Woman in Real Life

In my New Year's Tree post, I talked about the "branches" that are guiding me in these early months of 2016. While these toy snow globes might simply look like a fun little project to do with the kids, they also fit nicely into three of my branches (areas of focus) - order, creativity and family.

In terms of order, I have done a ton of de-cluttering over the last six months but there is still quite a load of stuff in our basement storage room, much of it old toys. Although the kids are 11 and 13 now and rarely use these toys, they have trouble letting go. While most of the small plastic figures they have collected over the years need to be tossed, I thought it would be fun to ask the kids to pick out a few to keep on their dressers inside homemade snow globes. Therein lies the "family" part of the equation - ie. spending time together making snow globes. And the creativity part, well I guess that's obvious!

Despite visiting a couple of thrift stores and an antique market in the last week or so, I haven't purchased any thrifty finds lately. I'm trying to be super picky about what I add to the chaos of this home. It is spring and all that. I should be purging rather than buying. Or purging and THEN buying!

I did add to my Pyrex collection though, via a gift from my mother. That brings my Pyrex pieces up to three. Ha. There's nobody like a mom. I told my mom that Pyrex has become hard to get, so she stopped by the thrift store in her town to check for it. This Homestead pattern covered casserole had a sticker on it that appeared to say $8. Mom wasn't about to pay that. But it was half price day. And, it turns out the sticker was meant to say $3, so she got this dish, complete with lid, for $1.50. Nice work Mom! Now here's a little peek at the stuff I didn't buy these last couple of weeks.