3 latest discoveries – for home

Another month calls for my latest finds, this time for home, paired with my life stories.

Use a doily under a candle

A long time ago, just when I bought a round dining room table (the one I recently replaced), my heat went out in the winter. I was entertaining/babysitting (but they weren’t really kids, they were teenagers) and we were freezing. I heated up my townhome ghetto style by turning on the oven and lit some candles.

I returned downstairs to check on the teens and I smelled something fishy. “Did you guys cook something?” I asked. They looked at me like I was crazy. The smell was the varnish on my new dining table that was burning! The candle in the tin had run out making the bottom hot. I had to literally yank the tin candle to detach it from my dining table. DOH!

It was sort of in the middle so I had to add a mirror from Pottery Barn as my permanent centerpiece. I’ll never put a candle on anything that can burn again! You can use a doily and put it under a candle just to be safe, or place the candle lid under the candle itself as a prop.

Silent Digital Timers

I’m a huge fan of automatic timers in the house for lighting. Lights automatically switch on as the sun goes down, and turn off at 11 pm telling me, lights out, head to bed.

The ones we’ve been using for a while were fine, until you’re having a meeting and it’s silent and suddenly you hear it and it sounds like a bomb is ticking. Awkward.

I immediately grabbed my phone and ordered this digital timer from Amazon. It works well, just read the instructions, it’s an easy set up. Now, lights go on and off without that annoying toy wind up sound.

Find replacement flatware or china

I had emptied out our dishwasher and discovered we were missing a spoon. I counted again – what happened? Did it go in the trash with someone’s yogurt cup? The Ralph Lauren flatware set was discontinued so I was pretty sad that we’d never have the set of 8 again.

I found the digital receipt and the name of our flatware, did a little Google search and found I could by the missing spoon by itself! Sure it was about $25 all said and done after shipping and handling, but – now my little flatware family is complete.

Visit Replacements, LTD to find china, crystal, or silver. You might be surprised what they have the replacement to! Perhaps a nana’s china collection?