Tried and True - I have used it for a year

Last year I participated in the 31 Days challenge over at The Nester.  I had a lot of fun gathering information for everyone and I even tried a few things myself.  But I have to admit there is only one thing that I tried myself last year that I am still using today.

Can you guess which one it might be?

If you have read the series you will see that there are a lot of neat DIY 'recipes' posted and billions more online for you to find but I wanted to update you on the one thing I use and will never stop using.  It's the DIY Dryer Sheets Method 1.  I went to the local thrift store and bought a couple of baby receiving blankets and cut them up to use as my dryer sheets.

We have only purchased ONE bottle of Fabric Softener in a year and we still have lots left.  I personally use one home made sheet for 20 washes and then re-soak and use again.  The only thing we found to be a negative was that when my son would do laundry, he would always take my dryer sheet home with him, and we would never see it again lol.  So now we don't let him use them LOL .  See only one negative and I fixed it.

Here is my latest load with the dryer sheet.  It looks dirty but remember that it is used about 20 times and then washed and we do the whole process over again.

Have any of you tried this?  If so what did you think and are you still using it?  It saves us  tons of money each year.  If you have not tried this yet, please do, it really does work, we never have static cling and like I said we do use each 'sheet' approximately 20 times before moving onto the next one.  

Saturdays Recipe Round-up

I'm going to try and do a feature post on the weekends where I share interesting recipes that I have found on-line that week.  I also am hoping to prepare one of the previous weeks recipes and give you my review for that recipe and what it was hit or a miss. 

I want to try and do some of the things that I lovingly pin each week.  So for this week's recipe round-up please see below and if you decide to try one of the recipes featured each week I would love for you to come back and let us know what you thought about the recipe, anything you found difficult or would change/add, and its level of difficulty.

Do you know of a good recipe that you think should be showcased, please click the link below to email me the link to the recipe and I will try and get up some from those sent in each week.

So let's begin our very first feature here at Homemaker Haven.  I hope you will enjoy this feature, if you do please leave a comment and let me know if this is something you wish to see continue.

Creamy Macaroni and Cheese Ham Bake

Beer Battered Grilled Cheese Sandwhiches

Cinnamon Sugar Pull-Apart Bread

Creamy Bacon Carbonara

Chocolate Covered Banana Split Bites

Yum! I wonder which recipe I will choose to make this week.  So many possibilities and so little time.

 

And last but not least, here is the recipe that I am  going to trying to make this week.  With October coming up upon us I decided to try out these amazing looking Pumpkin Snickerdoodles.  Just click the picture to be taken directly to the recipe. 

I do hope that someone will join me and make one of this week's recipes and leave a review in the comments below.  Happy Cooking!

Are you a disorganized pinner?

This week I am going to try and get some of my Pinterest boards cleaned up.  I have been on there for about 3 years now and what a mess I have created.  If you are not familiar with Pinterest then let me help you get addicted lol.  While you can go and view things, to actually save your boards, you will need to register and to do so you need an invitation.  Feel free to contact me and I will send Here is a screenshot of what it looks like right now.  I did start working on renaming and making new boards to help keep things organized but I have a very long way to go.

 So this is what my Pinterest looks like at the moment.  I have a wee bit of boards, but the problem is I have things stashed all over the place, like all my recipes are in the Recipes folder.  So it will take me forever to find a recipe I want to use if I have to go through that folder which at the present holds 197 recipes.  You may also notice that I started to cull those recipes into specific recipe boards.  Such as 'Recipe - Deserts', and 'Recipe - Cookies and Cakes'. 

This will take you some time to get things organized if you have been a pinner like myself.  This project will take longer than a day for most of you.  But set a reasonable goal in regards to how long this will take you to complete.  I am going to try and get into Pinterest once a week and organize.  If I am able to come more than once all the better.

First thing I do to organize my boards is go in one.  Then I slowly look at each of the pins and move any to other categories if they are placed incorrectly.  I also look for duplicates and get rid of any that I find by deleting them.  After both of those are done , I take another quick look at what is left in the original board and decide if they can be split into more specific boards and create those to move the pins to.

To edit my boards I click the little pen icon and create a board or move the pin to its correct board from there and then when you click save, a refreshed board will appear with your pin moved.

You can also now specify your cover photo for your boards.  To do this you will go into the board of your choice.  I am going to choose my scrapbooking board for this example.  Just hover your mouse over the board you want to edit and a button will appear that says 'change cover'. 

Click that and another box will load up on your screen.  This box allows you to scroll through the pins on your board and find your favorite one that showcases what your boards are about and once you find the image you would like, click save changes and voila… you have a new board cover.

Today I have worked on my Scrapbooking, For the Home, and my Photography boards.  But there is still tons to do but remember not to get burnt out by doing too much of one thing each day.  That is why I will be working on this task a bit each day till the boards and nicely organized.

Do you keep your Pinterest all organized and if so how do you do yours?

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I'm Back

Hi everyone.  I must apologize for being absent from the blog for so long. 

I got quick sick in the last year and have not even been able to get out of bed let alone blog but I am back!  I ended up having an Ileostomy at the end of May and my life is slowly getting better and better every day.  I will be posting about the last year of my life in the near future just to help explain the absence.

So, with the news that I am back, I also have purchased a domain for this blog and will be moving over to that in the near future as well.  So there will be lots going on over here at Homemaker Haven.  I do hope that you will stop by again in the future to see me and be a part of the new blog.

It's that time of year when we start making crafty winter/Christmas décor items and gifts for our friends and family and I have some ideas that I want to do for my own house.   One project that has me all excited is making a candy wreath.  I will be slipping out this week to get supplies. 

Although… we are not sure but we may be moving in the near future, so I might have a gorgeous new home to decorate.  Yeah! 

I hope that all of you are well and I look forward to meeting the new faces and reconnecting with those who were dropping by before.

Well that’s all the news I have for you today but please check back in again as I start my way back to my dream blog and reclaiming the house into our home.

When do you all start getting ready for winter/Christmas season?