Adventures In (a few of) My Favorite Things
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Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens
Brown paper packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things
In December of 2020, a co-worker gifted me a box full of sample sizes of different flavors of tea from the IV Tea Company. I enjoyed (almost) all of the teas but did manage to narrow down my favorites to two: Blackened Pom-Berry Tea (a black tea, full of fruity flavor) and Island Oasis Tea (a caffeine-free fruit tea, which is lovely and aromatic). I find that I brew a couple of (large) pots of tea every day in the winter, which prompted me to purchase my huge teapot off Amazon and even sew a tea cozy for it. My tea pot comes with a metal filter, of course, and is quite easy to clean. But since I hate cleaning wet tea dregs out of even the easiest filter, I found my way out of that chore by adding a paper coffee filter. I put the tea in the coffee filter, twist the top to close it, and then drop that package into my metal filter and pour the hot water over the top. Super easy to clean…you just pull out the paper packet and chuck it. Easy peasy! Is there anything better on a cold, wet winter day than a pot of hot tea and a good book? I don’t think so.
I have a confession. I am terrible about flossing my teeth. If I’d just do it every day, I’d never have any gum sensitivity or cavities. During one of my biennial flossing lectures during one of my biennial dentist appointments, my hygienist told me about CoCoFloss dental floss. I can’t really remember exactly how she described it, but whatever she said was enough to get me to purchase one of their small sampler packs. And I love the stuff. It’s hard to quantify the specific details but flossing with it is more satisfying somehow than flossing with your average dental floss. It’s soft but durable (no shreds getting stuck between your teeth), tastes great (these days, I stick with the Fresh Coconut flavor), and really hauls the gunk out of the space between your teeth. It’s not cheap but the fact that it’s more expensive than plain floss encourages me to use it. Why pay more for something I’m not going to use? And I need every encouragement to floss regularly. Just once, I’d like to go in to get my teeth cleaned and be able to avoid the flossing lecture from the dentist…I mean, would a “Good job, your teeth look great!” be too much to ask?
A few summers ago, I was looking for a pair of 100% cotton capri-length pants, and I found these Veatzaers on Amazon. They are astonishingly comfortable and flattering. Although I am nowhere near as slim as the model in the photo, they are still quite flattering on me, which I am happy about, of course. I bought a pair in red and a pair in olive green. I’ve had them for about two years now, and I wear them almost every day. Even in the winter, they are so comfortable that I wear them inside the house. Given that they are getting a LOT of wear, they have also held up amazingly well. There are no holes, nor even any thinning spots in the fabric. I throw them in the washing machine with all my other clothes, and then hang them up to dry. They have not shrunk, even though they routinely get washed in hot water. They are relatively inexpensive and definitely a case of getting full value for your money. I highly recommend them.
In the winter, when the forced air heat is running in my house, the air gets very dry and I start coughing a lot. The solution, of course, is to run a humidifier. I bought the Levoit 4L humidifier a couple years ago and I’m very happy with it. It has directional nozzles, so you can direct the mist where you want it to go. It has a large reservoir, so if you’re only running it on low at night (which is how I do it), then the reservoir will last you for 2-3 days before you have to refill it. And while I hate cleaning humidifiers, it’s necessary if you want to keep using it. This one is relatively easy to take apart, scrub with soap and water, dry, and then reassemble. And although it’s not what the manufacturer recommends, I find that cleaning it once a month keeps it from getting gross.
And finally, re-keyable locks. Am I the only person who didn’t know this was a thing? I needed to replace the doorknob on my garage-to-deck door, as twenty years of weather had finally rendered it inoperable. I was sure I was going to have to enlist a locksmith to re-key the lock so that my house key would open the lock on this new doorknob. But as I stood in Home Depot perusing my doorknob options, I discovered the Kwikset Re-Keyable Doorknob. I worried about anyone (specifically, potential burglars) being able to re-key my lock, but that’s not how this works. You have to have the original key (that comes with the doorknob) plus a little tool that also comes with the set. You insert and turn the original key, and then insert the special tool into the tiny little hole visible to the left of the lock in the picture. Once that’s in, you can take out the original key, insert the key that you wish to use on the doorknob and turn it. Then remove the special tool. Hey, presto, you just re-keyed your own lock! I really think this is genius. I like my locksmith just fine, but I LOVE discovering I can do things I didn’t know I could do. (One of these days, I really must tell you about wiring a new thermostat into my house when the old one died…I’m very proud of that.)
