Thursday, June 26, 2014

DIY Face Powder

I've seen that you can make your own face powder all over the net. I've looked at a ton of different sites and found instructions from easy to complicated.

Well, since I'm all about the easy, I decided to try the most basic of powders......two ingredients.


Yep! That's it.

I started with about 2 Tablespoons (heaping) of corn starch and added the cocoa powder in 1/2 teaspoon at a time. I think this is about 1 1/2 teaspoons.




I tried it as a powder foundation, but I prefer a little more coverage. But, I love it as a loose powder over my regular foundation. The corn starch really helps with taming the shine from my summer oily skin.


The actual recipe that I found used arrow root powder, but I had corn starch on hand so that's what I used. So far it has worked for me just fine. I also saw recipes that included nutmeg or cinnamon to adjust the color. I tried with a little nutmeg, but found it to be too grainy. I didn't try the cinnamon because I was happy with what I've got. One word of caution though, always be careful when using cinnamon to be applied to the skin. It can irritate the skin very quickly. It won't take much. That's why I didn't even bother. It wasn't worth risking it. I've made other beauty products (like scrubs) that I use cinnamon in, but not for my face.

So, if you want to try something else to make for yourself (and costs about 25 cents) give this a go. I'm loving it so far!

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Sneak Peak

Here's a sneak peak of a work in progress.

It's a cross stitch of a pumpkin with a Celtic design.


I usually follow the rules and stitch all of one color (at least in one general area) at a time. But this time I decided to be a rebel and do both colors as I go!

What?!

I KNOW!

I'm sometimes wild and crazy like that.

I decided to do it that way because I'm only working with two colors so it's not all crazy and confusing. I have two needles threaded. I work down my line and back with the one color, and then do the same with the second color. So now as I finish each line, I'm really finished with it. It's giving me a better since of accomplishment as I go along.


Now, this is working for me on this project, but I certainly wouldn't try to keep up with all of my needles threaded if I had any more than just two colors.

I'm hoping to have this finished before the Fall, but I'm really not holding my breath. I haven't done any cross stitch in a long time and I really forgot just how slow it goes.

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Even a little bit helps.

In this case I'm talking about a little bit of organization. I can freely admit that it's not one of my strong points, but I do try to make baby steps in that direction as often as I can. I have learned to not kid myself into taking on these huge makeover into being organized kind of projects. If I don't do it in small doses, I don't usually follow through. So, I've seen all the space saving techniques for plastic grocery bags and decided to give it a shot.

With shopping for a family of six, I end up with a lot of those bags around my house. (And, yes, I use them for all kinds of other things around the house, but still have them everywhere.) I do own several of the reusable grocery bags which I actually keep in the back of my car so I'll have them with me. If only I could remember to carry them into the store with me, I'd be set!

Anyway, the tutorial I used can be found here.

This is what I started with:



That's three bags filled to overflowing!!!

As you can see, I forget to take the extra bags to the recycle bin even more often than I forget to use the other bags.

But, after spending quite a bit of time folding these bags, they all fit into the one lunch tote size bag......with room left over! Woohoo!! A little bit of organizing that I can keep up with and it really does make a big difference.


Here's another option for 'folding' them. I tried it, but I found that the football fold made the bags smaller and flatter.....although that can just be me. lol

Hope this helps with extra plastic bags around your house and that even a small bit of organization like this makes you as happy as it has me.