Some Soup for Your Cold

Our apartment is full of sniffles and coughs... it's cold season again (actually, my cold has mutated into a sinus infection and bronchitis... ick ). I've been reading a number of blogs on how to help shorten the duration of a cold. The writers have recommended everything from taking 1000mg of vitamin c for three days, to Netti pot usage (these are so wonderful! If you haven't tried one, you really should!), to exercise. One recommendation has been common on almost all of the blogs I have read: don't eat dairy. Dairy can increase mucus production and make you feel even more miserable (which is sometimes hard to believe, but trust me, I rebelled one day and regretted it!) I found a great, dairy free soup recipe that both Jordan and I enjoy. Use it for colds, or just entertaining! I also added two stalks of celery that I had in the fridge to give us some more veggies.

It's the Little Things :)

In our NYC apartment, space is used in ways that this Iowa girl could never imagine. Shelves give more vertical space, hidden compartments in furniture allow for extra storage, and the many tips derived from Ikea catalogs make our studio apartments hold as much as a small ranch house. One thing that has been driving me crazy for YEARS has been our plastic grocery bags. Jordan and I try to reuse these as often as possible, but storing them can get unruly. I was too frugal to spend cash on storing "trash" bags, and my old, metal, Singer sewing machine was starting to show it's age. We stored all the loose plastic in a large paper bag on the floor of our kitchen near the garbage. Not the most pleasant to look at. I finally decided to make a bag holder that I had seen in so many of my friends homes growing up made from old towels. This Little Piggy had a great tutorial! I used some scrap fabric I had lying around and tada! A neat, little bag holder!


I know, I know... It's just a bag holder... but sometimes, it is those little things in life that make you smile :).