This and That

Well, it looks like the email notification for comments is fixed! Yay! Now I can start blogging regularly again. :) 

Here are Holly and Finn checking out my birthday present. They were so interested, they didn't even mind being so close to one another. I mean, there was still hissing, but whatever. 

I was getting ready to transfer my stuff from my old purse (blue) to my new one. After I took this pic, Finn promptly plopped himself into the empty purse. He's a little firecracker and keeps us busy.

Our crepe myrtles are going wild...

 The Torrenia in the pots is doing really well too, even in this heat.

Okay, so here's a pet peeve of mine...None of my delivery guys ever ring the bell! They just quietly place my packages IN THE MIDDLE OF MY FRONT PORCH FOR ANY PASSERBY TO SEE! Drives me bananas! I mean, how long does it take to just ring the bell to let me know there's a package? And there's a column right by the door, but they never place the items behind it. They always put them smack dab in the middle of my front door. Is there a reason for that that I don't know of? We used to have a great delivery guy that would always place our packages behind the column and ring the bell, but the new guys never do that. 

 So I really wanted a live camera to alert me of any motion, so I'd know when things are delivered. So we went a little crazy and installed security cameras all around our property. I mostly wanted the one in the backyard so we could see what kind of wildlife traipses through (mostly raccoons and cats~ha!) So with the cameras, I get an alert when the delivery truck pulls up and I can grab my items off the porch immediately. Modern technology is so neat! Our cameras record everything too and it's stored for several months. The picture is crystal clear and it even has sound. Love that! It has live views too. One time, it alerted me that someone was in the driveway and it was my son. So I went to live view and pushed the speaker button and asked him to bring in the mail. He loves that. Ha! 

In case you're craving a laugh, here are a few funnies to brighten your day...

Anyway, thanks for listening to me ramble on and on and on today. :) I hope y'all have a great weekend! 

~Lisa 

Blogger Comment Fix? And Vitex, Lantana and Magic Erasers

Okay...let's give this blogging thing another try, shall we? So after my last post, I still wasn't getting email notifications when y'all left me a comment. It was so frustrating that I pretty much quit blogging for a while. Then I came across a "fix" that's supposed to work, so I'm trying it here. Here's what I did:

I clicked on "design" on the upper right of my blog page.

Then on the left hand side, I clicked on "settings" then "email." 

It shows your email address inside your comment notification box. I deleted my email and hit "save." 

Then I re-entered my email address and hit "save" again. 

I immediately got an email from Blogger with an invitation to receive comment notification, and I clicked on "subscribe." Now apparently I'll start getting your comments emailed to me again. Let's hope this works, because if it doesn't, I might be done with blogging. I just don't have time to mess around with all Blogger's problems with their email notifications. (Don't worry though, you can still find me on Instagram @texasdecor and I post regularly over there.)

Anyway...the following post has been in my draft folder for a couple of months. I just didn't see any point in posting when I wasn't getting your comments sent to me. But I figured it's a neat cleaning tip and hopefully I'll get your kind comments again. So here we go...


This post is all over the place. Ha! 

How is everyone? Are your kids out for the summer? I don't have any kids in school anymore (just college) so I'm not keeping up with when school is out, etc. 

I had to share my Vitex tree with you. When it blooms, it BLOOMS! It's filled with colorful purple flowers. 

And remember my Lantana I've been giving updates on? Here's a refresher...

Here it is March 7th...

And April 7th...

And May 7th...

Quite a difference, right? It's blooming profusely now and will continue to do so all summer long. So don't get discouraged if your Lantana freezes down in the winter. It'll come back quickly and if you can just stand the little in-between stage, you'll end up with beautiful blooms. Gardening takes patience. :) 

So you know how I love to clean my house? You can see my last cleaning routine post HERE. Well, I recently used a Magic Eraser to clean my shower and WOW! I was really impressed! It all started when I saw my friend Kristy's weekly cleaning post HERE. She mentioned using Magic Erasers in the shower, so I gave it a whirl. It did a bang up job everywhere, but especially on the shower floor, which in my opinion is the hardest part to get clean. But it was bright white when I was done, yay!!! (a little PSA...always wear gloves when using Magic Erasers)

Here's the original Magic Eraser I used...

The only thing is that the original magic eraser doesn't have any germ killing cleanser in it (at least I don't think it does) and it fell apart pretty quickly after I started scrubbing, so after I cleaned everything (tile walls, glass doors and floor) with Magic Eraser, I rinsed the entire shower and sprayed a little Method Bathroom Cleaner on everything...

I let the Method stuff sit for a few minutes, then rinsed it off. I felt better knowing I might have knocked out a few germs the magic eraser missed. 

But then Kristy mentioned a Magic Eraser specifically made for bathrooms, called "Mr. Clean Magic Eraser Foaming Bath Scrubber." I liked that these had the cleanser built in, and they're a lot stronger than the original, so I bought them the next time I was at the store. 

Here's a pic of the box...

Y'all, I couldn't wait to try them! I'm such a cleaning dork! They did a really good job, but I think it was mostly because it's more durable than the original. These didn't fall apart and you might even be able to get away with using these twice. The cleanser didn't have a strong scent either, which I loved.

I still sprayed a little Method Bathroom Cleaner on the walls after I scrubbed and rinsed with the Magic Eraser, just to get in a little extra cleansing power. :) 

Here's another tip...I always try to rinse the shower walls after I'm done taking a shower. It helps to remove any soap or shampoo that might be stuck to the walls. Without any residual soap scum, it makes the weekly cleaning a lot easier. 

So tell me, do you have a secret to getting the shower sparkling clean? 

Okay...let's see if I receive your comments. :) 


~Lisa

Blog comments not being emailed to me...Blogger Problem

Hi everyone! Just wanted to let you know that I haven't been getting your sweet comments emailed to me. I don't know what's up with Blogger, but apparently it's a big problem right now. A lot of us aren't getting email notifications when we get a comment. It seems to have just stopped working a couple of weeks ago. 

(If you could be so kind as to leave me a comment on this post, I'd appreciate it. That way, I can tell if I was able to fix the problem. Thanks!) 

I went ahead and responded to all of your comments in my last post, so if you left a comment and didn't get a response emailed to you, please check the post and you'll see my reply in the comments section. I'm so sorry. I know that's a lot of trouble and it is for me too. Hopefully Blogger will fix it soon. 

If you use Blogger, have you noticed the comment choices have changed? If you go to your 'settings' and then 'posts, comments and sharing' it used to give you four choices of comments to accept:

1. Anyone (includes anonymous users)

2. User with Google accounts

3. Only members of this blog

4. Registered users, includes openID

I always had mine set on 4. Registered users, includes openID. That way, even someone without a Google account could comment. But that option has disappeared. #4 Registered users isn't even an option. They've removed it completely. Now it has my settings as 2. User with Google accounts. What? I certainly didn't change it and now that #4 isn't an option, I changed it to 1. Anyone (includes anonymous users) Because I'm allowing anyone to comment (hoping that'll fix the problem and my comments will be emailed to me again) I also put on comment moderation. Meaning I'll have to approve every comment before it's published. Since I'm allowing anonymous users, comment moderation is pretty much necessary. That shouldn't be too big of a deal and if it fixes the problem, it'll be worth it. 

If you use Blogger for your blog platform, have you noticed this problem too? Are you still getting your comments emailed to you? It's so frustrating because I kept having to check my post to see if there were any comments. It's much easier when they're just emailed to me. 

And because I can't do a post without a pic, here's Finn relaxing with his foot propped up...

Edited to add: Well it doesn't look like my "fix" worked because it's still not emailing me comments for moderation. So I changed my settings back to "User With Google Accounts" and took off moderation. We'll see...

~Lisa