Use a Humidifier

Utah is technically a desert.  That means it is dry, of course.  With the winter weather, our house has been really dry lately.  My children's hair stands up straight like they are touching a Van de Graaf generator after they put on a shirt.  In a dark bathroom, we can get an electric lights show when changing out of polar fleece sleeper jammies.  A couple weeks ago, I dropped our kitchen timer and broke it because I received a shock when turning on the light switch.  Time to run the humidifier.  We have a cold mist humidifier that I run in the night time.  It helps tremendously to reduce the trouble we've been having with dry air.  It helps with dry, itchy skin, bloody noses and bloodshot eyes, chapped lips, and even helps me get to sleep better since it isn't so hard to breathe.

Our pediatricians have always recommended running a humidifier as soon as the kids get sick.  It helps more than any medicine, I think.  My mom has a steam humidifier.  It works, too, but a little too well!  If she runs it all night, she wakes up in a tropical rain forest, with water dripping down the walls and a bad smell from the wooden furniture.  It is better to run hers a couple hours before bed, and then turn it off.

Christmas Cards In October

I recently saw a store ad for a sale on Christmas cards.  I though it was crazy at first, but then it dawned on me that it is actually a really good idea to get started early and have them all done and ready.  Some years in December I get so busy that my cards don't get finished and sent out.  If I signed and addressed all the cards in October and November, stick on a "forever" stamp, I could have them waiting and ready to drop in the mail at just the right time in December.  Brilliant.  I already have the cards since I bought them at last year's clearance sale.  I do like to put in a family photo, so that is something else to be thinking about getting done early.  Ritz photo has 3x5s for 7 cents every Wednesday I think. 

Lets see if I actually do it.  I'm still sewing Halloween costumes at this point, (but I am proud to say I have a considerable portion of my Christmas shopping done already!)

Raspberry Preserves

My mother kindly said that my raspberry preserves were the best she's ever tasted.  What a compliment!  And it was only my first time.  I followed the recipe from the paper insert of the Sure-Jell fruit pectin.  It comes in a little yellow box like Jell-O.  There is a recipe for freezer jelly, cooked jelly and cooked jam.  I made cooked preserves, but it was something in the middle of jam and jelly.  I didn't know which it was, so I took an average of the amount of sugar between the two and cooked it at an average time between the two recipes.  (Also I only had half as much raspberries to contribute, so I cut all ingredients in half.)  It took quite a lot of time to get the seeds out of the berries.  This is what I did:

I had to scrape the berries against my wire strainer with a spoon to strain them.  It was difficult and time consuming.  My husband says his Nana has some sort of contraption rather like a mortar and pestle she uses to de-seed her berries.  I may have to invest in one of these, now that I'll be gathering raspberries from my own yard every year.

Some of the berries had sections where the bumps were white instead of red.  I imagine it is from the wasps sucking out the juice, but I don't know.  Anyway, I ripped those parts off.  I also discarded the mushy old ones.  From a 6 cup/ 48 oz. bowl of berries, I made just over a third of that in--in--what should I call it? Not juice... berry goo.  After all was done, I had 7 of these tiny jars (1/3 cup each) of marvelously delicious preserves.  I decorated them fancy to give away, but I think I will have to keep a few more for myself than I thought, after all that work turned such a small yield.  My son is thrilled to have his very own jar and refuses to open it or share it.

Bottling Peaches

I gathered nearly 200 of the juiciest, sweetest peaches I've ever eaten in my life from my very own tree this summer.  What a treasure I have!  My friend taught me how to can them so I could preserve them for later.  I've never canned anything before, and it has been a great learning experience.  Here's what I learned. 

Cut the peaches in the groove all the way around.  Pull one half away from the pit and then use the knife, a spoon, or your fingers to pry the other side off.  If the peach isn't ripe enough yet, you won't be able to get it separated without squashing the whole peach.  If they are sort of green, leave them on the counter for a couple days until they ripen up.  They should be soft when you press them with your finger.  You can peel the skin right off if they are ripe.  The ones that weren't quite ripe needed a little help with the knife.  Blemishes are okay because they come off with the skin.  If not, cut out the bad spots.  Collect the skins and pits for the compost pile if you have one.

Slice the peaches and put them in jars.  I discovered it was a good idea to be sure all the lids were off the jars before you get your hands all sticky.  Wearing an apron can help keep your clothes clean.  Fill the jars, and press them down gently to make room for more.  Mix about 2 cups (16 oz) of water with 1/4-1/3 cups (2-3 oz) of sugar.  Stir it to dissolve the sugar.  You may want to let it rest while you are cutting peaches to be sure it dissolves well.  Make more later if you run out.

Pour it over the peaches, and then use a spatula to gently press against the side to release some of the air bubbles.

Wipe the rims and threads of the jar with a clean cloth to get off any spills.  Pour boiling water over the lids and leave in hot water until you are ready to put them on.  Use a fork or one of those fancy sticks with a magnet on the end.

Hand screw on the lids (not real tight).  Aren't they pretty?  I love the red edges, but that disappears after cooking.

Put them in the rack of the water bath pot.  Fill it with water (you could be heating some up in the mean time).  My friend said to do it up to the rim, but I have since read elsewhere to cover it with an inch or two.  Put the lid on and boil it for 25 minutes.  This timing might be different depending on where you live (altitude), so I suggest actually looking up a recipe online or in the Ball Blue Book.

Remove them if you have a tool to do it without burning yourself, or remove the pot from heat and let the water cool.  Let them cool for 12 hours on a towel or wire rack.  Check the seal to see if it pops.  If it does, you'll have to put them in the fridge.  If not, you can keep them on a shelf.  You may want to unscrew the ring to see if there is any water trapped in it so it won't rust.  My peaches floated up to the top and made a lot of juice underneath.  It must be normal, but this is my first time. 

Do I have any readers more experienced than I?  I would love to hear if you have any tips or tricks.  Please leave a comment.

Dave Ramsey and House Chores

In Dave Ramsey's book Total Money Makeover, he teaches how to stack your debts by paying off the debt with the lowest balance first while paying minimum payments on the rest, then after that balance is gone, adding what you would have paid for it onto the next lowest balance.  I have pondered his advice to pay off the lowest balance first rather than the highest interest rate.  It seems like you would be done paying it all off faster if you weren't accruing so much interest along the way.  It is a psychology trick, not a mathematics trick.  It's about motivation.  Once you have paid off the smallest balance, the easiest one to do in the shortest amount of time, you get a psychology reward that makes you feel like you can keep doing it and not relapse into bad spending habits.  It seems to me he is making some assumptions about uniformity of human nature, and I do not personally agree that this solution is one-size-fits-all, but I can certainly see some validity to his point.

I take his debt stacking solution and now apply to cleaning the house.  Lets say your whole house is a disaster--worst case scenario.  Dishes piled to the ceiling, trash bags spilling over, hampers filled and dirty laundry trails in every room, black rings in the toilet, toys and books everywhere except where they belong, crumbs and sticky spots under the table, leftovers growing mold in the fridge...  Need I go on?  How do you go about tackling a job like this?  Realistically it isn't all going to happen in one day if you have to work alone.  I say pick the smallest and easiest job to do first.  Maybe it's the guest bathroom.  Just swab the toilet, wipe off the counter, and change the hand towel.  Voila! One whole room clean.  Doesn't that feel great?  Progress.  Now the next smallest job.  Or you could do a little bit in each room, whatever catches your attention, but at the end of the day, you'll probably be left feeling like you didn't get anything done.  Tomorrow the work will feel more like a drag.  That's kinda like paying a little extra on all your different debts at different times.  That's the least likely method to bring success.  Or choose the biggest job with the most interest...  That's probably dishes.  Gross.  If you don't take care of those soon, you'll have bugs in the house and a smell that won't go away.  And you'll have stains in the sink...  This task will take a long time, and you may need to take a break in the middle when the dishwasher or drainer is full.  So you've put in a good amount of effort that doesn't pay off immediately.  This job is going to take all you've got to keep going.  Just plow through.

At times I feel like I'm running in a hamster wheel.  Run run run run run and get nowhere.  There are always more dishes, more dirty clothes, more crumbs on the floor...  So I imagine that my hamster wheel is hooked up to a power generator, and I'm pumping energy into my family.  That helps.

I see that I have only had 7 people look at my blog so far, but I'm curious, how do you manage your housework?  Not just in worst case scenario, but generally, how do you stay motivated to work?  Leave a comment.