You Should Tour a Mine at Least Once
Everyone should tour a mine at least once in their lifetime. It is a tangible and interesting way to understand the effort, danger and environmental impact that goes into extracting natural resources from the ground that are used in everyday items we find indispensable. Your cell phone alone contains many natural resources that come out of the ground such as copper, gold, silver, palladium, crude oil, and lithium. Now, I’m not encouraging you to tour an active mine or to get lost in an abandoned mine. No, no, no. There are plenty of tourism opportunities all around the country and world to take a guided tour of an inactive mine.…
Welcome to Our Colonial Farmhouse
This is not a drill. I repeat! This is not a drill. Our house hunt is over and I can finally talk about our new home without jinxing the deal. Thank goodness! Our new home is actually quite old. Old as in founding fathers old! So without further ado, welcome to our colonial farmhouse! If the story is correct, the original part of this house was supposedly built in the 1780s. The “new” section of the house (shown above) was built around 1849. There is some etching in a stone in the attic with the builder’s name and date to verify the 1849 date. Let me do the math for you. At…
Happy List: #124
It is officially summer in our household! I now have a 7th grader and a 4th grader! We celebrated the end of the school year with an ice cream date. In addition to that excitement, be sure to come back on Monday for the big news: the reveal of our new house!! We haven’t slept there yet, but I took some pictures to share with you. This week I shared a fun DIY project – a herringbone rolling plant caddy. I also told you about that time we wanted to buy and live in a gas station. Some people yell “save the trees!” I yell “save all the old buildings!”…
House Hunting in New Jersey: The House That Wasn’t a House
Are you having fun following along with our house hunting in New Jersey adventure? Last week I shared the first house we made an offer on. I nicknamed it the sad house. Now, before the sad house was the house that wasn’t a house. Oh. My. Goodness. We fell HARD for this house that wasn’t a house. Hook, line and sinker. So if it wasn’t a house in the traditional sense, what was it? In a previous life this house was a diner and a gas station. Is there a better combination than a place where you can get dinner and fill your car up with gas? Yes, actually. I…
Herringbone Rolling Plant Caddy
We might have leveled up our reuse and repurpose game with our latest DIY project – a Herringbone Rolling Plant Caddy. We created it from items we had in our house, which made it a zero cost project. And I love it so much. Three main items were repurposed to make this rolling plant caddy. The first item was an old board that we cut into a square. What would I do without old boards in my life? The second item was a set of wheels that we removed from this thrift store dresser. The third thing we repurposed to make this plant caddy was a set of wood blocks that…
Happy List: #123
The excitement is palpable around these parts because after today there are just three more days of school. I have to wonder why the last two days are half days though. Can’t we just combine those into one day and be done with it? No one asked my opinion, but it doesn’t stop me from sharing it here. The benefits of having a blog. Let’s recap the week. On Monday I shared three ways I’m reusing items from our house in a clever way (if I do say so myself) as succulent planters. Here’s the twist to this story and why this blog is worth it to me even if…
House Hunting in New Jersey: An Offer That Flopped
Ready to hear more about our house hunting adventure in New Jersey? This is a story about an offer that flopped, but the reason the offer flopped is still hard to understand. The first home we made an offer on was a 5 bedroom, 3 bath home. The property is what really sold us on the home. It was on 3.5 acres and a creek ran through the property. It was priced at $380,000. In order to keep all the homes we were looking at straight in our minds, we gave the houses nicknames. This one was the ‘sad house’ because the home looked sad and neglected in the listing.…
3 Unexpected Succulent Planters
I’m excited to show you how I’ve planted my succulents in 3 unexpected planters. I do not have a green thumb, but I seem to be able to keep succulents alive. This is probably because succulents tend to do well with a little neglect less watering than regular houseplants. Now that I’ve inspired your confidence in my abilities (ha!), let’s get to the fun stuff. Pretty much anything is fair game around my house to be used or reused in an unexpected way! Unexpected Succulent Planter #1: Shot Glass This idea could go very tacky very quickly. Believe me, I know. However, we happen to have a brass shot glass that…
Happy List: #122
Hey, hey, hey! I’ve had an interesting week. On Wednesday I went to my son’s recorder concert. I actually thought sixty recorders playing Hot Cross Buns was better than one recorder playing that song. Should I question my sanity or my hearing? Remember when I wrote about the benefits of the recorder here? I still stand by that sentiment. Then I volunteered at the elementary school’s Field Day. Here’s a Universal Rule. Any time your child’s school sends home a note that says “please have your child wear a (insert any color here) shirt to school” that will be the one color of shirt your child does not own. You will…
House Hunting in New Jersey is Hard
We started house hunting in New Jersey!!!!!!! Yes. That sentence required an overuse of exclamation points. I want you to know how excited I am. I also need to remind myself how excited I am because house hunting in New Jersey is hard. Oy! I was adamantly opposed to living in New Jersey, but now that we’ve been here for a year the state has grown on me. Prior to moving here my negative impression of New Jersey was generated from bad reality TV, the jokes New Yorkers make about New Jersey, and the Newark Airport. That probably wasn’t fair and now that we’ve had a chance to explore this state…
