It’s July.  Do you know what that means?  Time for a new month-long goal at our house.

First I have to admit that last month’s challenge didn’t go so well.  I wanted to look up something new on Wikipedia every single day.  But with all the new mechanical and physical properties I was learning about flying a plane, I just wasn’t interested in trying to learn something else, too.   My June goal was a total failure.  I followed through seven out of 30 days.  Did anyone else try to spend more time learning little details?  How did it go?

On to July.  On to a new challenge.  I’m spending a little time each day improving my beauty routine.

You can probably guess that it doesn’t mean waking up 30 minutes earlier to scrub and dry my hair and put on makeup.  Actually, I’m taking quite the opposite approach (not just because I prefer beauty sleep, either).  I’m wondering if maybe less really is more.  Our skin can absorb up to 60% of the stuff we apply to it.  So it hungrily soaks up the water, vitamins, and minerals we put against it.  And then our skin proceeds to suck up the potentially carcinogenic ingredients we’re rubbing against it, too.

Have you ever thought about how many chemicals and products you apply to your body just in the first hour of the day?

This month, I’m thinking about all the products that I apply to my skin and trying to cut back – both on the number of products and the amount I apply.  That means trying to use half the shampoo, half the lotion, and fewer soaps and products on my skin.  It’s an interesting experiment.  So far, I can’t really tell a huge difference other than the fact that my shampoo is disappearing half as fast.

You can probably guess that using simple products that I can understand like Plain Jane Skin Care products is high on my list.  So is reading this book:

I’ve been poking through The Green Beauty Guide by Julie Gabriel for several months.  It has so much wisdom – from product suggestions to recipes and most importantly, answers to my questions about skin products, green washing (false eco-advertising) and, especially around this time of year: the topic of sunscreen.  Considering the book costs the same price as my favorite Burt’s Bees body butter, I think it’ll quickly pay for itself – especially with all the products I won’t need to buy any more.

What about you?  Do you have any changes that you’ve made to detox your beauty routine?  I need you to help me keep up to speed.

(Images from Flickr and Amazon.com)

One of my goals in our summer living in the western US was to take my German husband, Martin, to his first rodeo.  What better time than the 4th of July to stir some dust around (or rather – watch the cowboys do it while we sneeze in the bleachers!).  We hit up one of gobs of rodeos happening over the weekend to see the pros compete for the big bucks.

We plopped our cowboy hats on and strutted to our seats.  The smells of cattle and dust were quickly accompanied by the heavy, thick scent of beer.  The crowd got louder as it got colder and colder (seriously – is this really July?  brrr.).  So we stomped on the bleachers and cheered plenty, and a fairly tipsy cowboy fell over when he looked at us.  Do you suppose it was the hats?

Yes-sir-ee.  Martin and I snagged cowboy hats of our very own.  Ever since I posed for this picture dressed as “Cowgirl Kate”, I’ve had my heart set on getting a cowboy hat one day.  (A hat for each of us was our one exception to the No New Clothes Summer at our house.)  Now we wear them everywhere.  Stay tuned for the scoop on hat shopping!

Meanwhile, back to the rodeo.  First there were the cowboys behind the arena.

Then there were the same cowboys getting bucked around the arena.

Martin is thrilled to announce that now that we’ve been to a rodeo, he can officially say that old line, “This ain’t my first rodeo, cowboy” any time he wants.  I’m pretty sure that statement is only applicable to the people in the arena this weekend.  But who’s going to know that in Berlin?

Then cowboys wrestled, trying to get steers roped, tied, and on the ground.  You know – making ground beef.

The whole thing was fantastic.  I still flinched as much as ever during the bull riding.  And the barrel racing surprisingly had us on the edge of our seats.  

Have any of you been to a rodeo?  Or how about in the rodeo?

Martin and I are fast approaching our wedding anniversary (I know – anniversaries are quickly coming for every couple married in the later part of the summer, right?).  We didn’t even live in the same town, let alone the same state for most of our engagement.  So while making a home involves so many things, the fundamental beginnings of our homes often begin with the people that we live with.  In fact, it’s the people that matter the most.  That’s why I’m excited to start sharing a different sort of post with you each Friday – posts about green weddings, international weddings, and most especially, a look at the things that really matter in our lives – each other.

I’ll wrap the whole series up in August on our anniversary.  Yes, Martin and I are really going to spill the beans on our little wedding – an experience that came far before we ever knew we’d live in Berlin or especially a house made of tires.  But like I said: it matters more who you’re with than where you are and what you have in your home.

The first new little family I want to introduce you to is Christine over at Simple Savvy and her new hubby.  They just got married last month with an oh-so-simple (and completely enviable!) green wedding.  She’s ready to share her little paradise.  But I have to be honest with you.  We’ve already hit the road (or should I say air?) for the 4th of July weekend.  So you’ll just have to hang on a little bit as we launch this series.   Will you do that for me?

To all our American friends and people in the US:  Happy Independence Day.

(Images taken from our wedding)

Are the chemicals slowly disappearing in your house, too?  One of the first to go around here was the stuff we were putting on our bodies like harsh soaps and nasty shampoos.  We were happy with Avalon Organics.  Then when I thought my skin couldn’t be happier and I would never truly be able to pronounce all the ingredients, Plain Jane Skin Care gracefully waltzed into our lives thanks to a fabulous friend.

I honestly didn’t know body products could work so well and have so few basic ingredients in them.  Love it!

And one lucky Making This Home reader is sure to fall in love, too.  Plain Jane is offering a fabulous gift package that I so desperately wish I could win.  Just look at all this simple, natural stuff:

The prize, valued at 30 smackaroos, includes:

Plain Jane is only available online unless you’re in the Atlanta area.  You’ve got to love the green, small business movement in action.  With soy candles, natural bug repellants, and products especially for babies and kids, you’ll just want to eat all the yumminess right up.  (Luckily you can thanks to the short sweet list of ingredients Plain Jane uses.)

The prize:

One winner in the United States or Canada will receive all of the Plain Jane products mentioned above valued at $30.

How to enter:

Leave a comment below (one entry per household) that describes the part of your morning routine that you struggle with most (or skip!), especially in the beauty department.

Deadline:

Entries must be received by Monday, July 6 at 8:00 pm EST.  The winner will be announced on Making this Home the following day.

How many of you have found yourselves completely hooked to those home remodeling shows on HGTV?  And how many of you cringe when the cast slips on the most basic construction vocabulary?  (Maybe that second one is just Martin and me, so maybe it really is a good thing we don’t have TV out here in the tire house).

In any case – cringe or no cringe – here are two basic slip ups you’re guaranteed to hear.  Feel free to label yourself as an official know-it-all after this post.  Just don’t expect HGTV to come knocking, okay?

Slip up #1.  ”We’re installing hardwood floors in the kitchen.” All wood floors are not hardwood floors.  We have different types of wood, just like we have different types of apples.  Just because I think gala apples are the best, it doesn’t mean all apples are gala.  It’s the same with wood floors.

Yes, hard woods (like cherry, maple, and beech) are usually better for flooring materials than the competition, soft woods (like pine, cedar, and fir) because hardwoods tend to be denser and harder.  We need every ounce of strength we can get underfoot, but don’t be fooled by thinking all floors are hardwood.  Some softwoods are actually harder than some hardwoods.  So you just never know.  Well except you do know one thing:  all wood floors are not hardwood.

Slip up #2.  ”We’ve been using a table saw for that there job.” I guess because we set this saw on a table, people on TV frequently call it a table saw:

Sorry folks.  No matter how much I correct the people on TV from my chair, they just don’t listen.  That quick guy is a chop saw.  It’s really good for cutting trim, crown molding, and 2x4s.  The blade gets great angles, but it can’t cover a lot of area like a table saw can.

Here’s a table saw.  Notice how it is the table:

A table saw has a blade coming out of the table itself, which is incredibly dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing.  (The blade is covered by a clear plastic shield guard here.)  More people lose their fingers to table saws every year.  Martin and I cut all of our cabinet walls, doors, and shelves in our kitchen with a table saw because it’s really good for cutting large, long things like sheets of wood.  I often hung out the window to balance pieces of wood as Martin cut them on the table saw.

Know any other frequent slip-ups when it comes to tools and terms?  Or do we have any smarty pants in the house who already knew this stuff?  I don’t mind co-correcting people on TV if you want to get together.

Update:  It seems I just discovered how to get my husband talking on this site.  Martin brings up some fabulous points in the comments that you might want to check out.

(Images from Amazon.com)