Hawaii and Beyond

I just loaded an Ford Explorer full of junk to the dump this afternoon. How did we accumulate that much stuff? We managed to donate about half of the items, but where did all of it come from? We'd like to think we are minimalist, which means we are scared of becoming hoarders. Why am I telling you about this? I came to the realization on the way home that Buying Quality Items is the Green thing to do. Theoretically, you will be saving the planet by buying a product of highest quality opposed to cheapest priced. The higher quality product will last longer meaning it will stay out of the already overflowing landfills. Let's use my fiancé and her desire to collect  Louis Vuitton Bags as an example. Her justification for getting the bags are the quality hand-made designs. It makes sense. Why buy 5 cheap purses that have the same life spam as 1 quality bag combined? Wasteful. Trendy. Out of Style. Despicable. She already had good taste and now she has my support to buy qua

I published a post about a year and a half ago titled Go For Broke - Self Reflection  that outlined my flaws. I've made some strides, but also failures since 2011. I'm excited! At least I'm doing something with my ideas instead of just staying ideas like I used to. I thought the below quote was fitting: An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that exists only as an idea. - Buddha So what am I doing? I've started selling my bamboo soaps at local farmer markets and on my Etsy page  . Things are going great and it acts as a therapeutic task turned business venture. I also created a website for traveling nurses to Hawaii that connect them to local community members that are willing to rent out their homes / condos and cars. Hawaii Travel Nurse is still very beginner and new, but I hope to stay with it and see where it leads me. The third idea I'm currently working on is a ecofriendly surfwax that is 100 % made with natural m

Weekend Challenge: Figure out what to do with our outdated medicine cabinets in our bathrooms. Background: Our home was built in 2005, but was purchased by us as a short sale about a year ago. We have been making minor changes during this time such as: laminate flooring, recessed lighting, and painting to update the look of the house. The house is coming along and really has a nice vintage and minimalist feel to it.  Old Mirrored Medicine Cabinet Our project this weekend was to get rid of the medicine cabinets in the bathrooms that are hinged mirrors and old looking. We like the open/built in cabinet concept so we decided to rip out the medicine cabinet and frame the cut out space.                                          I didn't want to break the bank, but still wanted it to look nice. I tossed around different ideas and finely came up with probably the most simple. I decided to buy dry wall spackle from Home Depot and make it look like a built-in cabinet.