How to Bend & Shape PVC Pipe

The man of the house has been wanting to expand his work shop area for some time. I am happy to have him do it because the small enclosure he uses as a shop really is too small to hold all his tools. When ever he has a project he needs to pull everything out onto the patio to make room for working. Since he only has scraps of time, his "stuff" lives on the patio indefinitely till he finishes his project and DRIVES ME CRAZY!  annoys me. 

But there has been something preventing him from expanding the shop; me.....uh I mean a water faucet; the only one available to the back yard. It was all the way in the far back corner and required me to pick my way over and through his stuff, squeeze by some over grown oleanders to get to it all the while looking out for scorpions and black widows with each step back there!  The faucet first, then the shop I insisted. 

Twinning: Weaving a Rag Rug

Debra over at Frugal Little Bungalow has been responsible for me getting interested in a couple of things; quilting along with the Benjamin Biggs Quilt, and Twinning a rag rug. Thanks Debra! I have found that I love Twinning much more than crocheting for rag rugs. Very satisfying and addicting for me. My loom measures 26" x 38", it has nails across the top spaced at 1/2 inch intervals. It also has a metal rod down the side to keep the sides straight and not have them pull in. I can't imagine how hard it would be to have straight sides without that rod! I had a bit of a wobble even with it there.

DIY Painted Wood Bowl

Oh my I love this distressed chippy paint bowl project! The photography is wonderful and the tutorial is very good. A frugal easy DIY project to add to the beauty in your home. Really great gift idea here too ;) You will find the tutorial over at Anderson and Grant. 

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This link is from my weekly link up, Wow Us Wednesdays and is my feature. I link at these parties.

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Bibs from Drop Cloth & Fabric Scraps

Super easy and fun bibs for from drop cloth and fabric scraps! A great way to use up scraps and a fun way to use drop cloths too. Things need not cost a lot and free is always good. Like I always say, use what you already have. You can do that to make these bibs. See the tutorial over Hill House Homestead. 

Copyright © Family Home and Life 2010-2014 All Rights Reserved

Adding Pizzazz to Book Shelves

Remember the TV cabinet we made from kitchen cabinets? I wanted to put something inside on the back to kind of finish them off. They were fine as they were but I thought they could use a bit of sophistication. I have seen several different ways to do this as well as different materials used and techniques to accomplish it. It was easy, so easy I can't believe I didn't do it sooner!

Almost Free Decorating

Decorating for free is possible, but not always so easy. Taking a free item and making it into something new and usable usually takes a little work. We are always looking for free items we can use around here. Instead looking at something and trying to think of what it could become, I think of what I need, and then see what I have that can possibly be what I need. For instance, I wanted a smaller TV cabinet and thought about the size it should be, then began to look for pieces that were about that size or could be made to that size. It would need shelves and I wanted doors too. And what do I always say? Use what you already have!

22 Repurposing Ideas

Re-purposing. It's a trendy thing to do these days. Or wait, hasn't re-purposing been around for a while? Yes, it has. It is something I love to do and I find a fun challenge at times. It is great way to save money too, using what you already have. Or perhaps a freebie you found or were given can become something usable for your family. What kind of new life can you give something today? Here are some really great ideas. 

Save Time Doing Laundry, My Version

Laundry can be quite boring so hang with me here ok? How many times do you have to go around to different rooms in your house putting clean laundry away? How many times in a week do you open a set of drawers to stash underwear and socks? How many times have you re-folded clothing because it didn't get put away, or re-washed something because it was too wrinkled from not being folded and put away? Or, re-washed a whole load because you forgot to put it in the dryer?

Oh, you haven't counted? Well, saving time and effort is something I take seriously, so I have counted ;o)  No just kidding, I don't have an actual number but being aware of how I do things around the house and then working on stream lining the process gives me more time to do things I want to do like write this! 

Denim Repurposed

Denim jeans; American just like Apple Pie and Baseball. I love blue jeans, and I have recycled, up-cycled, re-used and re-purposed lots of them over the years. A couple of tips.....use really sharp scissors and a denim needle in your machine. Look for 50% off thrift store sales or purchase used jeans at yard sales very inexpensively for your projects.  Here is a round up of denim jeans from my linkers at WUW. 

Fresh Herbs in Winter

Guest Post

Greetings form the North Maine Woods! I'm Sheryl Thompson aka The Wilderness Wife and I blog over at The Wilderness Wife Blog. It's a blog about my life in the wilderness of the North Maine Woods and all the things I enjoy doing - cooking, crafting, gardening and enjoying the outdoors. I feel honored that Connie has invited me to share with you so I thought I would tell you about something that incorporates two of my favorite things - cooking and gardening. 

That's my sleepy little herb garden under that blanket of snow above! And I really miss it. I love cooking with fresh herbs. In the summer and early fall, I can just step out the kitchen door and grab a handful of whatever herbs I need. But right now, in the dead of winter (we still have 4ft. of snow on the ground) that isn't going to happen.  And where I live the little general store doesn't carry fresh herbs, even in the summer.  So I always had to use dried herbs.  Sometimes that can work.  Herbs like rosemary, oregano, basil are all right dried but dried parsley or dried chives just aren't appealing in my book! So this year I have started growing herbs on my windowsill.

Organize Your Cars Glove Box

The glove box of my car was always a mess. Finding a good organizing system for the auto registration, insurance papers and other things I store in there, was as easy as re-purposing a coupon organizer.

Quick and Easy Valentines Decor

Valentines Day kind of gets passed over around here as there are birthdays galore from mid January to mid February and I am busy making gifts and celebrating at parties and dinners out. Valentines Day gets lost in all the other activity. But I did want to have a little holiday decor for the kids and this is an idea that can be used in different ways and for different Holidays. Around here things have to be fast, inexpensive or free, and I usually use what I already have. 

Re-Purposing Pool Noodles

Remember that garage sale stuff I bought a while back? There were a couple of Pool Noodles in the pile that I re-purposed. It was fun and I found several uses for them around the house.  I could have used a few more!

Soft, Spreadable Butter

I love butter; I've never been a big fan of margarine. Butter is better for you than margarine too. Haven't you seen that email forward that's been going around for years or maybe the article on Facebook about the horrors of margarine? No? Well check this out, or this. Ok, are you convinced butter is better?

There are a couple of problems with using butter however. Straight out of the fridge it's 

Saving Money at Home

I am looking back on some of my past post. I hope you will look with me!

Looking for ways to save money? 

Save money, the environment and protect your families health by making your own cleaning products; check here also. The scrubbing sponge? Might not be what you think.  Use this idea to keep your feet looking good and save on Pedicures.

Make your own Sugar or Salt Scrub for you or as gifts.

Find out where to buy spices to save money with this post. 

Think microwave popcorn is too expensive? Make your own. 

A lot of money savings by shopping sales and planning menu's; here's how I do it.

Here's my two cents worth on why I buy certain things from the grocery store. 
Under my Label Saving Money there are a lot more porjects and ideas for you.

I link at these parties.

 If you are reading this post anywhere else but at Family Home and Life then it was used without permission! Please report it! Copyright© Family Home and Life 2012 All Rights Reserved

Re-purposed Ribbon Storage

*Join me on Wednesdays for Wow Us Wednesday live at 12:00 AM*

You all know that I love to re-purpose and use what I already have.  I went thrifting and found some things I could re-purpose at a yard sale. I paid five dollars for it all. Here is the first item I re-purposed....

Black Eyed Peas and Cornbread Cakes

I love Cornbread and I love Blackeyed Peas so why haven't I written this post before? I have no idea but I wanted to do something for New Years Day and you should be eating Blackeyed Peas for good luck on New Year's Day right? You have time to go to the grocery for ingredients before tomorrow. Here's how I make this dish. Remember that it's only Papa and I eating this (it is enough for dinner and lunch the next day) so you may want to double the recipe if you have more people to feed. This is a very frugal dish to make.

Start by placing 1 cup of Blackeyed Peas in a pot and cover with 5-6 cups of water. You may want to add more water later. Bring to a boil and turn the heat very low and simmer. Most people soak the peas over night but I usually don't remember to do that.

I often cook them with chopped ham or a ham bone; sausage is good as well as bacon. I am cooking the bacon separate this time as to not add the fat to the peas. Also I really like the crunch of the crisp fried bacon.

You could also add some type of fresh or frozen greens (2-4 cups of kale, collards or even spinach) at this point, but the man of the house wouldn't eat it if I do so I leave them out.  A can of chopped stewed tomatoes is a really nice addition too but I don't add them for the same reason as not adding the greens :) Continue to cook another half hour or a full hour until the peas are soft and your additions are cooked. 

Serve the Blackeyed Peas over a Cornbread Cake and garnish with crisp fried bacon.

Now that's the way to start a new year, with delicious and healthy food. Well, this is my last post of this year. It has been a year that was busy and full; and very blessed. There were trials and issues to overcome, but we came through it all together. I will see you in the new year! Thank you so much for stopping by!

I link at these parties; Old Time Farmhouse and The Shabby Creek Cottage.

If you are reading this post anywhere else but at Family Home and Life then it was used without permission! Please report it! Copyright© Family Home and Life 2012 All Rights Reserved

Easy Christmas Decorating Idea

 *This is a re-post from last year.*

Gramma’s workshop has been on overload for a while now! I’m sorry but there is not enough time in the day to make the kids gifts and post about it all at the same time. I’ll have to do that later. But I did want to share a Christmas decorating idea with you.

I am seeing glass covered cake stands, cloches, and glass domes used for decorating everywhere and decided to see if I could do something fun for Christmas with my cake stand. I like to use what I already have whenever possible, and that's just what I did with this idea. This is what I came up with!

I created a little scene on the cake plate, and sprinkled artificial snow on it. Holding the cover over the sink, and using my fingers, I dabbed the top with a little water and let some drip down the sides.

Then immediately, using a spoon, I generously sprinkled some sugar on the wet area and then set it aside to dry. When it was dry, I carefully turned it over tapping gently, allowing the excess sugar to fall into the sink, and then placed the cover on top of the cake stand.

What do you think? I love it! When Christmas is over, it will go into the dish washer for easy clean up.

Merry Christmas all!

I link at these parties and Creative Cabin. 

Kids Activitiy Binder

I sometimes find it hard to keep my older grandchildren occupied while I am busy with the younger children. One day I found some free kids printables online and printed a few things out for them to do.....things like dot to dots, hidden pictures and mazes. Soon, they were finishing them before I could get the next one printed out. That could get expensive fast not to mention it was becoming wasteful. 

I printed out several different activities in a variety of skill levels and marked each level by number, with a #1 being the easiest. Then, I put them into protective plastic sleeves and placed them all in a binder. Armed with a washable marker the kids can find an activity for their skill level, complete the activity, and then the markers will wipe off  for the page to be used again. No more wasted paper and printer ink, no more keeping grandma running to the computer to print one more thing.

Our binder has grown to over 100 sheets now with educational activities added too; pages for practicing writing and number skills, tic tac toe games, etc. The binder could be divided up into individual activities or skill levels with tabs; though this Gramma has yet to find the time for that. It's nice for the kids to be able to take it outside on a quilt to work on, or to use while sitting quietly when Gramma is busy or just needs quiet time (or to finish a blog post ;) It will pack up nice for car trips too. 

Here's a good place to get started with your activity binder printables. Do you have any suggestions for additional activities I can add to my Activities Binder?

 I link at these parties.

I have had a lot of content theft lately. If you are reading this post anywhere else but at Family Home and Life then it was used without permission! Copyright© Family Home and Life 2012 All Rights Reserved

Scripture Ornaments

This is an easy and fast yet lovely Christmas Ornament that you can make with the kids. I call them Scripture Ornaments because I used a page from the Bible about the birth of Jesus as my back ground. But if scripture is not your thing sheet music is nice or make up your own verbiage. These would make great gifts or tweak this version to make gift tags.

Here’s how I made these. 

**Update** PicMonkey has started charging for some of it's features though most features are still free and very useable for this craft. I will be checking out other free sites to see what they have to offer and let you know what I find. In the mean time, a good free site is Ribbet and Fotor.

Before we get started, I want to tell you that while there are a lot of popular crafting projects that use old book pages, I cringe whenever I think of old books being destroyed for the sake of crafting! Old books can be very valuable so please do a Google search to find out about yours before you start cutting it up or use cheap paper backs. I scanned the pages I wanted to use into my computer…… I can reuse that same page over and over without destroying another Bible or book! If you don’t have a scanner, try taking a photo of the page. Ok, on with the tutorial.

Upload your image to PicMoney and size it appropriately. I choose to make mine 8x10. Then I choose overlays-geometric-circles. I played with the placement of the circles so I could get the size I wanted and carefully placed them. I wanted them to be uniformed because I would be printing both sides of the card stock and wanted my Monogram to be centered on both sides. Once I had the circle the size it needed to be, I faded it so I could see the words underneath and duplicated it. (duplicate by right clicking and choosing duplicate overlay)

Next I choose ‘P’ (text) then choose a font I liked, and sized the letter to fit the circle appropriately. I wanted the letter to be black and choose not to fade the color. Next I duplicated my letter and placed one in each circle. Then I went back to each circle and faded the color completely out. Now I saved my image to my picture files. 

 I printed my image onto card stock that I had cut down to regular printer paper size. I marked a corner of the page with an X so I would be sure to reload the page for printing on the other side correctly. After the page is printed, find something to trace a circle with that you can see through; I am using a small mason jar lid. Trace your circles and cut them out. 

Punch a hole for hanging in the top; roll them first into glue then into glitter. 

Let them dry and add your string or ribbon for hanging. 

I used twine that I unraveled using only a single strand. If you want these to last year after year, a coat of Mod Podge will be helpful.

This is a great project to make with the kids, it’s easy, fast, and the final product is very good even in the hands of a six year old! My oldest grand daughter and I made these together and she chose to cut hers out in the shape of stars without the monogram. She used a star stamp to trace around. Instead of using ribbon or twine for the tie, she used chenille stems. She could manage the chenille stems but couldn't tie the twine; also I think she liked the pop of color.

Please feel free to save and use my scripture image to your computer to use again and again or upload to PicMonkey, you can do that by right clicking and choosing save image.  If you would like to print this image as is, click here. You can find vintage sheet music at Graphics Fairy. 

I link at these Parties. Please join me on Wednesdays for Wow Us Wednesday.

I have had a lot of content theft lately. If you are reading this post anywhere else but at Family Home and Life then it was used without permission! Copyright© Family Home and Life 2012 All Rights Reserved