Finally! A Re-purpose worthy of last year's Christmas cards!

It all started with a little plan I had for a little get-together. The setting: my (landlords') back garden. The character: originally Mexican-themed, with tortilla chips, guacamole, and salsa complementing summery margaritas. The change: Instead of margaritas, the event is now planned around peaches.

Peaches, which have become my most favorite fruit in the world. Grocery store peaches, given time to ripen, are delightful, but already ripe peaches from the farmer's market are just about heavenly. I think Ontario must be a better region for them than Virginia, since I don't remember them ever tasting this good back home.

So, since the star of the show is now a little more sophisticated, I decided to edit the invitations, as well. Requiring, at first, fancy stationary. Circumstances, however, have prevented my purchasing fancy stationary. Luckily, in a hunt for already-owned fancy stationary (unsuccessful), I found just enough old Christmas cards to use instead. The second ingredient: Last year, I bought certain antique magazine pages on Etsy (gotta love that site), and haven't found an appropriate purpose for them.

The equation, then, is this: Last year's Christmas cards, plus an antique magazine page with marvelous images of hats and dresses and art nouveau flowers and vines, plus scissors and glue, equals home made cards! Sort of.

Anyway, I love the results (pictures up here as soon as I develop my latest film role, a la 2000), and am utterly chuffed that I found a way to re-purpose two un-purposed items just sitting around my apartment!

News Bulletin

Good news! The allergies I ranted about in my last post have mostly subsided. I don't want to jinx anything (cross your fingers and no, I'm not superstitious), but they have been at a very manageable level for the past few days. It appears that the change in allergy meds worked.

In other good news, I finally put up a shelf in my room. Very excited, because now I have a place for some of my extra books and my oxygen, clean-air producing houseplants. Which are all thriving, so far. Now, about my pumpkin... that might be a different story. I write "might" because I've been neglecting it yet again, and don't have any idea how it's faring. :(

Tomorrow I'm going to see the Capitals play the Vancouver Canucks!!

Lastly, I recently took one step closer to playing a greater role in saving the planet by signing up to volunteer in the area! Some weekend in the near future I look forward to helping clean up the Anacostia river. Among other things.

That's about it for this broadcast, check back later for more.

Keeping Your Refrigerator Happy

A friend passed me this link, a Consumer's Report about how to get the most efficient and cost-saving use out of one's refrigerator:

Consumer Report's Happy Refrigerating Tips

If I had cash, I'd go home tonight and perform the "dollar test".

To Do: Check refrigerator operations.

DIY Back-to-School

"Brightly colored string, an empty cereal box, a thick stack of scrap paper, and a little creativity..." is all you'll need to create personalized notebooks, binders, datebooks, etc. Not to mention scissors, glue and pens and pencils. But those are easy to find.

Check out the New American Dream website for an article on skipping back-to-school shopping by New American Dream's resident DIY guru.