Home is what you make it

WOAH! I slept like a baby last night, it might of been my combo of Lavender, Valor II, and Frankincense last night, but I definitely think it was all the work I did yesterday! I had no intentions of getting anything done yesterday, except for the fact that I go out of town for a week and am going to leave a husband here alone so if I didn't get anything done it could of looked worse. (My disclaimer to that last statement is that I am like the tazmanian devil when I come through the house, so typically Chris is like FEMA and cleans up after me, definite roll reversal). So I came home and looked at my poor out of comish husband curled up on his hard air mattress in the living room watching golf and thought to myself THIS IS NOT GOING TO BE MY DAY! So I got to work!

First things first, cleaner! I cleaned out underneath our kitchen sink and I had cleaner under there that I bought 3 years ago!! YUCK!! It stayed good for 3 years so what kind of crap is in there, nothing that I want to clean my house with thats for sure. So I whipped up a simple but effective cleaner:

1 capful of vinegar

10 oz of hot water

10 drops of lemon oil

The oil can be changed depending on what you plan to accomplish, but lemon is a great disinfectant and smells wonderful! So I have my cleaner and I'm ready, right? Wrong my ADD brain skipped to the next thing I wanted to do. I wanted to build a shelf for our spare bathroom. The story behind this shelf is both of our bathrooms are moderately small, and neither have room for 2 people at one time. So getting ready together is an absolute nightmare. I decided to take over the spare bathroom, so when school gets back in session I can get ready and not bother my sleeping beauty. Well before you build a shelf you should clean the floors its sitting on. So I cleaned up that spare bathroom nice, I mean cinderella style with sparkles on the floor! Then I built this:

This was my inspiration from Pinterest : )

Don't you hate when you find something on Pinterest and there are no directions on how to make it? Me too! Luckily my personal Handy Manny, Bob the Builder is only a text/phone call away (that would be my dad, best contractor EVER) and he always has an idea on how to make it pretty easy. So I went on the hunt for crates. Target, to expensive. Michaels, changed their coupon policy and only takes 1 coupon per transaction. SO it was Joann's, they let you have a coupon for each item! So the crates were already painted white (which saves time) at $15.99 a piece and I had enough 40% off coupons for all four (1 from michaels, 1 from hobby lobby, and 2 from joanns) which made each crate $9.60. The wood glue was $3.49 so total cost was $41.89! Pretty AWESOME! Here's how you make it (CAN WE MAKE IT?? YES WE CAN):

1. Put glue on top of bottom crate and bottom of the crate to be attached

2. Attach the two crates and line them up (this will not be a perfect line on the middle rows, but can be perfect on the front and sides)

3. Clamp the area together (I did not have clamps so I used painters tape wrapped tight and heavy books)

4. Repeat for the other crates

5. Allow to dry for hours, best for 24 hours

**Watch for dripping, if glue drips just wipe with a damp cloth**

Finished product

(I repurposed an old basket to hold my hair dryer, curling iron, and flat iron)

So back to cleaning! I did the baseboards and doors and frames and found a neat trick to wipe them with dryer sheets to help keep from dust collecting. I did this in every room! Wow that was a lot of baseboards. The cleaner I made I used to mop the floors and they look great, even the laminate wood floors!

Then I was looking at our collage wall I put up about TWO MONTHS AGO. We have been staring at picture frames for TWO WHOLE MONTHS! It didn't even bother us, is that a bad thing? We had friends over a few weeks ago and they asked us about our invisible family, well there they are! HA! I finally sent all my pictures off to Walgreens and found an awesome 50% off coupon code so had them all done for $8. I decided it was time to put them up! We did! Here's the end result! LOVE LOVE  LOVE IT!

By the time I was done with that it was time for dinner. Tonight was something new for us, Sausage and Peppers. Being from an Italian family this was a pretty big staple for parties in our house, except my pork allergy always held me back from eating it, so I never learned how to make it. I watched it enough that I decided to wing it!

1. In a large skillet heat a tablespoon of Olive Oil

2. Cut up your Peppers (1 red, 1 yellow, 1 green) and your Onion (I used a sweet onion)

3. When the oil is heated and skillet is hot add peppers and onion 

4. Keep them on medium heat constantly stirring so they do not burn

5. In another skillet cook your sausage over medium heat

(we use turkey sausage and I cut them into thirds)

6. When the onions and peppers seem soft, add 4-8 oz of tomato sauce ( depends on how saucey you want it)

7. Cook until the amount of sauce reduces to half

8. Add sausage and serve!

We had ours with garlic bread, another great idea is over pasta or rice, or even on a hoagie roll.

Now it's time to relax! NOPE! I was still going, why did I have so much energy?? So I knew I needed a tray to hold my oils and though to myself, well I have this old box, and some scrapbook paper why not repurpose the box for a tray. So I did. It took about 15 minutes. I cut the top off the box, wrapped in in scrapbook paper and used modpodge to adhere the paper. It came out looking great!!

Start

finish

In action!

Now for real it is time to relax! I had a very crafty day, a clean house, a happy and fed belly, and a new space that I get to call my own to get ready in! I think that was a very productive day. So I think I slept well because I was so productive, however I would never write off my diffuser combo : )

Why I will not be participating in this years Ice Bucket Challenge

Last year there was a lot of hype around the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. This challenge consumed our lives, between getting them emailed to us, doing interviews, having golf channel take over our house, and answering the nonstop question of "Are you the Chris Kennedy that started the Ice Bucket Challenge" I mean by the end of September we were pooped. This challenge meant a lot to us! Here's the short version of the progression:

• Chris got nominated for an ice bucket challenge in July
• Chris took the challenge in a friends back yard and called out 3 people to take the challenge or donate to the ALS Association
• Those three friends took the challenge for the ALS Association as well
• One of those friends was my cousin Jeanette (her husband is suffering from ALS)
• She called out her friends
• Who called out their friends
• It eventually reached the network of Pat Quinn (another ALS patient in Yonkers, NY, a town over from Jeanette)
• His network ran with it as well and then it reached Pete Frates (a Boston College baseball player who got it in even bigger spotlight)
• What turned out to be a joke made an international sensation and raised millions of dollars

So this seems great, right? Why wouldn't I want to participate this year? Here is why, first researchers have gone out and outright said that this will never reach the viral outbreak it did last year because, well, it's not new anymore. Did it feel good in those hot hot summer months to dump ice water on your head? YUP! Would I do it every day if it took away an ounce of Anthony's pain? YUP! The reality of it is it did its part it put ALS front and center and now people are talking about it! Before this challenge people would say "your cousin has what??" and I would go into detail about Lou Gehrig and they would know what I was talking about. Now people say "oh ya that disease that kills your muscles that we all dumped ice over our heads for."

The problem with this challenge is the fact that some people turned it into a way to make money for themselves. Who wants to profit from someone else struggles. The Anthony Senerchia Jr. Foundation gives 100% of their proceeds back to people suffering from ALS, where some take their proceeds for their own benefits. The ALS association is putting their proceeds to research, and keeping their organization running, not to buying a house for themselves and their family. I saw myself wondering why people were fighting to be the original ice bucket challenge starter (if that's even what you call it). What was the glory behind it? Did we have any monetary benefit, NOPE! Did it help our careers advance, NOPE! Did we have a good time and put a smile on Anthony's face, YES! If Anthony asked me tomorrow to dump ice over my head so he could laugh, I would do it.

I will not be taking the challenge this year because quite honestly I do not want to see the power struggle over who started it pop up again. I am glad it happened in the first place, and words cannot describe the outcome that came from it and how unbelievable that was! I will gladly make a donation to the ASJ Foundation and my local ALS Chapter because that is important to helping others with the disease find some comfort and relief. I love my cousin dearly and am so happy to have been apart of something that will no doubt be the largest viral fundraiser in history. Last summer it was all about gaining awareness, this summer should be about maintaining your donations and keeping that awareness alive. Why does it need to be with an ice bucket? Are we in a society where we can only keep talking about something by drawing attention to ourselves, instead of silently giving a donation and helping others understand while we are out and about why this is so important? Think about this before you pick up the bucket, maybe just take a click on the computer and give a donation : )

Anthony Senerchia Jr. Foundation
ALS Association
Taking Ice for Ant Senerchia Jr. Youtube

 Chris doing his challenge last year

Me and Anthony May 2014 at my wedding

First ALS Video

ALS Awareness Thank You Video

I'm leaving on a jet plane...

Hello Blogger World!! (really I mean hi mom and my few Facebook friends that follow me)

Sorry I have been MIA but I have been on to GO! As soon as summer hit I was like HEYYYY VACATION!! First I went home, which is only a 3 hour car ride through cow pastures, but I went there. I went there for what was supposed to be 3 days, and it turned into 10! THANK GOD I brought my diffuser with me or else I would feel naked.. For real though! I diffused Lavender every night and my sleep was never disrupted (which is always a challenge when out of town.) When I returned home   I had 3 days and then it was on an airplane to New York City!

So if you know me, you would know I HATE FLYING. I mean loathe it. If you could teleport that would be my method of travel ( I mean I guess it would be everyones method) but if you hate flying it would definitely be your method. So I hit the books, what was going to keep me calm and not clawing at my neighbor. First thing was first I upgraded to even more space (JetBlue might have the most leg room in coach, but that extra space, especially the front row helps BIG TIME) and then I packed ALL of my oils! ALL 15 of them in a ziplock baggie in my carry on! My go to for flying was this:

(this picture shows valor, really I have Valor II)

So when I boarded the plane I had a man next to me who was a veteran flier! I found him wiping his seat down with lysol wipes!! WHAT?? He asked me if I would like to have one for my seat, I said no thank you I came prepared and whipped out my bottle of Thieves. Before I started wiping my seat I placed a drop on my thumb and put it on the roof of my mouth to help with all the icky germs that you catch while flying. Then I put a few drops on my hands and rubbed them together and rubbed my seat down. The veteran flier seemed impressed that I was so prepared. He was even more prepared with a Publix sub and his own cookies, but hey no biggie!

Next I had to calm my nerves and since I boarded first I had some time before take off. I whipped out the Valor II and Lavender and rubbed those on my wrists and behind my ears. (I had a backup stash of nerve calming medicine in case this didn't work, but I didn't need it once.) Both of these oils have been known to having calming properties. I felt nice and relaxed right at take off!

Once we got in the air I get a bit of motion sickness this flight wasn't bad but I inhaled some peppermint and put a drop in my water to help with that. I didn't have a problem from there on on the rest of the flight. I just kicked backed put my feet up (you can do that in the front row because theres a wall in front of you) ate my blue chips and watched some TV while browsing free wifi! It was a pretty sweet flight. Before I knew it we touched down in NYC! I did all of the same things on the flight home as well!

While I was in New York my daily use of oils stayed the same, except I did not have a diffuser. I did get to share the oils with my sister and brother in law. He had very bad dry cracked feet (that kind of looked like they could be infected) so I looked up some things too do and I made him an awesome soak! I did warm water mixed with baking soda, thieves and lavender. He soaked for about 30 minutes and then lathered up with Eucerin Cream and covered them up in socks. It seemed to help, but like most men he did not keep up with routine! It was still awesome to show them that there are other ways to help your body than things that are not all natural for you.

I promise not to stay away for long this time! HAPPY JULY (AND HALF WAY THROUGH 2015)