Household Tips | Lil Blue Boo

Simplify With A Monthly Household Worksheet

March 5, 2013 By Ashley Hackshaw 16 Comments

A few years ago I created a worksheet for my business to help me keep on top of all the moving parts of accounting, taxes, inventory etc. I was a disaster before….but now I am always on top of everything. I’ve adapted it into a household worksheet as well to keep our monthly finances and other things in order. As technical as I am with computers and smart phones, over time I’ve come to the realization that there’s nothing better than handwritten notes and records. A few things I like about this system:

Filed Under: Downloads, Financial Organization and Accounting, Getting Down to Business, Getting Organized, Household Tips, Organization, Things I've Made, Tutorial, Uncategorized

The Office Makeover: Craft Storage (Free Vintage Label Download)

December 18, 2012 By Ashley Hackshaw 15 Comments

Martha eat your heart out. I labeled 70 boxes yesterday with vintage-inspired labels. It’s part of my big office makeover. I can’t show you the office yet because it’s a disaster. Anyway, it took almost all day to organize the boxes and create the labels but I feel really organized now:

The shelves were an early Christmas present from Mr. LBB. This area is a hallway behind my office….technically it’s a “butler’s pantry” for serving food and storage but it’s the perfect area to store supplies right off my work area. The wall space above the countertop was just empty space. The area used to be a huge sunken living room before we remodeled a few years ago. We added a wall at the end of the room to create the storage space.

Here’s what it looked like two weeks ago:

Filed Under: Downloads, Getting Organized, Home Decor, Home Projects, Household Tips, Lil Blue Boo Home Edition, Organization, Printables, Printing/Stenciling, Silhouette, Storage, Supplies, Things I've Made, Tutorial, Uncategorized, Work Spaces Tagged With: craft room, free download, home decor, labeling, office decor, organization, printables, vintage label, workspaces

Cheap DIY Fixes to Make Your Home More Livable

October 30, 2012 By Lisa 4 Comments

Katie White from DIY Mother is here to share some simple ideas to live comfortable on a budget!

Our first house was a serious fixer-upper: it was a small two-bedroom, and I’m convinced that there wasn’t a single thing in it—from the carpet to the wallpaper to the dishwasher—that was younger than we were. It was a pretty dismal place to live at first, but we decided to do some research and find ways to liven it up—and after some hard work, we had a real, comfortable home. Here are some of the best ideas we came up with.

Beautify your front entryway

You can really enhance your first impressions by making a few changes to your front entrance. Some of the simplest ideas include repainting your front door and exterior trim, trading up for nicer house numbers (they’re cheap), or even installing new lighting. For a quick, headache-free investment in your home, consider buying a new steel door—on average, homeowners who replace their front doors see their money back with considerable interest (5%-30%) when it’s time to sell.

Kidspot

Open up your kitchen

Kitchens are busy, and it’s very easy to feel cramped and shut in if your home has a small one. Consider a few visual tricks to enhance the sense of space in your kitchen, like installing mirrored backsplash tiles, repainting in light, breezy colors, or removing the doors on your overhead cupboards. Fill the holes with putty, sand, and repaint. By pushing back the visible space to the walls, open shelving can really open up the room. Coordinated dishware makes them look even nicer.

Filed Under: Home and Garden, Home Decor, Home Projects, Household Tips

Home Management System and Free Printable Labels

October 6, 2012 By Lisa 2 Comments

If you loved Heather’s “Clean Your Room – A How-To Guide” set, you’ll love this for organizing your life…..

Pretty organizing printable sets by Heather B Design:

There are 2 sets available: Important Information and Organize Your Kitchen and you can choose from two different styles: neutral or bright. These are digital files that you can print as often as you need to organize and re-organize your life!

Each module has a neutral or bright color option. Included in each is a plain version for pages as well. CONTINUE READING

Filed Under: Digital Graphic Projects, Getting Organized, Home and Garden, Home Projects, Household Tips Tagged With: downloads, home management, organization, printables

Babble Roundup: Crockpots, Fall Cleaning and Kid Projects

September 19, 2011 By Ashley Hackshaw 3 Comments

I write daily for Babble.com’s The New Home Ec. Here are a few recent roundups and posts I’ve written….click image to view:

(more after the jump)

Filed Under: Babble Roundup, Household Tips, Uncategorized Tagged With: cleaning a dishwasher, cleaning a washing machine, crockpot, how old are spices, kids projects, slow cooker

Organizing Electronics

September 15, 2011 By Ashley Hackshaw 10 Comments

This is what my electronics box used to look like. I could never find anything and had no idea which cords went to what. During my organization spree last month I empties out the box, gathered every electronic manual, accessory, software CD and box from around the house and set to work on creating an organized system.

First I created envelopes for items that are rarely used or need to probably be donated or sold:

(more after the jump)

Filed Under: Getting Organized, Household Tips, Organization, Random Tips, Tutorial Tagged With: declutter, fall cleaning, homemaking, household organization, organizing electronics

Easy, Eco-Friendly Silver Tarnish Remover

September 7, 2011 By Ashley Hackshaw 11 Comments

I recently pulled out a bunch of old jewelry and silverware that was in storage and was shocked to see how much tarnish had built up over the last 10 years!

I cleaned it all up easily and without any harsh tarnish removers using an eco-friendly stovetop method. All you need is a large pan (see bottom of the post on how to manage larger pieces of silver), mild dish soap, tin foil and baking soda:

(see more after the jump)