GARDENING AND BUGS

When starting your garden seedlings indoors, plant the seeds in egg shell halves. Simply crack the shells around the roots of your plants and transplant them outdoors - the shell is a natural fertilizer!

Are cockroaches in your home driving you mad? Try this tested trick. Fill a large bowl with cheap wine and leave it under the sink. The pests will drink it, get drunk, fall in the bowl and drown...easy!

Ants, ants, ants everywhere... Well, they are said to never cross a chalk line. So get your chalk out and draw a line on the floor or wherever ants tend to march - see for yourself!

To keep those pesky insects away from your plants, combine one bulb of garlic, 1 small onion and 1 Tbs. cayenne pepper in the blender. Mix with 1 quart water and let stand for one hour. Then add 1 TBS Ivory liquid and mist your plants!!

Gardening tips -- The Worm Turns -- Plant dill around your tomato bed. It's a great way to keep tomato horn worms from getting the better of your plants. When to Pick -- The best time to harvest fruits and vegetables for maximum flavor is in the morning.

FIRST AID

Next time you need a quick ice pack, grab a bag of frozen vegetables out of your freezer~no watery leaks from a plastic baggie!

Cure for headaches: Take a lime, cut it in half and rub it on your forehead. The throbbing will go.

To get rid of itch from mosquito bite: try applying soap on the area instant relief!

When your or your child gets a splinter, reach for the scotch tape before resorting to tweezers or a needle. Simply put the scotch tape over the splinter, then pull it off. Scotch tape removes most splinters painlessly and easily. ~~parentsoup~~

Poison Ivy all over the place.....how do you get rid if it???? Mix 3 pounds of salt with a gallon of soapy water; spray the solution on the plants leaves and stems.

After a tattoo is done, the artist puts some salve on it and covers it with a gauze pad for 24 hours. Then the person is told to keep it moist with either triple antibiotic ointment, or something of the sort. Preperation-H works wonders, and won't allow any of the color to fade during the healing of the tattoo. It doesn't have an offensive odor, and keeps the tattoo from drying out as well. The healing time is cut in half, compared to other ointents.

OUTDOOR HINTS

Getting out the patio furniture??? For aluminum furniture, apply a layer of past wax to tubular aluminum to avoid pitting! Plastic furniture, clean with bleach and water on a sunny day...the sun helps bleach out the furniture!

Wicker furniture, wash with a mild salt water solution to avoid yellowing!

Wash wicker outdoors and let the sun dry it to tighten up sagging seats! Wrought iron furniture, remove rust with steel wool, apply a layer of aluminum paint before covering with outdoor paint. When pain dries, add a layer of paste wax!! :-) ~~compliments of Mcd131 s/b ladyisreal

Outdoor cooking -- Fast Starter -- Stuff a crumbled sheet of newspaper under your coals, then roll another sheet of news paper into a cone and poke it through the coals to the paper to form a chimney. Ignite the paper. It will carry the fire into your charcoal.

Make cleaning easier -- To make cookout cleanups easier, take a preventive step and spray the cooking grill with nonstick spray before placing the grid over the coals. Food won't stick nearly as much as it does on an untreated grid.

Juicy News -- Always use tongs when turning meat on the grill. This way, you'll avoid piercing the meat, which causes it to lose its natural juices.

Alka-Seltzer®

Clean a toilet. Drop in two Alka-Seltzer tablets, wait twenty minutes, brush, and flush. The citric acid and effervescent action clean vitreous china.

Clean a vase. To remove a stain from the bottom of a glass vase or cruet, fill with water and drop in two Alka-Seltzer tablets.

Polish jewelry. Drop two Alka-Seltzer tablets into a glass of water and immerse the jewelry for two minutes.

Clean a thermos bottle. Fill the bottle with water, drop in four Alka- Seltzer tablets, and let soak for an hour (or longer, if necessary).

Remove burned-on grease from a pot or pan. Fill the pot or pan with water, drop in six Alka-Seltzer tablets, let soak for one hour, then scrub as usual.

Unclog a drain. Clear the sink drain by dropping three Alka- Seltzer tablets down the drain followed by a cup of Heinz White Vinegar. Wait a few minutes, then run the hot water.

Get short-term relief from nicotine withdrawl symptoms. As long as you're not on a low-sodium diet or have peptic ulcers, drink two Alka- Seltzer tablets dissolved in a glass of water at every meal.

Soothe insect bites. Dissolve two Alka-Seltzer tablets in a glass of ater, dip a cloth into the solution, and place the cloth on the bite for twenty minutes.

HOW TO DETECT A TWO WAY MIRROR

When we visit toilets, bathrooms, hotel rooms, changing rooms etc, how many of you know for sure that the seemingly ordinary mirror hanging on the wall is a real mirror, or actually a two-way mirror??

Just conduct this simple test: Place the tip of your fingernail against the reflective surface and if there is a GAP between your fingernail and the image of the nail, then it is a GENUINE mirror. However, if your fingernail DIRECTLY TOUCHES the image of your nail, then BEWARE, for it is a two-way mirror !