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Letting the house get damp with the A/ C off just makes me ill.  I had no idea how bad until the week without power after Helene.  I loved hearing the outside though especially at night.  

I’m interested to sew how you do sewing panties!  I set aside a pair that is fraying all along the waist band that I want to use as a template to sew my own underwear, but I have never sewn with knits so it will be an adventure.

I’ve felt like I haven’t really dived into the 1930s, but reading your blog post today helped me take a larger view of it.  We have zero debt.  I cook our meals from scratch (most nights) and bake our bread.  In the evenings we are all in one room with just the light for that room (or just the TV if we watch an episode).  I’ve been 100% line drying all of our laundry for almost two years now, and drying clothes this way helped us learn to wear our clothing even more than twice.  I mend things and find way to use what we have instead of buying something new.

Last Saturday I baked a pie, my first pie not using store bought crust in more than a decade.  I was baking an egg and potato casserole for dinner so I decided the electricity to run the oven would be best used to also bake a pie!  Because of various allergies I made a simple oil crust using avocado oil.  I was surprised that I still got a flaky crust!  The filling was made from canned peaches because I had some in the pantry, and while it tasted good, I should have trusted my instincts because putting the filling (which was cooked on the stove) into the crust I felt there was too much liquid, and there definitely was.  But that wasn’t the point, I was mostly wanting to try out the oil crust and to round out our dinner.  I do have some good frozen crusts that were only $1.35 for 2 crusts that I will use up soon, but after that it will be homemade crust only.  This morning I baked biscuits in the toaster oven, I wanted to see what size batch will work in there.  I made a single recipe (2 cups flour) but I think I could have done 1 1/2 batch with 3 cups of flour.  My son can’t eat my biscuits, he is dairy allergic but I am allergic to most of the dairy substitutes like soy, tree nuts, and unless something has changed coconut as well.  Sometimes I have to bake something he can’t have because my restrictions are far worse between multiple food allergies and autoimmune inflammatory bowel disease.

Lana D. I struggle with feeling sticky without A/C too!  I grew up without A/C although after I was 9 we did have a swamp cooler that worked sometimes, just not when it was also humid.  To this day I hate the feeling of damp in a house using a swamp cooler.  There are many things I am willing to change and give up, but the A/C will be one of the last things to go.  On very hot days I leave it set just low enough to not be sticky during the day (usually 78 - 80°F) but I have to turn it down to sleep.  One symptom of my autoimmune disease is having difficulty regulating my body temperature, and I can’t sleep if I’m too hot.  I have adjusted however, and this year when it is over 90°F during the day I can set the A/C to 74°F around 8PM, whereas for several years with uncontrolled disease I had to have it at 71-72°F at night.

What a reward for getting done with my work. A new post! Just what I needed. :) I am going to 1932 next week. All this time since May 1st I have been practicing. One thing I want to do in 1932 is to take care of my house better, so I was polishing furniture and washing windows and mopping floors the old fashioned way today. I dug out a bar of lye soap that I knew I had somewhere and washed the windows and mopped the floors with it. Lye soap really cleans well! I used my graniteware basin and sponge mop, the old kind, for the floors, soaping them with a rag first. I felt very 1932 putting my mop and basin outside to dry. I used a plastic pail for the rinse water for the windows. Plastic is not 1932, but it's what I have. :(

I've made one week of inexpensive menus that I'm repeating. I like knowing what it's going to cost for food each week. We don't have exactly the same thing every time. I might substitute meatloaf for hamburgers, for instance. We eat meat three times a week. The garden changes the vegetables we have. Spinach and lettuce are on their way out and the peas and cabbages and beets are now ready to harvest instead. 

Then there is my budget. I reworked it a few times and started my envelope system. I have to think every minute what if my husband loses his job? I've read about the Depression a lot, but I realized that I never believed a job loss could happen to us. It can! Not having an income is a frightening thought. When I did the Depression study in 2023, it was fun. Now it's serious stuff! But the timing of this study is so perfect for my need to think like the Depression now. Thank you, Grandma Donna. I really need to learn to squeeze those pennies!

I'll be going through our clothes later in the week. We keep things basic with our clothes, but I haven't taken an inventory in a long time, and I want to see what we have. 

I enjoyed hearing about the poor family who still had their pride of living decently. I find stories like that very hopeful. 

I'll be able to relax more next week. All the thinking needed to make the changes to go to 1932 has left me no time to think about other things. One thing that I am very good at for 1932 is going to the movies. I have practiced a lot. :) My movie admission can is getting filled. I may have enough money for some movie treats soon. 

I can't wait to hear what everyone else is doing. 

I had to turn my AC on for a couple of days the humidity was so high and even though I had fans and windows open I just could not breathe properly. My allergies were out of control so I broke down and turned it on. I keep it on 78 and once the humidity is out I can turn it to 80 and be okay. But I really didn't want to have to use it.  

Now we are in a cool snap and finally got some rain, I had been watering the garden by hand but rain is so much better.

I use the morning TV news as my 1930's morning edition of the newspaper and then again in the evening news as the evening edition. I am truly enjoying the quiet.  IF there is a show I want to watch I call it going to the movie and charge myself (money in a pot) to watch it . 

I have been using my newfound time to do things around my home, today it was sanding and repainting the door and trim and then I sanded and painted a couple floor register covers. I will continue with floor covers until I am out of paint.... The entry foyer looks so much fresher! A job that I had been putting off because I thought I didn't have time. I had everything I needed and didn't have to buy anything.

Made an icebox pie, strawberry cream. Made yogurt and have simplified my meals. I am picking salad greens and they determine my menu. 

Chickens are laying well and I have my DD sell the extras to people in her office and then she uses the money to buy and bring me TP from the store right beside her office. When I feel like I have enough TP stocked up I will figure out what else to stock up on. I am calling it "barter" even though it really isn't.  

I am truly enjoying the quiet and calm of my 1930's days. I really needed this study.

Thank you to everyone for the study and the comments, they "take me home".

I found some good incandescent lightbulbs last winter and they made such a difference in my well-being. I felt my body relax when I started using them instead of LEDs. They felt the way lightbulbs should, to me. They are expensive, so I only have them in my bedroom to relax there. My husband bought a solar generator a couple of years ago. It has solar panels that we put on a sawhorse on the side of our house where there's sun, but they're out of sight. The generator is about a foot long and six inches wide and eleven inches high. We put it under the solar panels and connect to the panels when it needs charging. We bring it back into the house when it's charged, and plug whatever we want into it. After reading this post, I put the generator by the head of my bed on the floor and plugged my floor lamp into it. Incandescent bulbs use more electricity than LEDs, but Grandma Donna has inspired me to think another way, and use my incandescent reading light for free. Thank you for all of your wonderful ideas. 

Today's post got me thinking. I read it before dinner.

While I live in a small house I have a large kitchen; well, larger than one would expect in this size house, which was put in a couple years before we bought it. So they made sure there was plenty of lighting unlike the rest of the house. If I told you how many lightbulbs were in here you'd laugh. There are more lightbulbs in here than the rest of the house combined.

Tonight I decided to use a single lightbulb (over the sink)  to clean up the kitchen after dinner and prepare for tomorrow's meals. Most of the kitchen was then in darkness. 

I remember my grandma's farm house. There was one light in each room. 

I finished my garden fence.  It looks more like a prison than a garden now, but I don't think Mr. Groundhog will be getting in.  My squash and beans are up and doing well, and I planted some melon seed, but it was from 2022 so I'm not sure if it will germinate.  Still working on tearing out the rest of the old pasture fence, rolling it up, and storing it in the barn.

I also started on digging out a large patch of daylilies.  I'm a bit sad to see them go, but they're invasive here and really never should have been planted in the first place.

Today was cold and rainy (with sleet on and off) so I spent most of it indoors, and took the time to write several pages of letter to a friend, and a shorter one to her little daughter.

It's been interesting to say the least, Donna - I have only recently discovered your blog.  I live in Queensland, Australia, and humidity in summer is one of the many things we suffer as well as heavy tropical rains and frequent flooding - we're on the lower end of the scale for cyclones but nevertheless they can happen here.  

We have split-system air-conditioning in the living room which we rarely use as mostly we spend our leisure time under the house (high-set 1960's house) - down here we have fans, nothing else.  We rarely use the air-con upstairs but we do have it installed in the bedroom - before retiring my other half worked a lot of night shift which is why we have it in the bedroom - this is only run on humid nights and we set it on what is called a 'dry' or teardrop setting which takes out the humidity but leaves the room very comfortable - the power it costs takes very little to run it.  

In this climate in winter, we simply don't need heating - we can go down to almost zero degrees but it's not freezing cold, and quite comfortable.  As well, our state government granted every household a thousand dollars toward the cost of living on energy bills and the federal government contributed three hundred dollars to the same - so we haven't had a power bill to pay for some time.  For lighting, we use fluorescent lights, have always done so, and these are much more durable and lasting, plus costing less to run.

I don't even own a clothes dryer these days, so everything is either hung out on the line or if damp I hang it under the deck where the breezes flow - doesn't cost a cent.  We have minimal electric appliances, I've mostly ditched the lot of them and just keep the odd one as we don't use them so why not donate them.  It's only the two of us, living on a pension with no other income, and we manage very well - meals are made from scratch and we have eaten our main meal in the middle of the day for some time now as it's better for our metabolism, with something light at night.

We don't pay for streaming services and just watch either DVD's or recorded programmes from free to air television - we don't go to movies now, they're too small and claustrophobic for me and there's really nothing that appeals anyway.  Life is quite simple - we've not grown our own vegies for quite some time as we're getting older now, but still have voluntary tomatoes and capsicum growing by themselves - and we 'shop' from the local farm gates and a very good small market chain whose prices outdo the big guys any old time.

Thank you and all the people who post on here - it's giving me a valuable insight into 1930's living (which my parents were very familiar with) as well as making me realise that our simple life is very satisfying.

Hello Grandma Donna, the pies look delightful. It is a lovely tradition to have. If you invited someone over for pie here, they would think it would be a savoury pie. Having sweets or a dessert wasn't a tradition for either side of my family. We would have homemade sponge cake with whipped cream and strawberry jam or apricot jam for birthdays, and a pavlova at Christmas but that was really all. You had dinner and you ate everything on your plate and then you were done. I think there was a feeling of austerity left over from the depression and war years. It wasn't a bad thing, it was just how it was.

I've been continuing with simplifying life. Making do as much as possible, using things up. Skipping the fruit shop every second or third week so we can empty the fridge. When my husband comments that the fridge looks empty, I say that is wonderful. That means we are not throwing anything away.  We are avoiding shopping centres and supermarkets and spending our limited dollars at family businesses who source their produce locally or grow it themselves.

i haven't shopped for two weeks but am still managing to find good things to eat.This morning for breakfast I had French toast made from a thick slice of homemade sourdough with cinnamon and sugar and a cup of tea. It felt like a real treat.

As always, I enjoy reading the comments. Wishing you all a safe and tranquil week.

My mother-in-law always called rhubarb "pie plant" because it was the first fresh fruit of the year and she baked pies with it.  She always baked pies, pies and more pies and they were always from scratch and yummy.  I do not recall a meal at her house where pie was not on the menu.  Her family's favorite was apple.  I think it was often in my f-i-l's lunch box.  Her son's never carried lunch boxes because they live 1/2 block from school and went home to eat.

As a child of the Great Depression, my m-i-l left school after 8th grade and started working as a hired girl.  As such she lived with the family she worked for and had only one-half day off each week on Sunday afternoon.  The job was very hard cooking, canning, gardening, helping with livestock, cleaning, laundry, carrying water in and dirty water out, wood cook stove and probably wood or coal for heating.  Air conditioning did not exist.  

This was her life until she married at 21 and she probably worked even harder thereafter. She started married life living in what was basically a shed on her uncle's farm.  My late dh was born in that shed/home.  They purchased a home that had three rooms and no bath in town and lived there until dh was in high school before building on a bath (the bath might have been earlier) and two bedrooms.   The bedrooms were definitely when dh was in high school.  

When my m-i-l was in a nursing home another lady was making fun of her due to her uneducated way of speaking.  I was ticked and told the lady off because my m-i-l was very accomplished homemaker and also had worked many jobs.  The skills she had learned as a homemaker and at her jobs, would be a benefit to any of us trying to cope today.  She taught me how to dress a chicken and helped me when I was learning to crochet, advised me on gardening and watching her encouraged me to learn new skills.  There wasn't much that lady wouldn't try!!  

Donna,

            I enjoyed seeing your garden. This evening, I was so proud of myself when I made a salad; everything except the salad dressing was from my garden. I haven't had a garden for years, so gardening is exciting for me. My garden isn't as far along as yours is, but I do have things coming up now. Where my daughter lives, they have a seed library where you can give or take seeds. I got some new seeds that I have never grown before, such as Backlund Bly Orach, Salsify, Painted Lady Runner Beans, and Good Mother Stallard Beans. I will be anxious to see if these grow and what they are like. I am also trying Malabar Spinach again since it is a green that likes the heat. It is pretty too. My peas have climbed to the top of the fence and are going down the other side. They only have one flower, so no peas just yet. My carrots are just starting to pop up. It seems like it takes them a long time. 

         I like your solar lights. I have many like that as well as some round ones that hang from the ceiling. I have solar panels for them in the windows. I also have rechargeable lights that go under my kitchen cabinets. They are nice since my kitchen doesn't get a lot of light. If I want to go to the kitchen in the evening, I don't have to turn the light on. Yesterday we had a power outage for about 4 1/2 hours. As soon as I saw that the storm was coming, I started charging all of my rechargeable lights. When the outage came, I had plenty of light to get me through. When the power came back on, I started recharging the lights I used. Whenever I see that there is going to be a storm, I ask myself, "If the power or water goes out, what will I wish I had done?" Then I try to get it done before the storm comes. Anything is easier to cope with if you have clean dishes, bedding, floors, clothes, etc.

    Which pattern will you be using to make your underwear or bloomers? I might like to make some.

     Our weather has been so beautiful lately. It has been in the 70s and low 80s. Just perfect for me. I live in southern Missouri, so I know it will be hot soon, but I'll adjust to it like I always do. I haven't used my AC or my furnace for about 5 years. It is hard when it gets in the 90s or 100s, but I know that people lived for thousands of years without AC, and I can too. When I was growing up, I didn't know anyone who had AC. We didn't have screens on our bedroom window either, so it was very hard. It was either be eaten alive by mosquitoes or swelter in the heat. We didn't have a fan either. When my Mom got a job, she bought us one of those portable window screens. We felt like we were rich when we got that. I will bring out my sleeveless house dresses soon. That is mostly all I wear in the summer. I put on a nicer dress when I go to town.

       Have A Great Day!

                                       Becky Sue

Although I am not going back to the 1930s, I have been continuing to embrace more of an old fashioned lifestyle with my husband. Slowing down, enjoying simple pleasures, using the resources I have, has gradually wrought a deep contentment, more serenity and happiness in my daily life.

It is wonderful that you have cut your electricity bill in half. If we make time to be quiet and to think, so many ideas begin to come to us. We all need to make time to simply “be” and allow those ideas space to grew in our consciousness don’t we?

I love your pie tasting experiments. I used to bake a lot because I spent quite a long time using the Ration Book recipes and books from WW2, here in the UK. Although, I was not as physically active as housewives back then, and baking made me put on too much weight. 

We have not had a television for years, no newspapers, and have deleted most social media. 
I find your blog posts encouraging and enjoyable to read. I also love to see your sewing, linens, and those adorable bunnies that keep deciding to move into different locations.

I did enjoy the sewing video. Mum said they had to hand-sew a pair of thick, navy blue school knickers, fastened with buttons, in the school needlework class in the 30s, to learn the different  flat seams, hems and buttonholes.

It is raining here in Staffordshire after some unseasonably dry weather. 

http://thevintagepatternfiles.blogspot.com/search/label/Underwear

I found a link to free knitting patterns for 1930s lingerie more suitable to our weather. It was knitted in the finest wool. Similar underwear is still available here in knitted cotton. 

Hello, I am a mom of 6 and love reading your blog Donna. 
I grew up in the 90s so I am slowly learning some of these skills from previous generations. I do have a handful of memories from my childhood (mostly from my grandmother) telling us to be more mindful of our spending and how we choose to live our lives.  One specifically where she chastised us for food waste. She was a wonderful person and a hard worker. I miss her often and wish I had asked her more questions as a child. She owned few things and I only have a handful of them but as you said I would trade them in for her presence any day. 

Another memory came to mind as you were talking about AC. We had an elderly neighbor when I was growing up who didn’t have air conditioning in his house. One afternoon we asked him how he survived those humid summer days. He said that he would open the windows in the evening when it started to cool off and close them early in the morning before the sun came up. This would hold a lot of the cool air in the house during the day. I’ve taken his advice often and it seems to work well.