Good Idea Friday - Preventing Buttons From Falling Off

Long story short, I have an AMAZING coat I love that my dear husband hunted down from one of my pinterest pins (take note: pinterest is a great way to find the perfect gift for someone! He's always poking around my pinterest boards for gift ideas). But despite how much I love it, I don't love the fact that the freaking metal buttons are always falling off. They cut the string, any string, that I've used to sew them on. To the point that I need to sew them back on at least once a week.

The coat in question - by a company called Just Add Sugar

So I started looking at ways of fixing this problem. I originally thought maybe buying new buttons, but I like the buttons on the coat. So, dental floss? Ehh.. it's white and might be visible from the dark coat and black buttons.

Then I stumbled across this sewing forum post, and gave the hook and eye method a try. Weeks later, the buttons are still on the coat, even after a long camping trip to the Olympic forest that involved a lot of running around and hiking.

What you need is some hook and eye findings, like these:

You just need the "eye" portion, that on the right

This will only work on buttons with shanks, vs buttons with the typical 2 or 4 holes. Loop the eye portion through the shank (I had to use pliers to undo one end, threaded it through, and reclosed it) then simply sew the eye bit onto the coat, not the button.

Ta-da!

Hopefully this helps out anyone else with the problem of buttons popping off. I know there are other solutions out there (sanding the shank down, using waxed thread or dental floss, etc) but this one is so simple and lasting I had to share.

Good Idea Friday - Plywood Floors

We've spent the past year overhauling our attic into a bedroom. Our house, built in 1909, has amazing hardwood floors in most rooms and we were trying to figure out how we could install new flooring--on a budget--that wouldn't clash too terribly with the original flooring. After spending countless searches on pinterest trying to come up with a solution within our budget, I came across this blog post from the infamous Centsational Girl about plywood floors.

Now, I was skeptical. Really skeptical. But after crunching the numbers we realized with $80 worth of plywood, we could install flooring not just in the new bedroom, but also in the hallway leading out to the upstairs landing, So we decided to give it a try. If it didn't work out we weren't out that much money, and hey, nothing a couple area rugs couldn't cover right?

We went about it slightly different that the above post, we had the hardware store cut the wood for us, in the same width as our hardwood floors, and in various lengths. Stores generally charge for this, but for us this was still better than trying to use our extremely old and fairly scary table saw.

First to go down was the sub floor chipboard, screwed to the floor joists, then plastic foam sheeting designed to go under flooring. We laid out the planks, lined them up to our liking, and nailed them down using a brad nailer. Once in position, we used dark caulk to fill in any gaps. This is a great trick, by the way, for hard wood floors; plaster, putty, and glue-sawdust mixture tends to dry and can crack apart and/or pop out over time. Silicone caulk on the other hand, does not. You can find it in various different colors too, so get one that matches the stain you plan to use. (I got the idea from a great friend who also blogs about home remodeling and projects - Us Versus The House) 

After the caulk set we sanded, gently. Plywood is thin sheets of wood glued together, sand too hard or deeply and it gets funky looking, as some colored inner layers will start to show. Just be careful when sanding. We then applied 3 coats of a dark brown stain (Jacobean by Minwax), the same we used on the original floors, and then finished the whole floors with 3 coats of water based polyurethane.

And the final product! 

There's a few things we would have done differently with our flooring though: don't skimp on the wood. We went with a thinner (cheaper) 1/4" plywood, where as the original blog post suggests 1/2", and though it was fine for the room it's in, in a much higher traffic area we would really recommend going with thicker plywood. It LOOKS great, and nearly matches the original wood floors for us, but the sound is off. I know that sounds silly, but it actually sounds more like a laminate flooring instead of actual wood.

All in all I'm extremely pleased with the floors, and for the price (roughly $160 for all the supplies), you really couldn't get a cheaper flooring option than this. This might SOUND like a large undertaking, and something out of the reach of most people, but it really was one of the easiest projects I've done. To summarize, you basically get plywood, cut into planks, lay down subfloor and subfloor sheets, nail planks down. sand, stain, poly. Done. Something like this could easily be done in a week or less (have to let that stain and polyurethane dry!) and is a great floor option for anyone looking for something new on a tight budget. 

Oh, and because I just can't NOT post before and after photos of the attic turned bedroom, here you go if your curious. It was originally lined with wood planks and covered with newspaper from 1918. We KNOW wood plank rooms are en vogue on pinterest, but if you saw the amount of dust and heaven knows what else that fell along with the planks.. you wouldn't want that in your bedroom. Ever.

Before Remodel

After Remodel

Posts Revisited #2

Time for an update post on two different posts.

Natural Weed Killer Update:

Just a few weeks ago I wrote about a couple of DIY weed killers. A few people mentioned sometimes it takes more than 24 hours for commercial weed killer to do it's magic (different weed killers work differently, some work by stopping chlorophyll production, so it can take sometimes a week or more to show results). I kept an eye on the weeds I sprayed (disclaimer - I had already pulled the big, nasty, hit-you-in-the-leg thorny weeds before all of this, so I apologize I have no update on those) and here they are today, about 2 weeks later:

Yeah still looking pretty healthy to me. I went ahead and used up the rest of the vinegar/soap/salt mix, however, on the surrounding weeds just this week, and here's how they currently look (note the completely dead crispy weeds on the top of the rocks there, that's from the original experiment done 2 weeks ago)

As some of you know, I'm naturally skeptical, especially when it comes to anything involving infamous Cure Alls like vinegar, coconut oil, etc., but I'm going to stick with my original review and say that yes, this really DOES work, and it works well. Though boiling water is just as effective, easier, and cheaper, this mix isn't bad and does work.


The BEST Fruit Fly Trap Update:

I've also had a few people ask about where to get sticky tape for the fruit fly trap. I found some just the other day at Winco actually, but I assume most hardware stores will carry it. It's actually marketed as a window tape for flies, it comes in a little package that reminded me of those hand warmers you find around winter time.  And of course you can find it on amazon if you don't feel like hauling yourself to the hardware store.

And that's it for today. I'm running low on bad ideas, so please! If you have a bad idea you've came across on pinterest, let us know. Feel free to share bad ideas with us over on Facebook or Twitter. I've had a couple requests to try a few other natural weed killers so if you have any you'd like me to test, let me know!

Good Idea Friday - Glue and Food Coloring to Make Colored Beach Glass

A fan sent me this and was wondering just how do-able it was. I've seen this around pinterest like many of you I'm sure, but I was pretty skeptical about how well it would work. 

I did a sneak peak awhile back on our facebook page and needless to say, since this is a Good Idea Friday post, it worked! 

I had a small glass candlestick holder I picked up at the dollar store to test this out on. Mixing just your basic kids glue with a drop or two of food coloring (a little bit goes a LONG way! I wanted a more softer realistic color to the glass, so less was more) and I painted it on.

Looking at it, I was still really skeptical. It looked streaked, thicker in some places, and blotchy. 

But checking back on it once it dried.. yep. turned out perfectly! 

Now a few things, this is just basic glue. Water, grease, dirt, even your nails, will damage the coating. In fact you can just peel the glue off or wash it in warm soapy water to get the glue/dye mixture off. But if you're looking for a temporary way of dressing up a table or mantle this would be fine. As far as the source, it looks like it belongs to a private G+ account that had this image shared publicly, so I won't link to that. 

Have any pins you're wondering about? Let us know! Find us on Facebook and Twitter.

Good Idea Friday - The Hard Boiled Egg Debate

So, last year we posted about how adding a bit of baking soda to your hard boiled eggs allows them to peel more easily. The response received after that post was bigger than we imagined it would be. Apparently the way you boil (or don't boil) your eggs is highly personal and widely debated. So this year we thought we would take the time to test out various methods of hard boiling eggs and see which resulted in the easiest to peel category. We posted on our Facebook page for ideas and suggestions. Armed with 2 dozen eggs bought last Wednesday (same lot, same date, same time, variations would be at a minimum) we got to testing yesterday.

I will say right off the bat that I'm not a fan of eggs and hardboiled are probably my least favorite way to eat them. Sorry. I was unable to be the taste tester, so I had my kids and husband judge for me.

Method One - Traditional Method

Place eggs in a pan in a single layer, add enough water to cover. Turn to medium-high heat and allow to come to a boil. Once boiling, turn heat off and cover. Allow to sit covered for 12-17 minutes.* Place eggs in a cold water bath. 

REVIEW - First off, the timing on this method depends entirely on how you store your eggs. Most reviews say 12 minutes, but having used this method myself I always find them slightly undercooked. At least in my house, my kids like the yolks to be firm, no gooey bits, but not dry. Due to how you store your eggs--some countries it's more common to store eggs out, but here in the US we tend to keep our eggs in the refrigerator--it can affect the way the eggs cook. Room temperature eggs take less time than cold eggs do, so they require a few extra minutes cooking time depending on your tastes. Personally, I find 15 minutes to be the perfect time.  

So how well did they peel? Perfectly. I give it a 5 star rating. 

Method Two - Oven Baked Method

Pre-heat oven to 325° F. Place eggs in a muffin tin. Bake 20 minutes. Place eggs in cold water bath.

REVIEW - I have heard by die hard fans (as well as my all time favorite scientist/cook, Alton Brown) that it is THE WAY to make hard boiled eggs (though they aren't boiled, so .. hard baked?). Easy enough to test out. The results though left me less than impressed. I will say that my oven, due to a couple infamous oven fires, isn't the best working oven out there. That very well may have altered the results. However, they were far harder to peel, and they were over cooked. Most had a couple hard brown spots on them, and there were several that had weird brown spots on the shell where the egg inside tried to push it's way out of the shell. All ovens vary, and I've heard using a silicone tray works to prevent the burned spots, but I didn't have one to test out. 

All in all, I give it a 3 star rating. I think if you know your oven and time it better, this may work, it just wasn't as foolproof as I was hoping it would be.

Method Three - Baking Soda Method

Same as Method One, ddd in a couple tablespoons of baking soda prior to boiling. Place eggs in a cold water bath. 

REVIEW - Honestly it worked just as well as the traditional method. Since I was using week old eggs for this test, it didn't make much of a difference. Having used it on fresher eggs in the past though, it does work. 

I give it a 4 star rating on fresh eggs since it's not perfect, but it works better than just a plain boiling method on fresh eggs. 

So there you have it. There were other methods I've came across just tonight that I was unable to test out in time, pricking the bottom of eggs with a pin, baking in the oven in a muffin tin with water in the cups to prevent drying out/burned spots, boiling with a bit of vinegar instead of baking soda, boiling room temperature eggs, etc., etc.

Really though, the truth is the reason eggs stick to their shells is because of a thin membrane under the shell. So I don't doubt some of this methods will work; the pin prick, the baking soda, and the vinegar all act as ways of separating the membrane from the shell. It's one of the reasons you are suppose to put the eggs into an ice bath right after cooking, in hopes the thermal shock will aid in it as well. It's also why older eggs peel better, as they age the membrane separates from the shell.

And as always, you can find us on facebook and twitter. Please let us know what your favorite method is and let us know if we forgot to test out a certain way.

Good Idea Friday - Paper Weed Blocker

Newspaper Weed Barrier : Rosemary On The Tv 

A fan posted a question on our facebook, asking if this was a legit pin or not. Now I know some of you are probably still facing down piles of snow, but here in the Pac NW spring has finally showed up, so it's not too early to start thinking about gardening.

Well start saving those old newspapers and cardboard boxes, because it does work really well. If you're looking for one of the best ways to prevent weeds from popping up in your flower beds or gardens, look no further. 

Now what about professional weed blocking sheets you ask? They have their pros and cons - if you don't plan to do a lot of planting or plant perennials in that spot, then a commercial non-biodegradable sheet will work just fine. The con is of course that they don't break down fully, so if you want to gut your flower beds or move plants around, it becomes a huge hassle. They also aren't foolproof, and can fail over time which means you have to rip them out and redo it. 

With things like newspaper or cardboard however, it does break down over time, and is generally great for the soil - think of it as compost that helps fight weeds. It can also help maintain a damp soil, since the paper or cardboard will absorb the water and stay moist longer.

If you're interested in reading more about using newspaper or cardboard as a natural barrier, the forums over at Organic Gardening have a lot of comments and suggestions on it. The orginal pin just went to one of the ever so common relinking websites that had little information on the actual image or idea, but I was able to hunt down the blog where the image originated from - Image credit goes to Rosemary On The Tv's blog post about this - creatively titled Manscaping (which gave me a good laugh) You can read her posts about it here. 

Good Idea Friday - How To Clean Really Stubborn Pots and Pans

Saving a Ruined Le Creuset Pan : Squidyboo

So as some of you probably know from reading my blog, I am not a baker. At all. In fact my husband has pretty much banned me from using the oven after countless kitchen fires from my attempts at baking. But where as I can't bake, I can cook. Really well I might add.

But even the best cooks make mistakes, and that is how I was faced with a dilemma some time back (which is why this post is lacking photos, sorry!)

You see, I was using one of my beloved Le Creuset pans and ended up burning the risotto terribly. It's bad enough ruining dinner, but the idea I may have ruined a $200 pan was more than I could bare. I tried to clean it best I could by soaking it and using a melamine sponge (Magic Eraser). That barely touched it. I then tried Barkeeper's Friend, which again didn't do much, so I tried straight up baking soda, but the black remained stuck to the bottom of my pan.

So what to do? I spent quite some time doing research and seeing what other sites would recommend. I wanted to be careful not to ruin the pan by cleaning it (so oven cleaner was right out, though that does work on things like uncoated stainless steel just fine)

Well after reading a lot of forums on pan care I found the blog post over at Squidgyboo. Looks like we were in the same boat. She tested out 3 different ways of cleaning her Le Creuset, and had best results with... boiling water and baking soda?

Seriously? How is that going to work when scrubbing the damn thing with baking soda didn't work? But I was desperate and willing to try anything at this point. And wouldn't you knowit, it worked! I took about a half hour of effort, but it worked. I skipped her suggestion of a butter knife since my pan is my baby and I was worried about to ruin it, and went with a wooden spatula (rice paddle, really) instead.

So here's the trick: 

Take your baked on possibly ruined pan or pot and place it on the stove. Add 1-2" of water and bring to a gentle boil. Grab your baking soda and add about 1/2-1 cup. It will fizz. This is good. Take your wood spatula and gently start working the spot or burned on area. After a short time it'll start to flake up. If it stops flaking, add more baking soda. Once the water gets too nasty or stops fizzing when more baking soda is added, dump and start again.

That's it. I have tried this before using just water with mixed results, but I noticed a huge difference once I brought in the baking soda. So go out there and test this on any pans you may think are ruined. And if you have any other great tips on saving baked on, burnt on, pots and pans, let us know! Leave your comments and photos on our facebook or twitter page.

Good Idea Friday - Frozen Bubbles

And we're back from our break! Hope everyone had a great holiday season! A huge cold snap has taken over most of the U.S., and with cold weather comes a lot of interesting pins, one of which is an image of a bubble freezing over. I had at least a half dozen fans send me this image asking me "This can't be true, can it?"

Well, actually, yes! I know, I was skeptical too, but it turns out that yes, bubbles can and do freeze if the temperature is low enough.

There are a few tips to doing this though. First off it needs to be COLD outside. I'm not talking barely 32 degrees, it needs to be really cold outside. According to this great youtube video that shows a bubble freezing, he says that it needs to be at least 8 degrees for it to begin to freeze. Even then, it does take some time for the bubble to begin to freeze. You can read more about it and see some amazing photos here.

So has anyone tried this yet? I live in the Pac NW where it doesn't get that cold, and we were spared the cold snap that has moved across the country this week, so I haven't been able to test it. Share your stories and photos over with us on facebook or twitter.

Good Idea Friday - Glow in the Dark Cupcakes

Goulish Glowing Cupcakes : Recipe Snobs 

Pinterest  in general (well, the people on pinterest, so I guess "Pinners") have this weird obsession with all things glow in the dark. I've never personally put a lot of thought into what I can and can't make glow in the dark, but on pinterest a quick search can pull up dozens of different ideas, most of which are wrong and won't work.

A fan of the blog sent me this, and I was delighted to see something glowing that isn't a bad idea for once! Not only that, it's cupcakes! And who doesn't love cupcakes?

So, what's the secret? Well it's tonic water. It's the quinine in the tonic water that does the trick. However they won't just magically glow in the dark, you need a black light to activate the glow of quinine (just like you do with the infamous "Galaxy Cocktail")  I can't vouch for how this tastes, but it would be a fun and easy enough project for Halloween to test out. Head over to Recipe Snobs for the full recipe. 

And remember, if you have a pin you are curious about, we're always taking ideas! Find us on facebook or twitter. 

Good Idea Friday - Flat Iron Your Clothes

Flat Ironing Clothes : Clementine Bean 

I saw this trick posted on pinterest this week and knew I had to share it. Over at Clementine Bean, she blogged about her trick of using her flat iron for simple ironing fixes. It's something I've personally been doing for ages on my ribbons or scarfs I use on my hair. If you ever find yourself running late and don't want to break out the iron for a simple fix, say your shirt's cuffs are a bit wonky or the hem is curled up, just use your flat iron. Now make sure that the clothing you're using it on is iron safe, of course; don't try this on polyester or anything prone to melting. Otherwise it works great. I'm actually a bit of an odd ball who doesn't mind ironing clothing, but it does seem a bit excessive or labor intensive if all you need to iron is something small. 

In fact, for those of you who sew, I bet having a cheap flat iron dedicated to pressing seams would be an ingenious item to add to your sewing kit. 

Posts Revisited

Well there's been enough posts and wonderful fans asking a lot of questions and comments that I think it would be great to revisit some of the past posts I've done.


The first post I have new information on is the infamous Glow-In-The -Dark Walkway. The mystery is finally solved! I've had a lot of really great suggestions from fans on how this photo was taken, but one commenter shared a link that fully explains it, directly from the photographer himself. What I had missed the first time around was a small faint water mark on the bottom right hand corner of the image. The photographer is David Tejada and famous for his lighting techniques. You can read the full interview here, but basically it was done with a ridiculously long shutter speed and a flash light in his own back yard. So there you go, straight from the photographer, this isn't glow in the dark paint. 



The second post I'd like to revisit is a Good Idea Friday I posted about last month. The "Ziplock Bag To Prevent Flies" has been hotly debated. Apparently Mythbusters did an episode on it, and they found it actually attracted more flies. However, a lot of people debate on the effectiveness of their experiment as they not only did this indoor with artificial lights, they left out the pennies. They also had a lot more flies than you would normally have, rotten meat, and a fairly small area in which they did the experiment (I love Mythbusters but agree they tend to go the extreme when testing things). Critics of their test believe these are enough to say the test failed because they weren't doing it correctly. You can read more about this over at Hoax Slayer. So for now, Good Idea still? Maybe. It is ridiculously cheap to do, and it may or may not work. And as tacky as it might look, it is slightly better than fly tape. Unfortunately I don't live in area with much of a fly problem, so I'm unable to test this myself, but I would love to hear from fans on this.

So that's our recap. Are there any posts we've done that you'd like to see us go more in depth on? Let us know! We're on twitter and facebook.

Good Idea Friday - Bleaching Pumpkins

Preserving Jack O' Lanterns : My Science Project

I wasn't planning on doing these pins quite yet, but after everyone on my Pinterest page started pinning autumn things I figured I'd jump in. I've seen this pin and others like it a dozen times or more this time of year; so, does bleach really help keep cut pumpkins lasting longer? 

Yes! I figured it would, but I had no idea just how well it worked until I found the source of the above image.  Over at My Science Project they run a pretty extensive test on some of the more common methods people use to preserve cut pumpkins. It's pretty interesting read, and wouldn't you know it, but bleach actually came out the winner (neck-in-neck with a commercial product, but bleach is cheaper and would be my go-to), with the cut pumpkin lasting a whole 2 weeks before molding.

So with autumn just around the corner, it would be a good idea to keep a bottle of bleach on hand when you carve those pumpkins. 

Good Idea Friday - Monistat Cream as Face Primer

Monistat as Primer : My Vanity Basics

I first heard about this many years ago on a bargain forum and couldn't believe when I found the pin it was still a thing. I mean come on - it's an anti-chafing cream for a lady's more, uh private, parts, and people are putting it on their face? Just as skeptical now as I was years ago when I heard about it, I decided to do more research on it.

Lets start by taking a look at the ingredients of Monistat gel vs Smashbox primer (here is where I warn you that when they say Monistat, they are talking about a certain anti-chafing gel, not the yeast infection medication. Please don't just grab any monistat product and start rubbing it on your face.)

Smashbox Ingredients:

Original Photo Finish
Cyclopentasiloxane, Dimethicone Crosspolymer, Dimethicone, Trisiloxane, Silica, Dimethicone/ Vinyldimethicone Crosspolymer, Ethylhexyl Salicylate, Retinyl Palmitate, Tocopheryl Acetate, Carthamus Tinctorius (Safflower) Seed Extract, Propylene Glycol, Water (Aqua, Eau), Vitis Vinifera (Grape) Seed Extract, Cola Acuminata Seed Extract, Camellia Oleifera Leaf Extract.

Monistat Chafing Relief Gel Ingredients:

Cyclopentasiloxane, Dimethicone/Vinyl Dimethicone Crosspolymer, Silica, Tocopheryl Acetate, Trisiloxane

In fact, chances are any face primer you grab will have at least dimethicone in it. The science behind it that basically dimethicone stays on the surface of your skin, helping to minimize the appearance of wrinkles and pores and prevents your foundation or base from rubbing off. I can't say if it's really the best thing to be smearing on your face (most reports say it's pretty harmless, but some say dimethicone adds to your skin drying out and over time can cause more problems, and that its not biodegradable, so there's always the environmental factor of it.) Also most major primers have added moisturizers and SPF added to them to better aid your skin. 

So does it work? Yes, as well as the Smashbox primer does. Pretty much all cosmetic companies today have a facial primer on the market, and as much as they vary, the one thing in the common they all share is dimethicone. It's the price point that wins most people over; an ounce of Smashbox primer can cost over $40, whereas a bottle of Monistat anti-chafing gel? Around $6 a bottle from Amazon. 

Good Idea Friday - Ziploc Bag To Keep Flies Away

"Ziplock bag of water with 5 pennies in it - keeps flies away - AMAZING"

I'll be honest, when a fan sent me this I laughed and thought it had to be one of the most ridiculous pins I've seen in awhile. I mean really? I was skeptical to say the least.

However, a quick search later and I realized I was so very wrong in my original assumption. Not only does it work, it works well. You see the light reflecting off the water and pennies in the bag freaks out the flies eyes, so they can't see well, and will avoid the area. You can read more about it here. Sadly it doesn't seem to work on anything other than flies, so if you think it might work on mosquitoes and other insects best to try other remedies (we offer some suggestions in previous posts, ideas for both mosquitoes and wasps).

And because lets be honest, this is Pinterest we're talking about, if the idea of having baggies swinging from your porch isn't as aesthetically pleasing as you'd like, there are other options: 

You can buy this rather dashing glass one from designer Jose de la O. 

Anti-Fly Sphere : Jose De La O 

Or in true Pinterest fashion you can even DIY one with the ever popular mason jar! Just wire wrap around the neck of the jar, fill with water and a couple pennies and hang by your door.

Good Idea Friday - The Truly BEST Fruit Fly Trap

Fruit Fly Trap : Wormilicious

That's a pretty bold statement in the title, I know. And today's Good Idea Friday didn't come from Pinterest (sorry!) but it's so amazing that it should be on Pinterest.

A few weeks ago we woke up to a to a huge fruit fly invasion, out of the blue. Apparently they are really common this time of year. We spent the day cleaning the kitchen really well, setting out glasses of wine with a few drops of dish soap in it, and figured that would take care of that.

We were wrong. Very wrong. By the next day, they had invaded every room of the house. I was so skeeved out I wanted to run out of my house screaming. So we spent all day doing a huge deep cleaning of the entire house, setting houseplants outside, pouring boiling water down the drains, trying the paper cone method that is fairly popular. We even set out bowls of fruit and vinegar, with plastic wrap over it with holes poked in.

By day three however, it was apparent nothing was working. None of the traps seemed to work. They just hung out on the rim of the soap laced glasses, and very few ventured into the paper cone method or plastic wrapped bowls. We talked of bug bombing the house, because at this point I couldn't even pour myself a glass of wine without having fruit flies instantly descend into the glass.

But as luck would have it, we didn't need to bug bomb the house. Instead, we grabbed the fly tape. Yes, the cheap fly tape you can get at the dollar store. We hung it over the sink with a glass of wine below it, and waited. By the next morning, there were noticeably less fruit flies flying around, and the fly tape was honestly disgusting looking it. By day two of having the fly tape up, we were pretty much fruit fly free.

Unfortunately my husband and I were so grossed out by the sight of the fly tape that we tore it down before I got a photo of it for the blog, but trust me when I say this is by far the quickest easiest method I've ever tried to get rid of fruit flies. I decided to do a google search and was amazed to only find one blog post about this method. Over at Wormilicious, she builds a really ingenious trap using fly tape as well. In fact, my husband was trying to figure out how to get a fly tape around the glass to begin with. I think next time we end up with an invasion on our hands, we're going to try her method.

Post Update: I've also had a few people ask about where to get sticky tape for the fruit fly trap. I found some just the other day at Winco actually, but I assume most hardware stores will carry it. It's actually marketed as a window tape for flies, it comes in a little package that reminded me of those hand warmers you find around winter time.  And of course you can find it on amazon if you don't feel like hauling yourself to the hardware store.

Good Idea Friday - How To Open A Bottle Of Wine With A Shoe

"Open a Bottle of Wine with Your Shoe Maybe the most useful thing anyone needs to know, ever."

This is a trick I found on pinterest a while back that I was really excited to try. I watched the original video posted, and it looked easy. But if it's so easy why isn't this a common party trick? So I decided to test it out myself and film the results: 

I decided to skip the idea of hitting it on a wall because A: I didn't want to damage my walls and B: I figured this is best used when away from home and without a corkscrew handy, so chances are you won't have a wall to hit. Despite hitting it on various things, my husband was unable to get the cork to even budge slightly.  However once it was opened, and recorked, we tried again with far easier success.

I've since watched a couple more videos on youtube of people trying this, and it seems those who did succeed were hitting the bottle for quite some time before it started to budge. So I'm going to go ahead and say this will work, but it would be easier all around if you opened the bottle, recorked it, and then did the tree/wall method like we showed. 

So has anyone tried this yet? What were your results? Do you have any other tricks and tips to opening a bottle without a corkscrew? 

Good Idea Friday - Lemon and Clove to Scare off Wasps

"A way to get rid of wasps! Lemon with 10 cloves or put out a saucer with cloves in it. Wasps hate the scent!"

Lemon and Cloves : Warsztat Mamy

This is a pin that I thought would be easy enough to research and instead has taken me weeks of research and emails to people to collect data on, only to I realized I was focused on the wrong part of the pin. 

You see, I was honestly really skeptical about this. How often do we see natural remedies or pest control ideas on Pinterest (like garlic for mosquitoes) that just aren't effective. Having grown up in a very rural part of the country myself, I have seen the way wasps especially flock towards any fruit (you learn real quick as a kid not to run barefoot near the apple trees) Wasps like the scent of fruits and meat, so I wasn't too sure if a fruit like lemon would really drive them away. I spent some time on google trying to find if wasps really didn't care for the scent of lemon and was unable to find anything regarding it. I decided to go straight to the source. If there is one person who would know if wasps like lemons, it would be the owner of a lemon orchard. 

I sent out a couple of emails and Karen from Lemon Ladies Orchard in California was kind enough to reply. She keeps bee hives next to her orchard (great for pollination) but hasn't noticed any wasps. Is that due to the lemons, or the bees? She sent my question on to other lemon growing friends of her. Susan Burchiel of Birch-Hill Organics replied and said she hasn't seen wasps in the orchards, but does have yellow jackets. Interesting, I started wondering if the honey bees and yellow jackets were chasing off the wasps or if really was the scent of lemons. Yellow Jackets are actually a class of wasps themselves, so I was starting to think maybe this wasn't a true remedy to deter wasps. 

And then I decided to start looking at the clove aspect of the pin and that's where I became surprised. You see, a lot of bugs really do hate the scent of the cloves. In fact, it's one of the most popular form of natural pesticide and is used in even commercial products. (source) It's called eugenol oil, and is found in cloves, cinnamon, basil, and bay leaves. Now eugenol oil despite being natural does come with it's own host of dangers, mainly that in large amounts it can kill you if ingested. (source) But it works, and since this idea uses cloves in their natural form it's probably a far safer method than using just pure eugenol oil or other pesticides. 

So if you're looking for a natural way of combating pesky wasps and other bugs at the picnic table, this is a pin I would suggest trying. 

Good Idea Friday - Coloring Your Dresser Pulls

"Color plain dresser pulls with a sharpie and bake!" 

Faux Malachite Knobs : Tea and Lime

When I first saw these I thought for sure it was the good old switch-a-roo, like the spray painted light bulbs I wrote about. These don't look like sharpie covered knobs to me, instead they look like something you could get at Anthropologie for $22 a pop. So I was honestly surprised when I found the blog post about how to make them!

Over at Teal and Lime, Jackie wrote about how she wasn't happy with the pulls that came with a dresser she had bought. So she broke out a sharpie and started coloring them. After letting them dry she baked them at 350° for 30 minutes. They certainly are beautiful, but I was worried that with being knobs, the wear and tear would soon have the ink coming off. I sent her an email and asked how they were holding up. She replied that they were still holding up fairly well, a bit of the color was coming off but that it wasn't enough to bother her yet, plus touch ups won't be hard. Readers of her blog have suggested you could even do a quick lacquer coat with professional spray or even clear nail polish, which is something I would highly recommend if these are going to be used regularly. Another idea would be to use a ceramic marker (which was her original idea until she learned her marker had dried up). But all in all, I think this is a great idea for adding a pop of color to your home without spending a fortune on new pulls.

Good Idea Friday - Nail Polish to Brighten Solar Panels

"Rejuvenating solar garden lights — with nail polish! Brilliant!!!"

How to rejuvenate your solar lights : blog.kriegsman.org

Today's good idea post is going to save me a lot of money. Last summer I noticed my solar lights for the garden weren't as bright and nice as they were when I bought them. I switched out the batteries but no luck, so I pulled them all up and put them away, thinking it was probably time to buy new ones. 

Well I never got around to investing in new ones, and I'm really grateful now for that. A little fine grit sandpaper and clear nail polish is all it takes to revive the solar panels on your lights. You can read more about it over on the blog kriegsman.org 

Good Idea Friday - Cleaning your Whiteboards

I was honestly highly skeptical about this tip. I'm in the middle of preparing for a yard sale this week, and I stumbled acrossed a cute whiteboard that used to be in my kids' playroom. The problem? It had been sitting in the basement for over a year covered in ink. Yikes. So I did what I always do - I busted out my trusty  melamine sponge (Magic eraser). That worked ok, but the board itself seemed stain from the ink. So I took it into the bathroom and applied a thick paste of bleach gel. A day later, and it was still stained. 

So I turned to pinterest. I knew I had seen a post before on how to clean whiteboards, but I assumed they all offered the same advice I had just tried. Until I found this post from over at the blog Milehimama. 

Her suggestions? Toothpaste. Yes, cheap, old school toothpaste. A similar tip to my post on how to clean your headlights I wrote about. But can it do the work my melamine sponge couldn't? I was highly skeptical. So I tried it on half the board and sure enough it worked! Knowing then that it was the grit of the paste and not the toothpaste itself, I tried a cup of baking soda with a wet cloth on the other half, and it worked just as well. So next time you're staring down a not so whiteboard and thinking it's a lost cause, break out the baking soda or toothpaste and give it a try.