Works-For-Me Wednesday: The Toys Worth Buying Edition

I haven't had many household tips to post the past few weeks, but this week's Works-For-Me Wednesday is all about toys that are worth buying. Since I have 3 children (almost 5yr old boy, 21mos old boy, and 21mos old girl), I can easily contribute this week. When I thought about what toys to recommend, I could only come up with unisex or toys geared towards boys. My daughter is only 21mos and there just are not too many girly toys she is interested in aside from baby dolls.

The Leapfrog Fridge DJ is the first toy I would like to recommend. There are 3 different stations and a wide variety of songs so it does not become repetitive. The songs are catchy and the children will like dancing to it. The radio itself can be carried by hand, sit alone on a flat surface or be place on the fridge because it is magnetic. The songs teach everything from the alphabet to counting to the days of the week . . . and some of them are just for fun.

The next toy I would like to recommend is a classic . . . Legos. This toy is a great investment. Our choice is the Lego Duplo blocks. These are recommended for ages 1-1/2 to 5 years, but I say it should be 1-1/2 to adult. My husband and I enjoy building with these as much as the children. We love to build things for them to use their imaginations to play with by incorporating their other toys, like a multi-level parking garage for my preschooler's diecast cars.

The last toy I would like to recommend is the MegaBloks Tiny 'n' Tuff collection. These are cars and other vehicles that come in 3 pieces. It really promotes problem solving skills in toddlers because they have to figure out how to assemble them like a puzzle. They can also interchange the parts from different cars to design new ones. We have many different sets including the one shown below. My preschooler has loved this toy since he was 1-1/2. (The only thing about this car carrier is that he has pinched his fingers on the back that opens and closes.) They even make some cars in pink!

To play along or to read more toy recommendations, visit Rocks In My Dryer. Thanks for stopping by to read mine!

Works For Me Wednesdays: The Kitchen Organization Edition

This week's WFMW theme is kitchen organization. Since we live in a townhouse and have a tiny kitchen, we have to be creative about storage. One thing I recently started to do was to keep a little wooden tray in the space between the top of the refrigerator and the kitchen cabinets located just above it. In this tray, I keep colorful magnets of all different geometric shapes. My preschooler loves to create pictures with these on the fridge, but with all the other notes, pictures, and character magnets already on there, it just gets too cluttered to leave the shapes on the fridge all the time. Now if he wants to play, I just take the tray down for him.

You can use the tray to store anything else that is relatively flat, like take-out menus for example. Don't forget that it gets pretty warm up there from your refrigerator running, so don't put anything up there that could melt easily.

To read more kitchen organization tips or to share one of your own, visit Rocks In My Dryer!

Works For Me Wednesdays: Making Your Kitchen Sink Look New

I haven't participated in WFMW in a couple of weeks because all I could come up with was tips on how to make your house messy. ;P

For this week, I remembered a tip that my mother-in-law gave me, but I have not had a chance to try it out yet. It is about how to restore the finish on your powder-coated sink after it becomes all scratched and marred. She said that using Pledge on it works wonders and just buffs out all the defects. You can imagine how my kitchen sink looks since it sparked her to give me this little tip.

If anyone has tried this or ends up trying this, please let me know how it works.

For more great tips or to share one of your own, visit Rocks In My Dryer!

Works For Me Wednesdays: The Backwards Edition

On the first Wednesday of each month, there is a theme for Works For Me Wednesdays. This week's theme is to post a household-related dilemma that you need help with. Then hopefully someone will offer you a solution.

Since we live in a zoo (dogs, cats, birds, turtles, . . . ) I would like to know if anyone has any tips for removing pet odors from the house, whether it's from the air, the upholstery, . . . everything. Thanks in advance for any tips!

To play along or to find some great household tips, stop by Rocks In My Dryer. Click here to read all my Works for Me Wednesday posts!

What Works For Me: Peeling Hard Boiled Eggs

This might be common knowledge, but it seemed like a wondrous secret had been revealed to me when I tried this! The last time I made deviled eggs, I looked online for some different recipes. That's how I came upon DeviledEggs.com. What do ya know?! A whole website dedicated to deviled eggs!

Anyways, this website had a tip about deshelling the eggs. After you cool eggs and crack the eggshells all over, place the egg back into a bowl of cold water, completely submerging it. If you leave it for a couple of minutes, this helps the shell to separate from the egg. I tried it and IT WORKED! I boiled a dozen eggs and I had twelve perfectly deshelled eggs in the end. I didn't even lose one. Usually I have one or two that become horribly defaced by my trying to pick the shell off one millimeter at a time.

Hope this tip helps at least one person. To read more Works For Me Wednesdays posts, visit Rocks In My Dryer.

What Works For Me: Storing Diecast Cars

Welcome to my first Works For Me Wednesday! Do you have a million of these in your house?


Well, I wanted to share a way to store them that has worked for us for over two years. When my son's collection started growing into the hundreds, we had to figure out a new way to store the cars that would not damage them. Even the largest Hot Wheels suitcases only hold 100 cars.

My husband and I have to be very creative with storage in this tiny little townhouse of ours. We came up with the idea of storing the cars in a single layer in boot trays and keeping the trays under the living room sofa! It has worked out really well. The cars are out of the way and out of sight, my son can access them easily, the cars won't get damaged as they would all thrown into a bin, plus the trays keep other toys from disappearing underneath the sofa.

To share a tip of your own or to read more Works For Me posts, visit Rocks In My Dryer.