Healthy teeth

I have bean using a blend of peppermint and wintergreen essential oils diluted in almond oil to brush my teeth with, and you know what? I don't like how it tastes. Everyone else I know that uses it loves the taste, so I don't know what wrong with me. To my joy I finally finished up the blend and I decided to make a new one. I mixed about 10 drops each of birch (antibacterial and good for the gums) clove (helps with toothaches and stops bleeding.
So it's good for soars in the mouth) and some orange oil (great for the mouth and gums in general). It tastes kind if like a Christmas root beer. The initial taste was a bit weird at first, but the aftertaste is so incredible! I absolutely love it. And my tooth that I have bean having problems with since I got my braces off feels so much better. I put the oil in my old bottle for essential oil. You can also use a glass bottle with a dropper, but you need to make sure it has a glass dropper also because the oil can kind of "eat" away at the plastic which you don't want in your mouth since it absorbs so much of what you put in it. All three of these oils are awesome for all sorts of stuff. I really like mixing birch with grapefruit in my vinegar cleaning bottle. It covers up the vinegar so well, and it leaves such a delightful sweet smell. Birch is good for keeping skin from aging, and both it and clove are great for arthritis type pains (gotta use birch internally and clove externally). I mix clove and peppermint with almond oil in a roll on and it gets rid of the aches in my neck and back. I encourage you to look up the other uses. And make sure you get a therapeutic grade oil and make sure you won't have any adverse affects before proceeding. Oh! And keep those teeth nice and clean! The rest of your body suffers when you don't keep them clean especially when you loose them.

A new year to add to our lives

Jacob's and mine's birthdays are coming up real soon. His is in just a couple of days, and mine is in a couple of weeks after that. I have bean really thinking about my goals that I want to accomplish before I turn 20 (ah! It seams so soon! just a year away!) and it has brought up a lot of memories of what I have already done. I figured I'd show you some of the highlights of the year, and maybe in another post I'll put up some of what I accomplished with my goals in mind. This year has bean such a crazy ride. I'm glad to have that one behind me, not because it was bad (it wasn't bad at all really) but because it means I have so many more ahead of me to enjoy with new knowledge to help me better myself, new family to help me along the way, and an incredibly wonderful husband to support me and to grow along side me. Believe me, he is still growing, it seams that guy gets taller everyday! hehe

Here is a bit of my year in photos.

 Engaged, book contest, croquet & garden party, bridal shower, graduations, bacheloret party, reception, wedding, powderhorn, helping with breakfast for bikers, cousins family reunion, marriage celebration, wine and cheese party, Halloween, camping, book swaps, fun times in the park. Their are so many other memories that I am being to lazy to post, and even more un-photographed memories that are only tucked away in our minds, but I wanted to share some with you. Even if it was just these precious few. Ok, I need to stop or else I'm going to get all super emotional thinking about this past year. I have made a lot of really good memories that overshadow all of the bad ones. I'd say that this has bean such an amazing year, and I am so, so, SO looking forward to the next one.

Sharing time

I love watching educational videos on YouTube. I learn so much, and I think that it is important to continue to learn new things, so along with reading I watch a few neatoe channels on You Tube. We don't have a TV, so now Downton Abbey, BUT, it also saves a lot of wall space so that I can put up more picture. Also, we really don't have much of any need for one. If I watch say, 10 videos on YouTube  then that will suck up maybe an hour of my day, but if I watch an hour of TV, I will see maybe 2 shows tops, and they will make me (well, I guess the wont make me, but still!) sit through commercials and the show replaying bits that happened before. So it kinda wastes my time when I can get more information from ten minutes instead of 30.

Here are my favorites! I like lots of geeky things, but they all are very interesting, and definetly keep your attention. Those are first, then I have some of my more girly and diy stuff. 

My odd cat, 2 drink recipes, and the easiest Asian dish.

 First of all, living with my husband has made me learn quite a few things, such as my cat who wont eat tuna or other usual cat treats besides her food really likes lentils and bread. (Below is Jacob giving her... bread) So Weird!

This week I got some supper awesome books in, Sapphire Blue (2nd book in the Ruby Red trilogy) and The Lost Prince (a continuation series of the Iron Fey.) Such Good Books! I highly recommend you check out Ruby Red and The Iron King.

For a little shindig I made a supper yummy punch with Raspberry soda (a 6 or 8 pack of hansen's) and rosewater. That's it!!!! You could use raspberry juice and sparkling water though to cut down on the sugar. 

I love ginger and lemon together, so yummy! I usually boil some ginger root and mix it with some lemon juice and honey, but I wanted to make something that I didn't need to wait for it to boil and steep every time I wanted some. So, I brought like 3 cups of water to a boil and simmered 2 inches of ginger root that I had cut up (with the skins on) for about 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours. I turned the heat off and just let it sit their for a couple more hours, what I ended up with was some really, really STRONG ginger! It was crazy how spicy that stuff gets! Since obviously I had to majorly dilute it I put a bit in my cup then added water until I was satisfied with the strength, I ended up getting 1/4 cup of ginger juice stuff mixed with about a cup of water. To this I added a bit of xylotol (you can use honey, stevia or other types of sweeter BUT! I warn you stay away from the aspartame or face dire consequences, plane old sugar would be way better than that icky junk.)

 If your unfamiliar with xylitol is just as sweet as sugar, but it is actually good for you. It doesn't spike your blood sugar, it has 40% less calories, it's good for your bones (including teeth) and your gums, It kills certain harmful bacteria, and it inhibits yeast which is supper awesome if you get those pesky yeast infections. I get xylotol made from birch, but it is easiest to find it made from corn (just get it organic! I suggest the Now brand if you get it made from corn.)

Back to the recipe, So basically it is 1/4 cup of supper strong ginger tea mixed with a splash of vanilla (can omit the vanilla if you'd like) juice from 1/2 a lemon, and some sweetener  Mix that in a cup, and fill the rest of the way with water. The lemon juice helps to detox your organs especially the liver and kidneys  and the ginger is so supper good for a range of things, from ovarian and colon cancer, to digestion, to reveling headaches  cramps and nausea, and it is also good to take during the cold and flue season. So tasty and makes you feel good, plus it is cheaper than ginger ale! Mixing the ginger tea with komboucha is yummy also. 

 This dish is supper easy. Cook some Asian egg noodles and some veggies (I just threw some frozen veggies in while the noodles were cooking) Mix with 1/2 an inch of fresh ground ginger (I use a small grater) 1/4 of a bunch of fresh chopped cilantro,  a couple tbsp of sesame or peanut oil, and a few tbsp of soy sauce. You can always add a bit of fish sauce too if you'd like.