Happy List: #377
Hello! Welcome to this week’s Happy List. I am honored that you are here.
This week on the blog I shared the new table legs we made for our kitchen table. That project was long overdue. I also wrote a little tribute to our wedding anniversary. I love love, don’t you?
As always, I am so thankful you chose to spend a few minutes here. I enjoy sharing what creatively inspires me and I love connecting with you and hearing what you’re up to. If you want to reach out, you can always comment on this blog post or email me here. You can also reach out on Instagram or Facebook.
Here’s the Happy List!
CHARMING
How absolutely charming is this kitchen from Yellow Coffee Pot? The peg rail, the rag rug, the happy wallpaper.
I don’t decorate with it often enough, but I think yellow is the happiest color. It makes me smile.
(image: Yellow Coffee Pot via My Domaine)
PIVOT HANDLE
Have you seen the pivot handle on the Milwaukee wheelbarrows? It means you don’t have to put extra stress on the wrist and pivot your grip to dump the wheelbarrow. Home Depot carries the wheelbarrow.
This was invented by Pivot-All Motion Tools and licensed to Milwaukee. You can read about it at Core 77.
If the video doesn’t load, you can watch it here.
PICKLE CRACK
I bought this Pickle Crack hot sauce off Amazon on a whim and last night Handy Husband texted his friend in the middle of dinner (!) saying, “This is the hot sauce I never knew I needed.”
It does have a dill pickle flavor with a hint of heat. If you like pickles, you’ll like it.
We put the Pickle Crack on a roast I had cooked in the crock pot. It would also be good on a burger, as a dip for fries, or on a deli sandwich. You can see how much we ate in one setting in the below photo!
SHOE CABINET
I thought this shoe cabinet made from an IKEA cabinet by Erin Zubot Design turned out so pretty. I also appreciated her honesty about the particular cabinet she decided to hack and the pitfalls it created.
Love the little gadgets she used to keep the shoes organized inside the cabinet too. I could use some of those.
(image: Erin Zubot Design)
IODIZED SALT
Did you know that iodized salt is one of the greatest public health accomplishments in the last 100 years?
In the early 20th century, up to 70% of the children in the U.S. Midwest had goiter (source). Goiter is an enlargement or irregular growth of the thyroid gland. This can be really bad for your health and is caused by an iodine deficiency. Most people, at the time, living on the coasts would get their iodine from fish. This was not the case for people living inland.
The solution was iodized salt. You don’t hear about goiter very often anymore, do you? Iodized salt is why.
I had no idea about the history of all of this. I learned about it on one of my favorite podcasts, Ologies. You can listen to the thyroid episode here. The thyroid is fascinating, by the way.
The NIH also has a longer history on the prevention of endemic goiter.
P.S. I did have a mini freak out because the kosher salt I mainly use is not iodized. Then I remembered that we probably eat enough other salty things (hello, tortilla chips) that we’re probably fine.
P.P.S. I also listened to the hippopotamus episode this week and learned that hippos are most closely related to whales! WHAT?!?!
RELATABLE
(image: Sad and Useless)
5 CALLS
Have you heard of 5Calls.org? If you’re in the U.S., it’s an easy way to effectively increase your civic engagement.
5 Calls gives you, all in one place, the phone number of your various representatives and a script for issues you might care about. If calling politicians’ offices makes you nervous, they recommend calling after hours and leaving a voicemail. All calls get tallied by staff.
In my experience, when I’ve called, which is daily lately, I either get voicemail or whoever has been answering the phone has been polite and professional. It probably takes ten seconds because their job is not to shoot the breeze with you, but to take a message and record the tally of your call in support or opposition to any given issue. I find it’s a much more productive way of channeling your energy than rage-commenting online.
There’s an app too!
(image: 5calls.org screenshot)
QUESO
It does not matter if you loathe queso and have no intention of ever making it. Please go read this queso recipe by Alex Beggs on A Cup of Jo. It’s the funniest thing I’ve read this week and I think we can all agree we need more laughter in our lives.
Two quotes that made me laugh out loud:
About ingredients: “I’ve moved on to real cheese from my Velveeta days, though it still holds a dear (and possibly medically permanent) place in my heart.”
About how to keep queso warm: “Or you can hope your guests will do their jobs correctly by just eating the queso before it’s cooled.”
(image: Alex Beggs for A Cup of Jo)
POETRY MOMENT
Shoulders by Naomi Shihab Nye
A man crosses the street in rain,
stepping gently, looking two times north and south,
because his son is asleep on his shoulder.
No car must splash him.
No car drive too near to his shadow.
This man carries the world’s most sensitive cargo
but he’s not marked.
Nowhere does his jacket say FRAGILE,
HANDLE WITH CARE.
His ear fills up with breathing.
He hears the hum of a boy’s dream
deep inside him.
We’re not going to be able
to live in this world
if we’re not willing to do what he’s doing
with one another.
The road will only be wide.
The rain will never stop falling.
Thank you for reading today’s Happy List.
Be good to yourself and others this weekend.
I’ll see you back here on Monday.
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