Cleaning your Silks

For some time now, Gloria at Happy To Be has been asking me to do a post about cleaning our faux flowers/greens.  Honestly, I have been waiting for the weather to warm up because there are a couple of ways you can do this task.

 

I didn’t want to drag it outside but if you have a tall ficus or other sort of faux tree that is causing your nose to run from all the dust (!) the easiest way to clean this is to take it out to the yard.  You can fill a bucket with soapy water to start off with.  Any sort of mild soap will do.  Do not go crazy with the soap, just a squirt.  Oh, and do not squirt the cat or she will no longer be your best friend!    :-) 

 

Another way to clean the really tall trees (I carry them up to 9’ tall) or the smaller one like I have pictured is to take a spray bottle and fill it with soapy water.  You will spray sections at a time of the soapy mixture or just take your prepared bucket and with a sponge wipe off the leaves.  The sponge method works better on a smaller plant such as the one I have pictured.  After you have wet it down with the soapy mixture, take your garden hose and gently rinse off all the leaves of soap.  Use your thumb to defuse the water pressure. You might want to put a nozzle on to control the pressure.  We are gently cleaning here, not using car wash pressure, ok?

If you have loose greenery up above your kitchen cabinets or even those stuck in baskets or containers, the easiest way to clean these is to run a few inches of water in your bathtub.  Add just a bit of whatever bubble bath happens to be sitting there.  Please do not use bath oil for obvious reasons!!  Oil and dirt do yucky things together!  Now after you have swished them around just a bit in the water, run your bath faucet and rinse them off.  You will want to dry them quickly so they don’t water spot.

  You may use your hair dryer OR you might want to take them outside in the sun to dry.  The way our winds blow around here, the greens will be dry in seconds.  Watch so they don’t end up in the neighbor’s yard!

There is a product I sell called Silk ‘n Splendor that is excellent for cleaning your fauxs.  You just spray it on and the dirt literally drips off. You don’t even have to rinse.  If you are doing this inside with a large tree, it is best to have a drop cloth beneath or place the tree in your bathtub because this method can get messy but works beautifully.  It is so easy and they will look new again.

 

 

 

 

 

You may be very surprised ~ but I doubt it~ today’s silks are really not silk but actually a blend of poly/cotton.  You may also use the above cleaning techniques for your faux flowers as well.  A little disclaimer here ~~ not everything you own or those you may have had from two decades ago will clean up with 100% success.  I sell the quality stuff and I know my cleaning methods work on those.  Cheaper fauxs from the dime store may “bleed”.  You may want to do a little area at a time to make sure they don’t turn a really pale green! 

 

I hope this post has helped.  Please feel free to ask if you have any other questions I didn’t go over.  Oh!  If you have a dusty dried arrangement, I suggest pitching it in the trash.  They are not attractive filled with dust and I have found no way to clean them.

 

Let me just say Thank You so much for your very nice comments from Monday’s post.  I really wasn’t fishing for compliments!  I just know that I sometimes don’t post as often as I would like, so at times I just feel you give up on me keeping up with my blog.  Occasionally I thinking of pulling the whole thing down, but I just enjoy it too much.

 

Now for a picture of yesterday’s project:

Until next time  ~~~~~~~

Please Mr. Postman

 

Raise your hand if you have starred my blog as being one of the most lame.

Luckily because I can’t see you, you won’t hurt my feelings by all the hands going up! LOL! 

As many of you have written on your blogs,  life has a way of interfering with blogging!  I don’t regret that one bit because a good portion of last week was spent with my dear mother. 

 

 

 

 

Mr. Brown Socks and I went to our home town over Memorial Day weekend.  This is the town my mother lives in.  We always take time to visit the graves of my father and Craig’s  mother and father.  We carefully place new flowers and flags on their graves, while removing grass clippings and making things look nice.  Call me weird, but I enjoy visiting cemeteries.   I find it very interesting to read names and to see the year they were born and how long their life was.  I love the really old headstones and the engraving on them.  I love looking at flowers family members have left and to see the flags waving on the veteran’s graves.

My mother came home with us to spend a few days.  I’ve told you before how amazing she is.  She keeps up so well and loves to be active.  We went antiquing, fixed a dinner for other family members, made jelly, talked, shopped for containers for my business, met with my cousin for breakfast and my aunt and uncle for lunch one day. 

Later in the week, we drove about an hour and met up with my sister.  We three shopped all day long and then my sister drove mom back home.

I’m the one in the middle!   :-)

 

 

Changing the subject here ~~ stay with me now ~~ 

 

Last summer I was at my mother’s home helping her to clean out her garage.  We ran across this old mailbox and decided it was well past time to pitch it.  Who knows how long it had been sitting with cobwebs in a corner of the garage.  That night in my sleep I decided that mailbox was not going to the trash.  Yes, I am a sentimental fool, but I can’t help that.

 

I remembered while still living at home, Mr. Brown Socks was off at college.  How many letters had I written to him, sprayed the envelope with perfume and walked to the street to mail them in this very mailbox?  How many times had I gone out to check this very mailbox to see if my true love had sent me a letter?

 

I was also thinking about my dear old Dad and how many times he had walked to this very mailbox only to complain about a handful of bills that might have arrived that day.  No, this mailbox had too many memories.  It was going home with me.  I have placed it in my garden.

 

You can see the row of potatoes Mr. Brown Socks has planted in front.  Behind the mailbox will be mammoth sunflowers which will tower over my special keepsake in a few weeks.  I have thought of painting it, but right now this original blue color is so popular.  I think I will leave it as if for the time being.

 

 

 

 

Soon we will be picking strawberries!  This is the third year for my strawberry patch and I have high hopes of it being productive.  We will be removing this tacky chicken wire soon.  I had to keep Chester the dog out while the strawberries were wildly growing and producing flowers and now berries.

 

  

 

One last thing I want to share. Do you remember a couple of weeks ago, I posted a tablescape with a garden theme?  I showed dinner plates that had a Fiesta look about them, purchased from the grocery store.  I waited til after Easter when they were $1 a piece, but sadly that they didn’t have that many left.

 

Well, I went to a neighborhood garage sale with my daughter on Saturday.  A lady had a stack of colorful dishes placed on an old dresser.  There was not a price on the dishes so I casually asked her about them. I didn’t want to seem over eager, don’t cha know? Well she bought them at Macy’s several years back and why didn’t I just make her an offer.  I hate when people do that, especially with dishes.  We talked awhile longer and pretty soon she said, “How about $2?”  I asked if she meant $2 a piece????  NO!  $2 for the whole pile of seven!  Yipee!!  Yes, I’ll take them!  So now I think I have about 13 of these colorful fun dishes!

 

Here is a picture of my new ones.

 

 

See?  I have had a lot happening.  It just wasn’t easy to blog while my mother was here.  I’ll try to do better.  I truly have missed contact with so many of you and seeing what’s going on in your lives as well!

 

Hey!  It’s June 1st! 

Happy Summer to us all!

I’m ready for hot summer days!  How about you?

Have you noticed?

They are everywhere?

Birds, that is…..

This sweet windchime is maybe my favorite find of the year so far.  Guess where it was discovered?

                  TJ Maxx! :)

 

 

I would venture to say that birds are as popular now as geese were in the 80’s.  Now that’s a pretty strong statement. 

Remember (those of you young enough) how much we loved geese with country blue?  Now birds seem to appearing in every form, color and texture.

My daughter recently found these pictures hanging in my downstairs bathroom.

 

 

 

She was a bit discouraged when I told her they were found on one of my Thrift Store runs.  She doesn’t have much time to scour Thrift shops like I do.  She loved the vintage feel of them.  It surprises me that at her young age of 26 she is loving these feathered beauties as much as I am.

Remember recently I showed you this fabric we are going to make a wall hanging with and hang in her new living room?

 

 

 

Yesterday during a quick stop at the Thrift store I found these….

 

 

I think she is going to like them.  I personally love the red frames, but so far I don’t think she is decorating with reds.  They would be pretty painted bronze or black or maybe even latte.  I think we’ll wait until she is moved in and her treasures in place before painting.

 

Yesterday was a good thrifting day.  I also found this for…….

 

Are you ready?

 

99 cents!  woohoo!

Shall I leave it this color or would she (I’m sure it’s a she) be prettier in a different color?

 

 

Last summer I found this little chubby at my mom’s church auction

 

This was right at $1.00 as well.  Also thinking of painting her because I don’t have much in silver.

 

I think Jamie will be happy with my find for her and I’ll keep these hanging in my guest bath for now…

 

 

I {heart} Step Aerobics

When I find a form of exercise I really like it is best I just stick with it.  Such is the case with step aerobics. 

 

For four years now my alarm has gone off just before 5:00 a.m. three days a week.  Yes, you read that right, and no I don’t think I’m crazy.  My friend and I joined this step class and we really, really like it. It meets early because so many must race home and get ready for work.

If you are looking for a new exercise routine or one you might be able to stick with, I offer two suggestions.  Find a class with a really good instructor who likes to change things around frequently.  It is so nice to have variety to keep the class from getting stale and boring.  Number Two ~~ grab a friend to exercise with you.  Having an accountability partner is definitely a major reason I have stuck with this class.  During quick water breaks, we watch the clock together and complain about how energetic our teacher is (even though we love her!)  the whole time we wipe the sweat off our brow.   We even fantasize about leaving and going to Starbucks instead of finishing the class. 

But in reality, we stick it out for the 48 (or so) minutes of step which includes hand weights while stepping and about 12 minutes of abs work followed by 2-4 minutes of cool down to Barry Manilow.  Barry now has new meaning.  It means the end of class has come!  We LOVE Barry! ha!  By reading this it sounds like we really don’t like the class.  We actually really do.  It’s a very good workout and we KNOW we have worked out.  I have brought my cholesterol numbers down as well and maintained my weight through my 50’s.

 

Tomorrow morning my daughter Jamie is picking me up at 6:15.  Her boyfriend and cousin are running a half marathon.  We are going to walk a 10K, which is 6.2 miles.  We aren’t in it for the race and time.  We just enjoy walking together and she wanted to do this since her b/f is in the run.  Trouble is, the temps are suppose to get down into the 30’s by early morning.!  brrrrr  As soon as i finish this post I’m going to dig out my gloves and Yes, maybe even a scarf!

 

What is your favorite form of exercise?

Up Close and Personal

I just had to share with you this photo I captured a couple of days ago.  My neighbor and I were out talking in her back yard about birds, of course.  She was mentioning how no hummingbirds were coming to this glass feeder.

About 3 minutes after she said that, here was a visitor!

I have never been this close to a hummingbird.  This is the female.  The male came just a few minutes later, in full blown color.

 

We could actually hear them before we could see them, with their fast beating wings.  It was truly amazing to be so close.

 

 

 

As far as our bluebirds, my neighbor now has five little babies that hatched a week ago.

 

 

 

 

This is the mother sitting on top of the house.  Sorry it’s blurry.  I forgot to switch my camera over to distance setting.

 

 

 

 

 

As far as my blue bird house ~~~~~  I have a family of wrens setting up residency.  :(  I’m a little sad it isn’t blue birds, but wrens do have a beautiful song. 

 

 

I’m going out right now to start planting my flowers.  It’s a little breezy and chilly, but the sun’s out.  I do hope you have a fun weekend planned.