By Anita Sands Hernandezastrology@earthlink.net
Want Life to be terrific?
Want wealth and health to come your way? 
Where
there's ORDER, there's MONEY, -- a great philosopher told me. (It was Rosa,
my ancient Mexican maid who kind of spat at me contemptuously when she
said it.) Do as I did in the wake of meeting ROSA. Vow now to clean up
the house. And vow it every morn, after coffee, and clean for an hour while
the first flush of caffeine is fresh.
To inspire you to start this labor of getting spiffy, go outside, cut branches from trees, flowers if you find any, bring potted plants inside in baskets, with a plate set inside so you won't stain furniture. Fill the vases, mayo jars whatever. When you finish, you know those spray perfumes people give you that you hate? They make good lightbulb spray.
The way your house feels
when thusly loaded will inspire you to brake for garage sales and pick
up old vases for a quarter. VERY IMPORTANT for good home decor, or feng
shui is lots of flowers and plants in the house.
BUT BEFORE THAT, the most important thing is to DE CLUTTER!!!!
http://www.wenscentral.com/how_to_declutter_your_life.html
HOME-SPIFF
Organization 101
Julie Morgenstern, the New
York author of Organizing From the Inside Out
and Time Management From the Inside Out, recommends a three
step
approach to getting the most out of the space in your home: analyze,
strategize and attack.
Analyze. Decide what
three to five functions are normally done in the
space. Ask everyone what's really essential in the room, and what works
and doesn't work about the space.
.....
Strategize. Lay out
a "zone" for each function. Make one spot the
computer area, another the TV area. Maybe you'll have a reading corner.
Now figure out what you'll need in each. A chair and a bookshelf
for
the reading area, perhaps - and that box with your scissors, sticky
notes and reading glasses.
.....
Attack. Only after
you have a plan should you start to do the work.
Making SPACE
- Now, says Morgenstern, it is time to work out your SPACE - meaning
to
Sort, Purge, Assign, Containerize and Equalize.
Sort out similar items and
group them. Don't, for example, have the
bookshelf across the room from your reading chair, or your bound to
end
up with a stack of books on the floor next your chair. Consider placing
a bookshelf perpendicular to the wall to help block off your reading
area.
Now purge what doesn't belong.
Ask yourself, for example, if those
pencils rally have a reason to be in the reading corner.
Then assign everything a
home. Things should be put away in the same
place every time so everyone knows where they are- and where they go.
It's a lot like kindergarten: Everything had a place, and the items
were
easily put away in about five minutes during clean-up time.
Next Containerize items,
Morgenstern says. Figure out what needs to be
in what container, determine what size the container should be, and
then
go shopping. That might mean looking for basket and drawer units, or
it
might mean buying a few extras of things you already have in your house.
Finally, Equalize: Have a
rule that everyday at a certain time, the room
gets cleaned up. And then once a year, give it an over-haul, checking
to
see what you should keep an what you should throw away. This is
especially important if there are kids at home because their interests
change as they get older.
Organizing the room may seem
like a big task. But by planning before you
act, it should be easy. Two other websites that describe this process:
http://www.wenscentral.com/how_to_declutter_your_life.html
http://www.svainteriors.com/designnews.htm
SPACE concepts were
created by Julie Morgenstern,
http://www.juliemorgenstern.com
has more on this. Plus offers the books for sale.
============================
It's
easy to clean a house.
1.) take a big box, walk around picking up all objects that look 'extra.'
Later you'll know where to find them. Outside on table in sun.
2.) You throw in a load of laundry at a time.
3.) Vacuum and sweep the same areas, alternately. Dustpans, brooms
great inventions. Prob don’t need vacuum!
4.) Turn on radio and listen to talk shows while you wash dishes. It
keeps you from hating doing dishes.
5.) Don't bother making beds. Open them fully. Wide open. Leave them
to breathe all day and exhale your aroma and dampness. Let them breathe
themselves fresh. Lock bedroom door or the dog may add a new aroma.. Who
looks at a bedroom anyway.EXPERTS tell us this kills the moisture that
leads to mold in our pillows, mattresses and bedding. In Europe, they hang
all bedding out on the line in sun! Read up on MOLD
here, (click on URL)
6.) Take a broom, drape with rag, clean cobwebs above, in ceiling corners.
7. Pour old dishwater on kitchen floor, broom it out the backdoor.
Then use the rag to rumba across floor 'til it's dry.
8.) fill vases with flowers, branches.
9.) Spray entire house with anything aromatic. Febreze fabric spray,
cologne, incense. Room fresheners
10) Dust-rag all shelves, books. Wax furniture with old, rancid handcreams.
11) On hands and knees, de-spot carpet with a heavy grade brush. Detergent/water/ammonia.
Then use a rag to scrub up the water and soil. Every six months, during
hot, dry weather, use a rented, 19$ 24 hour hot water shampooer with your
own HOME MADE mix of shampoo,same recipe as above. Give instructions to
all house mates it’s coming so EVERY SINGLE THING, chairs, etc, is up on
unmoveable objects like beds.
READ
FILE ON BUGS
SPECIFICS OF CLEANINGHOUSES
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Clean with cheap stuff, ammonia,
dish soap, (detergent liquids), old rancid face creams and body creams
as furniture wax, not costly cleaners and waxes. A great website, http://www.pennysolutions.com/
tells you how to make your own.
Vinegar Kills Bacteria, Mold and Germs
Adapted from the "Care2 Ask Annie" newsletter.
Vinegar is a mainstay of the old folk recipes
for cleaning, and with good reason. The vim of the vinegar is that it kills
bacteria, mold, and germs. Heinz company spokesperson Michael Mullen references
numerous studies to show that a straight 5 percent solution of vinegar
- such as you can buy in the supermarket - kills 99 percent of bacteria,
82 percent of mold, and 80 percent of germs (viruses). He noted that Heinz
can't claim on their packaging that vinegar is a disinfectant since the
company has not
registered it as a pesticide with the Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA). However, it seems to be common knowledge in the industry that vinegar
is powerfully antibacterial. Even the CBS news show 48 Hours had a special
last December with Heloise reporting on tests from The Good Housekeeping
Institute that showed this.
Just like antibiotics, common disinfectants found in sponges and household sprays may contribute to drug resistant bacteria, according to researchers of drug resistance at Tufts New England Medical Center. Furthermore, research at the Government Accounting Office shows that many commercial disinfectants are ineffective to begin with, just like antibiotics.
Keep a clean spray bottle filled with straight (5 percent) vinegar in your kitchen near your cutting board, and in your bathroom, and use them for cleaning. I often spray the vinegar on our cutting board before going to bed at night, and don't even rinse, but let it set overnight. The smell of vinegar dissipates within a few hours. Straight vinegar is also great for cleaning the toilet rim. Just spray it on and wipe off.
http://www.care2.com/channels/solutions/home/164
Here is a list of OTHER homemade cleaners...just for FYI! A bit cheaper than buying... so there’s money left for the important stuff: Garage sales and new furniture. NEW TO YOU!
Window cleaner
In a plastic jug, mix: 1/2; c. ammonia, 2 Tbsp baking soda, 1/3 c.
white vinegar, water to fill jug. Save your old jugs. They abound in trashcans.
All purpose cleaner
Rubbing alcohol and ammonia. This is a favorite. Spray it
on and use a soft vegetable brush to brush the sinks, then rinse.
Ceramic tile and grout cleaner
1 cup baking soda, 1/2; c, vinegar, 1 c. ammonia, 7 cups warm water. This, obviously, can be divided by half. Spray on and wipe with a scrubbing pad. This is the equivalent of Tilex. At the time I read this, Tilex was 2.99 for 24 oz. This recipe cost .56 for the same amount
Window Cleaner Spray
Mix 3 c water & stir in 2 Tbsps ethylene glycol (antifreeze). Put in spray bottle.
Ammonia Wall and carpet Cleaner
Household ammonia, washing soda, white vinegar, 1 gal warm water. Measure ammonia, washing soda, and vinegar into water in a bucket. Mix. Store in clean bottle.
GLASS CLEANER
1 cup isopropyl alcohol, 1 cup ammonia, 1 Tbsp. soft soap, 13 cups warm water.
ANOTHER GLASS CLEANER. If you find an old bottle of windshield wiper solution in somebody's garage, discarded, put it in a spray bottle for glass cleaning.
Toilet Bowl Cleaner
Mix 4 c sodium bicarbonate & 3/4; c caustic soda. Store in airtight can/jar. To use, sprinkle in toilet bowl, let stand 1/2; hr. Then brush and flush with clean water.
Scouring Powders 1/4; c soap flakes, 2 tsp borax, 1 1/2; c boiling water, 1/3 c whiting
Dissolve soap flakes & borax in boiling water by stirring mixture. Allow to cool to room temp. Add whiting & stir well. Store in sealed plastic or glass container in dry, cool place.
Jet Dry for the dishwasher
Mix in a jar, 1 cup borax and 1/2; c. baking soda. Add I Tbsp of this
mixture to the dishwasher soap for each load.
---------------------MAKING FRUGAL SOAP
QUESTION: What can one do with those little slivers of melted soap that are saved? You know, Used soap, all kinds ---from all stores too. For handmade soaps, one can put the soap in a crock pot with a little milk and rebatch it and pour it into molds with some Essential oils.Another form of recycling for soap bits and pieces is make scrub sacks with them. Into a piece [nice big square say 5x5] of cheesecloth I lay my scraps, add a very generous handful [maybe 2 handfuls, I have small hands] of oatmeal [regular not quick oats] then a tablespoon or so of lavender or chamomile flowers. Gather the ends and tie off. That oatmeal feels divine. You can recycle your cheesecloth for later scrub sacks too.
Rebatching may not work with corporate soaps, because those are petroleum product based. However, scraps of homemade soaps can DEFINITELY be rebatched this way. Use 9 oz of cold milk to 24-32 oz of grated soap. yes, you should grate those slivers, or at least, break them into smaller pieces before attempting to melt them. Use leftover juice cans or tuna/cat food type cans to remold the soap in. Always allow rebatched soap to dry for three weeks before using it, or the soap will just dissolve in the shower.
FOR
CORPORATE SOAPS
Save the old slivers from your house (and others, if people will part with them) and put them into a small canning or jelly jar. when the jar is filled nearly to the top and the soap is crammed in there pretty well, cover the soap pieces with water. Let sit on the counter for a day or so. Every day or so, smash the pieces together and gently stir the mass until it becomes one glob of soap. Use a braun handblender to whir it up, then pour into molds, make soapballs OR put it into decorative molds. Allow to dry to firmness. Takes weeks.
CLEANING
CARPETS.
I personally have washed every kind of carpet. I love those rented shampooers that you empty every five minutes. I never buy the l0$ shampoo they sell you. I mix ammonia, dish soap with water and it works fine for a hundredth of the cost. The carpet absorbs the soap, then you suck up all the grungy, black, muddy water which goes back into the machine and you carry it over to bathroom and it goes down the toilet. Then go back and do that a hundred times. Imagine the amount of filth that carpets collect! Then You need a major RAG collection, and I’ve saved scroungey towels for 3 decades to be able to Lay TOWELS on every inch of carpet and stomp up and down to soak up last dampness.
Those shampooing machines do pull a lot of water from the floor, but if you have nice wood floors and own the property don't do it. This is the revenge-on-the landlords invention of all time. Landlords should make you sign a lease saying you won't ever use them. If you own the house, at least do this wood warping torture when it's exceedingly dry outside. Dry and hot.
Do huge 8 x 10 area rugs outdoors. I either lay it on the cement driveway soaking wet. I like the slope of hte driveway for draining. Or I hang it on the fence. How to get the dirt out? Ingeniousness to the rescue. I took a one by four scrap piece of board, a lumber piece a foot long, wrapped it in heavy plastic, like for green house walls, 6 mil? so it was slidey. Then when I got on knees, it slid over the surface of the carpet, squeegee-ing the water in its path, out of the carpet.
As I didn't have a deck, I used a concrete driveway that had a slanted pitch, down to the street. On hands and knees, I squee-jeed and water ran down the carpet to the street. Many times, hosed it, soaped it, squeegeed it. Let it dry on the slant. Dirt and water were squeezed/ drained out, down to the street. Didn’t drive car up the driveway, that's for sure. Parked it in street for a day.
My driveway gate was ten feet wide, wrought iron, so for medium carpets, I'd lay carpet over the top of gate, hose it, couldn't squeejee very well there, just hose and soap action.
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SPIFF
THE HOUSE UP. Buy really awful, amateur night in Dixie stretched
canvases/ paintings at garage sales. If the art is awful enough, the Thrift
Store will be in agreement with you it's worth nothing, they should pay
you to take it away. Don't tell them that you’re going to use a canvas
which even at the cheapest art store, is very costly. Next, buy some
oil or acrylic paints and paint portraits and landscapes and then re use
the frames you bought them in. Remember this. IF the paint is OIL already,
you cannot cover it with acrylics. If the paint is acylics, you CAN cover
it with oil.
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NOW, hit the garage sales. Look for overstuffed furniture you can cover with fresh cottons. Sheets work. Buy a stack of printed sheets, whip stitch them into a coverlet tailored to the chair. Turn outside in and throw on 'til your ship comes in and you can afford reupholstering.
EXTERIOR
OF HOUSE looks like Afghanistan?
Walk perimeter of bldg. FIX ALL BROKEN CORNERS OF THE HOUSE WITH CHEAP HOME MADE CEMENT . Use Cheap cement. Sounds neat, but how do we do that? Saw this in a chatroom. "I am curious as to how the newly laid block will hold up to the elements if it takes a few days to construct, seal, and roof the building. If I were doing this, it would be over several weekends, and I'm wondering if I could safely leave the partial walls etc.?? Maybe after your experimental brick has cured you can check its water resistance in that state, I'd try a batch myself, but my wife doesn't let me near her kitchen stuff.
ANSWER: go to a Home Depot, Lowes, Builder’s Square or similar building supply house, go back in the section which has pails of bedding mud for drywall joints, mortar mix etc. and look at the various tools. Among them will generally be two brands of mixers for insertion in a half-inch drill for mixing small quantities of mortar and paint. It’s cheaper than a divorce.
If you soak paper strips overnight it pulps easier and more quickly. With 10% Portland in the mix, though cellulose brick will shed water it will be very absorptive if rained upon. That won’t cause any deterioration in the cellulose/cement brick, but until the excess water is re-evaporated the compressive strength would be reduced somewhat, sand and cement don’t compress but the cellulose component can (like sawdust-cement heavy on the sawdust)---not too important if there is no load on the wall.. After the walls are erected or after a roof-panel is made of the stuff and raised, a water-shedding paint should be applied. Take your choice of cement-paint (read the label) or acrylic latex-based paint.. Note that each has advantages and accompanying disadvantages. You can patch small joints, cracks or damage to a cement-paint wall with a little cheap Portland and water cement paste. You have to use epoxy to repair a wall painted with acrylic latex. Embed roofing fiber-tape for larger repairs (comes in four-inch rolls)
Making and testing samples is always advisable before plunging ahead. This stuff works fine. It was the subject of an article in Countryside four or five years back for someone who built himself a quickie, small dome, and Jack Bays (don’t know if he is still alive), an eccentric in Cedaredge, Colorado, used to sell a king-size malted-milk mixer you dropped in a fifty-five gallon barrel to mix this and other good stuff of his devising.
Since it was then more available and of even less value (stores paid you to haul it off), he used pulped cardboard boxes, in which the fibers are a little stronger than those in paper.
There have been some recent developments along these lines, and one patent Tridex which used junk materials like this to make an extremely strong building panel with good insulation characteristics.
THIS
JUST IN, Tip from my holistic Expert: If you find VODKA in the trash, TAKE
IT HOME!. VODKA
IS MAGIC. This germicidal stuff has been used by the wife of the 800 million
dollar man and she is a gal who has gone to every holistic classroom, bought
every book on holism..She says "IF you stumble upon a bottle of vodka or
gin in an alley, in the hands of a sleeping or comatose bum, tilt it so
you can see the label. If it is 100% proof, yank it from his grip, run
home & use it for cleaning. Only l00 works, not 80 proof. It is used
by acupuncturists prior to needling. I use it for toilet seats, faucets,
silver ware that doesn't go in dishwa...on the fly. etc. instant germ proofing/cell
phones, house phones, tooth brush soaking, (rinse first before using),
great for cleaning glass, glasses, clean steering wheel muck, under fingernails,
toenails, shower head, fixtures, ...endless uses. I get a lot of razzing
for those jugs under my sink! and more so when I stand in line w/the jugs
in my cart....haha the truckers say, "Yeah, sure lady!" so funny.
solvent
dissolves adhesive.
bottle
with vodka, spray the caulking, let set five minutes and wash clean.
The
alcohol in the vodka kills mold and mildew.
dampened
with vodka. The alcohol in the vodka cleans the glass and kills
germs.
safety
razor blade soak in the alcohol after shaving.The vodka disinfects
the
blade and prevents rusting.
the
skin and tighten pores.
cleanses
the scalp, removes toxins from hair, and stimulates the growth of
healthy
hair.
them.
and
freeze for a slushy, refreshable ice pack for aches, pain or black eyes.
fill
the jar with vodka, seal the lid tightly and set in the sun for three
days.
Strain liquid through a coffee filter, then apply the tincture to
aches
and pains.
as
a liniment.
oil
from your skin.
some
of the alcohol to numb the pain.
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HOUSE CLEAN? Now, start on the GARDEN.