homemaking – Page 7 – Home's Cool!

Good ol' days, Homemaking, Inspiring, Sayings, Womanhood

Saturday Sayings — Everyday Life

Posted on September 15, 2012September 26, 2012 by Katharine

woman in housedress: madison + 41 — woman in housedress

I cannot believe what I have seen, lately.

And that comment deserves an explanation.

The wedding wowed us all, and my son, no doubt, rejoices, now. We’ll talk about that later, I’m sure.

But what I realize suddenly, is that for the last 42 years, I have been co-existing with my kids. That thought barely fits inside my head. Just barely. For 42 years, I’ve had kids in my corner — whether pre-borns, school-aged, or 20-somethings, they were my kids and they were here.

Gradually, almost imperceptibly they have sought their niches and moved on to life as they envisioned it.

I wonder if they envisioned it accurately, any better than I did. I mean, I always wanted six children, but I never, even once, thought I would live with kids for 42 years. It makes me laugh because it sounds like I ran an orphanage. Often I jokingly said of my profession, that I helped my husband manage a home for children who would otherwise be homeless. I believed that, even while I laughed about it. I joke about someone else doing their laundry for a change, and I believe that, too, as I laugh.

The time arrives when all that work is over and I enjoy reaping grandkids and such. I re-arrange furniture in empty bedrooms, glad for the space, glad for a chance to access the under-bed areas with a broom and mop, daring not to allow the mixed emotions a venue, terrified of second thoughts, unable to admit missed chances, refusing to ponder the distance to check on these kids, allowing only the happy-thoughts.

I did it. They are raised and gone. Their rooms are again mine. I can have a sewing room and an office.

And more money for luxuries.

And more clean.

And more time.

And more quiet.

And my own way, more.

This brings me to the saying for Saturday, a chorus from an old song by Glen Campbell: Dreams of the Everyday Housewife

Such are the dreams of the everyday housewife
You see everywhere any time of the day
An everyday housewife
Who gave up the good life
For me.

However the writer of this song assumes the wife longs for the good ol’ pre-marriage days, it fails to realize what it juxtaposes:

Wrinkles vs. young men’s ridicule — give me wrinkles, any day.

Apron vs. dancing men waiting in line for her — really; that’s the good life.

Closet vs. photos, and dried flower crumbling — actually, I have many, many photos and flowers, none crumbling, and I could use another closet.

Housedress vs. mind-blowing gowns — the way I dress in the house is far more sensible and comfortable and desirable and if gowns are the “good life”, I’d give them up in a heartbeat for what I’d really like.

I’d really like to ride that “housewife” ride all over again.

(Photo credit: bondidwhat)

Blessings of Habit, Good ol' days, Health, Homemaking, Inspiring, Photos, Wisdom, Womanhood

Ode to a Wringer Washer

Posted on August 27, 2012December 26, 2016 by Katharine

genuine Kenmore wringer on tub — Genuine Kenmore Wringer on Tub

The second-most-viewed post on my site. I cannot figure this, but have loved seeing nearly every week, someone else coming to read this.

Have fun.

My gramma had a laundry wringer. And for a while, so did my mom. I always loved these machines that squeezed the water out of clothing so graphically and intriguingly.

click to view water running off — Click to View Water Running Off

Back then, washing used only one load of soapy water, beginning clean, with white clothing, and proceeded to gradually dirtier and darker clothing and water, until the last thing washed was the dingy dungarees worn to protect the good clothing from animal chores.

After washing came rinsing, or some said, “wrenching,” which surely they thought referred to the old way of removing extra water, by hand wringing, making the arms and hands feel nearly wrenched out of socket. My gramma put bluing in rinse water to make whites look whiter. I never could understand this substance, bluer than a computer screen, that made things white.

Gramma used homemade soap on clothes. I mean: natural lye made from last winter’s wood ash combined with natural trimmings from natural meat, and yes, she made it herself, on the wood stove in her woodshed, and stacked it everywhere in there to cure. Then she grated it for flakes. It all smelled so fresh and good.

To this day, aroma from homemade soap makes me think of birds calling and locusts scritching combined with comfy sloshy sounds of laundry done during warm laundry days. And my gramma’s voice explaining . . .

The washer, and its accompanying rinse tubs on platforms, rolled creaking out onto the bumpy concrete porch around Gramma’s woodshed. A hose ran first to fill rinse tubs, and later to empty them onto the enormous strawberry patch.

Only large pots of scalding water went into the washer, itself, and yes, heated on that wood stove. All the concrete porches got a scrub-down with used laundry water splashed on, pure and natural.

There were manual and electric versions of the wringer. My gramma had the kind she had to crank and disdained the electric, which could swallow up an arm or break off buttons. She fished clothes out with a stick; the water was that hot. My auntie had one and I didn’t like the noise of it. Besides, cranking the wringer was an honored chore because you had to be old enough to reach and strong enough turn it without let-up.

The wringer and its tray were rotatable to provide also for two tubs of rinse water. Every article of clothing went through the agitation in soapy water, wringing, pouring and dribbling, to kerplunk into the first rinse, and then into the second, before finally being wrung into a laundry basket for hanging on the line.

It seems like so much work, and it was. No wonder laundering was an event with its own day set aside. Imagine dragging all that production outdoors on a daily basis for just one load! Yet, all this was such an improvement over lugging all the laundry to a stream, or boiling it in a huge pot over an open fire.

Yes, it was good, honest work, but that woodshed and that porch were my gramma’s gym and she stayed fit, even into old age. And although she belonged to a gene pool that proved a tendency to plumpness, she always remained trim.

Unlike me.

Blessings of Habit, Good ol' days, Homemaking, Inspiring, Womanhood

My Grandmother’s Quilts

Posted on August 26, 2012January 28, 2015 by Katharine

This is my most visited post, so far. It amazes me that folks come here, most. Enjoy.

I just want to tell you about my grandmother, Laura, this time.

I am a grandmother, and when I was little, I always wanted to be one. When I need inspiration, I remember my grandmother, Laura. Life is so different, now, though.

I know she was elderly because she had arthritic knuckles, gray hair, and a craggy voice. She wore a dress at all times, and she wore shoes with thick, high heels that tied on, sort of like men’s dress wingbacks, perforations and all. Do they even still sell those?

She sewed all her dresses. And sometimes, as a gift, she sewed my mother a dress, too. And she sewed the first dress I ever wore when I was very tiny. I know she made these dresses, because she made a quilt for each of her grandchildren. She did not go to a store for fabric for these quilts. No, she used fabric scraps from sewing dresses. When she made my quilt, she was careful to use many scraps from my mother’s and from my dresses.

I look at the quilt she made for me and I see the dress my mother wore to church in summer. I see a dress my grandmother wore. I see my very first, ever, dress I wore when I was tiny.

I don’t know how my grandmother found the time. She babysat three children, to make an income, because she was widowed when my mother was six. She used her entire, small backyard as a strawberry patch and put up all those berries or traded them for peaches and crabapples to put up. She made her own soap on the wood stove in the woodshed for all washing needs, for clothing, dishes, and bathing. She heated with wood or coal. She did laundry in the woodshed using a wringer washer and hanging it out in summer or in the woodshed in winter, when it froze.

And she prayed. I mean, she really took time out to pray. She would tell us not to bother her while she prayed, she would go to her room and shut the door, and she would pray.

When we visited her, we played with her one box of toys, leftovers from when our aunts and uncles were little. We loved these odd toys that didn’t do anything except prop up our playtime. She let us watch while she made us rolled-out sugar cookies in shapes like stars, hearts, and flowers. When we asked for colored sugar, she told us it tastes the same. We didn’t believe it.

One wonderful time, I got to sleep with her because I was the oldest and probably would not kick too much. I got to watch her unbraid and comb her hair, which was far beyond waist length. Seeing my grandmother in her gown in the moonlight by the window, combing amazingly long and wavy hair, made her seem to me like an angel. I was in awe.

Then she broke the spell by rebraiding her hair. She never used a rubber band, but simply pulled a strand of hair and wound the end of the braid like a fishing lure. I was filled with questions, then. Why do you braid your hair to sleep? How does it stay in place with no rubber band? I don’t remember her answers, but only my awe and her amusement.

She died about 48 years ago. I still miss her. I still want to be like her when I grow up.

My Grandmother's Quilt — My Grandmother’s Quilt

Here is the quilt she made for me. You can see light red and white tiny checked fabric on the bottom, just right of center. That was my baby dress. It had teensy rickrack on it.

Just right of that is a sort of black and pink Tattersall with pink x’s. That was my mom’s summer Sunday dress for a while. It had white lace at the neckline.

Partly out of view on the left is a white with black swirls. My grandmother wore that. There we all are, in one quilt.

Home School, Homemaking, Inspiring, Who's the mom here?, Wives, Womanhood

Later

Posted on August 20, 2012August 21, 2012 by Katharine

Okay, it’s later now.

When I was raising children, my answer to the eternal question about my work phone number — you know, the question that implies you are a check-forger if you do not have a separate work phone number — was: “I am self-employed, so the phone number is the same.” Always got raised eyebrows and curious comments from that. No put-downs for being only a mom.

Nowadays, however, I give my cell number for the work number. Odd the question does not come up so often.

If they asked me, out of curiosity, what I did as a self-employed contributor to the GNP, I often said, “My husband and I manage a home and school for children who would be otherwise homeless.” Boy, did that answer cause awe!

If they asked me more, I just kept on with things like, “Well, the pay is not the greatest, but the perks go beyond money. The satisfaction level is off the charts. Knowing those blessed little ones have a happy place to call ‘home’ just makes my day, especially if they hug me or call me ‘mom’.”

I actually had named our homeschool, ages ago, so when folks asked, I just gave that old name: Cherith Christian SChool and Home. (Yes, we capitalized it wonky, so folks might think to pronounce the first word with a hard “ch”. (Cherith is the brook where Elijah found water and birds brought him food during the time of a huge drought. 1 Kings 17)

Nowadays, when someone asks my profession, I tell them I am a retired educator and textbook writer. No one usually ventures beyond that because most people know not to mess with a teacher.

But if they continue in this line, I tell them I have taught all grades and the textbooks I wrote were for high school level literature. Sometimes I insert, here, my years of magazine writing. That usually stops them. If it goes further, though, I begin discussing the scope and sequence of the literature texts, and of my favorite stories from ancient literature. (Did you know the story of Joseph in Potiphar’s house appears in the ancient Egyptian literature?!)

Or I tell them of some of the difficulties, such as translating haiku into English, which really does not work. (English poems that purport to be haiku are almost always not, actually.)

Or I explain the topics of the magazines I wrote for: child raising, education, etc.

Folks usually become overwhelmed, long before I have finished my speech, or else I end up having a great discussion with someone who actually knows this stuff and cares, which is always fun.

But, heaven help them, if they ask, “Do you work?”

I’m toying with the idea of saying, “No. I’m a big fat zero. The only thing I’ve ever accomplished is turning five illiterate humans into productive members of society.”

Just once, I’d like to see the response to that.

Home School, Homemaking, Inspiring, Sayings, Who's the mom here?, Womanhood

One Mom’s Description

Posted on August 20, 2012October 5, 2016 by Katharine

I couldn’t believe my eyes and my mouth hung open while I read this. Then the chuckling began and grew until I was laughing too loudly for the library. This is great!

Found on the Internet:

A woman named Emily, renewing her driver’s license at the County Clerk’s office, encountered a woman recorder demanding to know her occupation. She hesitated, uncertain how to classify herself.

“What I mean is this,” explained the recorder, “do you have a job, or are you just a . . . “

“Of course I have a job,” snapped Emily. “I’m a mom.”

“We don’t list ‘Mom’ as an occupation. ‘Housewife’ covers it,” said the recorder.

I forgot all about her story until one day I found myself in the same situation, this time at our own Town Hall. The clerk was obviously a career woman, poised, efficient, and possessed of a high-sounding title: Town Registrar.

“What is your occupation?” she probed.

What made me say it, I do not know. The words simply popped out. “I’m a Research Associate in the field of Child Development and Human Relations.”

The clerk paused, ball-point pen frozen in midair, and looked up as though she had not heard right.

I repeated the title slowly, emphasizing the most significant words.

Then I stared with wonder as my pronouncement appeared in bold, blue ink on the official questionnaire.

“Might I ask,” said the clerk with new interest, “just what you do in your field?”

Coolly, without any trace of fluster in my voice, I heard myself replying, “I manage a continuing program of research, in the laboratory and in the field (normally I would have said ‘indoors and out’.) I’m working on my Master’s, and already have four credits (all daughters.)

“Of course, the job is one of the most demanding in the humanities, (any mother care to disagree?) (any dad care to disagree?) and I often work 14 hours a day (24 is more like it.) But the job is more challenging than most careers and the rewards are more of a certain satisfaction rather than mere money.”

There was an increasing note of respect in the clerk’s voice as she completed the form, stood up, and personally ushered me to the door.

As I drove into our driveway, my glamorous new career buoying me, three of my lab assistants – ages 13, 7, and 3, approached to greet me. Upstairs I could hear our new experimental model (the 6-month-old baby,) in the child-development program, testing out a new vocal pattern. I felt I had scored a beat on bureaucracy!

And I had gone on the official records as someone more distinguished and indispensable, to many, than “just another mom.”

Motherhood – what a glorious career! And what fun to have a title on the door!

Does this make grandmothers “Senior Research Associates in the field of Child Development and Human Relations” and great-grandmothers “Executive Senior Research Associates?

I think so.

I also think it makes aunts “Associate Research Assistants”.

May the wind sing to you and the sun rise in your heart!

Please forward this to anyone you want.

And what about you? Can you make up some clever response for this age-old competition/comparison?

How do YOU answer when they want to know if you work, where, or your work phone number? Later, I will post my usual answer(s).

____________________

photo credit: Wikipedia

Homemaking, Photos, Who's the mom here?

Weekly Photo Challenge: Wrong

Posted on August 10, 2012October 11, 2013 by Katharine

Again.

I am so accustomed to being wrong. People tell me I am wrong all the time.

They say I pronounce words wrong, and I shrug.

I am a linguist . . .

They say I load my dishwasher wrong.

I offer them the job . . .

But in the kitchen, I am usually right. I love to cook from scratch and invent recipes. I love to eat and watch others loving eating. Since all my kids are spoiled with extraordinary food, they all have learned how to cook, at least the basics of my secrets, and have begged for my recipes, freely given, before they would move out — even all four of my sons.

So-o-o-o, when I get it wrong in the kitchen, I am miffed at myself. No excuse. You know how to do this and you just didn’t do it.

That’s how I talk.

How ironic that since I believe in no excuses in the kitchen, today the photo challenge should be “wrong”. Sighs.

Today I burned a whole pan of rolled sugar cookies. These are the fiddly ones you bake only when the grandkids are present, but I volunteered to donate these for a charity function, so had a nonchalance that proved expensive:

What can I say?

I could make excuses about an important phone conversation,

but I know to take the timer with me on such occasions.

But I didn’t.

Blessings of Habit, Home School, Homemaking, Inspiring

No Such Thing as a Single Income Family!

Posted on August 2, 2012August 2, 2012 by Katharine

Someone’s gotta stay home with the kids if we homeschool. Right?

Right.

We may quibble about which parent must stay, but no doubt one simply must.

Lots of people think keeping a parent at home precludes being a two income family, but it does not. The act of staying home saves so much, we sometimes wonder how those who work outside make any money at all.

Let’s look at how it adds up:

Clothing. Stay-home clothes bought on sale cost far less than suits or uniforms bought under duress. The same is true for shoes, bags, coats, etc.
Transportation. If only one parent is going out to work, only one car is necessary. Same for gas.
Work. Someone has to do it. Either you clean the house or someone else gets about $1000 per year to do it. You can do your own laundry, yard work, repairs, etc., and save the prices of hiring them done. Or the price of a counselor trying to fix your brain after you try to do it all yourself . . .
Cooking. A rib-eye steak costs about $5 on sale at the grocery, about $18 at a restaurant. Spaghetti dinner for 6 costs the same at home as for 1 at a restaurant. Maybe less. A homemade birthday cake costs about $7, compared to $20 from the store, and you know which tastes better! Hearty, homemade bread costs half or less of insipid store-bought. However, if you make these yummy foods to sell, you get the store price!
Shopping. What? Isn’t shopping how we lose money? No, that’s random spending. Shopping is comparing prices, waiting for sales, and squeezing all the value you can from every penny. It is sticking to your list, buying in bulk, and always being ready for the surprise bargain for someone’s gift for the future. It is what you don’t have time for if you’re on your way home from the office.
Sewing. While it is true, fabric prices have gone up, it is also true you can make new, lovely curtains with hardly any sewing instructions, covering that window in sale fabric for about $25 instead of $125. With only a bit more knowledge, you could make yourself a skirt or cape. Learn a tiny bit more and make simple dresses for your girls. All with the same savings rate. But if you sell, it . . .
Gardening. A pint of home-canned green beans costs about ten cents for the lid and bit more for energy to run the stove. There is an initial investment, but you can re-coup the cost once you’ve canned for a year or two. And store-bought vegetables are nearly $1 per can.
Crafts. A bit of yarn, a drop of glue, how surprising the fun and savings in making gifts! And the savings is phenomenal. You could develop a reputation for a certain type of gift and become known as “the afghan lady” or the “soap lady”, turning it into a business. Astronomical savings in greeting cards, alone!
Last, but not least, Child Care. It’s about $18 per day per child. That does not factor in the cost of medical care for all the diseases they will pick up.

This list could go on forever, but you get the idea. If, when you are at home, you actually WORK, you are a working mom, and your rewards are good.