November 24, 2008

(frustrations and) good things

November 24, 2008/ molly balint

I probably shouldn't be writing this post right now because I'm feeling really frustrated--with typepad, which is still giving me issues with responding to your comments, making me feel very disconnected with all of you. And with firefox who insists on reinstalling every time I open it, and then takes me to some different version that isn't the one I was using before.

And while I'm at, the girls and I are all battling colds--nothing horrible, just not functioning at 100% which results in lack of sleep and lots of sisterly bickering.

But anyway, focusing on the positive......we had friends over this weekend for dinner. It was so much fun. Lots of good food, lots of laughing, while my kids moved from lap to lap and enjoyed being in the mix of it all--that's one of the perks of being host. Even though I have to work a little more (aka clean to get my house presentable), the actual entertaining part is so much more relaxing and enjoyable for me, when I can have people over to my house. I don't have to worry about my kids breaking things, or climbing on things, or getting too tired to hold it together.

My friend Kate, who came Saturday night is getting ready to take her hobby of baking to the next level and will be starting classes at the Art Institute in Philly very soon. She sent us an email last week with a list of about ten desserts, asking us to vote on which we wanted her to make. That's my kind of election.

Apparently, you get more votes when you're the hostess because my vote for the Toffee Cheesecake won out. And when I got it out on Sunday to nibble on after lunch, it looked so yummy, I had to take that picture.

I've also been meaning to share this sweet clutch of birds that Molly sent to me a few weeks ago. I absolutely love them, as does my husband, and my children. They'll be roosting in our Christmas tree very soon, and then they'll find their permanent perch somewhere prominent in our home. Molly, thank you so much. Your pottery is on its way. (check out Molly's new work with burlap. Oh my.)

Alright. If I don't stop this now, I worry that a toddler's wandering fingers are going to delete my whole post.

Happy Monday.

September 09, 2008

I don't wear much...jewelry

September 09, 2008/ molly balint

First of all, thank you everyone for all your "oh, I know, I've been there", "I'm struggling, too", "it will all be worth it", "didn't you know Day 2 is the hardest", "hang in there" comments on my last post. Wow! You make a girl feel pretty good and gave that extra push of encouragement just when I needed it.

I still haven't completely found my homeschooling mojo yet, but our "work table" is losing a little bit of its charm for miss elizabeth, which makes things about one hundred times easier. But things are getting better. This is good, folks. This is right for us, for now.

Speaking of thank-you's, I owe a big thank you to the talented Lisa Leonard. She recently sent me two lovely gifts in the mail that I'm so excited about sharing with all of you.

To be honest, I'm really not much of a jewelry girl. Well, actually I really like jewelry I just don't wear very much. But since receiving this gift from Lisa, I've added a new staple to my jewelry "wardrobe".

I've always kind of pined after those necklaces or bracelets with a small, simple charm for each of your children. But I rarely found one I really liked. So I was thrilled to receive this one from Lisa. I'm sure you can probably guess who those little letters stand for.

Lisa, I love it. I wear it every day. And I'm still in the process of training Elizabeth not to yank it off my neck.

And if you're looking for the perfect little classic baby gift, I think I've found it. I absolutely love these sweet "Baby's First Spoon" which you can find under her "something extra" category. (I can't find a direct link). Wouldn't these make the sweetest engraved baby gift? It seems like all my friends are having babies these days. It is always nice to have such a classic gift to give them. A little something special.

You can find Lisa's shop here. (this month's featured item is beautiful, by the way.)
And her lovely blog here.

Have I just written a whole blog post on jewelry? Me, the jewelry-less wonder? I suppose so. Lisa's work is beautiful and well-worth the few moments to check it out.

More tomorrow, if I can find those three quiet minutes once again...

August 14, 2008

good things to come home to...

August 14, 2008/ molly balint

I think I might have to go away more often. Although maybe it's a bit like childbirth--you quickly forget about the contractions and the pushing and the pain...or in this case the laundry and the packing and the whining and fighting in the back seat of the car.

But in reality, it was good for me to get away for a few days. I came home itching to get back to our routine, to laundry (yes, to laundry), to cooking in my kitchen, to picking tomatoes and watering flowers, to good naps and normal wake-up times for my children.

I also think I need to start leaving my husband home alone more often. I returned to find many projects that he completed while we were away. I knew he was up to something because when we would talk on the phone and I'd ask him what things he was working on, he'd always answer: "Oh, just a bunch of different stuff..."

So I came home to a simple, tall, painted headboard that he built for our bed. Very nice. I love it. A new mantle for our dining room fire place the design of which he copied directly from the mantle in the back living room at my grandmother's house, a desk/sewing/work space set up for me in the guest room, hooks finally hung in our bathroom for towels, and a great new laundry system for dirty clothes--much better than a big pile on the floor in the corner.

He's a good man. When all the projects have their final coats of paint and I clean the twelve inch pile of stuff off my desk, I'll take a few pictures...

I also came home to exciting mail--some I'll share in the next few days, but the other is something I've been dying to share with all of you.

I am in the September issue of Wondertime magazine!!

Thanks to the help of a dear friend, I've been able to submit a few things that will be showing up here and there in the magazine. Though there's no byline to circle and show to all my friends :) the recipe for "Power Balls" is one from our Balint family kitchen that I wrote up for this issue. It was fun to go through the process, hear about the recipe being tried out in the Wondertime test kitchen and passed around to staff for a taste test. Everyone I've worked with at Wondertime has been easy-going, encouraging and sometimes downright funny.

I feel privileged to have a tiny spot in this wonderful magazine.

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Thank you to everyone for your well wishes, shared experiences, and good advice for our dog. He still doesn't seem quite himself the past two days. But your encouraging, understanding words have really meant a lot to me.
xo.
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June 11, 2008

going green and healthy:: with my laundry:: part II

June 11, 2008/ molly balint

The heat wave has moved on and my brain has finally awaked from its heat-induced coma. Man! that heat and humidity just sucked all the life out of me....but storms rumbled through last night bringing sweet relief, better attitudes and a beautiful day.

I've been meaning to get back to the discussion about my pursuit of healthier and greener laundry practices. So finally today I want to share a few more things I've found and I have a giveaway!!

One of the other products I tried from the Gaiam catalog, (which I love) was the Wonder Ball. The Wonder Ball claims that you can eliminate all laundry soap from your wash, which is good for the water supply, good for the environment. And by eliminating laundry soap, you obviously eliminate any chemicals or dyes that might be irritating to your skin. Apparently, there are some petrochemicals and minerals inside the ball that change the surface tension of the water in your machine that make the water "wetter" and allow it to penetrate your clothes fibers and wash more deeply.

Did I lose you on that one? I'm not sure I completely understand it myself.

But here's why I am liking the Wonder Ball: I have to confess that I have not been brave enough to try it sans all detergent. But the other claim it makes is that you can use it with less detergent. So when I ran out of Nellie's Nuggets and had to go back to regular detergent for awhile, I was able to use about one third of the detergent I normally would. This made everything seem less harsh and perfumey, it was still making my water less chemical-laden and it was saving me money. The wonder ball may seem a bit pricey, but it lasts 3 years or 2000 washes and if you can cut back on the amount of detergent you are using, it would save you money in the long run. So if Nellie's Nuggets or other green laundry detergents are out of your price range or inconvenient to come by, this might be a good option.

The other laundry product that I'm really excited about is for the dryer. When the temperatures start to warm, most of my laundry goes on the clothesline which is the ultimate in saving money, energy and avoiding sticky dryer sheets. But in the winter months (though I've been known to hang out laundry with my mittens on) and for those personal items that I don't like to hang on the laundry line--I am now in love with dr yer balls.

Two of these little blue-spiked beauties go in with your laundry and work to separate and soften your laundry. This also allows more air to pass through your clothes and speeds up drying time. Once again, I was skeptical, but I was proven wrong. I definitely noticed a difference in length of time it took my clothes to dry. I would estimate they were drying about 25% faster--which ironically is what it claims to do. The other thing I like about the dryer balls is no more dryer sheets which make my clothes feel sticky and slimy--a difference I did not notice until I stopped using them. But what a difference it was! And I also like the fact that when I put just a few things in my dryer--not exactly "green", I know--the dryer balls help to keep things fluffed and moving around instead of all clumping together in the corner--and those few things are dried so quickly.

The dryer balls are inexpensive. And they will last two years--as long as they don't get lost in the same land where socks disappear to. And thankfully, they are made from non-toxic materials because my teething babe really enjoys chewing on those bumpy spikes. And before your children chuck them across the room to see how high they will bounce--they really don't bounce. Oh, and one more thing--they aren't noticeably noisy--at least not to me. And remember, my washer/dryer is in my kitchen, which is in my living room, which is in my bedroom. And I really don't notice it.

They sound good, don't they? Good! Because the lovely people at Nellie's All-Natural (thank you, jackie!) sent me a set to giveaway!! Yippee!

So leave a comment and let me know you're interested and I will draw a name at the end of the week. But do me a favor...would you mind telling me your secret to stain-removal? Do you have a product you love? Or a technique?--besides not letting the stained clothes sit in the laundry bin for a week. Guilty. I'd love to hear it. And if you don't have a secret, no big deal--I have no special secret either.

But did you see those strawberry stains???

********THE WINNER IS: MARYBETH! Send me an email with your address and I'll pop them in the mail!*****

May 07, 2008

a few good reads for you, for me

May 07, 2008/ molly balint

A good family friend, Sarah, has just started blogging in the last few months as she courageously (and with a lot of spunk and style) battles breast cancer. Yesterday, I was catching up on her blog and I read a post about how good it felt for her to do "normal" things. She was just starting to feel better after a recent treatment and was so excited to be able to vacuum and change sheets on the bed. Reading that post was the reminder I needed this week. Here I am dragging my feet and grumbling through my "normal" day's activities but reading Sarah's blog entry quickly brought everything into perspective for me. It was a much needed little kick in the pants, slap in the face. Thank you, Sarah.
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When Dan and I moved from Wisconsin to the farm apartment, we only brought the necessities. We were putting our house on the market weeks before everything fell apart and we blindly thought we would be reunited with our stuff in just a matter of months after the house sold. Hahaha!!! So here we are, two years later and the reunion has just begun. (though not because we've sold the house!) But one of the things we didn't intend on leaving behind were several large boxes of children's books. It wasn't until we started unpacking and saying, "Where are all the girls' books???" that we realized we'd forgotten them. So this week, Dan has been bringing over a box or two in the evenings for the girls to dig through. Oh, it's so much fun!

Since my pre-mommy days were spent as an elementary school teacher, I have quite the collection of books and I'm finding many multiple copies as I dig through boxes. So, as I come across them, I figure I'll share some of those extra copies here with all of you. The two I found in the first box, ironically, are about the same topic--Sir Ernest Shackleton's Endurance expedition whose goal was to cross the Antarctic continent on foot. If you don't know this story, you must read a book on it. It is an amazing story of willpower and strength and courage and leadership and adventure. Dan and I have this book which you should definitely check out, if only for the amazing photography.

But moving on, I have two children's books about this story to share today. The first is called, "Trapped in the Ice", which you can read about here. It is an easier read, soft cover picture book.

The second is called, "Shipwreck At The Bottom of The World". It is also a soft cover book, but definitely more in the young adult category or maybe a read aloud. Read about it here. It has some of the amazing photography that you'll find in the book Dan and I have.