should be dusted first, and care should be taken to collect all the dust in the dust-cloth. After collecting the dust, the cloth should be shaken out-of-doors, washed thoroughly, and boiled. The dust-cloth should be dampened before using on all surfaces except the polished furniture and windows.

Sweeping should be done with short strokes and the broom should be kept close to the floor, so that the dust will not be scattered. The corners of the room should be swept first, the dust gathered in the center, and then swept into the dust-pan. The dust should be burned, for it may contain disease germs. Loose hairs and fluff should be removed from the broom after using, and it should also be washed periodically.

Small rugs should be cleaned out-of-doors. They should be swept, beaten, and re-swept, then rolled until ready to be put on the floor. If the rug is a large one and cannot be removed, it should be wiped over with a damp cloth, rolled, and the under side of the rug and the floor beneath it should be wiped.

After the room has been cleaned, the windows should be arranged so that a supply of fresh, clean air can come constantly into it. This is essential to every room in the house, if perfect health is to be maintained."

Wow! Now that's a clean room. I need a carpet beater.

Dish Dryer Rack for File Folder Organization

Source: google.com via Elyse on Pinterest

A Manual Can Opener That Lasts!

WMF Profi Plus Safety Can Opener


I've been using this bit of German engineering weekly for about six months now. I used to get so irritated with manual can openers not working properly or breaking after a month of use. This one has lasted, and it's easy on the hands. It took a while for me to get the hang of it because it opens the outside rim edge of the can, and has to be placed onto the can horizontally. It glides around the can without much effort leaving no sharp edges. It was a bit expensive, but the price was worth it for a reliable can opener. It opens those big 6.5 pound cans effortlessly. I picked this one after reading customer reviews of various can openers, doing a bit of research on Amazon.

Support for the Relaxed Homemaker

Home Living had a wonderful post recently for de-stressing your life as a homemaker. A relaxed homemaker can often find herself out of step with the rest of the world. Being an older keeper of the home, I relate particularly well to her slow living posts. I can never thank her enough for posting supportive and affirming posts on the benefit of an afternoon nap, or "taking to the bed", an old fashioned way to recharge and keep your body healthy when we let ourselves get run down.

She allows for printing of her posts as long as it's for personal use. A handy site is linked making posts print friendly, allowing you to delete sections, and save to a PDF.

If modern society leaves you feeling unsupported and inadequate, read Living Without Unnecessary Stress, and browse her other posts. Slow living is not about being lazy; it's about living smarter, and enjoying a quality of life that lingers, that you can savor and does not lead to indigestion of spirit and soul.