Living Like the Past

As some of you that follow my blog you will know that the first day of January 2019 we started a new history project and chose to live this year as if it were the year 1932. When we study a certain year, we normally start off the first part of the year with much research material that I post about and we slowly fade off as we get busy living the year we are studying. This record book is being used daily thanks to Charles steady routine of each morning doing his readings and recording how much water we have used and electricity, the temperature and humidity and notations of changes.Often I feel that I fail the years study as my post do not always reflect this year in the past.  ......

We all live in different locations and countries and some of us are going into winter soon and some in summer. At this time, after a very hot summer I feel that I would rather bundle up with layers and layers of warm clothes than to try and get cool when it is triple digits and high humidity. I am so happy that I could wear a sweater and coat the last several days. It is once again fall cleaning time at our house and this has kept us very busy. Each season is a good opportunity to give the house that extra special clean up. We remove our window screens and wash our windows at least spring and fall. I have posted several times about cleaning windows since this blog ......

I posted a question from T about mold. Here was her question,This is from T that lives in a corner of Michigan that gets lots of lake effect rain. Question; I was hoping you or your readers might have some tips on dealing with indoor humidity, without running an air conditioner or electric dehumidifier. The dehumidifier is my biggest user of electricity and I would really like toeliminate it, but don't want to risk the resulting mold problems.Things like moisture absorption packets don't really seem like awhole-house solution, considering the dehumidifier is removing aboutsix gallons of water a day.Opening windows for ventilation is rarely helpful where I live because the air outside is ......

I wanted so badly to be able to put the quilt on the bed once again. This was the long hot summer that would not end. Finally we have reached a temperature that I can ease the quilt over the bed. The Chrysanthemums knew it was fall but the thermometer did not agree. But they held true and bloomed anyway.I had pampered them and a few times put them in intensive care with the drought and heat. They needed IV fluids a few times as I thought they were not going to make it. I believe that we would have lost every one of them had they not had special care due to the drought.We have a hawk that has been hanging around for a few months now. I respect our birds of prey an ......

Sometimes it seems that everyone is tense or bothered by something but actually it is not true that everyone is like this. There is happiness, maybe we do not see it at the moment because of turmoil in our lives. Life keeps going all around us no matter what we are doing. Each one of us on a different journey and we often worry about things that never happen. It makes more sense to put our efforts into preparing for the things that could happen and then go on with life.Elizabeth is our, let us say, delicate child. She startles easily and absolutely does not like baths. But, she has a special sensitive side and is empathetic and always knows if we do not feel well or if something i ......

To live a vintage life today we have to make it happen. What is vintage anyway? Vintage has many descriptions. It can be considered something having quality. A fine wine sometimes is a vintage wine, sometimes vintage is something of importance. Some may think of it as being old but some think of it as being classic.I feel it is the best parts of the past.This is Muriah, she reads and follows my blog and sent me this picture of her beautiful vintage treadle sewing machine. Muriah enjoys living a more simple vintage life. She is a beautiful young lady and this picture makes my heart happy. I asked her permission if I could share this with all of you and she said yes ......

The long Hot Summer... It started before Spring this year, it was hot early. Everything came early so I thought fall would come early and then winter and set things straight.But that did not happen. So many things just burned up and I decided to take what I could and concentrate them in small beds. My big plans of the container garden did not work out. I learn my biggest lessons from things that did not work out so this year I had big lessons.It caused me to do more research and I discovered that lavender does not like it wet. So I started over once again. To me life has a lot of starting over, isn't that we are suppose to do? We cannot just go within and just give up. I have tried tha ......

No, that is not a glass of wine on top of that stove. This post is to answer the cloth question from Julia. We are trying to find a better way to stop having so many wash cloths, dish cloths and drying towels that we accumulate each day. As I said in the previous post I had to ask myself the same question as it seemed I had done better in the past because I cannot remember using a lot of cloths in a days time. We have some very good responses.*********************************************************************Hi Donna,This is for Julia's email question. My kitchen is not as vintage as gDonna's, but what I normally use is one dish cloth a day. At the end of the day I wil ......

Charles and I have been on an adventure into the past for several years now. We have been going by memory of what we considered better times then going back further than what we had any memory of by history projects, much research and by doing.We started many years ago going to the library and reading books and looking through microfilms. Then we dove in further and started reading journals and real diaries and invested in purchasing some of them. We have read old newspapers and trying to find what was happening in the home, the home front. We were most interested in the home, not as much about the wars or the great depression because we have read about these all along. We ......

Here is the situation of why I have not posted in two weeks. This picture above is the first picture I have been able to save because I had to get a new computer this summer that I cannot seem to get used to. I have been using my old computer to resize my pictures and file them on a removable thingy because my new computer did not have a picture program that I needed. But, my old computer that was barely hanging on stopped working, ending my photo solution. So I bought a photo program to put on my new computer and it has been a nightmare for me to understand. Just today I have finally figured out how to resize a photo and save it and then find it (after ultra multiple tr ......

Moving Forward, by going Back to Basics.Life can change course on us at any time. How can we take care of ourselves and especially our children if we do not know basic skills when a financial difficulty strikes. This can be a job loss, injury, health decline or disaster.Basic skills for keeper of the home. Cooking, cleaning, laundry, mending and sewing, repairing, first aid, gardening, preserving food, meal planning and keeping a budget are a few of the things. Do we have the skills to do these things to keep our boat afloat so to speak? My Grandfather the lumberjack on left. My grandmothers brother on right. They worked hard, and lived without electricity and running water because it w ......

Our lives are delicate. Much more delicate than many people realize. When we are traveling from here to eternity there are a lot of changes.For the last several months I have had this feeling to get things in order, I am not about to tell you I am sick or leaving the blog or anything, I just feel the sensible thing is I need to do better at having the laundry done, folded, ironed and put away. I don't need to wait to finish a project, just finish it.I feel like we should always be ready for change as it does constantly happen. We watch our children grow, our grandchildren grow faster than weeds in our garden.Just looking back on my blog or my picture file I see how many changes w ......

The Sensible Refuge - The HomeWe have been canning vegetables, fruits, meats and getting the pantry re stocked. Fall is coming. I could say this again before winter and I could say this again before spring or summerI like to keep the pantry rotated and topped off. In the past there were no grocery stores. There were mercantile's or general stores and eventually grocery stores and supermarkets came about as roads were built and cars were sold but many people did not have them.Sometimes we hear about when cars were made or televisions were made but many people did not own them. When the televisions were starting to be sold there was no use to own one because many areas had no reception. Here i ......

This is not a post on Sarah's diary but a discussion of how Sarah's diary is affecting many of us that are reading the diary posts. We find that Sarah makes a white cake most every week along with several pies. I have received emails from those of you that find peace in Sarah's Diary. Some find inspiration and that they are finding more joy in keeping home.In Sarah's lifetime, it was common to bake bread, cake and pies as they did not have the processed junk food that we have today. Many years ago I also made white cake and pies.Charles has been helping me with the last several diary posts by reading the diary to me as I type and I could see the longing for the white cake as well ......

I hope I can type out the right words in this post that are coming from my heart. I feel that when I was a child I had one foot in the old times and one in the more modern times. After world war 2 was over life started changing quickly as the modern things of the 1950's were coming on fast and furious. Food was becoming more processed. It actually changed quite a bit during the war due to shortages. Then it was all about easier but it was not coming from the homemaker it was coming from advertising and door to door salesman. This was during the time that most any type of new appliance was being sold door to door. Insurance men came to the house to sell insurance and to ......

Sometimes life changes unexpectedly. It can be most anything. A job loss, a fractured ankle, a death of a loved one, a robbery, storm damage. Sometimes it is a good change, a new baby, a pay raise, a unexpected gift. Every day is going to be different and what we do with that day is a choice. Many of us live with some kind of pain, physical or emotional. Sometimes we can push through and sometimes we cannot. Most important is we try. As many of you know I have had some health setbacks this summer and I finally had to give in and rest my body and I also had to make a change. I had to heed the warnings my body was telling me and rest. It is important to underst ......

To me life had become just filler food. Before we changed to living a more simple old fashioned life I felt that I was going through life on just filler food. Spending on unnecessary things, shopping without making sure it was exactly what we needed. Often things ended up in the donate box or trash with very little use.It was like going to a buffet bar restaurant and eating a mixture of things that were not that healthy but something to fill us up.Many people today just buy to fill up that emptiness. Constantly looking for entertainment but never seem to get enough. All the while the credit card bill grows larger and most of the items charged are no longer even being u ......

This is the place I have spent a lot of time lately. If the pillows are at the head of the bed I can look into the kitchen. If they are at the foot of the bed I can see out the windows.I have been quite ill for the last several weeks. I have mentioned before that I have Meniere's disease, tinnitus and Hyperacusis.. It all has to do with the ears. Balance, nausea, vertigo, ringing, roaring, whishing noises and then if that is not bad enough add a megaphone in your ears making All sounds too loud. And to make it sound crazy but everything is too loud and yet I have hearing loss. Everything from water running in the sink to someone talking, setting a tea cup into a sau ......

Just a very short post to let you know I am not posting this week to take a needed rest. The heat really does me in this time of year so I am trying to take care of myself. I will be back at it next week hopefully.We also have a Great Grand baby due to be born next month. We are excited about that and I am putting together a new baby package to send with my daughter-in-law when she goes for her next visit. I have been taking this time to do some sorting of sewing items and a few drawers. I am thinking about the fall garden since we have so much damage to the spring garden due to the heat and drought. We finally got some rain this past week but not enough an ......

The food forest has been doing good until the drought started getting worse. We have watered every day and this is difficult for us because we try to conserve water and the plants do not like city water.We started harvesting something each day that will make a meal.It is such a good feeling to eat what we grow but it really is not easy for us produce enough in a small back yard to grow enough to be able to preserve much of the harvest. This year has been an all in effort and I have learned a lot such as I will give each plant more space so the bees can get to it and so it has a better chance to fight off disease. To grow only what we enjoy eating.But then there are the butternut squash ......