Brutus Brag Book

Well as any good scrapper does, you make a brag book about your kids, well our new kid is Brutus the Boxer. Named for the Ohio State Buckeye mascot, Brutus joined our family back in June of this year. He's the best puppy we have ever had! Poor Dakota didn't know what to think, but they get along pretty good and it's been such a joy to have them both.

I decided to do something a little different with a mini book since I am always afraid that they will fall apart faster than a regular album so I applied modge podge over the whole thing after it was completed. I wouldn't say that my first attempt at this was overwhelmingly successful, but the album it's self turned out great. The trick is drying time. There has to be A LOT of drying time and you have to make sure to turn the pages frequently or they stick to whatever surface you have them on. Perhaps next time I will place the pages on wax paper and see how that turns out. Slide show is't working currently, but when I get a chance I will upload all the images from this project for your viewing.

Bringing in the New Year

Happy 2010 everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful New Year's celebration and got your year off to a great start! I know yesterday we sat and watched the Rose Bowl game and Ohio State won! YEAH!!!! It was an awesome game. Had to get online to get my husband a t-shirt for that win and was lucky I had a $10 credit to use from my last order.

Well, if your anything like me, it's time to take everything down and store it till next year. I dread this part of the year. However, I have a couple of tips to making your Christmas tear down very lucrative.

Tip #1 - Use this time as an opportunity to get a jump start on your spring cleaning - Instead of just taking the decorations down start in one area of the house and take your stuff down and clean that area before moving on to the next. That way by the time your done you have all of your stuff put away and a clean house as well. If you have ledges and hard to reach places, use this as an opportunity to clean these areas of dust and dirt. It will help keep the rest of the house cleaner thruought the year.

Tip #2 - Put ornaments and other decorations back in their original boxes and write the dates on them so you can remember when you got them.

Tip #3 - As you go thru each of your rooms, don't forget to overhaul the cupboards - I know during the holidays we can get really busy and often times we start to just throw things into cupboards so that way it's out of site and out of mind or things just get unorganized. So go thru the cupboards, re-organize them so you can pull stuff out easily and weed out any items that you no longer need, want or didn't use from last year. If there are items that you don't want to get rid of, but rarely use, put them in cupboards up and out of the way from your daily usage items.

Tip #4 - Don't just put lights back in a box to have them tangle for next year - Take a rectangular piece of cardboard (one from a box is perfect, it recycles the carboard and saves on the trash) and wrap your light around the carboard. This keeps your lights in an orderly fashion. Next year when you get them back out it will make placing them where you want easier. All you have to do is hold the carboard piece and unroll as you place them on your tree so you don't have to keep trying to hold them all as you wrap them around your tree or garland and they won't get tangled up.

Tip #5 - Don't be afraid to throw stuff that's old and haggard away - Got garlands that are falling apart or decorations or timers that haven't been keeping time or don't come on at all. THROW THEM AWAY! With stores having early sales and coupons, you can easily replace items that are starting to wear out.

Tip #6 - Store and re-use your New Years decorations - Several years ago I started an annual New Year's Eve party for my family and we would buy a few new things every year. Start with a favorite general theme. I particularly loved the black, silver and gold. So every year I add to this little collection and kept the packaging for all the little decorations so I could re-use them each year. I now have a great collection of hats, horns, noise makers that all have this central color scheme. I store them away in a small box and can bring them out next year where they look just as new as when I bought them. Saves on the cost of having to re-buy new supplies every year. Also don't buy decorations that have the year on them and don't be afraid to spend a little more for quality hats and accessories so they stay nice looking longer.

Tip #7 - If you have extra plates, napkins, and other accessories, don't throw them away - store the plates in large gallon size ziplock bags and put them away in the box with the decorations. If you have platic wear put them back in their box or also store them in ziplocks and you can either use them next year or for other parties as well. Thru the year I have different themed parties and I always have left over nakpkins. I store them in a large plastic shoe box and I break them out during the different seasons for dinners, bbq's or just to add a splash of color throught the year on my table or use them for the next year and they stay flat and clean and no one will remember if you used them the last year or not. That way you save yourself money for the next year. A good investment for holiday plastic wear is picking a color that will work for multiple holidays and buy them in a large box at your local party store. Red is great because it works for Valentines Day, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, and Christmas. Bright colors can be used for Easter, and all summer long for bbq's and beach parties.

Tip #8 - last but not least use plastic bins to store all your holiday decorations - Right now is the best time to stock up or buy large plastic bins to hold all of your holiday decorations and other seasonal items. Most stores are running sales on storage bins right now and they are a better way of keeping your precious holiday decorations safe and clean. Cardboard boxes can get old and when they are stored in the garage can break down and get dented and smushed. You don't want your glass bulbs getting broken because your husband is looking for something and just throws your boxes around. Plastic containers protect your items and when all in similar sizes can be easily stacked. Also makes it harder for bugs, spiders and other pests to get into them as well. If you don't have a lot of storage space in your kitchen for other seasonal wears or party supplies plastic bins makes a great way for all of these things to be stored easily. Just be sure to label your bins so it's easy to find what you may be looking for thruought the year.

I hope that you find these tips useful and a great way to get organized and clean for the upcoming year. Now I am off to start in on my de-decorating and cleaning.