You catch more flies with.... vinegar?

In addition to my normal recycling, I have begun composting. I asked for a composter for my wedding anniversary and it has been placed outside my kitchen window, making it very easy to set aside scraps and toss them out into the composter. Unfortunately, I also have a one year old, a husband, and a full time job, so very often those scraps sit in the sink a little too long and I now also have fruit flies. My cousin showed me this great trick for recycling a 2 litter bottle into a fruit fly trap. It appears to work great for her, but an old bottle filled with liquid and dead bugs sitting on my kitchen counter just wasn't doing it for me. So here is my attempt at decorating the fly death trap, along with instructions for the actual contraption. Enjoy!

Materials: A 2 litter plastic soda bottle, apple cider vinegar, 1 sheet of 12x12 scrapbook paper, scissors, glue, unwanted fruit flies. Cut the top of the bottle off using the edge of the label as a guide.

Place the inverted bottle top back into the bottle so that the two cut edges are together. If the top slides down into the bottle used some tape to hold it in place, but keep in mind that to empty the dead flies you will eventually have to untape the top. It is better if you can get it to stay in place on its own.

Cut a piece of 12x12 scrap book paper to be a little taller than your bottle. The paper won't quite be long enough to wrap all the way around the bottle, so take the extra piece that gets cut off and use it to lengthen the page so it will fit. Your paper should be a little taller than the bottle so that you can fold the edge to the exact height ad have that little overlap piece shown in this picture. I wrapped my paper around the bottle and secured it with a ribbon. Then I folded the overlap over the cut edges of bottle so my finished edge is smooth, AND the paper helps close any potential gaps that could provide an escape route to a smart fruit fly.

Pour some apple cider vinegar into the funnel of the bottle top and set near your sink. Watch, or don't watch, the fruit flies die!

A gift for Baby Charlie.

My friend Cindy is decorating her 2nd nursery in less than two years. When big sister isn't big enough to move out of the crib and your trying to put your house on the market to build something bigger, it can be difficult to choose decorations that will spruce up an old room and still work when you move to the new. Cindy found some nice brown gingham check bedding, but wanted something for the window. She had an adorable stuffed blue bunny in the crib when she asked me what I thought. The bunny's tag said his name was Charlie, just like the new baby. I was so excited to find this blue and brown plaid fabric on the remnant pile at my favorite discount upholstery shop. Then when I saw the brown farm animal fabric, with bunnies included, I knew I would make some type of pillows to coordinate. I was able to get 2 valances out of the plaid and still had some extra to trim out the bunny pillows. My idea is that the valances can be gathered together to cover the one big window in the current nursery, but later they can be separated should the new house have two windows. The extra fabric was just enough to make one last pillow with Baby Charlie's initial.