Wednesday, October 31, 2007

The Itsy-Bitsy Spider Crawled Up the Kitchen Wall

I have always adored autumn. The crisp days and the frosty nights, the brisk walks in the equally brisk air....

And after being outside, enjoying the crunchy leaves and the cool breeze, isn't it nice to walk into a toasty-warm house and know you are warm and safe for when winter arrives?

Guess what? Bugs like it too!

Around here at Casa de Bumblebee, when the chilly weather arrives, so do the indoor pests. Ants come inside looking for warmth, water and food. Spiders try to take up residence in the heating vents or the blinds, and many more random bugs I can't even name show up around the house.

I can't think of any homemaker who's willing to share her house with all sorts of creepy crawlies, and with that, I'd like to share a few ways you can minimize the yearly autumnal invasion.

The most important thing is to make sure that there is no food whatsoever on you floor. A good way to avoid having to clean incessantly is to keep all food in the kitchen of dining room. If you must have your nightly hot, salty, buttery popcorn while you watch reruns of Gilmore Girls (ummm...hypothetically, that is!) make sure that you don't drop anything on the floor, and if you do, pick it up right away. This is also the perfect time to deploy your vacuum hose. Really get into all the nooks and crannies, especially where the floor meets the wall. Also give a good cleaning to your window sills and the tracks that your windows and patio door slide along. After a good vacuuming, bring out your mop or Hoover Floormate (I love mine) and get everything nice and shiny.

Unfortunately, this isn't something that only needs to be done once at the beginning of the season; it's something you'll have to maintain by integrating it into your daily cleaning once or twice a week.

Next, make sure your house is tidy. Nothing looks more cozy to a scary spider than a pile of towels sitting on the ground and nothing is quite as tempting as a full-but-forgotten garbage can. Take away their hiding places, and your home will become less attractive to them.

Finally, a word about ants--the bugs that I find myself fighting against constantly in this old house. If you see half a dozen or so "scout" ants spread out over a small area, assess where they are. Sometimes they'll look for food in places where there isn't any, like a bathroom or laundry room. If you can possibly bear it, let the ants look around for a while. When they discover there's no food to be found, they'll return to their nest, but leave a chemical residue that informs other ants that the area isn't worth searching. Then, chances are you won't see ants in that location for quite some time.

That's it--that's all my tips on keeping the bugs at bay. As you can see, it's nothing complicated with lime-soaked rosemary stems or soap flakes and borax. It's nothing more than keeping your home clean, which robs bugs of their food source, and tidy, which robs them of hiding places.

May your home be cozy, and devoid of creepy-crawlies!

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Here I go again....

Well, I thought that since school was over I'd have lots and lots of time to give you all lovely blog posts, but I'm afraid I already have to take another break!

My sweetie will be headed over to spend six months in Iraq--and he leaves in a little under two weeks.

We will be trying to spend as much time as we can being together as a family, so I won't have much time for posting at all.

Thanks everyone for sticking with me--I'll be back in no time at all!

Saturday, October 13, 2007

Home Improve-mint

Quick! Name something minty!

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What did you come up with?

Toothpaste?

Candy?

Gum?

Mouthwash?

Breath mints (of course!)?

The above are all things that everyone considers minty, but have you ever wondered why? Why is it that so many personal hygiene products smell minty—especially ones we’re supposed to put in our mouths?

It’s because mint is clean. Mint is fresh. Mint lifts the spirits. Oh, and did I mention mind is clean? :)

It is for this reason that if someone asked me to name something minty, I would probably answer “my house.”

I discovered a few years ago, that although unconventional, the scent of mint is a wonderful addition to any home. As I described above, it just makes everything seem cleaner. Think of it as giving a breath mint to your house!

When using mint, I tend to rely most heavily on regular old McCormick mint flavoring, found right next to the vanilla in the spice section of the grocery store. I also like to use spearmint essential oil that I buy from www.sweetcakes.com. Because mint is a fairly easy oil to extract, you can buy a huge bottle of it inexpensively. I’m sure places like Whole Foods and Wild Oats also carry it, but I’m not sure about their pricing. When buying the oil, I like to get spearmint rather than peppermint, but that’s purely a personal preference. Try both—you might find you like peppermint more.

Anyway, below are some of my favorite ways to incorporate a minty freshness into my house:

--Pour about a tablespoon of flavoring into my bottle of homemade vinegar cleaner.

--Place a couple of drops of oil on my vacuum filter before vacuuming the house.

--Make my own scented scouring powder by adding a little oil to equal parts of kosher salt and baking soda (your tub has never been so fresh!).

--Buy a Yankee “Fresh Mint” candle. The way they have scented this is uncanny. It smells exactly like a mint patch growing out in the yard. They have perfectly captured not only the mint, but also the subtle earthiness and bitter-sweetness of real, fresh mint. Have a look at www.yankeecandle.com. It is well worth the $23—I promise!

--If you’ll be leaving home for a few days, pour a few drops of the flavoring down each drain and in the bowl of your commode. It will eliminate that stale smell that develops when stagnant water has been in the pipes for too long.

--Dab a few drops of oil on the cardboard tube inside your rolls of toilet paper and paper towels. You’ll have freshness with each spin!

--And don’t forget about using mint for personal care products as well: a lid-full of essential oil poured into a full bottle of vanilla body wash is incredibly delicious (my favorite is St. Ives Swiss Vanilla—about $3 at the drugstore or Wal-Mart).

Once your house—and you—are sweet and minty, you’ll wonder why you never thought to use it before!