I love Candles

       I was raised thinking that candles came only in few colors, like red, yellow and white and can be used when praying, for illumination during power interruption, for birthday cakes, etc. It really didn't came across on my mind that candles can also set a soft, warm and romantic ambience. No wonder when I first stepped in to my hubby's house I saw candles all over the place. I did not ask any question thinking that its an invasion of my hubby's privacy since we were not married at that time.     

     As the time goes by, I realized that candles are quite popular here in the United States. It comes in different shapes, sizes, colors and even scents. I remember way back when I was living in the Philippines that whenever I smell candles (because it's not scented), my mind was wandering thinking that a ghost was near me....that's creepy. But now I think having candles in the house adds its beauty. I was no longer thinking creepy things whenever I smelled it, instead I feel relax and at peace.

     Sometimes also, instead of going out to eat dinner, me and my hubby will cook at home or order foods to go, lighted all our candles and set our table as if we were in an expensive restaurant. It's indeed very romantic. In fact, candles are now part in our house decoration, from our living room to our bathroom. I have few candles that have not been used. I kept them in our cabinet and probably use it on an special occasion.  

Magic Eraser

     Have you notice lately that  your bathroom faucet, your sink, glass door of your shower, etc has water spots? Have you tried multi-purpose cleaners and other cleaners available in the market but still you are not satisfied with the outcome? Then we are on the same pace.

     Few months ago, I noticed that the handle of our faucet and the tiles around our shower has water spots. I thought when I clean it with soap and water  it will disappear. But to my dismay, I was totally wrong. I tried couple of cleaning products. It helps a little bit but I am still not satisfied with the result. One time when we went to the grocery store I saw this Tide Magic Eraser. I read the label and I am impressed in what it stated on there.  It's a little bit expensive to buy a box with four sponges on it but still I am very persistent to clean our bathroom. I followed the instruction and I was really happy with it. Every time I clean our bathroom and even our kitchen sink, I always used the Magic Eraser. In fact I used it in our glass door in our shower. I wet the magic eraser and take of the excess water and rub it on the surface of the glass lightly and gently to avoid on scratching it.

     Since grocery stores here in the U.S. carried their own brand, I found a store that sell their own magic eraser. I tried it and I was happy because it did the same thing as the Tide Magic Eraser and it's cheaper.

     If you want to try this product, always test first in a conspicuous area because if you don't, you might scratch and damage the surface of the area you are cleaning with. Always read the label of all the items you purchase before using it and follow the direction.

Now and Then.......Backyard

     I asked my husband before if he had a photo of our house before we met and got married. He told me that he hid the photos somewhere in our house but he could not remember where. Just as this moment I browsed all our photo files on the computer and I found many photos way back when my husband acquired our house and live here for maybe a little bit over five years. The first one I wanted to share was a photo of our backyard.

(This was our backyard before I got married and moved here)

     It was a nice backyard. I recognized a few plants my husband had that we still have right now. The structure you've seen behind the fountain is our recreation room and sometimes we called it studio room because my husband uses it  to shoot products for his outside clients. The stair in the left side is going to our rooftop. We don't use our rooftop that much. Sometimes we went there to watch the planes (because we live close to the international airport) or if not just to relax.

(This is our backyard now)

     As you can see we made a lot of changes in our backyard. We put the fountain at the midst of our garden and hired somebody to put a flagstones around it. We also bought a gazebo and place it where we entered in our garden. The white bench (shown in the old photo above) was being moved in to the right side of our garden (not shown on the new photo). The big bush in front of our recreation room was taken out because it's getting bigger and it almost covered up our entire room. Our grass was new because the old ones was being flowed and ruined by Bones (our dog). He used to play in our backyard. Running around so fast especially when he got excited. We also changed the color of our house from off-white and white to midday sun but we haven't changed the color of the stair that's going to our rooftop, garage door and windows and doors trim.

     Although you have seen Bones laying down on our grass (in the new photo) but we allowed him only once in a while and we made sure that we were watching him so that he will not damaged and ruined our grass again.
      It requires a lot of time, effort and money to have a nice looking backyard. I am very lucky that my husband too loves gardening and he usually is the one who's taking care of it. I helped him often but he exerted more effort than I do.

Protect your most valuable assets

      Around three weeks ago, our front door deadbolt was broken. We were very concerned at that time because if we did not fix it immediately somebody might be able to notice it and could enter our house while we're gone. Although we hid our valuables in a safe place, we really didn't know what thieves might do if they are able to come inside our house. As soon as we got the chance, we rushed to the hardware store that my husband was familiar with and decided to buy the handleset and instead of just the deadbolt. We weren't able to find a good and reliable handleset there for our front door and so we went to Home Depot hoping we will find the one that we were looking for. We found different brands of handlesets but we were leaning toward Schlage or Kwikset. Finally, we were able to decide and chose Schlage. We like the Addison with black matte design because it matches the motif of our home. We also chose Schlage because they have an excellent security with their strong strike plate and 3" screws to fit into the door jamb and all their handlesets are made of 100% solid forged brass and rugged all-metal chassis  for security.

Collection of Colored Glasses

     These colored glasses were a collection of my hubby before we met and got married. He got these items from a garage sale, given by his friends and relatives during a special occasion or at a very cheap stores, like  the 99 cents  store and Big Lots. He built the shelves by himself, painted it in white and put the colored glasses on the shelves. In order to protect them from falling he put museum putty under each of the glasses. This area in our kitchen is such a nice place because of its uniqueness. We receive a lot of compliments from our friends about my hubby's collection. They said, it simple yet attractive. 

     It doesn't need to be expensive to turn an empty space in your house into an attractive place. You can collect anything you think will look nice if assembled in an attractive way.