Unusually Domestic

When stumbling around the web yesterday, I found a link that amazed me. It was 6 uses for a binder clip that made me think: “Well I could have thought of that,” but were so neat and crafty! My two favorites:

A cord organizer:

 

An impromptu iPhone stand:

These simple and helpful uses for unlikely household items got me thinking domestically… what items could be used unconventionally around the house? I asked some friends that live in my sorority house and did some internet searching and found some great and kooky tips that will be fun to try out around the duplex next year!

Unlikely home tips:

Remove coffee cup stains by rubbing the inside with a cut lemon. For extra scrubbing power, dip the lemon in kosher salt. Then, wash in hot, soapy water.

Does your shower curtain stick? Rub hair conditioner on the rod, and the rings will move smoothly.

Use a wide candle as a pincushion. The wax helps pins and needles slide in and out of fabric more easily.

If you've lost your bathtub plug, use a golf ball as a substitute. It stays in place and rolls back if dislodged.

Speed up slow moving ketchup by inserting a plastic straw into the bottle. Take that, Heinz!

Remove dirty or greasy fingerprints from painted walls or non-washable wallpaper by rubbing the area with a slice of white bread.

To get animal hair off car seats or the sofa, run a rubber glove over the fabric. Hair sticks to the glove and comes right off.

Clean a bathroom mirror with shaving cream, then wipe with a soft cloth. It helps defog the mirror after showers.

Shine small copper items by rubbing gently with a cotton swab dipped in ketchup. Rub off with a cotton cloth and they'll gleam.

Put toothpaste on facial blemishes overnight to reduce the size and redness.

Use denture cream overnight to remove stains on bathroom and kitchen surfaces.

Ink/marker on furniture, clothes, walls and carpets? Spray some hairspray, wipe & watch it disappear!

Spray vodka on musty clothes to kill bacteria and make them smell fresher.

Stinky Sink due to the garbage disposal? Run hot water, drop orange peels down the hatch, and turn on the switch. Lemon, lime, and grapefruit rinds also do the trick.

Soak tea bags in ice cold water then apply over your eyelids, as compresses. The tea will bring down swollen eyes, removing the redness and puffiness after a while.

I hope you found these little tidbits as interesting as I did! My favorite new tip was absolutely the one about coffee cup stains because I am an avid coffee drinker. I can't wait to put this new information to test whenever these situations come up around the duplex.

Have any weird tips like this? Comment & share 'em! I'd love to hear your input.

Keep calm & carry on!

Folds of Fun

This post is dedicated to my dear friend, Spring Break.

Over the nice vacation that we just had from school, my family and I went on a cruise through the Western Caribbean. It was wonderfully relaxing, a ton of fun, and the best source of “people watching” that I’ve ever had. However, even through the beaches, massages and snorkeling, my favorite part about the week at sea was the quality time that I got to spend with my brothers and parents. My favorite time of day was dinnertime, not only because of the meal, but because no matter what we chose to do during the day we could all enjoy each others company for at least that one meal. Every night, the first topic of conversation at dinnertime was without fail: the napkins.

The napkins in the dining room of the cruise ship were always folded to perfection! Each night they were different and exciting. Now I know that it sounds lame, but believe me – we Nicholsons are entertained easily and got a real kick out of napkin art. One night, as I vowed to learn more napkin folding techniques, my mom suggested that I blog about it!

Even before spring break, napkin folding was very close to my heart. Odd? Maybe. Explanation: The summer before my freshman year at TCU, I worked at a Young Life camp in Colorado. I volunteered behind the scenes as a server in the dining hall, but this was no run-of-the-mill camp mess hall – we were full on waiters and waitresses, making a full meal experience for the campers! When the motto of the camp is “Guaranteed the best week of your money back,” it’s gotta be good. We, too, intricately folded 500 napkins each day for dinnertime. We would spend hours preparing them and it was a lot of tedious work, but hey, on the bright side now I have a new party trick.

We learned five different folds, one for each night the campers dined at Frontier Ranch, so I thought I would blog about our most basic one: the standing pyramid.

I wrote out instructions step-by-step, but I used pictures from www.napkinfolding.net because I don't have any fabric napkins to do the photos myself! 

1. Start out with a flat fabric napkin, lay it out so it looks like a diamond as opposed to a square.

2. Fold the bottom corner to the top one, so it forms a triangle. 

 3. Fold the bottom two corners of the triangle up to the top corner. They should meet in the middle and form sort of a gap down the center of the napkin.

 4. Flip it over! (That's my favorite step because it is the easiest!)

 5. Just like in step one, fold the bottom corner up to the top one to form a triangle.

 6. Fold down the center of the napkin. This makes an even smaller triangle.

 7. Part the triangle to make it stand up on its own! It's surprisingly sturdy.

How domestic. This little touch, a folded napkin, is sure to spruce up any table setting you have for any occasion. It's a fun, simple way to show guests that you care about their meal with you! Make an ordinary dinner a little bit extraordinary or put the finishing touches on your Thanksgiving feast. Click here to learn more folds! It's not a secret any longer: I love folding napkins.

Keep Calm 

& Fold On!