Of produce tray protection & synthetic paintbrushes

Volume III, No. 18 (December 4, 2005)
Copyright © Deborah Michelle Sanders 2005




Conceal your faults, & you will not prosper;
Confess & give them up, & you will find mercy.

Proverbs 28:13




BEST BUYS FOR DECEMBER:

The day after Christmas: wrapping paper & ribbons (Jews can buy solid colors); cards; ornaments; artificial trees, etc. Also candy & items packaged & decorated for the holidays.

Baking supplies

Apples
Bananas
Cranberries
Oranges & grapefruit

Potatoes

Turkeys





HOUSEHOLD HINTS:

Make a 3-tier protector at the bottom of your produce trays in the fridge. Put newspaper on the bottom, paper towels on top of that, & nylon netting at the very top. (It’s best to use netting with the largest-sized holes that you have.) This will help keep your fruits & veggies fresh longer.

If you have a computer printer, you’ll never need to buy notepads. Just take draft prints & cut them in fourths (you can easily cut 10 at a time.). Either keep them in a small bowl or basket as-is, OR square them up & rub the top with a rubber cement brush, which will hold them together.

If you bake bread in a household with just 1 or 2, you’ll need to freeze half the loaf, most probably. After slicing, to keep the slices discrete, insert a bit of waxed paper in between, with a tad sticking out for you to grab onto when you remove a slice from the freezer. You only need a piece about 4” wide, which you can then cut lengthwise for as many slices as you have (minus 1).

For a New Year’s party of any sort, January 1st, Chinese, Jewish, what have you, here’s a creative idea. Cut up last year’s calendar & attach the sheets in a random design on a tablecloth or brown paper.

New car warranties may vary among dealerships, even on the same makes & models. Find out before you buy how much you could be out-of-pocket, should something go wrong.

Don’t toss a shower curtain that looks dowdy. First, take off the hooks that affix the curtain to its rod. Wash the curtain. Substitute ribbon in a complimentary color for each hook. Tie a bow at each of the grommets. A whole new look!

Do you enjoy baking cakes? The cheapest implement for piping icing is NOT a Zip-Lock® bag, as once you cut off its corner, it cannot be reused. Instead, save a plastic squeeze bottle, such as a mustard bottle for this purpose.

Here’s a nifty way to keep your dog relatively free of fleas. When you bathe him, start by shampooing his neck. Fleas won’t be able to escape upwards as you wash him!

The safest way to handle unwanted credit card solicitations is to cut them up, put 1 in a wastebasket & 1 in a garbage can, & then consign the remaining pieces to the business reply envelope that accompanied the solicitation. Be sure to remember to mail it back!

I know, & soon you will too, 2 methods for getting rid of furniture indentations in carpet (once you move the furniture). The 1st is to apply ice cubes & leave them there for a few hours, a partial melt. The 2nd way is to dampen a towel, & place it over the indentation. Take out your trusty iron & iron the towel at a medium setting. Once the towel is dry, your indentation will be gone.

I’m sure that everyone who owns a dishwasher knows that to reduce energy costs, one should let the dishes air-dry instead of allowing the appliance to dry the dishes with heat.

You can use a synthetic paintbrush (best for latex paint) considerably longer if, after you clean off the paint, you give it a session in a solution of liquid fabric softener in water, about one part to ten parts.