I have a secret hobby. I like to look through real estate listings. I like to look at houses and compare features, location and price. I like to think about the gardens I would create in different backyards. I like to peak into other people’s houses and see their decorating style.

I have kicked into snooping overdrive lately. Although I prefer to call it research since we are planning to start the house hunting process next spring. Calling it research makes it sound so much more… appropriate and less peeping tom-ish.

Lately I have noticed several homes for sale that include a home warranty or home protection plan. I would guess that a home protection plan included in the purchase of your new home would give a certain piece of mind. No one wants to buy a home and then have to turn around and start fixing unexpected things or replacing major household components right away. Since we bought our home as a foreclosure we definitely had some anxiety over possible issues that would crop up after our closing and subsequent move-in.

As a home owner it is surprising, and sort of exciting, what a protection plan covers. A home protection plan seems like a great way to cover yourself for those unexpected home repairs that seem to crop up without warning. Lets be honest, no one likes spending tons of money to replace a water heater or repair electrical or plumbing issues.

So maybe while indulging in my secret hobby in the future I’ll make special note of those homes including warranties and protection plans. I guess I can’t really call it my secret hobby anymore though. I did just announce it to the world didn’t I?

So you have a home protection plan for your home?

This is a sponsored post. All thoughts, opinions and experiences are mine and true.

Today many foods that naturally provide the essential nutrients your body needs, also have chemicals and pesticides that could potentially cause harm as well. Organic foods not only are chemical and pesticide free, but because they aren’t genetically altered, they also have greater value to your body.

Just about everyone would like to eat cleaner and healthier, but they don’t know how to do it without wrecking their budget. There are some simple ways to get healthy produce for you and your loved ones at a much lower cost.

Prioritize Your Buying

Focus your organic spending on fresh foods like meat, milk and produce, because packaged organic food is still processed.

Certain fruits and vegetables retain pesticides while others don’t as much. This is mainly due to protective peel that keeps the pesticides out as you remove it.

The produce of most value when bought organic tend to be gentle in construction. These include peaches, apples, nectarines, strawberries, cherries, pears, grapes, lettuce, spinach, celery, potatoes and sweet bell peppers. Ideally you want organic produce where they are kept separate as misting can spread pesticide residue from conventional produce.

Join a Co-Op

Check to see if there is already an existing organization that offers steep discounts on healthy, organic food in exchange for volunteering or monthly dues. If there isn’t, find out what it takes to start one. It’s a great way to get access to locally grown produce and organic meats.

Grow Organic Produce Yourself

There is no better way to help your diet, wallet, and make a difference in the environment than keeping a garden of fresh fruits and veggies. Yes, there are some up-front costs and it will take time and energy to maintain it, but if you make smart choices you can recoup the cost quickly.

Ask your neighbors, or other local gardeners what they’re growing, so you can get a good idea of what works with the soil and weather in the area. Either buy some seeds, or ask around for some free ones instead of buying a pre-grown plant or sapling from the store. It may take longer to yield produce, but the cost difference is tremendous.

Try placing some buckets around the outside of your home to catch rainwater runoff from your roof to use in the garden. Put a large bucket in the corner of your shower to catch excess water that runs as you wait for it to get hot.

Today’s guest Author, sharing his tips for saving money while eating organically, is John-Michael Haines of DebtConsolidation.com.  Thanks for sharing your tips John-Michael!

I’ve always wanted one of those cute ribbon boards but never really had a place to put it. Until now.

A ribbon board in my bedroom makes no sense but a ribbon board hanging over my desk in my bedroom? Perfection! I ribbon board made of found items throughout my home. Super-Awesome-Perfect! Can you tell I feel enthusiastic about it?

We have a desk upstairs in the guest room that holds Luke’s double monitor computer set up. Up until a couple of months ago this desk was the place where I also tried to pay bills, organize papers, file things and well… make piles of things.

Hi Everyone, I’m Catherine and I a piler. I make piles of things. On table tops, , counters, shelves and in drawers around my house.

Luke? Well he is not much of a piler and does his best to deal with my tendency to make piles of books, papers, magazines, mail and more around the house.

So a couple of months ago we decided a desk all my own was in order. A desk where I could pay bills, write, organize papers, and well make piles of things to my hearts content. I searched around and found a cute little espresso colored desk at World Market, of course. I found a little ladder type bookshelf in an espresso color at Khols and I set up a little space for me in the corner of my bedroom.

Then I felt a little broke from buying furniture and had to start getting creative about how to accessorize my little spot. I found a few things around the house, some cloth totes, a candle holder I turned into a pen cup and a a few things I found at Goodwill to hold envelopes and address labels. I even found a cute metal and wicker chair at Goodwill for $3.

So I dug through my basement on a mission to find the things I needed to make a ribbon board of my own. Some cloth from a project I once thought I would do but never did because I can’t sew a straight line, some brads and furniture tacks, ribbon from my gift wrapping supplies and a 16×20 plain black frame.

I’m so thrilled with my ribbon board. I’m proud of myself for making it out of things I already had in my house. Home decor recycling at it cutest I tell ya!

Now I have a cute place to hang my inspiration. Words, colors, pictures, ideas you name it I can hang it and have it right in front of me while I work to help spark my creativity and keep my desk clutter free. Well, the creative stimulation is sure to happen. The clutter free desk is more of a goal than a guarantee.

Have you ever made something to decorate your home instead of buying it and been thrilled with the results?

It’s complete chaos as the Evolving Mommy Family tires to cope with the upheaval. Emotions run high and exhaustion is setting in. Will the family be able to hold it together until Monday?

About a week before Christmas I pulled my tubs of shirt boxes, ribbons and bows out of their storage spots. I lugged my selection of wrapping paper up from the basement. Then I basically piled everything in a corner of my living room. My wrapping pile because my wrapping head quarters and when a free moment presented itself I would wrap a gift and stick it under the tree. Slow and steady right?

Maddy found the box of ribbons fascinating. It seems every time I turned around she has strung six different colors of ribbon from the leg of one table to the leg of another. In her mind she was decorating. In my mind she was setting booby traps and throwing up road blocks. Cute little colorful road blocks. It was adorable the first four times I had to pull them down. But once the ribbons were becoming almost too tangled to use the whole thing was losing its cuteness.

Then one morning Maddy and her best buddy Boo located the box of colorful bows which for them was like hitting the jackpot. One minute they were digging through the tub filled with all sorts of colors and shapes to find their favorites and the next they had decorated my tree.

At first I was caught off guard. I thought it was a cute 3 year old thing to do and I assumed in the back of my mind that once they were finished with their fun we would all work together to take the bows down and put them back in their tub to be used for wrapping presents.

Then as I stood their watching my tree transform my opinion changed completely. My tree is so festive. So happy. So colorful and quite frankly perfect. I love those bows, both large and small, shiny and muted, so much that we have added more bows to the tree branches as we’ve received them this Christmas. When I look at my bow covered tree it makes me happy.

Those two sweet girls didn’t know it when they placed the entire box of bows all over my tree that they would be starting a tradition in this house. I always thought I would be more of the person who decorated her tree with beautiful ornaments and decorations in coordinating colors but now I can see I was wrong. I’m the person that will be decorating her tree in beautiful ornaments and decorations in coordinating colors and then adding a layer of bows and ribbons in all colors and sizes over the top.

Gift idea for guys! Gift idea for techies and gadget lovers! Gift idea for people who like to be organized and clutter free! Today’s gift suggestion is great for all of the above! A Space saving, clutter reducing, gadget that guys will love. Oh, and ladies too! I know I do.

The following is a picture story of sorts of the last few days in my little ol’ living room. You could say this is a how to post. How to install wood flooring in your living room.

Ditch tile around the fireplace. It’s in the way and ugly. Breaking tile with hammers and bars is fun. Especially when you are not all that fond of the tile in question.

Didn’t you know using pieces of wood as antenna and pretending to be a bug is a very important part of the wood floor installation process? We’ll it is. Just as Maddy.

Installing wood floors.

Install more wood floor.

Install more wood floor.

Falling over on the wood floor exhausted. (A word from the wise. Going out and shopping all night long at Black Friday sales all over town is not very conducive to having a lot of energy or clarity of mind to install wood floors.)

Then get back up and keep on installing those darn wood floors. This living room will floor will get finished if it kills you first.

Hope and wish and pray that someday you will be able to use your front door again. Also hope and wish and pray that the dining table will leave your kitchen and you will be able to open all of your cupboards and freezer. Someday. Please oh please oh please.

No carpet or furniture in the guest room makes for a crazy Catherine.

Ladies and gentlemen I’m thrilled to announce that the great flooring project of 2010 has begun. We have started on our first room of our 10 room journey and therefore I am also a little overwhelmed.

I am not one of those people who must have a perfectly clean house at all times. I like to keep things neat and tidy and functional but everything put in its place? Meh. The current state of my house right now is much much more than a little untidy.

Everything from our guest bedroom/office is spread throughout the house. Mostly in piles. Add that chaos to the 29 boxes of Brazilian redwood and random piles of tile and I feel like I’m in the midst of an episode of hoarders.

Oh man, oh man, oh man! On a side note that paint is going to have to go.

This morning our tile guy, whom I really really like called to tell us that we also needed to come and pick up our tile by next weekend. Which, by the way, was not in the plan.

Dear tile man, Why are you doing this to me? We were under the impression that the tile store was going to hold our tile until we were ready for it. We were under that impression because that is what you told us no less than 46 times. Please stop playing with my emotions. Love, Catherine

I still really like him. I’m just not sure I really really like him anymore.

In the coming weeks, months and hopefully not years please send me sane vibes and good thoughts. I’m going to need all the help I can get.

We're so close to having one room done I can almost taste it!

I mentioned I’m extremely thrilled right? Because I am. I’m thrilled to have beautiful wood and tile floors instead of old dirty carpet and linoleum.I just need to vent. Whine. Complain. More than I should sometimes.

I told you about how I am not the person to have decorate your home because I completely disregard to use of samples.

Actually I just ignored the idea of taking a sample of wood home before buying a house full of it. Good thing that choice worked out swell for me. Tile samples on the other hand? I am so all over tile samples.

We’ve been into our local tile store no less than 4 times in the last few weeks and I currently have tile samples spread out in the entry way, my bathroom and my kitchen. Meaning we have to step over tiles as we walk through our house. Why not move it? I need to see what they look like in different lights of course.

Other than tile spread throughout the house, I also have boxes and boxes of wood flooring stacked in no less than 5 separate locations in my home. Of course the wood can’t acclimate in the garage or basement. Of course wood flooring gods, of course.

My house feels like a freaking lumber yard and since we are installing all of our flooring ourselves there is a good chance my home will be decorated in lumber yard chic until the end of the year.

The end of the year!

For now I am stuck telling Maddy to stop standing/walking/jumping off of or on the piles. This wood better look good.It wouldn’t take much for it to look better than the current builder grade abused and stained carpet.

I should probably start thinking of some motivator to keep Luke going on the flooring. Maybe my my sanity will be enough of a motivator for him.

Honestly though, I’ll be helping. I’m just a little, okay a lot, overwhelmed and excited and overwhelmed.

Also? Excited.

And a pinch broke too.

On a side note I’m offering multi-course homemade meals to anyone who helps, including baked goods. Seriously.

Any takers?

We did it, we not only pulled off a rainbow party for Monkey but we survived it all too!

Why a rainbow theme you ask? Well, I was inspired by the idea of making rainbow cupcakes and it all sprang from there.

Add in a a bunch of ribbon, paper in all the colors of the rainbow,

rainbow colored snacks,

window markers and balloons and we had quite the colorful shindig.
I had so much fun making clouds to hang from our rainbow ribbons with Monkey and colorful flag banners to hang all over our house with Luke. I did my best to not go overboard but still plan the party that I had in mind.

Monkey had a ton of friends and family come to her party.It was great to have so many people, from all over, fill our home to shower love on our daughter. One thing is for sure, there is nothing like a birthday party to remind you how many people love your child.