I'm a wife, stay-at-home mom, crafter, and blogger living in rural New England. As seen in Martha Stewart Living, Food Network Magazine, and more! | Tutorials, DIY, crafts, parenting tips, recipes, money saving tips, product reviews, local product features, New England living, intentional living, and more! |
I shared this photo on my Instagram Stories earlier and got so many comments I figured it was worth explaining! Here in New England during winter, things get sooo dry indoors with the freezing cold temps outside and heat cranking inside - as a result your skin and throat really suffer, feeling constantly dry and scratchy. | This post contains affiliate links |
One solution is to get a humidifier to put some moisture back into the dry air. In fact we do have a
cool mist humidifier upstairs that we run at night when it's particularly dry or we're sick, but otherwise you can't beat the price and efficiency of an old fashioned "New England Humidifier" - a.k.a. a pot of water on the wood stove or radiator.
It works by simply adding moisture into the air by letting the water evaporate. It's most efficient when you put the pot of water on the heat source so it evaporates a bit quicker, but if you don't have a stove or radiator you can also leave the pot by a heating vent or just in the room with you. If you do leave the pot on your stove or radiator, just make sure it doesn't go dry (you want to take it off when you leave the house too) otherwise you might end up with a scorched pot!
Way back when I first opened my Etsy shop, I mostly made jewelry. Since then I've transitioned the shop to home decor items but still have quite a bit of jewelry inventory hanging around. With Christmas right around the corner, I thought it would fun to list some of these items at a huge discount to make a little more room in the studio. In our CLEARANCE section you can find these items listed for 50% off - perfect for last minute stocking stuffers!
*All sales are final and purchases made by 12/15 should arrive in time for Christmas, however I am unable to guarantee delivery date. Jewelry items may have some slight tarnishing.
Having a newborn means there's a lot of little essentials you're going to need - and even though this is our second baby, things like new combs, thermometer, and teether are always needed. Safety 1st was kind enough to send us their Precious Memories Premium Baby Care Set for our newest addition to the family and I wanted to share with you all the wonderful things that are included. | This post contains an honest review of products provided to us from Safety 1st. This post also contains affiliate links. |
First of all I just wanted to point out what a great value the Premium Baby Care Kit is! It includes all the items seen below - including a fox wash mitt, booger sucker, cradle cap brush, thermometer, toothbrush, comb, brush, teether, nail clippers, and photo cards. Whew. And it's all boxed up neatly in a sturdy wooden box that can easily be reused as handy storage in the nursery. All-in-all it's a $75 value but retails for less than half of that on Amazon! This would make the perfect affordable and easy baby shower gift for a friend or coworker (or for yourself!).
The kit also comes with these really sweetly illustrated "First Cards" by Milestone Baby. These are perfect for documenting those special firsts with your baby. I also love that there's a little spot to record the date as well so the cards can be kept and tucked away in your memory box after.
We've been using these items for a few weeks now and our favorites so far have definitely been the cute fox washing mitt (which our four-year-old has claimed as hers) as well as the cradle cap brush which we use religiously with each bath for our baby. I just love how the brush really scrubs off the the flaky skin without being too tough on your baby's sensitive scalp! It really does a wonderful job.
- I received this item for review from Safety 1st/Milestone Baby but all opinions expressed are my own. Please read our full Disclosure Policy for more information -
Safety 1st's Premium Baby Care Kit can be found at various retailers including Amazon and Babies 'R Us. Don't forget to follow @Safety_1st and @Milestonebaby on Instagram to see their latest products!
Our Etsy shop is back open for business after my Maternity Leave!
Quantities in the shop will be very limited this season since we're still so busy with our newest addition to the family. Please shop early and check back often as I'll be restocking the listings as I am able.
You might remember a previous post where I reused a repaired coffee mug as an herb planter in the kitchen. Well this year I decided to transform that mug one more time into a little bird feeder for a focal point in the flower garden.
Supplies & How-to:
The supply list really couldn't be more simple - all you need is a mug, bowl, or plate, a wooden dowel, a rubber cap, and some super glue! That's it!
I had my husband paint the wooden dowel with a couple coats of white outdoor paint first (normally I would have painted it, but the outdoor paint isn't recommended to be used by pregnant women). I wanted it painted to give a bit more of a finished look and to help make sure the dowel lasts longer outdoors.
Then with a little bit of Super Glue, I attached the rubber cap to the bottom of the ceramic mug.
By having the mug be removable from the dowel, you can easily pound the dowel sturdily into the ground with a small mallet or hammer then add the feeder once the dowel is in place. It also makes it easy to clean out the feeder regularly.
Since we've had bears frequent our neighborhood lately, I will just be filling the mug with water for now for birds and butterflies to drink from. Once the bears go into hibernation again I will be able to safely fill it with bird seed for our feathered friends.
Overall I'm happy with how this simple project came out - it adds the perfect touch to our flower bed!
Amazon Prime Day deals start tonight at 9PM! I'll be sharing some of my favorite deals here over on Facebook so stay tuned! Prime Day is a great time to get ahead on Christmas and birthday shopping and to finally get that something special for yourself too.
Not a Prime Member? Sign up for a FREE 30-day trial
HERE (affiliate link) and take advantage of all the sales over the next two days.
With baby #2 coming, we've been more mindful than ever about where our money is going and working hard to stay on-budget. By closely keeping track of everything we're getting a better idea on where everything is going and where we can shave off a few dollars. With only one income and a lot of expenses (both expected and unexpected) it can make it very challenging to stay on-budget each month. | This post contains affiliate links. |
Here I've shared a more simplified version of the spreadsheet we use (since we're self-employed we also need to set aside money for quarterly taxes and other expenses). You can change the Expense titles in the left hand column to fit your needs, but I've tried to include all the basic expenses that most young adults will have.
Next replace the monthly Income in the example with your own monthly income (I had to put in a number here as an example so the formulas wouldn't result in error). Then go down the Budget column and fill in what you expect or budget your bills to be. As your bills come in, put in these figures in the Actual Spent column. All of the percentages and totals will auto-update as you fill in the chart.
Over the course of the next few months, you'll see how your expectations (Budget) line up with reality (Actual Spent) and will be able to identify trends. Maybe you spend more for Gas than you thought you did.. or maybe you realize that you spend too much on Entertainment and should put some of that towards other bills...? Keeping track of where everything is going is very eye-opening and will help you stay ahead. The most important thing is writing everything down and sticking to it!
In the event the doing an Excel spreadsheet isn't your thing, there are also many great paper-based Budget Planners/Trackers you can buy out there! I haven't used it myself (yet), but I have heard great things in particular about this highly rated Budget Planner Notebook.
