happiness – The Self Cleaning House

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One of the most consistent things you will see in a clean home is that everything has a home and everything is in it’s home.

You can have a disheveled room and pick up and have it clean in just minutes if everything has a place to live.

If an item has no place to live, it is wandering aimlessly around the house from one flat surface to another feeling out of place and awkward.

Imagine how that whatchamacallit you ordered from Amazon must feel. It got ripped from a shelf, shut into a box and thrown into a truck. After a few rough rides, air turbulence, conveyor belts and another truck ride, it landed at your front door hoping for a warm welcome and a good home. Alas, it’s been moved from coffee table to kitchen counter to dining table, never really fitting in. All it wants is a real home. A place where it belongs. Have a heart! Find your whatchamacallit a home!

In all seriousness, establishing where something will live eliminates frustration when cleaning, it also helps prevent procrastination. As a bonus, you will always know where something is when you need it! Which also means you can delegate when necessary because you know where things are!

Next time you bring something into the house, think about where it’s forever home will be and put it there. NOT a temporary home on the dresser for now.

You can have a clean home for a hot minute without a home for everything but it won’t be that way for long. An organized home has a home for everything.

Making sure nothing is left homeless will save time cleaning, make your home more stress-free and allows you to do more of what YOU want to do!

We are in the middle of summer here in North Idaho, but I am already looking forward to fall! I love fall! The cool crisp air, the beautiful leaves, the boots, scarves and pumpkin spice lattes! Yup, I am that girl.

Apples are another of my fall favorites. We go apple picking at a local farm every year. Our whole family goes together. Hot fresh apple cider warms your hands while you stand in line for the pumpkin doughnuts, the aroma alone is worth standing in the long line. Local vendors are selling their homemade goods. Kids scream with delight at the bounce houses and beg to get their faces painted. Wonderful memories are made there!

So when I stopped in a roadside fruit stand and found Honey Crisp Apple for $12.95 for a giant box I had to get them! I can’t wait to go pick them myself but just couldn’t pass them up at that price. So let the apple cooking, baking, eating begin!

One of the first things I did was make a fresh apple cake. Seriously one of my favorite “apple” things!

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I peeled four apples. I needed four cups of apples but these things are the size of my head so I ended up with eight cups! I put the other four cups in a ziplock bag with a couple teaspoons of Fruit-Fresh and some water and put them in the fridge for something else.

I used my really cool apple peeler/corer to peel the apples. Super easy and fast!

Yummy!!!! Warm with Vanilla Bean Ice Cream is the way to go!

1 cup butter or shortening

2 cups brown sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 eggs

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking soda

3 cups flour

4 cups chopped apples

Topping

1 cup sugar

2 tablespoons butter melted

1 cup chopped walnuts

Cream butter and brown sugar together. Blend in eggs. In a small bowl combine salt, soda, cinnamon, and flour. Stir into shortening/sugar mixture. Fold in apples. It will be very thick. Put in a greased 9×13 baking pan. Combine melted butter and sugar and sprinkle over top. Sprinkle with chopped nuts. Bake in a 350 F oven for 50 minutes. Check for doneness with a toothpick.
Serve warm or room temperature with vanilla ice cream.

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Click on this picture to order Fruit Fresh from Amazon! This stuff is great! I cut up apples for my husband’s lunch, put a little Fruit Fresh in a ziplock bag and some water, add the apples and shake! No brown apples!

This apple peeler/corer is a huge time saver! You can even peel potatoes with it!! WOW! Click on the picture to order!

When the alarm goes off at 5am, what gets you out of bed to go exercise? Motivation or discipline? I can tell you for me it’s not motivation! I don’t “feel” like doing it! I am still working on establishing the discipline. I’m getting there!

Motivation is based on emotion, feeling and impulse. It’s helpful to have those things but not necessary to accomplish a task or achieve a goal.

We seem to want to put our feelings in the wrong place, backward in fact when we want to “motivate” to do something. For example, “I can’t seem to motivate to vacuum the house.” What we are saying is I am not having a good FEELING about the act of vacuuming. Instead, we need to CHOOSE to vacuum and then FEEL good about the vacuuming being done.

We could wait forever to get excited and worked up about vacuuming! It might never happen! Waiting for motivation causes procrastination.

Self-discipline is the key to achieving anything you have set out to do. More specifically, self-discipline is what will help you establish habits that will then not require motivation or self-discipline to do. The habit of brushing your teeth in the morning has been so ingrained in your brain that it doesn’t take motivation or self-discipline to do each day. In fact, I would bet most of us do it before we are fully awake! Its practically like breathing!

Self-discipline will be there when motivation fails you. Motivation is a fair weather friend. Discipline will conquer fear. It will overcome frustration. It will help you get up and keep going when you fall down.

How can you build self-discipline? discipline is like a muscle. It needs to be used to get stronger! The first few times making yourself get up at 5am is hard. After a while, it gets easier. (I’m still at the “its hard” part!)

Make it as easy as possible to make the best choices. If you are dieting, don’t buy a dozen doughnuts for the office.

Have a plan. If you are trying to resolve to have a clean house, put a system in place. Don’t just flounder.

Make small changes. Don’t decide you are going to go to the gym 6 days a week, never ever eat sugar again, lose 10 pounds by the weekend and start taking an online course at the same time! One thing at a time!

Take time to reward yourself or just enjoy the benefit of what you have done! This is extremely important! Our brains are wired to want to achieve a reward. Besides, you deserve it!

People who have good self-discipline are happier people! Be the boss of yourself! Don’t let your feelings tell you what to do!

Wisdomination has a crazy good article on this subject! “Motivation is trying to feel like doing stuff.” Discipline is doing it even if you don’t feel like it.”

Entrepreneur has a good article on how to develop self-discipline

“There are things you can do to learn self-discipline and gain the willpower to live a happier life.”

We love chorizo and I am always trying to find new ways to use it. Fried eggs on just about anything makes it better so this was a win-win!

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Chorizo and Egg Tostado

Recipe: Chorizo and Egg Tostado

Servings 6

Ingredients:

12 ounces fresh chorizo sausages

1 pound ground beef

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 seeded poblano chile diced

1 red bell pepper diced

5 green onions sliced

salt to taste

freshly ground black pepper to taste

1/4 cup your favorite salsa

1/4 cup water

6 flour tortillas or corn tortillas

oil for frying

6 eggs

mexican blend cheese

hot pepper sauce

avocado

sour cream

Directions:

Remove chorizo from casings. In a large skillet, cook chorizo and ground beef until browned. Drain off fat. Add 1 tablespoon olive oil to the skillet and add diced poblano, red bell pepper, and green onion to meat. Cook until tender, about 5-7 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add salsa and water and stir to combine. Cook until reduced slightly.
In another skillet, heat oil and fry tortillas until crisp turning once.
Fry 6 eggs as desired. Divide chorizo mixture between the six tortillas, top with cheese, egg, hot sauce and avocado. Garnish with sour cream and more green onion.

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Cook’n is a next generation recipe app that makes it fun and easy to share favorite recipes.

Click here to get Cook’n (it’s free!)

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� DVO

This Ove glove is a must-have in the kitchen or outside on the grill!!

This is the curling iron I will be ordering come payday! Mine finally died after many years of service. I really like the “Hot Tools” brand so I will be getting another!