Personalize $1 Store Calendars

You really can have a great looking fully functional calendar that fits your personality and your budget.

Lots of people use a $1 calendars or planners to keep track of their appointments, but I'm going to suggest using them for something else as well. Plus I'm also going to share with you an idea on how to decorate to make them more fitting to your life and personality.

First here are 4 ways to use a calendar besides keeping track of appointments.

1. Keep track of your finances. Write down every purchase on the corresponding date. Also write down when bills are due or need to be mailed and mark your paydays.

2. Write a couple words or even a sentence or two to describe your life on that day. One example would be "Date Night w/Hubby - Movies saw The Blind Side and ate dinner at my fave restaurant." Include everyday events and the special moments.

3. Instead of writing about your life -- write about your children's lives. A couple words each day to describe your child's development and daily life. Ex. Little Man took 5 steps in a row today or Becky had a field trip to the Zoo--she loved the monkeys.

4. Another option is to record you work schedule. Whether you work at home, from home or outside home you can keep track of which project your working on.

If you can't find any dollar calendars that fits your personality -- not a problem. Find a calendar that has the insides you life and can work with. Do you prefer monthly pages, weekly pages or daily pages? Do you want something that you can hang on the wall or fit in your purse?

If you like the insides, but the cover really isn't your taste here is a simple solution. If you are tiny bit crafty you can create a cover for your calendar. Here is a link to a great pattern to create a fabric book cover that you can customize to fit any size book. http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/2009/08/how-to_sew_a_simple_fabric_boo.html. By visiting your local craft store you can find lots of fabrics in a variety of colors, textures, and patterns to fit your personality.

There are lots of other uses for those $1 calendars in addition to the four listed above. Plus you can completely customize any calendar, so there's no need to go out and purchase one of those expensive day planner.

Make Chinese Food at Home

Just thought I would share with you something I found that my family loves. I bought this kit at my local grocery store. It's made by Wanchai Ferry and it includes all the ingredients to make Orange Chicken (except the chicken). It even includes the rice! I've made this a couple times before and my family absolutely loves it.

I don't know about you but my family loves Chinese food. The only problem is to feed my family of 5 it costs about $50 at the restaurants near my home. That's a bit expensive for my family nowadays. Whereas this kit only costs about $5 and the price of chicken (on sale of course).

I'm sure there are other companies that make the same type of kits. We've only tried this one because we had a coupon for it.

Anyways, I'm not much of a cook, but this kit is really easy to make.

Just a note: I was not paid, given anything, or in any way compensated for this post. I just love the product and thought I'd share it. Hope you enjoy it also. :)

Little Nightmares

My littlest one had some pretty weird dreams the other night. She woke up around 3 a.m., went to our craft cabinet, got the scissors and proceeded to cut holes in her bedspread. She thought her brother's stuffed animal was lost under her covers and was trying to save him.


There were lumps in her comforter from washing it so many time that the stuffing bunched up a little bit. She must have thought that was the stuffed animal. She was only using safety scissors and managed to cut all the way through to the sheets. Ugh!


This was a first for our family. None of my kids even tried to cut their own hair. I guess it's pretty common though, just like sleep walking or talking in your sleep. My little on was just having a bad dream. This is one of the funny (odd) things I'll remember when she's older. :)

The lesson I learned was to keep the scissors up higher - even the safety scissors. I probably should keep the markers up higher also, but that's another story. :)