Spring and cleaning

Birds and eggs inspire hope and happy thoughts in pretty much everyone at this time of year. The cardinals and finches have been frequenting the feeder today, and Phillip and I watched the grackles starting their annual nest in the neighbour's cedar tree this morning. (Between coughing fits and blowing my nose, in my case. I'm feeling better, but worse, you know?)
My MIL bought me the sweet pottery bird feeder above at Value Village last week, and I'm excited to put it outside.

And eggs! These are actually artificial (gasp!) eggs that MIL bought for me at Michaels. (She's good to me, I know.) I like that they're not as fragile as real ones (so they'll survive an egg hunt with Mr P, and being counted many times over) or as tacky as the neon plastic ones. That's the extent of my Spring decorating here - looking out the window is Springy enough, with the snowdrops up, crocuses here, and tulips poking up from the ground. Oh, and I did change my winter pinecone wreath out for a more Springy twiggy one, like this one, only darker.
I was looking at some Springy things online this morning, and found this gorgeous egg photo, featuring a great apron, by Abby Try Again, as well as this apricot blossom photo. I had never given any thought at all to apricot blossoms, since apricots aren't grown around here, but now I'm envious of those of you who might have access to some of those branches to force.

There's nothing quite as Spring-y as Spring cleaning! I looove this picture, also by Abby Try Again, and would love to have a huge one on a kitchen or pantry wall.

Speaking of cleaning, I have a safer solution for cleaning your porous old bathtub! (If you have one, of course.) I tried a mixture of 5% peroxide (available in the natural cleaning aisle at the health food store or grocery store) and baking soda in our ancient, porous clawfoot tub to get it to look somewhat clean, as suggested in The Baking Soda Book. I sprinkled on the baking soda, and used a spray bottle to liberally spray the peroxide over all of the baking soda. I left it for about 2 hours, giving it a light brushing with a scrub brush every now and then to make sure it was well covered, and it made such a difference! Without all of the scariness and toxicity of chlorine bleach. I would have left it a bit longer, to get the last tenacious stains gone, but it was time for P's bath, which waits for no man. So I rinsed it very well, and it looks great! It worked much better than anything else I've tried, including scary foamy stuff I had languishing in the cupboard. So, go forth and clean! Have a great weekend.