Another Craig List sale!

Remember the bunk bed and dresser I got?

 

 That dresser started out wayyyyy ugly but it was free if my pregnant self in my new mini van could load it up!

It was the first time I was ever thankful for how light fake wood was!
But it cleaned up nicely!

 The bunk bed was a $20 purchase that I didn't really need but 3 going on 4 kids later and some awesome quilts...it has served us well.

 But alas the time has come to depart. My husband is going to make beds that 1.2 hang from the ceiling/ 1/2 hang from the wall. I'm not totally sure what it will all look like but I know it will be AWESOME!
So it is my job to get rid of the bed and I've already replaced the dresser with one he was given on a job site (Solid wood, 5 ft tall...AMAZING! Who GIVES something like that away?)
So today I listed the bed and dresser for $240 baring a new coat of paint. I said I would skip the paint and take off $50 if they wanted. My phone lit up. Exploded. Calls, texts, emails...WHAZAM.
Blown away.
So I've taken the dresser apart, taken the mattresses off, and am waiting for my husband to get home to take the bed apart. The first call said I didn't need to repaint it but could I deliver? For $230 I think I can do that. I feel pretty confident with 3 people as back up plans if the first one falls through. I might be buying and painting bunk beds after this! I'm sure selling the mattresses and having a matching dresser has something to do with it. I did get one email just complimenting my quilts! ha!

Toy storage from Popcorn tins!

 

We like to have a room available to host people/family who need a place to stay. Right now our home is a 3 bedroom house and we have 3 (going on 4!) kids. So that means the office is also the guest bedroom and the kid’s sleeping room is also their playroom! Though many times the play room ends up being the living room!

So in order to keep the toys orderly I devised this organization system that cost me mere dollars.

I got some boy scout popcorn tins at 2 different garage sales and one thrift store:

These tins are a little shorter than the normal popcorn tin and since they all matched I didn’t have to worry about one being skinnier than the other etc…

And they are boy scouts so they are fairly easy to find. They ranged from 10 cents- $1

First I spray painted them metallic.

Then I used my mom’s Cricut to cut out the letters. I could have stenciled them on but this was handy.

 

She was given, as a teacher, the black vinyl so I didn’t even have to buy that!

 

Then I filled them with the toys. I tried to do this with the tried and true toys that have many parts. Like Lincoln logs.

It was like giving the kid’s new toys! They played and played with them. And it was such easy clean up. And easy to say, “Well, put that tin away and then you can get the other one out.”

 

Also it keeps the pieces from being lost.

I have noticed some of the paint chipping off. I did several coats so I’m not sure if I need to do some sort of clear coat on it to help protect it or what. I’ll see how they hold up!

Book in Review: Grace’s Pictures

I just finished reading Grace’s Pictures by Cindy Thomson. It is an excellent book with facts about history, photography, immigrants and living condition of the very early 1900. Thomson takes you back to a time when there weren’t smart phones or digital images and shows a girl’s passion for the art of capturing images. Her passion, however seems bent on getting her in trouble when she continues to snap photos at in opportune moments for the local crime gang.

With the help of the local police, men she had to learn to trust considering it was the police who took her from her mother when she was young, they seek to find the leader of the gang and bring him to justice, saving many immigrants like her from faring evil fates at the docks.

As she fights the fears that her father pounded into her head as a small child she turns to the Lord for her support and lets go of her self doubt.

 

This book is a great read. It has depth and unanswered questions that keep you hanging until the end. Thomson writes with great knowledge about the century and the countries portrayed in the book.

Author Cindy Thomson

Link to Chapter one: https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://files.tyndale.com/thpdata/FirstChapters/978-1-4143-6843-6.pdf

Questions and answers about the author: http://mediacenter.tyndale.com/downloads/press_kits/gracepicauthorq&a.pdf

Author blog: http://cindythomson.blogspot.com/

Onions for Ears!

My oldest started complaining of pain in his ear today. He is 5 and to-date none of my kids have ever had ear infections or ear aches. But today changed things. He has been fighting a cold and a fever (thank you crazy Oklahoma weather that is 95 degrees one day and 31 degrees and snowing the next).

I have lots of friends who's kids have common ear infections and so I has sent out an email linked to a helpful hint about onion juice relieving ear pain. So I pulled up that email and put it to use!

I put my son down to rest and stuck a 1/2 onion in the oven for 15 minutes at 450. I probably didn't need it in there that long. Just enough to make it soft.

 

I then took the very soft onion and squeezed/squished it through a strainer until some of the (very thick) juice ran into a bowl.

  

It didn't make much but all I needed was a few drops.

I didn't have a dropper so I used a syringe and filled it up with a little bit of the juice.



Like I said, it wasn't much.

I then put my son on a pillow so his ear was flat and put a few drops into his ear. He said it instantly felt better.
 

I had also read that you could put an onion on the ear and let the juices run down, so I did that too. I don't think it did anything but since it was still warm I thought maybe a warm onion compress might help.

I left him that way for about 10 minutes and went back in to massage his ear making sure some of the drops got a little deeper. He still claims there is no pain.

Yay for onions!

City Wide Garage Sale! Boohhyaa!!

 

I have no idea when my town wide garage sale is. But I do know when the little town near us has their garage sale. This town has the best school district so it attracts the higher dollar paying parents and land owners who collect things and don’t know the value of them afterwards and sell them once a year for super cheap!

Ok, so that is my take on it.

This morning it was 45 degrees. Cold, windy, and rainy. Perfect for getting good deals!

Check out this flannel board I got for $1. I know. Flannel board. Cheesy. But I think my kids will think it is cool and I’ve already got a family who wants it when I’m done with it. Whoot!

It came in this sweet case!

And has lots of options for having fun!

At our family’s first garage sale stop we got two sleeping bags for $2 each. They are kid size and perfect for my two oldest!

A big need was shirts for my 5 year old. He now has a great selection of short sleeve shirts! I got all these and a sweater for myself for $5

Meanwhile my bargain hunting husband found a good ol’ “remember that!” game for 50 cents.

We need to find the marble for the above game. Maybe eBay? Hubby wants to check at hardware store and that might be cheaper!

Got a $1 shirt for me and a 50 cent linen dress for my girl. Needs some TLC in the wrinkle department. I know.

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More clothes for me, I know this is boring…

This is a little more exciting! These jeans are worth about $30-50 each and I got them for $1 each.

At the end of this month I am in a wedding I got my dress for free & my shoes for free, but now it came time to outfit my daughter!

$6 later I got a $40 dress and shoes!

I got a steal on these paints! Talked her down for $5 to $2.

This pop up bucket was priced at $2. I’ve never seen such a sturdy bucket! But I offered her $.50 and she took it without hesitation. Yay!

My favorite buy is this! A faux leather bag from West Nine for $9. My own bag just busted a strap so “Yay” for this replacement!

Also the tin is from Silver Dollar City, where we go, and from the tags this is the 3rd time it has been sold. I got it for $.50. The last person got it for $2.59 and I think it originally was sold for about $12 with soap in it! Might make a great way to gift some homemade soap!

I also got this awesome Moby Wrap for $5.

Just look at the sale price on this! Between $40-125! I think mine is the $43 one. Score!

I really wanted to try one of these for our next kid.

 

Oh! And my money maker! (I hope!)

Sorry about the poor picture but this is a $3 find!

It is a rocker child’s chair! I’m so excited to see if I can get $40-50 out of this.

After my little girl is done with it, of course!

Review of “Adventures in Odyssey Meal time Devotions”

 

I grew up a huge fan, and still am, of Adventures in Odyssey by Focus on the Family. When Tyndale house publishing offered my blog a chance to review this book I was thrilled! Meal time devotion is a great way for families on the go to connect at meals. It has a very short and interactive devotion that brings in the food, environment, and God’s love all presented to the children in a casual setting.

By singing songs and playing games as well as holiday fun, this book will add spice to any table. It is great for younger children as the questions tend to be simple, and the songs catchy as well as the devotions short.

Some of the themes include: Eat your veggies, What time is it?, Don’t go solo, Are you nuts, surprise inspection, and Drink you milk. All valuable filled information that will help the kid’s spiritual growth!

Valentine’s day Calendar

I finally found a way to surprise my hubby: Just don’t think of it until the night before. Then everyone gets surprised!

Well, the night before Valentine’s day I thought of making Joel a new large wall calendar.

His work one we made him many years back was growing a bit old and was on the small size.

(No he isn’t into math like crazy, those are one of our workers who used to be a math teacher!)

For a while we had used electrical tape we’d cut down for the lines but about a year ago he took those off…I know, yuck.

I had checked into boards like these, but they run around $50.

No. Thank. You

By chance I heard my hubby tell our bro in law last Saturday that one can get a wall covering that is a white erase board.

So using this as inspiration:

And this one where a lady painted the whole wall in her narrow hallway:

I found the board the hubby had talked about at Lowes.It was really cheap ($11) for a huge sheet of White/Gloss Hardboard Wall Panel. I took a marker with me to make sure it would work as white board. In hind sight that could have turned out really bad if it hadn’t worked!!! Lol!

The guy who came to my aid at Lowes instantly regretted it when I told him I needed 36 squares. It was 7:30 in the morning. Maybe he was still waking up and I misunderstood his look.

He cut a great 8x8 squares for me and then I dug through the garage for tools to drill holes. I finally found drill bit that worked and drilled away! My idea was to make a calendar that the day’s could easily be removed and written on then hung back up. So the nail holes needed to be large enough to not get caught up.

I got a circle punch from Hobby Lobby and used a coupon so it cost only $9. I punched black circles out and then cut the numbers out of white paper. Then I laminated them by hand using clear laminate. then stuck them on with sticky tack.

I use this stuff all the time. It works for labels and covering books. It is the best!

 

I used it to cover the days of the week as well.

Finally, my creation complete!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thrifting for the family

 

“You find such GREAT deals!”

I hear this a lot. Do you? When pointing out my $6 kid rug ($30 at Target), or $5 Roman curtains (who knows how much at wherever!)…and I have to agree. But it is work. To find the deals you have to look. Over and over and over. Luckly I have eBay to sustain me between good deal for myself!

Today’s find was this:

For $3.99 I got a microwavable $35.95 Pop corn popper. Which apparently is super healthy and organic and small enough to fit over my fridge!

And I love the way it looks! Beats the one my folks had while I was growing up:

Oddly enough I had just decided that popcorn would be a great snack for the kids. I wanted to have a snack bin for all those “I’m hungry” times. We don’t do store bought snacks in our family and this will be a way to ‘splurge’. So on the way home I stopped by the grocery and purchased a pound of popcorn for $1.47.

And the popper worked perfectly!!! This is 1/3 cup of popcorn!

 

When I finished bagging the popcorn I stuck all the kernels on the bottom back in the microwave.

Waste not, want not!

So I now have a nice snack stash for my 3 youngins’!

Oh, and I popped the corn plain for now, but it does come with a lid for melting butter in it.

I’m just not sure how the metal will do in the microwave…still doing research on why they made this with a metal lid, now they use all silicone lids.

So that is my thrifty find for the family! How did you do?