Author: thefunkyfrugalista

I live in a cozy old home in the Piney Woods of east Texas. This is my journal Follow me on Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/stacy.kappelmanbruce Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefunkyfrugalista

Celebration

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn The Enchanted NomadLeave a comment

I took my day of rest yesterday because I was WORN out. Hannah and I got to the convention center about 3:30 to finish setting up. Even though the city website said that the doors opened at 6 it was actually closer to 5. Not many people came in then but that was okay because we were walking around looking at the other vendors.

We were positioned right by the stage. It was so loud when the musical theatre groups started singing. There was also bingo and trivia going on. After about an hour and a half we noticed people were walking in drenched. It was pouring outside.

The weather drove everyone inside which was great for sales. We met some really fun people. In fact, Hannah might have a job at one of the big haunted houses come Fall. I was nervous about using my square for transactions but it worked without a hitch. The reigning hotdog eating champion took a liking to Hannah. He won again. Fourth year in a row.

I’m actually surprised that we did so well because what we sell is very niche to the bohemian hippie(ish) crowd. So many people wanted to know if we had a store. I wish we did, but they took business cards so I need to get to work on the website for sure.

The rain finally stopped enough for them to announce that the fireworks were still going to be set off at 9:30. At 9 they announced that the convention center was closing and for everyone, except the vendors, to exit the building. We packed up so fast to get out before the rush of traffic. As we were carrying our things out to the car the fireworks started and it was like we were right under them.

We managed to start heading out during the middle of the show. I do love fireworks, but we were all so tired by this time we just wanted to get home. We were parked in the back and had to drive around the side to get out onto the main drive to leave. There was an Escalade in front of us that just stopped and started backing up. We backed up. They backed up more and almost hit us. I told Donny to stop the car and I got out and banged on their window (they did not roll it down) and told them to keep moving. They drove off as soon as I got back in our car. Donny told Hannah, “she’s going to get shot”. That never entered my mind, I’d just had enough of people that day.

All in all it was a fun day and I can’t wait to do another one. I hope everyone had a happy 4th and stayed safe.

Happy 4th!

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn The Enchanted NomadLeave a comment

Gotta say I’m a little nervous about how this evenings event is going to go. We had the option to set up yesterday or wait until today. Hannah and I decided that we would go ahead and set up early so if we needed anything extra we wouldn’t be rushing around the day of.

I didn’t want to spend a lot of money so I made the jewelry holders myself.

For the stand up block I had been looking for a bulletin board at the thrift store but could not find one. I did find this though.

I just painted it dark purple, put it in a stand and used colored thumb tacks to hold everything one.

The ring holder in the tray is just floral foam covered in fabric with stained dowels. The burlap covered cuff and ring holder is a styrofoam display that was empty at Dollar Tree and they just let me have it. Everything else I just pilfered from our house.

The wooden box is actually a plant stand that I just turned on its side. The treasure box sits on top of the plant stand at home. We did pick up the linen tablecloth from Treasures Thrift for $3.

When we got to the convention center there were a few vendors setting up. The t-shirt bar had a woman putting together this awesome multi level clothes rack. Here’s Hannah and I trying to jam together our Walmart racks. Hey, whatever works. We did run out of hangars so we’ll finish that this afternoon since we need to be there early.

All in all I think it turned out pretty good for coming in blind and never having done this before.

I decided to sell some of my wrapped sea glass necklaces and made a few more today. I’m interested to see how they go. I’ll keep ya posted. Wish us luck. Happy Independence Day!

The Enchanted Nomad

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn The Enchanted NomadLeave a comment

So what I’ve been working on for a few months is a small online business. I had to jump through so many hoops to get my tax id number and my EIN. Then when I went to order I had to jump through even more hoops on one of the bigger stores I am using. Here is my logo.

I’m selling boho/Hippie(ish) clothes and jewelry. The only place that sells anything like what I have is Earth Bound. My goal is to either have a step side van to do popups or a physical store. I have a booth at our convention center for the 4th of July celebration so I’ll see how that goes. Anyway, here is some of the inventory that I have.

The silver cuffs are mine. I was just snapping some quick pictures.

I have several different styles and colors of these tops.

This can be worn as a harem jumpsuit or harem pants.

This is just a sample of what I have. Everything is ethically sourced from Nepal and India. After the 4th I’ll have my website up and running. It’s theenchantednomad.com

My Instagram is the_enchantednomad

I hope this does well because I love all of these clothes and jewelry so much. They are all so well made and it’s not something you see everyone else wearing.

Penelope

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn chickensLeave a comment

Penelope is one of our OG chickens. Last week Donny noticed that she was walking funny, almost like she was drunk. He thought for sure that she was going to die by morning. The next morning when he went out she was walking normally so we just thought that she must have gotten into something but was fine. On Wednesday when I was mowing the backyard she was sitting just inside the coop. When I was putting the mower up she had moved to right into the doorway which was unusual for her. I picked her up and noticed that she had poop caked to her butt.

My first thought was that she was egg bound. I took her in and gave her an Epsom salt bath. I checked her to see if she was egg bound but that didn’t seem to be what was wrong. We’ve had chickens twice and have never had any of them have these symptoms. I gave her another epsom salt bath that night and ready that wet cat food could help her regain strength.

We put her in a laundry basket and she did eat some of the cat food. During her next bath we noticed that she had maggots on her. After a Google search we realized that she had fly strike. That’s when an animal gets poop stuck on them and flies lay their larva in the poop and the maggots start eating the animal. We immediately went to Tractor supply to get some supplies to try and help her. We were told to get ivermectin. Because it’s made for horses we only give her the size of a pea. We also bought some Betadine and antiseptic ointment. You need to get the one without pain killer in it because for some reason it hinders the healing.

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After administering the ivermectrin, we loaded up the warm water with Epsom salt, got the Betadine ready to go and started bathing her. To say we were not prepared for what we were finding was an understatement. The maggots did not like the Betadine and started crawling up her body. We were pulling them off left and right. Then Donny had the most brilliant idea: permethrin. I did a quick Google search and it’s safe for chickens. In fact, a lot of chicken owners dip their flock to keep bugs off. He went outside to get it and mix up some more. As soon as we sprayed it on her they maggots started dying. There were over a hundred on her. We worked almost an hour making sure we got every last one off of her.

She was exhausted. We didn’t know if she was going to make it through the night. Fly Strike can be deadly to chickens. But as Donny said, “she was going to die if we didn’t do something”. The next morning she was still with us but still not moving around much. Fly Strike causes the chickens to become incredibly weak and not able to walk. We gave her fresh food and water and she ate a drank a little bit.

Donny gave her a thorough examination and there wasn’t one maggot to be found.

She is still getting a bath a day and wound care, but still not one bug to be found. We moved her into a large tote and added some hay. She has been eating, drinking and moving around so much more.

We’ll be keeping her inside until she is strong enough to return to the coop. I know that permethrin is probably not the way most people would handle a fly strike, but it worked so well for us and Penelope is feeling so much better. If we wouldn’t have done anything she would have 100% died. She is also my favorite Chicken and only 2 of 7 that actually has a name so she’s pretty special.

WTF Sally

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Home lifeLeave a comment

Monday was my errand running day and it included picking up my hair dye from Sally’s. Autumn, the sales person, walked me over and got my color which is and has been 8A light ash blonde. I love this color.

Fast forward to yesterday. I mowed the front and back, weeded the front beds and garden and planted some plants. When I came in I did my 1 1/2 hour workout. So, needless to say, I was tired. Tired or not I knew I needed to dye my roots. I always do my roots first and then add the rest of the color all over, thank goodness. When I was 40 minutes of the 45 minutes processing time Hannah looked at me funny and here’s how the conversation went.

Hannah: What color are you dying your hair?

Me: The same color I always use.

Hannah: Are you sure about that?

I go into the bathroom and pull the bottle out of the trash and get the box it was in.

My first thought was OMG, what in the world am I going to do. I immediately call Sally’s and luckily Autumn answered the phone. She remembered me and she also started freaking out. She got her manager and the manager told me to immediately wash it out with Dawn dish soap. I don’t use Dawn, but we had a little left from killing the ants. The manager told me that she would get together products to help me fix it. I told her I was sending the kids to pick it up.

During this time I wash my hair 3x with Dawn, leaving it on my hair for 30 minutes. The kids get back and Sally’s has charged me 36 dollars for these products.

I did use the deep conditioning masque, but after I talked to several people they told me not to use the stripper because it will damage my hair. So I will be taking it all back today and just praying that everyone is right and the color will fade because I’m outside so much. So here’s my hair.

The ONLY saving grace in this whole debacle is that my hair was so light to begin with.

The moral of the story is to always make sure the product in the box is what it is suppose to be. At least I didn’t cry.

Amish For the Win

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn product reviewsLeave a comment

Week before last Donny and I went to Sasquatch in Gladewater. It’s the surplus grocery store that has the most amazing products. We get our ground beef, gourmet cheeses and are always surprised by new items. Let me start by saying that I could never imagine putting beef tallow on my face. Nope. Hate the word, Hate thinking about what it’s made of. My daughter Bethany loves it as does my friend Lisa. They have been urging me to try it for so long and I’ve always had to cut them off because just the thought grossed me out so badly.

Well, there was a new display at Sasquatch that was from Amish Farms Soap. One of the products was tallow face cream. I know how they got me. It was the yellow, my favorite color, packaging. So, needless to say, I gave in a bought a tube. I used it that night and the next morning. Y’all, I love it. I love it so much that I went back to Gladewater and bought the whole line that Sasquatch had.

My face feels so soft. I’ve been using it twice a day since I bought it. The soap is amazing. When I get out of the shower it feels like I have already put lotion on. It smells like Caress and my skin loves it. The deep cleaning soap is no lie. I use it about twice a week because it DEEP cleans. I mainly got it for the kids to keep any acne at bay.

If you happen to see this brand in a store I highly recommend trying it. They also have a website if you decided to go that route. I still can’t call it tallow though.

A Hot Minute

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Home life, UncategorizedLeave a comment

It’s been a hot minute since I’ve posted anything. I’ve been working on a big project that hopefully will be taking shape in June. As soon as everything is a little more finalized I’ll post it on here. But, in the meantime, this is what we’ve been up to.

Hannah and I went to the tattoo expo that happens every year here. It’s held at the Maude Cobb convention center. The grounds are just beautiful so we took a little walk while we were waiting on Gavin to arrive.

When we walked in Hannah found her tattoo artist who she was meeting there to go over the tattoo she was going to be getting the following week. I was just strolling around and met an artist from San Antonio. We started chatting and he asked if I had any tattoos. I said no, but there is one I want to get. I showed it to him and he said, sit down and let’s do it. There were about 15 rows of booths and we had just walked in so I said, let me think about it. We walked the whole place and I decided, why not get it. I loved his work and he wasn’t booked yet. We went back and I told him, let’s do it and unfortunately he was book for a big piece that was going to take the rest of the time that day. He told me I could ask the guy if I could go before him as the guy was walking up. I said hello and he did not seem at all friendly so I told the artist to go ahead with that guy. Doughboy, that’s what he goes by, pulled me in and told me that the group he was with were going to be doing tattoos in their hotel rooms that night and he would give me $40 off if I wanted to do that. I got his card and told him I’d let him know.

Here’s a little back story about weird things I’ve almost gotten myself into. When Donny and I were working for Harley Davidson, I had a customer and his girlfriend start chatting with me. They told me that they had a baby tiger in their hotel room. I was intrigued so they gave me their room number and told me to come by after work. Donny immediately said, no way, after I told him about it. Years later we are watching the Tiger King documentary and the Tiger King’s friend that took over the zoo was the guy who had the baby tiger.

Then there was the time that I was watching a ghost hunter show and they featured guest was a group out of Dallas. Well, I lived in Arlington at the time, so I found them, messaged them and asked if I could go on one of the hunts with them. They sent me over the next case they were doing in Mineral Wells. Donny read it and said, knowing you, you will bring back some sort of spirit. So I didn’t do that one. I really need to write about the haunted house we lived in that actually made Donny a believer.

I was going to go to the hotel to get the tattoo, but the expo ended at 11 that night and I fell asleep. One day, maybe.

We now have a part time dog because of this.

I’ve posted about Bingo before. She looks like a coyote and can clean their fence like a horse. We don’t want her to get picked up so when her owners aren’t home and she gets out she just comes inside our house. We’ve even had a slumber party with her.

She is so well behaved and completely house broken. Having her visit us also relieves some of the stress her owners have about her getting out.

Donny and I are forever working on the garden. We hit up an estate sale and picked up this huge galvanized washtub and metal wall hanging.

We decided to plant wildflower seeds in the tub.

We’ve got little sprouts popping up. I can’t wait to see if they all bloom.

My neighbor down the street brought me some gardenia clippings to propagate. I hope I get some roots on them because I love gardenias. The house I built in Florida had gardenias all down the side and went there was a breeze the scent was intoxicating.

Guess what opened right by our house?

Now we don’t have to drive clear across town to get their A2 milk which if you haven’t tried is so good.

I went hunting at the thrift store right by our house to see if we could find her a CD case. Being Memorial Day, they had a fill a bag for $5 clothing. She found some cute tops and I came home with these.

And besides it raining for the last 4 days, that is about all going on here. Oh, except the snack I have been waiting for since they told me it was coming out turns out to be one of the very best flavors.

I forgot to add one of my favorite outfits. I LOVE these pants that I got in Galveston. They are so comfortable. I wish someone around here, besides Earthbound sold them 😉

TCB

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn gardeningLeave a comment

On Donny’s two days off we were taking care of business outside. I started on Wednesday by washing the windows and the house. White siding on a North facing house means washing it every 2-3 months. I found the perfect combination to get it done and it’s whiter than it’s ever been.

I like this Castile soap so much better than Dr. Bronner’s. Look how clean it got the house.

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Since it was such a beautiful day I decided to go ahead and clean out and wash the car.

We consistently have cat paw prints all of the hood every morning.

And just because I love to torture myself, I weeded the enclosed garden. That was a workout in itself, but it looks so much better now.

Thursday we wanted to go get more strawberry plants. I looked online at all of the big box stores and the nurseries around town, but they are apparently out of season. We had some spots in the purple planters that needed filling. We found some bell peppers at Home Depot. We have some bell pepper sprouts going, but we really like bell peppers so hopefully these will grow some.

And because neither one of us had our glasses on, we ended up with three bell peppers and one Jalepeno. Oh well, we like those too.

Oh, and Home Depot did have strawberry plants. They were $15.98 for one medium sized one. Not worth it. We have 3, but next year we want to plant about a dozen. We are getting berries off of them though.

On Friday Donny realized that something, probably a cat, had been digging in the raised bed that didn’t have the fence around it. Our goal that day was to find affordable fencing. I got the black one that’s around the other bed at Dollar Tree. I knew there wouldn’t be any left there so we went’ to Family Dollar to try to find it there. No luck, but they had some great pots on sale and the cutest solar mushroom. We left empty handed and headed to Home Depot. Our plan now was to get small pickets and just build our own little fence. Well, Home Depot doesn’t carry the small pickets so since Lowe’s is right next door we headed there.

We found some! They were a bit more expensive than my Dollar Tree ones, but not too much. Also Lowe’s has THE BEST oops paint selection. I found a gorgeous purple color that had no price tag. I told the worker that I really love their oops paint and I use to to just paint random things and I really needed this paint for a mural I want to do. He came back with a $10.36 price sticker and that was a deal because the other oops paints were over $17.

The fence works perfectly and there has been no more digging.

We had to run to Walmart to pick up some groceries and I found, what Donny calls, my half dead pansies that I think I can revive. Well, I really didn’t have room for pansies anywhere and I really needed to get bigger pots for my cilantro, lavender and rosemary. That meant another trip to Family Dollar. How cute are these pots?

I decided that I DID really want the mushroom light. Of course, I chose yellow.

I just planted the pansies in the old pots. Plus some bachelor button seeds that I had picked up.

Donny made some pickles with some of the cucumbers.

We tried them today and they are so good. We did, however, cheat in how we made them.

The past few days have really felt like summer. It has been so hot, which I don’t mind if I’m dressed to sweat.

If you follow me on instagram then you have already seen this picture, but I found this baby eating the cat food. So cute!

Speaking of cat food, for the last week I’ve been making Mr. Whiskers an egg cooked in coconut oil. The first day he could finish it in one sitting, but he would come back for the rest. He’s now up to two eggs and he will patiently wait outside for me to cook them for him.

This morning I saw that it looked like he got into another fight. This time with a cat, but it opened the wound on his cheek. I slathered it in neosporin and will keep an eye on it.

Sorry this blog is so long. We’ve just been pushing hard these last few days and are worn out.

Dang It

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Home lifeLeave a comment

When we were in Galveston I noticed that my phone case was coming apart. The rubber around the edge had a rip in it. Because I will use items until I cannot use them anymore, I just put stickers over the tear. That really didn’t work because then kept coming off.

Donny, who also has the same case as I do, was also having the same issue with his case. I finally broke down and ordered us two new ones. His was off Amazon and mine was from Walmart.com. I was so excited when it came in and couldn’t wait to put it on my phone.

It didn’t fit. I don’t know what happened. I never return anything, but I decided I did want to return this case. It was a little over 14 dollars and I didn’t just want to throw that money away. When I got on their website to return it, I got a message that my refund had been issued and to just keep the product. I immediately went on Amazon and ordered the same phone case Donny got just in Teal. I don’t know I’m going to do with the too small case, but if anyone has a moto G slim I’ll gladly give it to you.

And yes, today is Mother’s Day. Donny was convinced that I needed a flame thrower for the dewberry vines. This was not a joke. he was serious and mentioned it at least 5 times. Okay, I can barely use a weed whacker without taking off part of the house. I’m pretty sure me using a flame thrower is a bit more dangerous and I could possibly burn down the block. I did not get that. I don’t need or want anything. I am working on a project that is going to be slightly expensive so my saving money right now is important. Plus, he got breakfast this morning, cleaned the kitchen and has been cooking with me. Baby, that’s all I need.

This is what it looked like when we got up around 7.

We were expecting a big storm. An hour later this is the sky.

I’m keeping a close eye on Mr. Whiskers. He is the head honcho of the feral cat colony. He got into a fight. A bad fight. We are thinking it was with this rottweiler that has been roaming around. I tried putting our cat wound spray on it. I got on spray out before he ran. He came back for lunch and I was able to get a glob of neosporin on the main gash on his face before he took off. I was thinking I could try to get him to the vet tomorrow, but I cannot even get my domesticated docile cat in the carrier so I’m not sure how I would get a feral Tom cat in one without him going berserk on me. I’m still going to call them and see if they can give me any pointers how to treat it at home.

It looks a lot better in this picture taken today than it did yesterday. His whole head is tore up. Poor guy.

One of our sunflowers opened up.

I’ve never planted this type with the orange around it, but I really like it. The lavender is doing well also.

Now I’m going to go back to watching movies and relaxing. I’m going to take full advantage of this Mother’s Day.

New Patch

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn gardeningLeave a comment

The main crop that I want to grow this summer is watermelon. I love watermelon, but I really only like the seeded ones because the seedless ones have become tasteless in my opinion. We planted seeds in both of the baby pool and there are some coming up, just not as many as I would like. I’m still holding out hope that it just hasn’t been hot enough for the seeds to all sprout.

When we were working on the garden on Thursday I had an idea to put another watermelon patch in. So that’s what we started and we actually finished it yesterday.

The plan was to use the boards, that we got for free, as the border and then plant more seeds. We went to Jake’s feed to get seeds but they actually had watermelon plants. They also had this cute chicken bar to mix treats for you chickens.

It was so tempting to not pick up more chicks because our girls are getting older, but we decided to wait until later in the summer.

We then headed to Home Depot to pick out the paint for the border. We knew what color we wanted and Donny made the final decision and it was perfect.

The color is Behr Classic Walz and it is the perfect shade of purple. You didn’t think we were going to get some boring color did you?

After I made sure the boards would fit, I marked the outline so I would know where to dig the trench and Donny would know how far to lay down the weed barrier. We layered the soil, organic garden soil, sand and then more garden soil on top.

I still need to level some of the outside boards, but I think it’s looking pretty good.

I also painted the outside border that I added. It’s not finished yet because I need to level it out more, but the pick axe I use is super heavy and I can only do so much in one day.

Donny and I were both beat after spending all day in the sun. We decided to go on a little date dinner to a place I saw on my social media that’s in Gilmer.

The special that night was the catfish plate and it did not disappoint.

It was only $9.99 and there was so much food I couldn’t even finish it. They also had free strawberry margaritas and you could BYOB if you didn’t want those. We will definitely be back.

One weird thing about me is that I love rocks. I have since I was a kid and one time when I was about 4 and was camping with my parents in Leakey, I filled our whole trunk up with rocks. My parents had to take most of them out so we would have room for our stuff and I remember being so disappointed. Anyway, anytime I’m at a place that has rocks I always grab a few of them.

Another weird thing is that I can’t just take one. There always has to be at least two because that rock will be lonely without another rock from where they lived.

Another picture of the zinnias because I just love all of the different colors.