Summer: List It, Plan It, Survive It

I am not one of those mums that looks forward to the summer holidays. The prospect of six weeks at home with the Evacuees, rain invariably drizzling down outside while our carefully-crafted daytime routine slips out the window, does not fill me with a warm glow. This may be because I am a SAHM and therefore do not have an opportunity to escape to the workplace during those six weeks; I suspect it may also be because I refuse to throw money at the problem. Whatever the reason, the summer holidays do not feel like a holiday to me.

Add to this the fact that I don’t want to waste this six weeks and see their education come to a complete stop. Like Jennifer Tankersley of ListItPlanIt, “I want to teach my children life skills, responsibility, and self-fulfilment.” But in our house too, “there’s a lot of competition for attention when children are at home: video games, computers, cell phones, television and movies.” Jennifer hits the nail on the head when she describes the school holiday: “It sometimes feels like I am fighting a battle between screen activity, boredom, and ‘mandatory fun’”.

However, there’s no homesteady situation that a ringbinder and a selection of printables can’t improve, I’ve found, which is why, inspired by Jennifer Tankersley’s 100 Days of Summertime, I am putting together a summer planner. This will start in earnest at the end of May, following the day-to-day tips in 100 Days of Summertime, which cover everything from End of School Gifts for Teachers, and Kids’ Chore Charts, to Vacation Packing Lists and Activities to Try. This clearly laid-out and easy-to-follow ebook is full of links to resources and checklists for your summer planner. It works particularly well as a springboard for getting organised and thinking up ways to keep your children entertained, purposeful, maybe even learning something during this long break from school.

Already I have mentioned to the King that it might be nice to have a party in our back yard this year, just to celebrate Summer. Knowing what an antisocial miser I am, the King was rightly astonished and pleased. Having the ListItPlanIt planning tools to-hand and being inspired to think about all the positive aspects of this time of year has made me feel more confident. Confident enough to share with you 5 ways to put together a fledgling and, needless to say, frugal, summer planner.

1. For a digital version, use Evernote or Pinterest, but I have opted for paper so the Evacuees can refer to it easily. I used a plain ringbinder and made dividers out of old wallpaper, which I labelled with white stickers. I have also handwritten a lot of it, to cut out printing costs.Total cost, about £2.00. None of this is pretty but I know I would spend HOURS decorating my planner all summer so I am not even going to start, at this stage. Don’t even SAY the word Mod Podge.

2. The Activities section is particularly important for me, as it reminds me that I was once (before the holidays began) inspired to try all sorts of new things like making an archery set and going to an airport. In this section I brainstorm everything I fancy doing over the holidays and include reminders as to where I can find further information. LifeYourWay’s 101 Ways toEmbrace Summer and the Confident Mom's 2013 Summer Survival Calendar are especially inspirational, but practical too. I also made a pocket in which to keep coupons for days out.

3. Packing lists are kept in the first section so I can tell Prima and Secundus to get their packing lists from the folder and make a start on that task.

4. The section for Meals is going to include a list of 21 recipes (and in which cookery books to find them). I’m hoping to try some new kitchen concoctions this summer. Meal plans will also be included here, and shopping lists.

5. I have identified five (count ‘em) special dates to celebrate (bear in mind, readers, we don’t have Memorial Day, Labor Day, Canada Day or 4th July in Great Britain…), including the Summer Solstice and our Wedding Anniversary, and plans for these will be found in the Events section. Festivals, Family and Food by Diana Carey and Judy Large is a wonderful book if you want to find out more about seasonal celebration. I come from a family that doesn’t tend to celebrate much so just to have an Events tab makes me feel I’m getting somewhere.

 Bring it on! Win your own pdf copy of 100 Days of Summertime by entering the giveaway here: 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Meal Planning Made Easy : Exactly What it Says on the Tin

With six mind - and money - saving strategies, plenty of flexible recipes and clickable links to useful foodie resources, Angela Esnouf's ebook, Meal Planning Made Easy is a straightforward approach to that half-hour a week we're all supposed to spend planning what to eat each day but somehow never get round to.

What I particularly appreciate about Angela Esnouf's approach is that she breaks menu planning down into seven essential questions. Answer the seven questions and the decision-making stress is cut right out. This acts as a structure to the thought-process of meal planning, which means you can go methodically through the questions and come to food conclusions that will suit you and your family.

Many people make the mistake of only thinking about recipes. Perhaps everything you cook has to be ready in a short period of time, in which case, something like Twenty Minute Meals by Leigh Ann Dutton. Her aim is to "give weary chefs grace while keeping families healthy". Alternatively, you may like the idea of a whole month of menu plans, all written out for you, with a focus on real foods and keeping within a budget. This is what urban homesteader Diana Bauman offers in A Month of Meals from My Humble Kitchen to Yours.

However, Angela Esnouf points out that there is more to consider. You need to look at your family's schedule and work out who will be home to eat, what activities are on round meal-times, and who will be at home to cook or help out in any way. "There are all sorts of ways to tackle the issue of creating a schedule, and moms tend to find themselves overwhelmed by it all," says Amy Roberts, author of The Homemaker's Guide to Creating the Perfect Schedule. Amy's "hope and prayer (is that her) ebook takes the headache and frustration out of creating a schedule that is perfect for your family by acknowledging that your family is unique and by using that uniqueness to your advantage rather than trying to squeeze yourself into someone else’s schedule." The upshot is, however, that you do need a schedule on which to base your meal planning.

Meal Planning Made Easy echoes Amy Roberts' approach to family life. There is no one best way to menu plan; the best way is what suits you. Angela offers a strategy to help you menu plan even if you have fussy eaters to deal with. Advice on making shopping trips far less stressful is also included. Another way Angela shows support to readers is to bring an element of preparedness combined with a degree of flexibility into the meal plans, made easier when you have a well-stocked store cupboard and a shopping list system. Becky Thorn, author of The No-Waste Meal Planner agrees: "The way a storecupboard works is very simple. The last thing you want to do is clog up your cupbaords with things you don't need. But is you keep a carefully personalised set of ingredients on hand, you'll always be able to transform you leftovers into something tasty and interesting."

Best of all, for all-or-nothing people like me who try to run before they can walk, Angela is firmly realistic and encouraging at the same time: "Know your time limits and level of skill. Stick with what you can achieve easily, especially at first. Over-reaching may end in frustration. Keep it simple and gradually build up to more complicated meals and expectations." Containing perhaps the most helpful piece of meal-planning advice I have come across, Meal Planning Made Easy does exactly what it says on the tin.

Join in the Creative HomeAcre hop

Yes, it's that time again, readers! Time to link up with our weekly blog hop. The Creative HomeAcre hop is hosted by:

Manuela from A Cultivated Nest
Mary from Back to the Basics and Mary's Kitchen
Me, Alison from Mumtopia
and Lisa Lynn from The Self Sufficient HomeAcre

That means that when you link up your posts each week, they will be viewed by even more people! Each host will be sharing her own picks for Featured Bloggers. This gives everyone a better chance of being featured and increases your exposure to new readers. Be sure to check all of our blogs to see if you were featured!

Thanks to all of the talented bloggers who linked up last week! If you would like to be featured, be sure to link back to the hop!

This week, the post I picked to feature is by Diane of Vintage Zest, and it is all about getting our fabrics in order - a task I certainly need to do - it's called Organizing and Folding Fabric

So, Diane of Vintage Zest, grab the button - you were featured!

<div align="center"><a href="http://www.theselfsufficienthomeacre.com/" title="The Self Sufficient HomeAcre" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.theselfsufficienthomeacre.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/new-featured-button-e1364654655957.jpg" alt="The Self Sufficient HomeAcre" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

Now, on to your latest creations!

Share your Creative Home posts featuring photography, creative writing, home cooking, eco-friendly crafts, home decor, vintage finds, objects d’ art, fiber arts and sewing, farm girl fashion, thrifty tips, food preservation and gardening helpers, hand made ‘wholesomeness’, and good ol’ fashioned homemaking news. If you have a creative side, I’d love to see what you’ve been working on! Etsy sellers are welcome to share here too.

Please link back to the hop in your post. If you don’t take a couple of seconds to do this, you won’t be featured. I’ve created a couple of cute buttons for you to grab, or you can use a text link in your post. Thanks for sharing the hop with others!

Pretty please, with cherries on top, go visit as many of the other bloggers posting as you can! The whole point of a hop is to build a community of like-minded bloggers who share and support each other. We all love to hear from our visitors, so please leave thoughtful and kind comments when you visit!

You are welcome to link your archived posts here, as long as all of the content you share is your own.

Link your posts once. Please do not link the same post you linked last week! Let's keep it fresh and fun!

By linking your posts here you are agreeing to let us share your post and images on social media and our blogs.

Happy hopping!

<div align="center"><a href="http://www.theselfsufficienthomeacre.com/" title="The Self Sufficient HomeAcre" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.theselfsufficienthomeacre.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/new-small-creative.jpg" alt="The Self Sufficient HomeAcre" style="border:none;" /></a></div>&nbps;

Lemons, Lavender and Good Clean Fun

They may not quite cut the mustard if you haven't cleaned your oven for six years (see The Elephant in the Room and How to Clean It) but lemons and lavender were part of our grandmothers’ and great grandmothers’ household essentials.  Along with soda crystals and vinegar, lemon fruits and lavender flowers were used to remove grease and fat stains, clean and brighten sinks and fabrics, and freshen homes with their clear fragrances.

Nowadays we are all used to seeing small concentrated bottles of essential oils – including those extracted from lemons and lavender – on sale in health food stores, supermarkets, chemists etc.  Pure, neat essential oils are extremely concentrated substances and need to be used with care.  A little goes a very long way.

A brilliant range of essential oils designed for cleaning kitchens and bathrooms is available from fully qualified and practising aromatherapist Susan Barnard.  Her ‘Good Clean Fun’ range is very effective, simple to use, and has wonderful gingham design for labelling (see above left), with plenty of tips and wrinkles for using essential oils effectively. For more information, contact Sue Whall at Innerscents.

As well as cleaning mirrors, toilet bowls, drains and plug-holes, as shown on the product lable, both Good Clean Fun blends (Lavender and Tea Tree, and Lemon and Tea Tree) can be used in a wide variety of ways:

In Simple Scrubs to Make and Give, Stacy Karen includes a recipe for bathsalts which requires 1 cup of Epsom salts, 1/3 cup bicarbonate of soda, 2 tbsp sea salt and 8 drops of essential oil - the Lavender and Tea Tree blend would work well here.

Good Clean Fun Lemon and Tea Tree would be ideal in Kirsty's Citrus Kitchen Refresher, which you can find in The Cottage Mama's DIY Guide. 8 drops of the essential oil mixed with warm water and poured into a spray bottle are all you need. Shake up and "use this lovely spray as a refreshing spritzer on your dining table, counter tops, and appliances when you clean your kitchen! Spraying it around the garbage can area, or under the sink, will help eliminate odors."

Also featured in The Cottage Mama's DIY Guide is a recipe for an all-purpose cleaner, which I have adapted. For this, you will need:
3 tbsp Borax
a few drops of liquid dish soap
8 drops of lavender and tea tree oil blend or lemon and tea tree oil blend.

For general cleaning:
Fill an empty spray bottle nearly to top with warm water; add ingredients and shake to mix well. Use for counter tops, appliances, etc.

To clean floors:
Fill a bucket with warm water and combine liquid dish soap and Borax as above. Mix in the essential oils and use for mopping tile or linoleum floors.

Alternatively, you could try Tsh Oxenreider's formula for all-purpose cleaning spray, which can be found in One Bite at a Time. She's more of a vinegar kinda gal, and uses:
1/4 cup white vinegar
1/4 gallon (1 litre) water
a few drops of essential oil.

I'm impressed with tea tree's antiseptic properties, but I prefer the smell of lavender or lemon, so the Good Clean Fun blends are ideal when I'm concocting cleaners. Best of all, the product labels tell you "Never spend too much time doing housework." Naturally, I'm not going to argue with that.

To Market! To Market! With a Green Circle Grove Bag Giveaway!

Anyone else know that "To market, to market to buy a fat pig" nursery rhyme, or is it just me?

Meredith and Kristen from Green Circle Grove are sponsoring another super giveaway. Check out this beautiful Toile Market Bag they are offering to one lucky winner!

Note: Cabbage not included :)

This fabric market bag is made from sturdy "outdoor cloth".  It is 12" x 9" x 8" in a white on red toile print, which reverses to red on white toile.  The black cotton webbing straps are double-stitched into the top seam for extra strength.  Machine washable in cool water on a gentle cycle; hang to dry.  Rolls up to stick in a handbag or to tuck under a seat in the car.

Please be sure to stop by and visit Green Circle Grove's Etsy shop for a great selection of handmade soaps and fabric bags.

This giveaway is hosted by:

Meredith of Green Circle Grove

Ann from Summers Acres

Carol from Everything Home with Carol

Jenny from Black Fox Homestead

Alison from Mumtopia (that's me)

Mary from Back to the Basics and Mary’s Kitchen

and Lisa Lynn from The Self Sufficient HomeAcre

a Rafflecopter giveaway

7 Steps to Bargain Bunting

Whether you have a good reason to put the flags out or not, bunting is a lovely cheerful edition to any homestead, indoors or outdoors. Here's how to make it the Make It and Mend It way. 

You will need:

An assortment of scrap material, such as children's t-shirts, sweaters and pyjamas, shirts with frayed collars, bed linen, tea towels etc. For best results, use a colour scheme of no more than three colours and have a mixture of plains and patterns, bold and light shades.

Pinking shears, pins, sewing machine or needle and thread (if you have the patience of a saint).

Around 5 metres (197") of fabric tape, such as bias binding (you can make your own or buy rolls of it)

Cardboard, to make a triangular template of about 12cm by 15cm (4.75" by 6").

What to do:

The Elephant in the Room and How to Clean It

The elephant in OUR room - in our kitchen, to be precise, is our oven. This is because its arrival coincided with the birth of Secundus and the onset of PND. The oven remains unclean, despite vague attempts with lemon juice and good honest elbow grease. 

Katie, at The Kitchen Stewardship, has a whole article called How to Clean your Stovetop and Oven, the Simple, Safe, Frugal Way which is full of excellent preventative measures and natural cleaning tips.  Jeni Mullinix, author of Clean Enough, uses distilled vinegar to "remove grease spots on oven door window" and baking soda to "scrub oven interior", and these are simple, eco-friendly, frugal solutions for every homesteader.

Unless your oven looks like this:

Needle-snappin' Roxanne Retro Headband

The first thing that caught my eye when browsing for hair accessories to sew on AllFreeSewing was that this one is labelled retro, the second is that it can be made out of denim. Both serious plus points, topped off by the fact that Maureen Wilson of Made by Marzipan (who created this pattern) calls it the Roxanne Retro Headband, which makes me think of that old Police song: ROHHHHHHHHHHHHHHXXXXXXXXXXanne. 

Alas, the only denim I have left is faded and ripped, and I don't think the distressed look goes well with this style, so I opted for red polka dot jersey, left over from making a t-shirt earlier this year. Although I strongly dislike sewing with stretch materials, I thought this project would be a good way to use up this lovely fabric. The fabrics Maureen Wilson recommends are cotton, denim or linen, however, and next time I will follow that advice.

Happy (non UK) Mothers' Day and Creative HomeAcre Hop

Hope everyone enjoyed Mother's Day. It was a really special day for me back in March (we celebrate it earlier in the UK). The little gifts were lovely but the best thing was what I learned. You can read about The Gift of Mother's Day here. 

Anyway, fanfare!

It's time for 

 The Creative HomeAcre hop

which is hosted by:

Alison from Mumtopia (that's me!)

Manuela from A Cultivated Nest

Mary from Back to the Basics and Mary's Kitchen

and Lisa Lynn from The Self Sufficient HomeAcre

That means that when you link up your posts each week, they will be viewed by even more people! Each host will be sharing her own picks for Featured Bloggers. This gives everyone a better chance of being featured  and increases your exposure to new readers. Be sure to check all of our blogs to see if you were featured!

Mumtopia's Featured Post

The post I have picked to feature this week is Dear New Mama by One Organic Mama because it absolutely is the kind of letter I could have done with reading eight years ago when baby Prima arrived. I know many of you were celebrating Mothers' Day this weekend in the US and elsewhere, and I think One Organic Mama's post is spot on. 

I hope her message will bless all mums, new and not-so-new! 

Aromatherapy for the IMproper Housewife

Before I became more homesteady, I used to celebrate whenever Flash all-purpose cleaner was on sale. Normally I couldn't afford to treat myself to some Febreze freshness, but if it was on special at Asda, I would splash out on bright green "New Zealand Springs" or vivid purple "Relaxing Lavender" TO THE MAX. The kitchen would not only be clean, it would smell clean. I felt like a Proper Housewife when I used these products.

However, since I began the frugal journey of making my own washing powder, dish soap and the like, I have really noticed how strong these perfumed cleaners are. Not so much in terms of cleaning power, but more in terms of the chemically smell. Using fewer artificial fragrances in day-to-day jobs has increased my awareness of them all over the home. I'd rather be an IMproper Housewife.