penzey's...a delicious experience

spent the weekend with my stl besties...thought you might want to "meet" them...they are some of my most favorite people in the whole world.

while i was there we went to penzey's. it is a spice store that i wrote about HERE

let me tell you...it was perfection. it was in a old building in a quaint part of a st. louis suburb. hardwood floors, wood crates, organization, and the smell...oh my! before we went i had prepared mr. dc for the trip. he knew that i had cleaned out the spice cabinet before we left. here is what i purchased while we were there.

just some of the bottom rack in the above picture

i bought these spices in bags, (you will see a picture below) because if you purchased in the bag you got a larger quantity for a cheaper price. i knew i had jars at home that would hold the spices. the store had all kinds of mixed spices, dressing mixes, and rubs.

i reused some of my existing bottles and removed the label from the bag that it came in so i could have the information for the spice

that sandwich sprinkle is straight from above...

these bags show how the spices came packaged

i would love to eventually have the entire spice cabinet be a penzey's spice cabinet

in the store they had all kinds of recipe cards for the taking, highlighting certain spices or blends to use in the recipe.

penzey's also has a catalog that has so many amazing recipes. i highly recommend subscribing HERE. and if you need spices let me tell you, penzey's is the place to buy. i found the company to have extremely reasonable prices and the quality is superior! i would buy the spices in the bag if you are going to have it shipped. and if you live near a penzeys, CHECK HERE, jump in your car and go NOW! what is holding you back. it will make you hApPy:)

one more little tidbit...a dash of penzey's almond extract in your coffee is deliciously decadent...thanks for the tip nanc:)

~type to you soon~

st. nicks wheel

found this little bugger today under the christmas tree after all the ornaments were put away in boxes, put into the plastic tubs, and stacked ready for storage. needless to say i was not going to pull all of the ornaments back out to see who was missing this. i could tell it was from the hallmark series of ornaments mr. dc buys for me each year so i labeled it as best as i could with directions for next year and put it in the christmas bin that was easiest to get to.

i do this a lot when i need to remember to do something with a "spare part". plastic baggies are a great organizational tool. not so green, but they do the trick when i need to remember something long term and i need to keep something small to go with the memory. hope this helps all of you who can't remember things from year to year. shucks...i can't remember things hour to hour:)

~type to you soon~

glass jars

just a little milk left in a 1/2 gallon container...no reason to take up that much space
no busted boxes and torn bags for the cereal

perfect for organizing a cabinet that needs some attention or consolidating tight quarters in the frig

~type to you soon~

recipe box

a couple of weeks ago i started the process of RE-organizing my recipes. note the emphasis on RE! this is something that i have had to do for years.

1. because i have these friends that cook this amazing stuff and i have to have the recipe for these things.

2. because i subscribe to some of the best magazines with these mouth watering recipes with these lovely pictures.

3. because i am how i am. i can't help myself. it has to at least look orderly. i THINK, again note the emphasis on THINK i have finally found a system that works for me. not sayin it will for you, but it might, just sayin.

so here has been the issue for the past 11 years or so, since i actually started caring about food, how it looked, tasted, was prepared, etc. i love, love, love a recipe box and recipe cards. especially ones that have been loved with worn corners and tons of love dripped all over but what was i to do with all of the magazine recipes and the online recipes because i don't like loose sheets floating around in my recipe box.

btw...it used to really bug me that all of my recipe cards did not match. sometimes i would even re-write them if someone gave me one. however along the way i really have learned to love when i get a different card that has different writing than mine. it is special. i am reminded of the person who gave me the recipe and it usually makes me smile while i am making the creation.

unless something goes totally remiss with the creation and then i get a little resentful of the person and their superior culinary abilities. just being honest, trying to work on my pride issues. admitting you have a problem is the first step, right?

so here is a brief overview of how i have combined the mismatched cards, Internet and magazine recipes all into one neat little box.

• all recipes are grouped by category. i like this method better than alphabetically because then i can just shove the card into the box under a category instead of rooting through each and every card.
• i fold the magazine and Internet recipes so they will fit on one of the recipe cards. i tape them to the card and then trim the recipe in such a way that i can unfold the recipe without removing it from the card. i also write the recipe name at the top of the card so i do not have to pull it out and look at the article. you can see how i cut the recipes in the above picture. this also makes the recipes sturdier and they seem to last longer. i attach them to the card with a piece of tape.

i am sure that you all are running to your kitchens to get started on organizing your recipe boxes. if you do get around to it soon send me some pictures. also a great rule of thumb for recipe boxes and recipes in general, unless it is a family recipe, if you haven't made it in the last 5 years...you probably won't. pass it on or trash it.

~type to you soon~

teach them well

most momma's get excited about a home run or a lead in the ballet but my heart filled with joy when my little cheeks brought her new pottery bowl creation out to the kitchen to show me her polishes organized neatly in the bowl. she said, "do you like my organization momma?" and momma said "oh yes sweet cheeks, I love your organization."

btw...i get excited about a home run and a lead in the ballet but you know how i feel about organization:)

~type to you soon~

the old ice chest

this is one of my favorite pieces of furniture
it is an old ice chest from my mothers side of the family

i just adore the carving in the piece

i did some more organizing yesterday and grouped all of my platters in the top door

it is a perfect size to hold the platters
the bottom of the chest is divided so storage of items is really easy
this is one of those pieces that i will always have
until one of children beg to take it to their home
(that's how i ended up with the piece)
i would love to see your favorite furniture piece
take a picture and email it to me
~type to you soon~

red baskets

its amazing what a small investment of 2 baskets will do for the look of a cabinet. i so wish i had taken a picture before, but i didn't. just like me to jump into something before thinking:) take my word for it, this sucker looks a ton better! i grouped all of the baking ingredients like soda, baking powder, corn starch, cocoa, etc. in the bottom basket. i even put chocolate chips in there. in the second basket is sprinkles. yes for some reason we have acquired an arsenal of sprinkles. i am so happy with how this cabinet turned out. what is something that you need to organize?

~type to you soon~

bucket o' mags

do you think that i needed to weed through the magazines?

from that to this...

and then filed in this...

the important part is the filing and doing so right away. i choose to tear the sheets that i am interested in out of the magazines and file them under specific topics such as recipes, decor, crafting, gifting, etc. the sheets that are torn out can pile up and be very time consuming to file if not kept up with. i try to file them right after i go through each one of my magazines. it makes things easier long term. how do you organize your magazines articles and pictures that you want to keep?

~type to you soon~

the post-it princess

go HERE to find all kinds of organizing tips

keeping little miss' room organized is always a challenge. kids rooms are by far the worst in regard to organization. what i have found is that everything HAS TO HAVE A PLACE!!! and the kids need to know the place, because the goal is for them to keep the room organized.

she scribbles, creates, colors, fluffs, tucks, trims...the girl is a bundle of creative genius. along with that comes the endless sheets of paper, post-its, receipts, stickers all tucked in their "proper" place. you get the picture. deep cleaning the post-it princess' room cannot happen when she is around, so yesterday while she was at school i seized the morning. here are the results.

re purpose a quilt into a shower curtain


those green shutters have ladybug buttons climbing around the corner

the butterflies were purchased at pier one and they were a rusty brown color. mr. dc helped me paint them before the post-it princess was born.

we use her kitchen to store all kinds of toys that she plays with. everything from my little ponies to her magnetic wooden dolls. i save old baby wipes bins to store all her little toy pieces.

bins are an ideal way to help little ones find a quick place for odds and end toys. not everything will have a place that makes sense. the bins are great for those things.

fluff added by the pip(post-it princess)

this is in the closet. helps with all the papers. i see these things are yard sales all the time. they are great for all areas of the house. especially painted a fun color. i have labeled some of the sections so she knows where to fill certain papers. ex. church, kindergarten, 1st grade, creations, cards, etc.

bought the rack at a thrift shop for 50 cents. a coat of white paint and some pink curling ribbon did wonders.

aside: to her credit, she does wonderful job keeping her room tidy, but at some point some of the papers must go. our recycling man will have an excessive amount of paper next go around. hopefully the post-it princess does not see the bin before he comes:)

~type to you soon~

and on to the kitchen...

i just love the clean, crisp look of all white in a cabinet
but i also can say enough about vintage pyrex and the slight addiction that i have involving this form of culinary genius.

more pictures to feed the addiction (most of the storage containers that i have are currently in the frig). i use the refrigerator containers (vintage pyrex) to store all of our leftovers. my favorite pattern is amish butterprint turquoise.

and then there are the kids cups. don't get me wrong...i have not received a more precious gift than our children, but these kids cups are just not very conducive to organization:) but i will keep them, relish them, because that means my little ones are still little. and that my friends is worth far more than organization.

~type to you soon~

organizing the meds

i have been very concerned about where we keep our medicine. i had the motrin, kids meds, and any type of super harmful drug up high but our vitamins were just in a kitchen cabinet. now that our children can scale the countertops i decided that it was time to keep them under a little more lock and key (for my own peace of mind, and the fact that our four year old who has no concern with rule following, decided to eat about 1/3 of the whole foods based kids vitamins the other day. thank the Lord they were not toxic when taking to many! so here was the organizing project today. i chose to label the small bins for quick access when dealing with a particular aliment.

btw...the red box is filled with different herbs, vitamins, etc. (not medicine) do not panic your not dealing with a drug addicted blogger on the other end of the screen. we just like our natural supplements:)

~type to you soon~