Green Cleaning: Air Freshener Spray

Air Freshener Spray:

Ingredients ~

• 1 clean 12-oz. spray bottle


• 1/4 cup rubbing alcohol


• 25 drops bergamot essential oil


• 8 drops clove essential oil


• 5 drops lemon essential oil


• 1 cup distilled water

Here's what you do with it ~

• In the spray bottle, combine the alcohol and oils, shake well to disperse oil.


• Add water and shake for a minute or two to blend.


• Let the mixture sit for a few days before using. This will allow the fragrance to blend.

A quick spritz will freshen a room!

You can experiment with different oils like lavender, pine, orange, grapefruit, eucalyptus, rose or spearmint.

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Green Cleaning: Fabric Softener

Fabric Softener:

Ingredients ~

• 1/4 cup baking soda
• 1/2 cup white vinegar

Here's what you do with it ~

• Fill the washing machine with water.
• Add the baking soda and then the clothing.
• During the final rinse, add vinegar or pour into softener dispenser.

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Is your family taken care of if you die?

I was talking to a man who sells life insurance last year about going into the business with him. I had thought since the economy was down, business would be bad but he said it was just the opposite. When the economy gets bad, he said his business goes up because it gets people thinking about their loved ones being taken care of. I bought all the materials, studied, and was ready to take the test when I decided against it. He and a relative of mine got involved and it ended quickly and nastily. I didn't think it'd be a good idea to get into that mix!

Learning all the ins and outs of life insurance had me thinking about my own family and own life insurance policies. I did start looking for online life insurance though to beef up our current life insurance we already have, which we did. I haven't decided if I will ever pursue a career in life insurance but now our family is covered should anything happen to one of us.

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Dr Would Not Give Swine Flu Vaccine to His Own Kids

Will you vaccine your kids? Why or why not?

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Medelita Contest to Win $50 AMEX Gift Card

Medelita is a top supplier of medical clothing - lab coat, nurse scrubs, clinician scrubs. If you're a nurse or work in a hospital, they can hook you up. If you know somebody who is, start your holiday shopping early.

For the rest of us not in the medical field, they can still hook you up - with some extra spending money. Enter their contest by September 30, 2009 to win a $50 AMEX gift card.

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Alli

I wrote the other day about insulin resistance and belly fat due to high cortisol (caused by chronic stress). It's a big problem in our society as people get busier and busier while the economy stresses us around the clock. I'd like to see a study of how much weight people have gained over the past few years while our economy hit the skids.

There are probably a lot of people looking at weight loss products. I looked up an alli review myself. I wanted to see what the side effects of this could be because it's highly visible in the aisles when I go shopping every week. Does it work? Doesn't it? These are things that I was curious about.

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Great Way to Get Kids to Floss

Getting my kids to floss has always been difficult. The smaller ones have a hard time manipulating the regular flosses with their hands and getting all the areas they're supposed to. Now there's a kids floss that my kids think is "cool" and even my four-year-old was able to do it herself after I showed her how briefly. They didn't mind me doing it but they were a bit impatient to do it themselves. Now that it's more fun for them, I'm hoping they'll continue to floss regularly now.

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Green Cleaning: Automatic Dishwashing Detergent

Automatic Dishwashing Detergent:

Ingredients ~

• 2 cups borax
• 2 cups washing soda
• 1 clean 32-oz. plastic container with cover

Here's what you do with it ~

• Combine the borax and washing soda in the container and seal it tightly for storage.
• For each load of dishes, put two tablespoons of the mixture in the dishwasher soap dispenser.
• For sparkling dishes, add 1 to 1-1/2 cups of white vinegar to the rinse cycle or pour vinegar into the rinse compartment before starting.

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7th Grade Health Class Topics

My 12 year old has a Health class in 7th grade. I've never had "Health" before so I asked the teacher for the syllabus. Here is what is included:

• Nutrition
• Body Systems
• Physical Fitness
• Suicide
• First Aid
• Sexuality
• Drugs & Alcohol

I'm curious to know what exactly they will be teaching for Sexuality. I would imagine that during these classes, a lot of kids will be wearing red faces.

My daughter is already certified through the Red Cross for CPR/First Aid so that part of the class should be just a refresher for her.

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Belly Fat and Insulin Resistance

Did you know that stress can give you belly fat? Stress can cause high cortisol levels which in turn causes insulin resistance. Some other signs and symptoms of insulin resistance includes fatigue, sweet and caffeine cravings, headaches, migrating pains, elevated blood pressure and of course, elevated cortisol. Considering that all of that predisposes you to diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and hormone-sensitive cancers, it's important to remove what is causing the stress where you can and learn to relax stress away when you can't remove the cause from your life.

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Need Husband Motivator

Last winter, my outdoor furniture was left outside in the elements because my husband kept putting off and putting off putting them away...until spring came and he didn't have to! This year, I might have to invest in outdoor furniture covers so I don't need to worry about my beautiful patio table getting ruined. It took me a year to get that table so I want to take care of it, but I can't move it down the long deck stairs and into the garage by myself but I can cover it up by myself. So I guess his choice will be to move my furniture into the garage or hand out the cash! I wonder if that'll sufficiently motivate him?

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Green Cleaning: Super Window and Glass Cleaner

Super Window & Glass Cleaner:

Ingredients ~

• 1/3 cup white vinegar
• 1/4 cup rubbing alcohol
• 3-1/2 cups water
• 1 clean 32-oz. spray bottle

Here's what you do with it ~

• Mix all the ingredients in a spray bottle.
• Shake well before using.
• Spray on surface; use newspaper to wipe.

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Vow Renewal: More Thoughts

When you renew your vows and have a celebration afterward, do you still do some of the traditional things like throwing the flower bouquet and wedding favors? I know already that I want a wedding dress since I didn't have one the first time. It wouldn't be over the top since it is a vow renewal but I definitely want the dress. I'd like to include our children in it in some way. A reception with music, food, and a cake would be a must. Memorable vows is another must. I found some samples but haven't found anything that really felt right so far.

Since I'd prefer to do the actual ceremony outdoors, do I want to take a chance with an outdoor reception as well with weather or go for indoors to eliminate one worry? There's just so many things to think about when I start to seriously think about planning this for our future.

I know we'll do it eventually. We got through a difficult ex (years of it). Since we came through that closer than before the chaos, I think we can weather any storm in the coming years.

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Green Cleaning: Citrus Disinfectant Spray

My kids have been on their school's environmental team for the past few years. They brought home several "recipes" for non-toxic cleaners so I thought I'd share them.

Citrus Disinfectant Spray

Ingredients ~

• Peel from one orange, grapefruit, lemon or lime


• 3 cups white vinegar


• 1 clean quart jar with lid


• 1 clean 32-oz. spray bottle

Here's what you do with it ~

• Combine citrus peel and vinegar in quart jar. Fasten the lid and store the mixture in the cupboard for two weeks. Give it an occasional shake during this time.


• After two weeks, remove the peel from the jar, strain vinegar and return to jar.

To use as a spray cleaner, pour one cup of citrus vinegar in the spray bottle and fill it with water.

To use it to clean linoleum floors, add one cup of citrus vinegar to two gallons of water.

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Green Cleaning

Over the next few weeks, I will be posting many recipes to make your own household cleaners that are safe for the environment and your family. My kids brought these home from their Green Team meetings at their school (environmental team). These could help prevent 32 million chemicals from being dumped down our drains every day. Wow! That's a lot!

Take care of our environment. Take care of our wildlife. Take care of ourselves.


Subscribe to my blog so you don't miss the Green Cleaning series of posts coming soon.

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Did You Forget Grandparents Day?

Did you remember that Grandparents Day was this past Sunday? We did (well, I did). I hope you remembered to do something nice for the grandparents of your children (buy a nice gift like Yellow gold diamond necklaces, perhaps a gift certificate to a nice restaurant, a phone call). Perhaps you just dropped all your kids off at their grandparents house so they could spend the day together (giving you the day off). That sounds like a great gift to me!

Did you forget that Grandparents Day even exists? I know a lot of people aren't even aware of it but if you need to score points with the in-laws, it's worth it to keep it on your calendar.

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Sunburned Eyeballs

I did something really thoughtless over the weekend. My two youngest girls were cheering for the football team and we were out in the sun for three hours straight during the hottest time of the day. Being mid-September, I wasn't thinking about sun damage. I should have been. I ended up with a bad sunburn on my arms, chest, and face. The worst part - sunburn on my lips and my eyeballs (not eyelids but my actual eyes).

Talk about eye damage! My eyes feel like something has been scraping them...real gritty. I burned them pretty good. I didn't have any regular sunglasses with me but I could've grabbed my husband's. Nobody would have noticed if I would have wore Men's Sunglasses. Would've preferred his to frying my eyeballs! I wasn't even thinking about sunburn.

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Is there such a thing as a handfasting vow renewal?

My husband and I really want to renew our vows but not in a traditional sense. We want it to be more of a handfasting type of ceremony.

Even though we didn't do the big celebration before or after our initial ceremony when we married, we do want to have some type of party for family and friends this time around. I'll have to forget about all the bridal shower games since I'm already married but we should be able to plan something nice. I just need to figure out how to incorporate renewal vows into a handfasting ceremony.

Shouldn't be too hard right? Actually, it seems a bit daunting to me.

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Luna Moth Caterpillar Pictures

I took these pictures tonight of a Luna Moth Caterpillar that was making its way across a part of our yard.

I went searching online to see what it would look like after it does its thing. This is what it will look like after it comes out of its cocoon:

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Hugh Hefner Files for Divorce

Hugh Hefner just filed for divorce from his long-time estranged wife, Kimberly Conrad. They've been separated for more than ten years (were living together as man and wife for nine years previously). He is also asking that his $40,000/month spousal support be reduced to $20,000/month. Either way you look at it, that will buy a woman a lot of womens shoes!

They also have two sons together (learn something new every day). If his sons were born in 1990 and 1991, which is what I found online, his kids are now adults. How long is a man expected to pay spousal support? No clue.

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Basement Flooring

We live in a bi-level so half of our living space is halfway underground. I am stumped on what kind of flooring to lay downstairs. Being half underground, the cement floor is cold (and it can get damp down there). I know I definitely don't want carpeting, especially with our four dogs coming in and out of the house down there regularly. I am thinking either a ceramic tile or one piece laminate flooring that looks like a wood or ceramic tile floor. If I go ceramic, it will probably stay cold which won't be too comfortable in the winter (unless we make it heated underneath). If I go with a one piece, it'll mop up easily from the dogs (but be hard next to the cement like that).

I didn't think when we bought this place how hard it would be to modernize it. It's been expensive so far and we haven't even finished one level yet!

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