Printable Hand Lettered Homemade Cleaner Labels and Recipes

Almost a full year of radio silence! I think this might be my new record, you guys. But, I was procrastinating while cleaning the bathrooms the other day and now I have something to share. Read on for some natural cleaning recipes and free printable hand lettered labels!

We try to use homemade and natural cleaners and avoid the harsh chemicals. There are a lot of great recipes out there on the Internet, though you must be a bit careful as many of them would have failed your basic high school chemistry quiz. Even more importantly, you must label your bottles very awesomely as cleaning needs all the help it can get when it comes to general awesomeness.


Clean All the Things - your general all purpose cleaner. Many of the recipes call for both vinegar and baking soda. Yes, this makes an impressively fun reaction, what with all the bubbling and foaming, but don't let that fool you into thinking you've created a super cleaner! What you've created is water, a bit of salt and a whole bunch of carbon dioxide flouncing off in a dramatic bubbly rage. And, water and a bit of salt aren't much of a cleaning agent.

I soak orange peels in vinegar in a mason jar, hidden off in the pantry for a few weeks. If you'd like to cut to the chase, substitute a few drops of your tea tree or lavender essential oil for several weeks of orange and vinegar on honeymoon.

Clean All The Things

2 cups orange infused white vinegar
2 cups water
a squirt of dish soap

Dat Glass - glass cleaner that smells terrible and works wonderfully! Wheee!

Dat Glass

2 Tbsp white vinegar
1 cup water
1 cup rubbing alcohol
I've read that corn starch added to this mix will make an even better glass cleaner, but it works so well without it and I don't remember enough of high school chemistry to understand what difference the corn starch would make and what the possible downside could be. An experiment for you to carry out, friends!


Glow Your Bowl - a toilet bowl cleaner that doesn't require you to throw every window open and fan on, just to breathe. Again, lots of fans of baking soda + vinegar and castile soap + vinegar out there. If you absolutely must include vinegar in your toilet bowl cleaning routine, use it as a rinsing agent AFTER you've cleaned.

Glow Your Bowl

1/2 cup baking soda
1/4 cup hydrogen peroxide
1/4 cup castile soap
1 cup hot water
For this one, I just use dish soap. I don't have castile soap and I firmly believe one only needs so many different kinds of soap in the house. Whisk it all together in a bowl and pour it into a little squeeze-y bottle, then go to town.

A few bonus homemade cleaning tips:

- we keep baking soda in one of those shakers you see in every pizza joint with hot pepper flakes in it all over the house. Perfect for the bathtub, for the glass top stove, for a stubborn stain or crunchy bit on the kitchen counter, for sprinkling over stains on the carpet.

- this magical carpet cleaner really is magical. To cut down to a normal stain sized portion, I just use 1 tsp vinegar, 1 tsp clear dish soap and 2/3 cup hot water.

- go straight for the super industrial sprayer bottles. There are very cute spray bottles at Target. Don't waste your time.

Want your own bottle labels? Download the free homemade cleaner bottle label printable here! I printed on label paper and used a 2" punch for mine, but I've included a row with a 2" frame for cutting out the old fashioned way as well. Enjoy!

Love is in the air. Or, on the wall.

So, let's just skip over the usual intermittent blogger dance and dispense with all the "wow, has it really been this long?"'s and "oh look, my blog still here"'s and get right to it.

When I first saw this I Love You Garland by Lovely Indeed (via Creature Comforts) last year, I knew I had to recreate it in sparkly pink for Cheeseball. And, it only took me a year!





I used a finer glitter (Although looking at the original DIY again, I now NEED chunky glitter. Just to have.)



And, I attached the letters to baker's twine with tabs at the top of each letter instead of mid letter. I printed the letters on cardstock, and if I were to do it again, I would glue the letters to a thicker cardboard first before cutting out and glitter bombing. But, I love it and I'm so glad I finally got around to it!

While we are definitely a "fair doesn't mean equal" household, I wanted to put some love up on El Niño's wall too. He is less partial to all things pink and sparkly than his sister. And he has just recently started to move out of the "I am Child and I am Awesome" phase of childhood and begun to discover the self doubt and concern about peer opinion that plagues us all through most of our school age years. So, I wanted to give him a daily reminder that I am still firmly in the "You are Child and You are Awesome" phase of motherhood.





If you would like to print the same in green for yourself, feel free to click through to flickr - just don't forget to click "view all sizes" and grab the largest. I coordinated the color with the JuneCraft print that I do love so. But, I also put together a file with the print in jpegs in several different colors as well as the original photoshop file so you can customize as you like! Download the file here.

I used Market Deco for both projects. Free for personal use!

Working on these two projects over the past two days has been SO fun. I've been feeling Christmas morning levels of anticipation and giddiness. And now, I can't WAIT for the kids to get home from school and see their little surprises.

Aht. More aht, dahling.

Without really intending to, I've been slowly but surely turning the fourth "bedroom" in our house into a craft room. Albeit a small-appliances-books-and-exercise-equipment-storage-accomodating-craft-room, but I like to share. And, what's this...? I have a shop! That officially upgrades this from a craft room into a studio. Aaaaand, suddenly I feel glamorous. Everybody should have a corner of their house that makes them feel glamorous, no?

Since purchasing this print by june craft for El Niño's room, I've been looking for other independent artist's prints for the rest of the house. And this letterpress print by Julie West would be perfect for mah stuuuudio, dahling.

Love, love, love.

Via paper crave

My closet is for the birds.

When I went looking for the post I originally wrote when I bought what I will eventually get around to talking about, I realized I bought this lovely wall decal in January. Well, a mere seven months later, I got around to putting it up on the wall. Sort of. I put it on my closet.


Isn't it pretty?

Then, I sat down to sew some curtains for our bedroom. Right now, we have to lean out and close the shutters. I realized that with the way the print flows on the fabric I have, I'll need another two yards to cover the whole window. Well, another two meters.

So, I sewed something else instead and I'll get around to putting that up here in less than seven months.

At Least A Cut Above The D List

In our house here in Germany, we have a built-in fridge that is lovely and matches the cupboards but is not magnetic. (I know, right!? I didn't even know there were fridges you couldn't overpopulate with kitschy souvenir magnets!) Having also relocated the junk drawer to a basket in a hall storage closet, I'm fresh out of spots to keep a running shopping list.

I came across two quite awesome printable shopping lists at A Print A Day and suddenly my motivation to create a spot for that running list went through the roof.

I picked up an old tin from a thrift shop.  Then, I covered a piece of cardboard with a coordinating pattern I printed and jammed it in the tin so that the pen wouldn't slide behind the lists. 




I printed out the lists above and created some new ones of my own, that I'd love to now share with you.



Download the owl shopping lists here.

Download the vintage veggies shopping lists here.

Bicycles built for me.

Maybe it's the beautiful weather or all the pedaling going on around me in Europe, but I'm in love with bicycle imagery lately. Here's some of what has caught my eye.

Clean, modern bicycle desktop wallpaper. seen on How About Orange and created by Eleanor Grosch of pushmepullyou design.

I have this one on my desktop at the moment.

I adore this bike makeover seen on poppytalk. Look closely, that's not a paint job...that's fabric!

How sweet are these cards by satsumalynn? I fell in love with them on design*sponge.

I think these printed glasses from vital are so much more fun than plain glass yet still feature a simple and clean look.

Less imagery than accoutrement, I couldn't resist what I found at The Bicycle Muse after following a link from oh joy!.

Ah, now I want to get out and hop on my bike!

Making Space for El Nino

El Niño's room has always been the epitome of the function over form problem that permeates the entirety of Chez Sushi. The public rooms have to have some sense of decor or I feel like a total failure. A little girl's room is a little easier to decorate, and Cheeseball really cares about that kind of thing. So, her room has some personality. But, poor El Niño has been toiling away on his Lego cities and amassing his personal armory in a room completely devoid of style.

I had just resolved to do something about that when I happened upon this adorable digital print of an original illustration by june craft on Poppytalk. Poppytalk has repurposed their handmade market as an oil spill response market for the month of July and june craft is donating a portion of proceeds to the cause, making this an even more satisfying (yet totally inexpensive!) purchase.

Isn't that just awesome? I love the color, I love the motion, I love the retro styling...really, I just love it. I bought it on the spot and decided to build the rest of the room's decor around it.



He already has this bunk bed from Ikea, but he desperately needs a closet. German houses don't come with built in closets, so thank golf for Ikea. I like the idea of closed storage in these trunks for things like giant Nerf guns that don't really add to the room, but certainly mean something to El Niño. He needs to upgrade from his current (miniature) pencil shaped coat rack, in a bad way. In fact the only thing in this redesign that I probably won't purchase is the rug. Because it's crazy expensive. But, what I wasn't able to find online, I'm sure I can get my hands on in real life with a little bit of legwork and patience.

1. blanket from Ikea
2. bedding from Ikea
3. bunk bed from Ikea
4. coat rack from cb2
5. Pax closet from Ikea
6. ridiculously expensive rug that sadly contains all the perfect colors
7. metal storage trunks from cb2
8. bookshelf from Ikea
9. wall file for very important Lego magazines from cb2
10. lamp from cb2
11. vise grip bookends from cb2

And now that I've gone back through it all, I see that despite a very long and exhaustive Internet search and the saving of many, many links I managed to find everything at two stores. Well, that was efficient. The good news is that we have an Ikea here and I really am going to turn in those Marriott reward points for a Crate and Barrel gift card.

Do you have the time?

Shortly after my ugly but functional clock radio became obsolete due to American vs. European voltage issues, my ugly but functional battery operated digital travel alarm clock kicked the bucket. Of course.

But, I've turned a new leaf in our new house and while I still promote function, form has taken on a new importance. So, I'm on the hunt for a pretty alarm clock and while I'm at it, why not a clock for another room or two. Currently without my ever present iPhone, I never seem to know what time it is anymore.

As always, my first stop is Etsy. And look what I found! Love.



1. hard drive clock by pixelthis
2. vintage Czechoslovakian Prim from ClockworkUniverse
3. vintage Russian Vitjaz from ClockworkUniverse
4. VW hubcap clock by GreenWisdom
5. vintage Russian Slava from ClockworkUniverse
6. splat desk clock by pilotdesign
7. Bulova mod pedestal from stilettogirl
8. green leaf clock by botanicraft
9. vintage German Europa from ClockworkUniverse
10. triangle clock by WoodstockClocks
11. vintage German Junghans from spacejam

My Just Rewards

After our month of accommodation in the hotel upon arriving in Germany, we find ourselves flush with reward points. I was shopping the reward web site and found a number of gift cards I might indulge in.

First up, Crate and Barrel. I'm still trying to figure out if they ship to APO addresses and if C&B cards can also be used at CB2. But, in the meantime, I've visions of lovely decorative wares dancing in my head.

I don't think I have that many reward points.  But, a girl can dream...

Sechs

Huh huh huh. Heh heh. Ok, so I'm a child. And actually it's pronounced more like zax. But, whatever. I'm easily amused. Add to that all the Ausfahrt and Othertypesoffahrt signs all over the place that I still haven't figured out, but like to giggle about and really I should just grow right up.

Today, we spent most of our day in America. We had an Easter Egg Hunt/Battalion gathering that we had to go to on post...something we like to call Mandatory Fun. Usually we skip these types of things, but The Man is the new guy and we figured we should make an appearance. We decided to catch the city bus to the closest post, then catch the post bus to the next post over where the Egg Hunt was being held. We were trying to pinpoint the location of the bus stop when the hotel staff strongly urged us not to take the direct, but tricky route and to take the longer but easier route instead. But, we figured we could handle it. And we did! We made it to the bus stop with no trouble, but once there realized that the bus route we needed didn't run on Saturdays. So, we figured we'd just keep walking and if we hit another bus stop with a running bus that would take us to post, we'd take it and otherwise we'd just knock out the 4km (2.5 miles) on foot. There weren't any other buses, so we hoofed it the whole way. The distance was measured for cars, and taking some of the dillions of bike and foot paths around here probably cut some of that down. I'm not sure how far we actually walked, but I was pretty impressed with the kiddos.

After the Egg Hunt, we caught the post bus back to the other post. Actually, we had some hilarious moments when - after being held up with good bye chit chat with some of the brass - we were sprinting down the road to catch the leaving bus. Then, sprinting down another road to just miss it at it's next stop. Then, finally giving up and flagging the damn thing down between stops. Thankfully, it stopped for us.

We did some shopping at the exchange on the other post, then walked off post and caught a cab back to the hotel. Much faster, and with less whining from Cheeseball.

We were barely home long enough for the kids to choke down half of their hard-won Easter chocolate, when we decided to drag them another 2km (1.2 miles) to Ikea for dinner. Mmmm meatballs and lingonberry sauce. I think moving here is making us extremely observant. When you don't know what the thing to do is and you can't read the signs or really ask questions, you just have to pay attention. The Man noticed that everybody was drinking out of cups, so we had to hunt some of those down so as not to appear primitive, chugging out of our bottles. Then, we had to sit and wait for someone else to get up so we could figure out whether or not we were supposed to leave our dishes or do something with them. Then, after wandering around the store for like a mile trying to figure out where the heck the exit was, we had to sit and wait for someone else to go outside before we were sure we could go out the door we wanted to use. In the US, if a door has an alarm on it, the signs are all red and contain dire warnings of imminent humiliation if opened and, of course, most importantly are in English and therefore legible to us. In Germany, if a door has an alarm on it, it merely has a polite written warning and a frisky looking gentlemen doing I'm not sure what on a green sign. I'm always terrified of opening exterior doors and having them start blaring and everybody looking at me like can't she see the frisky gentleman!?.

Nobody went out the door, so we finally gave up and successfully hunted down the elevators we came up in. We had come in through the sub-store parking garage, because it was the only way we could figure out how to get in! So, that's a very long way of saying that this evening, we probably personally convinced at least a quarter Ikea's worth of Germans that Americans are stupid. You're welcome.

Our extended tour of Ikea allowed me to mentally stock and decorate our entire non-existent house. I assured The Man that it would be no time flat before I had the entire layout memorized and we'd never get lost again. While I intended that to placate him, it might have terrified him instead. Hey, no sweat honey, we don't even need our household goods shipment! We'll just buy all new stuff here! I just hope that didn't induce an allergic reaction to meatballs in his future.

Technorati tags: Germany, Ikea, culture shock

Weekly Etsy/ 3.7.10

Spring feels like it's on its way and your weekly Etsy finds are already here. Enjoy!

clock by decoylab

shirt by pepperhem

leather pendant by flightpathdesigns

key necklace by ohhellofriend

phone from sovietvintage

lace necklace by whiteowl

poster by slidesideways

buckle by flightpathdesigns

cards by colettepaperie


Technorati tags: etsy, handmade, jewelry

Smaller, Prettier Recipe Binders

I adore poring over cookbooks. The pictures are beautiful and everything seems so delicious. And there is something so satisfying about holding a heavy, pretty cookbook in your hands.

I've done a detailed study of the first recently and checked the latter two (1,2) out of the library this week.

But, I find that as much as I enjoy cookbooks, the recipes I actually use the most are almost always printed from the Internet or passed on by family and friends.  Which means that I spend most of my recipe time poring over this heavy but exceedingly ugly binder.

Note the sole decoration - the original manufacturer sticker on the spine - it's been the aesthetic theme of this binder for about ten years. Not anymore! I started with some patterned cardstock, coordinating solid colors and a big stack of bright white cardstock. Also, four 1" binders with view pockets.

A little snipping and a little glueing and voila...

I'm so excited to be working with smaller binders instead of lugging the dirty behemoth around the house.  And I love how much prettier they are!

Technorati tags: recipes, cooking, organization

Weekly Etsy: Buds and blooms

I have always loved having fresh flowers in the house. With the lack of an actual farmer's market and the overabundance of boring roses and carnations among the fresh flowers in the grocery stores here, I've gotten out of the habit. Putting the house on the market has given me just the excuse I needed to start bringing in the blooms again. Which also has me keeping an eye out for beautiful vases again!

bird vases by catherinereece

snuggling vases by annaspots

fern vase by kensgardenpottery

crystalline vase by dbabcock

painted square vase by simplyprettyprints

double stem white vase by taylorceramics

orange wood vase by BowlsandBoxes

mini white vase by RouDesigns

slim black vase by mrhstudio

Let's finish up with one of the always inspiring weekly we like it wild shots from design*sponge.

Gorgeous ranunculus (ranunculi?)

Technorati tags: etsy, vase, flowers

Redo Recap

Now that I'm done with all the caulking and sanding and painting and waiting and waiting and waiting for the floors to finally, finally, finally be finished by a newly heartbroken old friend, I thought it would be fun to do a little recap of the work I actually managed to document with some semblance of before footage.

This whole project was a LOT of work but was a lot of fun in some ways.  I feel like I learned a ton about making things pretty and doing it right.  I've never been all that in to my home's decor.  I've always liked looking at design ideas and admiring other people's homes.  But, when it came to my own time and money, I've always prioritized clothes, accessories, fun and food.  Seeing the huge difference I can make with relatively little time and money, I am so inspired to beautify my surroundings and keep my eye on design in all of our future homes.  I can't wait to get my hands on a new place!

But, back to the old one.  A little bit of bad and better:

Hall/kids/guest bathroom:

Kitchen:

Master bath sink area:

Living Room:

Technorati tags: house sale, renovation, DIY

Living Room, Chez Sushi

I've got one last before and after on this little home sale staging project I've been working on. I wish I had thought to take before pictures of all the rooms I worked on, but I lack foresight.

Here's the living room circa 2006:

Here it is today, less a little furniture and plus a little fake wood and real paint:

The house is finally on the market.  Wish us luck!

P.S. Due to a happy event related to The Man, we had a whole passel of family in town and a big dose of excitement and in it all I completely spaced the Weekly Etsy love. Promise to get back on the bandwagon!

Technorati tags: house sale, renovation, flooring

Inspiration and Anticipation

All this "home work" I've been doing has been sparking my creativity and had me pouring over design blogs which lead to craft blogs and DIY ideas and in turn have SO inspired me. I can't wait to get cracking on some crafts (not least of which is the latest fun project sent to me by Alicia for Team Awesome) and sink my hands into some home design that's for us and not watered down and neutraled out for potential buyers.

In the meantime - while scrubbing and styling and curb appealing and real estate picture taking have to remain forefront - I'll just keep looking and longing. And showing you.

I love how these crocheted vases and bangles seen on Design*Sponge take something solid and make it soft. I haven't crocheted since I was a little kid and even then all I ever managed was lines. Long lines. Lots of them. Which I tied and made into leis. But, still. Lines.

I love the sentiment and the vintage charm of this wall hanging by Dottie Angel.

The last origami I folded was 1,000 cranes for my wedding about 8 years ago. This kusadama tutorial seen via Apartment Therapy make me want to pick that paper back up!

How amazing is this teeny tiny terrarium housed in a lightbulb?  Seen on The Hipster Home.

Ah, I can't wait!

Technorati tags: creativity, DIY, crafts

Al. Most. There.

I've finally gotten to the point where I'm tying up loose ends and seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. I've started taking some pictures for the realtor - they really need to be taken with natural daylight pouring in but I'll be meeting with her after work next week so I figured I'd try to snag them myself. Realty pictures are hard. Super duper hard. I've been climbing all over things and trying to get as high up and as squished up against walls as I can. The kids think I'm mildly insane and the dog doesn't understand why he doesn't get to be in the pictures.

I'm really hoping the rain lets up Sunday so I can fix the gorilla glue/zip tie solution The Man employed the last time the neighborhood's mailboxes were knocked down. Sploogy gorilla glue and zip ties!? Really!? Yes, really. I also need to freshen up the bark chips and plant some flowers. Veeeery hardy flowers - they need to survive the cold and my longstanding plant murder record. The Man can bring a stick back to life but I can kill a tree. I mean I haven't done that, but I bet I could if I paid attention to one.

In the meantime, while the rain pours, I'm staying so nice and cozy inside. And taking pictures. And now I'll shut up and show you the kitchen.

Wait, no, one more thing. I noticed the crap on top of the fridge after I took the first shot and moved it out but never quite captured the same perfect composition again. So, Alicia photoshopped the wine cube (what of it?) out. I think I'm still going to retake these pictures if I get a day with a little more sunshine.

Ok, now I'll shut up. Uh, right after this...one of the first things we replaced in this house was the light fixture over the eat in area of the kitchen. So, that's in this picture. But, everything else is original. Also, the plastic chairs. Yes, the plastic chairs. We loved that dining room table when we got it (like 12 years ago) but we never did find chairs we liked with it. The plastic chairs were supposed to be placeholders. And they were. For seven years. Wow. I'm suddenly mortified.

Note the hideous wallpaper, dated wood trim and cheap varnished cabinets.  Also the psychotic magnet collection on the fridge.  We buy magnets wherever we go.  It may be overkill.  Also, I wish you could see it in the picture, but just know that the outlet and lightswitch plates were sponge painted to match the hideous wallpaper.  That should be known.

Better, no?

Now, from the other side.

If I run out of things to do, I'll probably go back and repaint the cabinet doors like so:

Not just that one, either.

Technorati tags: kitchen, home improvement, house sale

Bleh. And meh. And pleh.

Yesterday, I woke up to El Niño at 7:30 telling me "I'm going to be in a play today and I need a wolf mask." I said "..." 7:30 is also known as the time that is less than an hour before we need to be dressed, fed and off for school or on the weekends as the time that is still a little early will you please go back to sleep.

But, I managed to get it done! And it looked pretty rocking, frankly. So, I was convinced that meant I was going to be awesome! yesterday. I was all Super Mom How Do You Like Them Apples!?

Today we woke up to snow!

Even though it was only freezing rain at that point, snow was on the ground and it was so pretty and the kids were stoked. We all got dressed and went out and played for a while and it was so fun and really I should have just stayed right there. Apparently the snow either meant that it was a good day to take a break and spend some time with the kids or it meant that I was going to super suck all day long. Maybe both. Take a break or I would super suck all day long.  I went with option B.

I think I'm just worn out. I haven't been sleeping well and I'm at two nonstop weeks of painting and packing and spackling and caulking and edging and also whining. Which is just as tiring, really. Instead of taking a break, though, I spent my day dropping paint, installing doorknobs before repainting doors and drilling holes in the wrong places. After removing screw anchors I had put in not two minutes before, I threw in the towel for the day. Because you've got to know when to hold them. And know when to fold them.

But all was not lost today.  Yesterday, I ran to the Sherwin Williams store and picked up a Premium XL Tight Spots 2″ Angle Short Handle Brush on Young House Love's recommendation. I always cut in and edge by hand with a brush. It's one of a very few practical applications where my normally annoying perfectionism and normally useless lifelong makeup and makeup brush obsession really meet and marry beautifully.

This brush makes it SO much easier. SO MUCH EASIER. Even with my day of total suckitude, I managed to turn out beautiful lines with no trouble.

Usually, I use an angled brush and then at the baseboard follow along with a baby wipe and my fingernail to make the line sharp and clean. That last step is totally unnecessary with this brush. Once I started painting, I literally said nothing but "ohmigod. ohmigod. OHMIGOD." for a good few minutes. It is an amazing edge tool. Also, I was having so much fun with it, I didn't even want to stop and eat lunch. Which means that it's even a great diet tool. I wouldn't be surprised if this little brush could save your life. I didn't need it for that today, but I'll keep it handy just in case.

Technorati tags: terms go here, terms go here, terms go here