Prairie Scraps

Whether you set resolutions or not, there is just something about wanting to have a clean house in the new year!  I'm going to be putting together a series for the month of January to not only clean your house, but to clean it as green as possible. In the last 6 months, I've had a weekly cleaning job, where my boss wanted the house cleaned with as few chemicals as possible.  That began my search for products that would work, not take too long to use, and do the job right. I'm going to share with you ideas, tricks and how-tos for getting your house deep cleaned month of January.  I'll be taking the entire job a little at a time, one or two areas at a time, so the even the busiest person can get through the entire house with deep cleaning.  Some people may deep clean their entire house all at once, but I dread doing that, so break it up a little at a time.  I try to clean as I go. One thing that will need to be done, while doing these extra deep clean...

I always try to do all my laundry on Mondays, washed and folded!  All of it for seven people in in our house!!! It may seem impossible to some.  I hear so many of my friends that only have 2-3 kids talk about how overwhelmed they are with laundry!  I've even been to their houses and they haven't a chair in the living room to sit on because laundry is on every surface. During school, we are down to just 3 kids, and I have to say, it's so easy to do this, but it does take discipline to finish the laundry.  My reward: being finished for the remainder of the week!! For the first time in a long time, I actually got behind and took until Wednesday night to finish!  Of course, four of my kids, with excitement of the holidays, forgot to bring their laundry down to me to get washed, so I was doing 2 weeks of laundry for over half of our household.  It feels wonderful to have it finished, now!  For the Personalized Laundry Baskets For tips and to learn how ...

December, you can save big on gifts, organizational products, bags and purses, as well as supporting my Direct Sales Business!   Know that your purchase go to help my family of 7 and yes I do make a commission off of all sales on my website.  Please check it out!    Also, if you need some organizing ideas for my upcoming series in January on 31 Days of Green Deep Cleaning Your House, this sale will help you get those closets and shelves looking neat and orderly! Stay tuned, starting January 1, 2017 for this Winter Cleaning How-to Series! I'm going to share Green Cleaning tips every day of January!

As a piano teacher, I thought I'd put out there some of my top recommendations for great, yet practical and fun gifts for the piano student this holiday season!   1.  Piano Maybe you weren't totally sold on your child playing piano, or maybe you got an instrument to get you thru the interim, until you find or can afford that better instrument, but what student wouldn't be ecstatic about receiving a better one for Christmas (or consider buying it for your family)?   Here's a great article that will get you started in  making the right decision: The Ins and Outs of Buying a Piano.     If you're wanting to order a digital piano, here are two recommendations: Be sure that you have a stand, pedal, and bench for use with the digital piano. 2.  Metronome I love this one But this one is great too!   3.  New Music Ok, so this one takes a little research.  Ask your piano ...

I have these stoneware pans that have the beautiful ceramic on the outside.  For years, I have only used them for family, because they look dirty and disgusting on the outside.  I understand that the stones are supposed to get seasoned on the inside, but I just can't see the point in glazing the outside of them, when this is the result!    I decided to give my Cleaning Paste and my Spirisponge a try on it to get the cooked on gunk off.  This worked so nicely, that it felt like I was just wiping it off!  I love the results.  It's like I have brand new pans! I now won't be so embarrassed to take this beautiful glazed stoneware to a potluck!   Any purchases from the links above, do assist and bless our family of 7!  Thank you for checking it out!