Kitchen cabinet makeover
Hi friends!
So if you follow us on Instagram you know that we are under some SERIOUS construction right now. It is a constant pit of dirt and nails and paint. We have been doing this since November, so while it has not been fun at all- IT WILL BE WORTH IT!
One of the things {haha quite literally the only ONE thing} that has been completed during this is our kitchen cabinet makeover. We have been in this home for 5 years now and when we moved in we had the whole kitchen redone. We went with custom cabinets and used a company that we thought was good. They did white cabinets for us, and while I fully anticipated the white getting dirty, I did NOT anticipate the chipping that happened.
Im talking, within a month of being in the house, the paint was chipping, especially under the sink area. The company just said I must be getting too much water on them. Also, that chipping is ‘totally normal and just part of having painted cabinets’. Well, they lied. Turns out they never primed the cabinets AT ALL. Literally just slapped some paint on them. So ya, they looked like junk 5 years later even with me keeping up with keeping them dry and clean.
So, now that we HAD to redo them because of a leak, and the chipping everywherrrreeee, Jeremy finally got his dream of grey cabinets!
Because the previous ones were white, we had chrome hardware on them. Chrome and grey paint don’t go together, so we swapped it out for brass. And I have to admit it, I actually like it. I am FULLY drawn to all things white. White and bright is my motto. But they grey looks good! AND will look even better once we paint ALL our walls white this summer:)
We also changed the hood in the makeover. The shiplap top and woodplank bottom look so so so good with the subway tile below!
{picture all white walls above. the two tones of grey kill me now, but I know it will be all good soon!}
Our guy Edgar who does all the cabinets in our flips is awesome. We know his work, know it handles kids and water and life, lol, so I am SO happy to now have cabinets that won’t look like junk in a hot minute! We went with the color Silver Polish from Dunn Edwards.
Hope you guys like them! Its a fun change for the eyes.
But now, well now I cannnnottt wait to get this whole renovation done and get started on our Pantry and Dropzone! SO many good projects in the pipeline!
A Day In The Life- Oils Edition
Hey friends!! It’s been a hot minute, right?!
Life is SO good, so crazy, and full- and I love it! We are loving doing this holiday season with all our babies, and just experiencing all the magic through their eyes!
One thing that I have been doing lately that all of you who also follow me on Instagram and Facebook know about, is showing a Day in The Life. How we use natural products seamlessly throughout the day. I feel like SO many people don’t ever start with switching things out because it seems overwhelming- so here is my breakdown of an average day:
-Lets wake up sleepy body and tummy! I LOVE adding a drop of Peppermint in to my coffee in the morning. It jump starts the digestive system, opens up the sinuses, and even makes my coffee taste amazing!
Also, fun and incredible random fact:
Every living thing has an energy, a frequency. A healthy person has a frequency that ranges between 62-78 megahertz (MHz). When our frequency begins to drop, we become susceptible to illness and disease. If our frequency drops below 58 MHz, our body becomes susceptible to disease. At 57 MHz, colds, flu, and other illnesses begin to invade our bodies. Our bodies are receptive to cancer at 42 MHz and death begins at 25 MHz. So, it is very, very important to stay above the wellness line and keep our frequencies up! Good news though, this is where essential oils come in!!!!
-Even holding a cup of coffee can lower your body frequency by 8 MHz (yikes!!!) Taking a sip lowers it by 14 MHz! 🙊🙊🙊 BUT!!! CHECK THIS OUT: When essential oils are inhaled following exposure to coffee, the bodily frequencies restore themselves in less than a minute. But, if no oils are administered, it can take up to 3 days for the body to recover from just one drink of coffee. CRAZY, RIGHT? Put that peppermint in it, or huff it from the bottle! Raise that frequency friends!
Supplements are a game changer in our home. I would rather blow my budget on supplements than anything else, truly.
I recently had blood work done and the doctor said that my blood was some of the best he has ever seen. (How awesome that was to hear!
🙌🏻)
The kids every day take:
-mightyvites (multivitamin)
-mightyzymes (an enzyme)
-life9 (probiotic)
-multigreens (amazing source of greens)
-and during the winter, super c chewable
-NINGXIA RED (antioxidant drink that blows my mind with what’s in it)
I take:
-multigreens
-life9
-super B (multi source of b vitamins)
-essentialzyme (digestive enzymes)
-omegagize (all your healthy omegas)
-during the winter-super c
-a postnatal multi vitamin since I’m still nursing
-NINGXIA RED!
I would much rather spend money and the time to take supplements daily, to make us all healthy from the inside out, than spend money and time getting us back to healthy from being sick
Skincare is pretty dang important to me, considering I am a licensed esthetician. I have used quite literally probably 100 different lines, and yet these are truly my favorites.
Depending on if my skin is feeling more dry or not, I rotate between Orange Blossom and ART gentle cleanser. Always tone with the ART toner (that I am actual powerhouse of essential oils). And moisturize during the day with my DIY face serum (I’ll share about that later today) and at night with Sheerlume.
Y’all, my skin looks so much better today than it did during the years I was using HARSHHHH and stupid expensive skin care.
You don’t need to spend $100 on a cream, or have your face be burning off, to get amazing results. 🙌🏻
Rolling up before leaving the house is key for us! The kids get a roller with Purification, Lavender, and Tea Tree in it. It not only helps boost their immune system but it also helps keep hair critters away!
Georgia gets a sweet roller of Gentle Baby, Frankincense, and Lavender to keep her happy and healthy.
Jeremy and I get an immune roller of Thieves, Frank, & Lemon.
Each week we do a Costco run for the insane mass amount of produce we go through in this house. I kid you not when I say I am slightly terrified of what our grocery bill will be as the kids get older.
I mean, we average 8 cartons of Raspberries each week. AND THATS JUST RASPBERRIES. Thats not allll the other things! Ah.
So to make sure everything we buy is coming to us with ZERO junk of it, I soak it all in the Thieves fruit and veggie soak. Fill my sink up, pour the tiniest amount in, and let the product soak for 1-2 minutes and rinse off. Done. Bonus- everything seems to stay as fresh as day one when I soak it with this. Week old Raspberries that are still nice and firm are the best!
One recent ditch and switch for me has been makeup! I am not a huge makeup person, but when I do apply it- I want it to be CLEAN. BareMinerals sounds super clean, right? Bare and all. Think again though:/
There are so many toxins in Makeup. The average woman puts over 500 chemicals per day on her body. It is believed that our skin absorbs 60-70% of any topical products we use. Makeup is a HUGE culprit of this! So switch it out for Savvy Minerals friends!
A few fun facts:
• Savvy Minerals are free from: talc, lead, bismuth, mineral oil, parabens, lead, gluten and mercury!
• Savvy Minerals are cruelty-free and mostly vegan (the lipsticks and lip glosses have beeswax so they are not considered vegan).
• Savvy Minerals by Young Living uses Arrowroot Powder and Kaolin Clay. Both are calming to the skin, help to absorb excess oil and moisture on the skin and make the skin feel silky smooth. This is important because most mineral makeup uses bismuth, which is a metal mineral that – when worked into the pores – aggravates the pores and causes irritation and breakouts.
• Savvy Minerals last ALL DAY LONG… seriously, ALL DAY LONG! You’ll look as fresh at midnight as you did at 9 a.m.!
Shopping carts, parks, classrooms at school, you name it- kids are dirty little things that spread germs like no other {and yet they are the cutest ever too!}
So what do you do to help that? Bust out the hand sanitizer right? Well did you know that
Triclosan is one of the most common ingredients in hand sanitizers and hand soaps these days. Some ways that this effects us you wonder?
Antibiotics are effective against bacteria. But what happens if your body builds up resistance to antibiotics, and in turn promotes resistance to bacteria?
Triclosan contributes to making bacteria resistant to antibiotics. It also disrupts our hormones, and weakens our immune system.
Want a better alternative?Long-lasting Thieves Waterless Hand Purifier is enhanced with natural Peppermint oil to cleanse and purify hands. It also has an awesome peppermint smell, unlike store bought sanitizers which come in at a 5 on the Skin Deep app! I keep these babies everywhere.
I am telling you- this cleaner is literally in my top 5 favorite products of all time! One bottle of it lasts us around 5 months!It can be used to clean EVERYTHING. And I mean it. And I can spray it right in front of my babies without any fear of what it’s doing to them! You know that headache you get when you clean your house? It’s from the fumes. Ditch that junk and switch to this. It is SO good, anddddd it’s cheap!
Thieves aromabright toothpaste {which TOTALLY doubles as a great deodorant in a pinch, no joke friends} and Thieves mouthwash every day! And then a few times a week I add a drop of Orange to the toothpaste to keep my teeth nice and white. None of the acid from the Orange though, since the EO is extracted from the Rind:)
My dentist always says how healthy my teeth and gums are now since switching {and trust me, I purposely didn’t tell him I was using something different- because I always want an honest reaction!}
Quite literally one of my most favorite forms of Self Care: Detox baths! Tonight I gave my babies one with Gentle Baby and Frankincense.
Typically, a detox bath is made with Epsom salt also known as magnesium sulfate, which not only draws out toxins, but has health benefits of its own:
-Ease stress and improves sleep and concentration
-Help muscles and nerves function properly
-Regulate activity of 325+ enzymes
-Help prevent artery hardening and blood clots
-Make insulin more effective
-Reduce inflammation to relieve pain and muscle cramps
-Improve oxygen use
-Flush toxins
-Improve absorption of nutrients
-Help form joint proteins, brain tissue and mucin proteins
-Help prevent or ease migraine headaches
amazing right?
They also get washed up with the Kidscents bath gel and shampoo. THE BEST stuff ever. So gentle, free from all the hormone disrupting common ingredients in the store bought stuff, and lasts so long.
Teething sucks. Amiright?!
Two things that make the most difference in our house are:
-Amber teething necklace {http://amzn.to/2j9IJnD}
-Copaiba essential oil
This is a SUPER gentle oil and amazing for helping with the pain of teething! Heres a little info on it:
It helps our bodies do their thing when it comes to injury or irritation. It aids in easing common digestion discomforts when taken internally…oh, sweet relief!
It helps the body regulate its natural immune responses. Always a good thing.
And, well, it’s the main ingredient in Stress Away, so obvi it can be real soothing.
Aaaaand it promotes a youthful appearance from the inside out! Yes please!
I rub this right on to Georgia Mae’s gums, and it provides her so much relief. Mamas, you NEED it!
To make my skin smooth like butter- the Satin Mint facial scrub is amazing.
Its gentle enough for ANYONE to use, and leaves a little tingly feeling afterwards!
Then I apply the bestttttt eyecream ever! The Wolfberry Eyecream is SUPER concentrated, a little bit goes a long way. I have had mine for well over 6 months, and still have plenty! Anything that can help slow down the ever growing crows feet is my friend:)
And lipbalm! Did you know that YL has 4 types of lipbalm? Cinnamint, Lavender, Grapefruit, AND my FAV, the Vanillamint that is just seasonal. All are super hydrating and the only thing I use anymore!
Smooth as a baby’s bottom right? That is unless our sweet baby has a diaper rash. As parents we always want to fix whatever ailment our sweet kiddo is dealing with immediately. But did you know that most store bought diaper rash creams are chalk full of toxic ingredients?
These are the top 5 worst ones that most contain:
-BHA [EWG score 9] is a synthetic antioxidants used as preservative in products and a known endocrine disruptor and possible carcinogen.
-Fragrance[EWG score 8] commonly represents synthetic chemicals that have been added to products to make them smell appealing. Typically fragrances are associated with allergies, and organ system toxicity.
-Boric acid and sodium borate[EWG score 8] is used as an antimicrobial agent linked to endocrine disruption and reproductive toxicity.
-Petrolatum [EWG score 4] is mineral oil jelly i.e. petroleum jelly and is used as a barrier to lock moisture in the skin. It is a carcinogen and linked to organ system toxicity.
-Parabens- propyl, methyl, ethyl etc [EWG score 7] are the most widely used preservative in cosmetics. They easily penetrate the skin and can mimic estrogen, and can act as a potential hormone system disruptor.
Instead, use Tender Tush {for your baby’s bottom and a million other uses for yourself like dry hands, patchy skin, pregnant bellies, etc}
Tender Tush has:
Natural Ingredients
Therapeutic-grade essential oils
No mineral oils
No synthetic perfumes
No artificial colorings
No toxic ingredients
As I already said about my babies and detox baths, those are my favorite. Hands down. Bray even says, ‘mommy- why do you always go take a bath once we go to bed?’. Y,all I just love them. They help me wind down and let go of anything lingering from the day. They are the best! BUT some nights I don’t have enough time for them, so i’ll hop in a quick shower- and make it like a Spa!
Grab a washcloth and wet it and put 5 drops of Myrtle {or Peppermint, Eucalyptus, RC, whatever!} on it and put it in the corner of the shower. It smells amazing and helps open up your airways!
After the amazing detox bath/shower, your pores are super open- so ESP. now, don’t put on lotions with toxic junk in them! My new fav lotion is this Coconut Lime body butter. It smells like a tropical vacation, leaves even the driest skin silky smooth, and is SO good for you!
Go do yourself a favor, open up the Think Dirty app, and scan some products in your bathroom. Lotions included. And then ditch that junk and get this!
Mirah shave oil, except I use it for the ends of my hair;) This stuff smells like a slice of heaven, and makes my ends SO silky- but not weighed down. Its also amazing to use almost like a lotion, but use it sparingly:) And of course, ESP. if you are someone who suffers with getting razorburn, this will be your BFF!
Babies are in bed! Now its time for some self-care. First up, a mask made with Activated Charcoal, Aztec Indian healing clay, and Frankincense, Ylang Ylang, and Patchouli. Mix just enough Apple Cider Vinegar in it to make a paste. Apply for up to 15 minutes, and then rinse off.
Your skin will thank you! I promise! Your husband will not love the smell…or look..but later when your skin looks amazing HE WILL THEN:)
This diffuser is new to me and I loveee it. It has like 9 color options, even a candle flicker mode. It also can run for up to 10 hours! Hello solid nights sleep for even your babies while they have this running ALL night!
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