Electric Stovetop Cleaning

For those of you who have an electric stove top I found this cleaning tip that is absolutely amazing! I don't mind cooking on an electric stove top at all. I grew up using one at my parents and it never bothered me. Anyway my parents stove top was black and ours is white. It shows EVERYTHING. It looks dirty and disgusting which drives me nuts because I like my kitchen and house to look clean. It made me start to hate our stove with a passion. It always had burnt marks and lines all over it.

 This is what it would look like...but worse because it would be a few days worth of burnt marks on it.

 This is everything you will need. Some baking soda, a scraper, spoon, a bowl, and some water. My favorite part is most people have this in their home already. We did so I tried it ASAP when I ran across this trick.

 Put some baking soda in a bowl and add some water until a paste forms.

 Put the paste all over the burnt marks and let it sit for just a few minutes. It doesn't take long at all.

 Use the scrapper and it just scrapes off. It doesn't take much effort on your part at all. I recommend testing the scrapper a little. I wouldn't want anybody to scrape off any protective coating your stove top may have (I'm not sure if they do this but testing a small area is always the smart way to go).

 You will see the paste collecting all the gross burnt color. 

This whole process maybe took 5 minutes. It looks brand new and I no longer have to hate my stove!! I had to pass this on in case someone else out there hates their stove too. :)

Benefits of a Snow Day

The last snow day we had I got on Facebook and saw nothing but negative comments. Why? I understand everyone is tired of winter and the snow, but you can't do anything about it. All your complaining is doing is making the world more negative. It's bad enough without the added negativity. God is controlling the weather so if he wants it to snow it will snow. Instead of grumbling and complaining about how its inconveniencing, we should step back and look at his work. That sparked my blog for today. I thought about what made my snow day awesome and here are some of my reasons. 

 

1. A little snow goes a long way. It amazes me that snow can make the dead look beautiful. I love watching it snow and seeing how beautiful it makes the scenery.

2.  I get to spend the day with my puppies. They are just too cute!  In your case you get to stay home with your kids or family. Maybe you were complaining because of this?

3. Movies!! On a weekday I feel that watching a movie takes up my entire night, but not on a snow day. I can watch a movie or too and still be productive.

4. I get to do my dishes and not feel rushed. For me, I get home at 5 and try to spend that time with Curt. Doing dishes, cooking, etc takes away from that and I'm not a fan. I got to get the dishes all cleaned up and cleaned my kitchen while I was at it.

5. I got to set my clock to the time. This is one of my weird things. I like my clocks to be exact. It drives me nuts if they are a minute or two off. Luckily my snow day happened after daylight savings and I could take all the time I wanted to get these babies on the right time.

 6. I get to eat a delicious breakfast that doesn't have to be scarfed down in 5 minutes or less. I don't wake up early enough to make yummy breakfasts everyday, but on snow days this changes.

7. Chilling on the couch with a blanket. I love staying in my pj's and cuddling under a blanket while watching my movies. Perfect way to beat the cold...plus Dash will join me on the couch sometimes and I get to cuddle with him.

8. I get to enjoy my shower and not be rushed. They are normally only a few minutes longer, but I don't feel like I'm running a race to get to work on time. :) Oh as a side note our shower head sucked....it squirted water everywhere and not much went onto us. We had a gift card to Menard's and decided to use part of it toward a new one.We got a waterfall one (which is pictured below) and it's amazing. Its worth every penny and was only like $35. Totally makes it feel like a spa. I recommend getting one.

9. You get to bake and make delicious desserts.  Mine happened to be shortcake so I could make strawberry shortcake. Yes it was awesome.

10. I got to workout and do an entire Zumba class (60 minutes long) instead of the short class which is only 20 minutes long. I do the short classes during the week so it doesn't cut out Curt and I time. 

 

11. I don't have a picture of this but you get to each lunch on an actual plate. Not out of a plastic container or baggie.

Now those are just a few reasons. Next time there is a snow day, whether its next week or next winter, be grateful you get to spend time with family and get a little break.

Laundry Room Makeover!

So our house needed color...badly. It was all the same tan color which isn't bad, but can be bland. I'm so excited that we finally finished this project! The room has been painted for a few weeks, but since we don't have many tools it took us awhile to get everything to get the shelf finished.

Before

 

After

 Ahh I love it now! It was pretty before, but now it is definitely more us (or me). Paint is amazing. I am loving that shelf over the washer and dryer too. I don't have too many decorations, but that will  change eventually.

 I found this rug at J.C.Penney. Their home decorations are super cute.

This was the same coat rack as before. I just painted it white and then put a sealer on top. 

 I was thinking how handy it would be to have the laundry detergent and fabric softener on that shelf. So I thought about how to make them decorative and thought of glass containers. The coolest containers I could find happened to be decanters, but I found them for $3 and $15.

I had a little basket and put my dryer sheets in it so they are handy as well. Let's hope this makes doing laundry a little more fun. :)

My Inspiration

My inspiration! I knew I wanted to paint our laundry room/mud room so I began looking on Pintrest. I ran across this picture and knew it was what I wanted.

Do you have any room makeovers you are planning? My next makeover is our guest bathroom!

Carter's Birthday!

Two weekends ago we got to celebrate Carter's birthday. Birthday's for our nephews are always fun! 

 Carter loved standing on the back of this tricycle.

 Eating dinner

 Totally hamming it up for the camera. These were like 2 seconds apart....Don't believe that lip.

 Jasper was having fun with all his family there too!

 He loved the candles.

 He knows he is supposed to blow but this was his attempt at it.

 Mmmmmm yummy cake

 Jasper eating some pizza and pasta

 Candid shots of the party

 Jasper got in on the action to blow out the candles

 What a cutie

 Checking out the gifts Curt and I got him.

 I think he is pretty excited to check out this duck. It impressed me because it is a bath toy as well as just a regular toy. It somehow senses when its in the water. My bath toys when I was little didn't even make noise. I had a Ken doll whose legs changed colors and that was the most impressive bath toy I had. :)

 Curt always snaps random pictures of me. This one turned out pretty good though. Maybe he has some photography talent he just isn't telling me about.

 Curt and I couldn't make it to Jasper's birthday party so we brought his gifts to Carter's birthday.

 He looks pretty excited about that giant box of crayons. We had to make sure he had plenty of colors to choose from. I think Bonnie was pretty excited for these too. haha

 You can never go wrong with books or cars for this kid. We got him a book with toy cars....extra awesome.

Our gift wouldn't be complete without a giant coloring book. They didn't have a cars one but we thought planes may work. Either way its a giant piece of paper he can color all over.