Miscellaneous Tips & Stuff – Page 3

Creative Gift Wrap Ideas

Published on December 2, 2023November 28, 2023 by Susie @ Pollywog's Place BlogLeave a comment

I don’t know about you but my phone has been going crazy with notifications about packages that will be arriving as we just finished up the majority of our Christmas shopping. I have a huge black tote in my room that I am keeping the gifts in… yes, I believe they will all fit in the one tote this year.

Now, I have to figure out how to wrap them. I have a bunch of leftover paper from years past. There was a time when I liked to have things color coordinated and usually each kiddo had their own paper to keep things a little more organized as the tags seemed to get lost before Christmas morning. I have always seen the towers that people do with different figures and they look so cute but I don’t want to buy special paper for them.

I have an idea of just buying some fabric and making reusable bags but maybe making them so that they could stack and make these adorable gift towers… with our new 3-4 gift rule it might make this a real possibility!

Here are some cute pics of the ideas I have from Pinterest:

Continue reading →

Save the Dishes Oven Placard

Published on January 28, 2023January 14, 2023 by Susie @ Pollywog's Place Blog3 Comments

I don’t know about your house but here we often have different people doing different things in the kitchen. One rule is that they need to check the oven before turning it on because sometimes people tend to ‘hide’ things in there and forget about them.

I’ve had many things that have been ruined because one person put a dish in there and the next person didn’t check it… most recently it was a plastic cover for one of my casserole dishes and the whole dish of peach cobbler that had been made for dinner… sigh.

This dish alone will cost me almost $40.00 ** to replace as I haven’t been able to find the lid sold separately… luckily the carrier is still alive!

More often than not it was my bread dough that was hanging out in there… minding its own business when someone would forget to check, even with the oven light on they forget, and then the temperature would go up and ruin the dough… (crying face).

Continue reading →

DIY Hair Detangler

Published on July 22, 2022July 20, 2022 by Susie @ Pollywog's Place BlogLeave a comment

I don’t think I’ve shared this post before but I wanted to throw it out there just in case anyone else finds themselves in need of this.

DIY Hair Detangler

Ingredients:

Spray bottle (16-20 oz)
About 2-3 T of your favorite conditioner or coconut oil
Hot water

Add all the ingredients into your spray bottle with just enough hot water to fill almost to the top.

Shake well and use as needed!

Spice Jar Fruit Fly Trap

Published on June 4, 2022June 4, 2022 by Susie @ Pollywog's Place BlogLeave a comment

Fruit fly traps

You need:

Old spice container

Dish soap

Vinegar (ACV or homemade fruit scrap vinegar work best)

Directions:

Tape off all but a couple of holes in the lid.

Fill the jar about halfway with vinegar.

Add one drop of dish soap.

Put the lid on the jar.

Place in area where fruit flies have been seen and wait.

Empty every 1-2 weeks, or as needed.

You can also use an old cup with a lid and a straw that has been cut in half.

Place the vinegar and dish soap in the cup.

Put the lid on.

Secure the straw with tape so that it is suspended above the liquid.

The flies will get in but won’t find their way back out… just make sure to label it so no one gets curious and takes a sip… yuck!

10 Smart Ways To Spend That Tax Refund

Published on March 19, 2022September 15, 2025 by Susie @ Pollywog's Place BlogLeave a comment

This post might be a little bit late to catch some of you but I do believe that with the various delays the IRS has had this year, there may be many who haven’t gotten their tax refunds yet. If you have, maybe you haven’t spent it and you are trying to think of sensible ways to spend it. Here are a few of the things that we are using ours on: