Natural Bug Sprays

June 16, 2015March 24, 2016 by Katie | Leave a comment

This is part of our ongoing series on using essential oils for home and body care. You can see our archive of essential oil posts here.

We’re celebrating Pollinator Week around here with a series of pollinator-related posts. When you grab a bottle of bug spray, I’m guessing that “pollinator” is not the first word that you think of, instead, it’s likely ~~“mosquito”~~ “f-ing mosquitos”. Am I right? But guess, what?! Mosquitos are pollinators!

Pollination aside, we will never grow to love the pesky mosquitos, ticks, and fleas. Today we’re sharing a natural, non-toxic bug spray. I find that this works well when the mosquito populations aren’t too high, but I admit, there are still times, particularly in the swampy waters at the shore, that I have to use something containing DEET. What this spray lacks in DEET, it makes up for in its beautiful scent, and in the ability to personalize (there are so many mixing options below!).

Pollinator Week!

June 15, 2015June 18, 2018 by Katie | Leave a comment

Today is the start of pollinator week, and we’re always excited for any reason to talk about the role of different organisms in nature, especially when it comes to the variety of species that we are intimately linked to through our food supply. Did you know that 75% of the food we eat is the direct result of pollination. In the US alone, the value of insect-pollinated crops is over $20 billion. But the benefit of pollinators goes well beyond food crops, as they are essential for preserving the biodiversity of native habitats. When talking pollinators, bees often come to mind, but did you know that butterflies, flies, birds, moths, bats, and other mammals are also pollinators? In fact, around the world there are over 200,000 species of pollinators!

In this post we’ll answer some of the big questions about pollinators, why they’re important, why they’re at risk, and what we can do to help them. Throughout the rest of the week, our posts will be tied to pollinators in one way or another. Check back to see what we’re up to!

Two Bits

June 12, 2015July 4, 2015 by Katie | Leave a comment

We want to break down these internet barriers and invite you into our lives and we’re hoping you’ll do the same. You are welcome to share a bit of your week or day in the comments, or if they’re better represented by a photo, tag us on instagram @liveseasoned.

Katie here :

If you’ve glanced at the weather report recently, you may have noticed that Colorado is covered in one big cloud that’s sticking around through tomorrow. It’s wet and grey, and if we don’t look out, we could be carried off by a flash flood. This is a complete 180 from earlier in the week when our days were warm and sunny. On one of those nice days, we went for a hike in Chautauqua. Starting up the the trail and watching the line of hikers both in front of and behind you always makes me laugh. Going for a hike, at least close to the city, is not the peaceful, solitary activity it was when we lived in PA, but once you get up into the trees and the trails branch off, the crowds thin out. They never completely disappear, but you can begin to hear yourself think. I’m not complaining about the crowds, because it’s nice to be surrounded by so many like-minded people, but I still haven’t gotten used to it. That said, after about a year of living here, it was nice to get up to Chautauqua again (we didn’t do much hiking here throughout the winter), and this time have it feel so familiar and like home, as opposed to feeling like I was on vacation in CO, which is what I felt like for so long after having moved here. Has that happened to you? You move to a place that’s so different from where you grew up, that you can’t quite shake the feeling that you’re just on vacation? It’s also slightly strange to me that Alex and Luc are going to grow up in a landscape that’s wildly different form the one I grew up in.

Using Essential Oils

June 11, 2015September 22, 2017 by Katie | Leave a comment

This is the first of a multi-part series on using essential oils in the home and on your body. Excited to make some potions? We already have some essential oil uses in our archives.

Wherever I can, I’ve been trying to eliminate chemicals from our home, and introduce more natural alternatives, whether we’re talking cleaning products for the bathroom, cosmetics, or even pharmaceuticals. What I’ve found again and again is that essential oils are often recommended as a natural source for ingredients in many of my replacement recipes. The world of essential oils is vast, and I’m just starting to really explore all that these oils have to offer, but I thought it would be fun to start a little series this summer where I share with you what I’m learning and the useful resources I’ve found both online and off. As I’m just starting this series, I think it’s important to note that even if you’re buying high quality essential oils, while these are natural products, if used incorrectly they can be just as dangerous as manufactured chemicals.

In this post I wanted to cover some basics about essential oils, focusing on what they are and a few examples of how they can be used. At the bottom of this post I share some of the resources that I’ve found particularly helpful. And we couldn’t end the day without a recipe, so in a second post this afternoon I’ll share one of my favorite potions for keeping our shower clean and smelling fresh.

5 Tips For Taking Better Kid Candids

June 8, 2015March 24, 2016 by Sarah | Leave a comment

Taking great kid candids is an important skill to have. Give any parent a stellar photo of their son or daughter and you’ll be invited over for dinner often. Throw all those kid candids in a photo album and BOOM you have the best mother’s day present ever, one that will never be duplicated or lost. If you need more dinner dates or a great father’s day present (it’s already June!) than read on my friends, read on and charge those camera batteries because today’s post includes 5 Tips For Taking Better Kid Candids.

Seasoned View: Vol. 15

June 1, 2015July 5, 2015 by Sarah | 1 Comment

Each month we share our Seasoned View. Snapshots of nature and daily life taken by the Seasoned sisters. Find last month’s past months’ here.

Merry Monday to everyone 🙂 Hope your weekend was whatever you wanted it to be. Mine was the perfect mix of work, rest and play. I saw Mad Max last night in theaters and I was blown away! So good; nonstop action, but not the repetitive kind. My week is shaping up the same way 😉 Have a good one!

You know the deal, simply click on the download link below each photo and save the image. You can upload one or all of these photos to use as your desktop background or as phone and tablet wallpapers. Enjoy!

Thank You!

May 25, 2015May 25, 2015 by Sarah | Leave a comment

We wanted to say THANK YOU to those who have served, those currently serving and all the loved ones who died while serving. We appreciate you today and everyday. Many thanks to those who are fighting for peace, justice and a more humane world in all spheres and workspaces as well. We need you and we’re grateful for your work.

This photograph is of our dear friend Nicole’s family during her husband’s promotion to Brigadier General.

Two Bits

May 15, 2015May 28, 2015 by Katie | Leave a comment

We want to break down these internet barriers and invite you into our lives and we’re hoping you’ll do the same. You are welcome to share a bit of your week or day in the comments, or if they’re better represented by a photo, tag us on instagram @liveseasoned.

Katie here :

Our week has been pretty lazy with just a touch of cabin fever. We’ve been overwhelmed by the cloudy and rainy days here (and the forecast for another week of rain ahead, ugg). While we would love spend more time outside than in, we’ve been looking for creative ways to spend our time inside; we’ve painted, played with blocks, and trains, but there’s only so many times you can do those things before even little A starts to go crazy. We still got outside, we just ended up cold and wet! As a result, we had plenty of time to watch the bird feeders this week. As you might have seen on Instagram, we had a flock of evening grosbeaks visit and we had a broad tailed hummingbird fighting with our black chinned hummer fighting for a place at the feeder. So that’s our wet week, how was yours?

Sarah here:

While Kate’s been bird watching, I’ve been dog wrangling. I’m pup-sitting two other dogs this week, which means dogs currently outnumber the humans in this tiny apartment. It’s pretty cozy around here besides the lack of a dog door that the two visitor pups are used to. Yes, they’ve taken turns pooping on the living room floor while K and I were asleep. After night two, I decided to just sleep at the dogs’ house so they have access to their doggy door because I heard you can’t teach an old dog new house training rules anyway…

North Carolina made the switch from Spring to Summer this past week too. It is HOT and soon time to shut the windows and turn on the AC, bummer! The mosquitoes, spiders and ants are out in full force too. Looks like I’m going to have to learn some ant remedies fast because there is a colony taking over my kitchen counter as I type this post. There’s also a dog under my desk, one laying behind my chair and another sitting on my lap! Looks like I have enough creatures to keep me company this weekend 🙂

Everyman’s Guide to Ecological Living: General Rules to Live By

May 13, 2015May 13, 2015 by Sarah | Leave a comment

I’m currently reading a great book called Everyman’s Guide to Ecological Living by Greg Cailliet, Paulette Setzer and Milton Love. I wanted to share their general rules to live by because they resonate so deeply within me. This book was published in 1971 and only cost $.95 at the time! It’s pretty short with a little more than a hundred pages. It is written in a really straightforward and simple manner and while some aspects are outdated (because this was one of the first resources of its kind and the internet wasn’t around yet) the ecological principles hold up. It’s actually pretty quaint to read things like, “Support manufacturers that sell deposit bottles. Write them and express your satisfaction with this policy.” So while some of those suggestions don’t make sense today, the ideas behind the actions the authors want you to take are still important and shouldn’t be forgotten.

I think Everyman’s Guide to Ecological Living is a great text if you haven’t really given ecological living much thought. I’m not sure if I mentioned this on Seasoned yet, but I have dreams of living far away from “the real world” on my own little plot of land. Self-sustainability and off-the-grid living is an attractive fantasy and one day I hope it’s an attainable goal. Not many of these principles are new to me, instead I find myself shaking my head ‘yes’ while I read page after page. For me, this book is a nice affirmation that living simply should and is valued by many, even if I don’t come across those folks every day. I also love the simplistic nature in which all these principles are laid out for the viewer. This text would actually be great required reading for middle school kids. Each page has suggestions for living a more ecologically-sound life; we could all do a little bit better, yes?

Here’s how the book begins:

General Rules to Live By:

Be Constantly Aware of the Interdependence of Man and Nature.

Everything we do has an effect somewhere.
Be alert to the ultimate fate of items you use.
Before using, ask, “What will it do to the state of the environment?”

Seasoned View: Vol. 14

May 4, 2015May 31, 2015 by Sarah | Leave a comment

Each month we share our Seasoned View. Snapshots of nature and daily life taken by the Seasoned sisters. Find last month’s here and past months’ here.

Happy Monday! It’s May! I can’t believe it. This year is flyyyying by. Do you feel that way too? Today we’re sharing our Seasoned View and it happens to be flowers, flowers and more flowers! I guess April showers really do bring May flowers… All these images were shot in Colorado, so know that you’re sprinkling a little bit of the Rockies onto your desktop this month. Have a great week!

You can upload one or all of these photos to use as your desktop background or as phone and tablet wallpapers. Simply click on the download link below each photo and save the image. Enjoy!

A nature-inspired lifestyle blog.

Category Archives: nurture

Natural Bug Sprays

This is part of our ongoing series on using essential oils for home and body care. You can see our archive of essential oil posts here.

Pollinator Week!

Two Bits

We want to break down these internet barriers and invite you into our lives and we’re hoping you’ll do the same. You are welcome to share a bit of your week or day in the comments, or if they’re better represented by a photo, tag us on instagram @liveseasoned.

Katie here :

Using Essential Oils

This is the first of a multi-part series on using essential oils in the home and on your body. Excited to make some potions? We already have some essential oil uses in our archives.

5 Tips For Taking Better Kid Candids

Seasoned View: Vol. 15

Each month we share our Seasoned View. Snapshots of nature and daily life taken by the Seasoned sisters. Find last month’s past months’ here.

Thank You!

This photograph is of our dear friend Nicole’s family during her husband’s promotion to Brigadier General.

Two Bits

We want to break down these internet barriers and invite you into our lives and we’re hoping you’ll do the same. You are welcome to share a bit of your week or day in the comments, or if they’re better represented by a photo, tag us on instagram @liveseasoned.

Katie here :

Sarah here:

Everyman’s Guide to Ecological Living: General Rules to Live By

General Rules to Live By:

Seasoned View: Vol. 14

Each month we share our Seasoned View. Snapshots of nature and daily life taken by the Seasoned sisters. Find last month’s here and past months’ here.