21 November 1957 “Carving a Turkey and Fun Clothespin Doll Place Settings”

Thanksgiving is on its way here in 1957.  Last year I hosted a rather large gathering and posted about my menu and my homemade place cards. If you search Thanksgiving in the search bar above that reads “Search the Apron Revolution” many of my Thanksgiving posts will come up. There are too many to link to here.

This year it is a very small Thanksgiving for us with Hubby, myself, Gussie, and Hubby’s Sister. It will be more informal but still with all the fixings. We will wind down the day playing cards by the fire, sipping eggnog and discussing our coming Christmas party.

I hope all in the U.S. are excited about ‘Turkey Day’ and look forward to hearing about how you celebrate. For those of you outside of the U.S. for fun why not have turkey dinner this Thursday and toast a cheer to your American cousins, “Chin Chin”.

Let’s look at carving basics. I thought these were rather good instructions and so have put them on this card. You could easily print it out to the size of an index card and keep it in your recipe box or folder.

I was also taken by the idea of homemade crafts for the table. Those with children would really enjoy such a project. But even those childless couples can have a blast with clothespin art. There are many ways you could make these little wooden objects into fun Holiday decorations for any holiday. I propose for this project Pilgrim Place Settings. Little Clothespin dolls made to resemble pilgrims or Native Americans made with old fashioned pins. Then hot glue a traditional clip clothespin to its back to hold a name card or the menu for the Thanksgiving Dinner.

Now this is simply a mock up I made with various images on the computer, so it looks a bit odd, but you get the general idea. You could easily paint the face rather than use googly eyes. One could also make them into turkeys with feathery tails.

These little dolls and the instructions are from a vintage magazine. And these images are thanks to Blue Prairie Photo Stream who hopefully won’t mind our sharing her lovely find. I think it a good starting off point to make our Thanksgiving craft, don’t you?

I will post more Thanksgiving tips and ideas tomorrow and look forward to your sharing your ideas with me. There is also a section under Homemaking on Holidays in the Forum. Join up and share your tips and treats by clicking the forum button up top.

I hope all have a lovely day and Happy Homemaking.

19 November 1957 “1950’s ‘On-line Christmas Shopping: The Magazine & Buttermilk Bread Recipe”

This little advert made me laugh so much, I had to share it. And so I thought I would share many of the little ‘gift ideas’ in some of my November issues of 1950’s magazines. The idea’s for Christmas gifts being bought in a magazine was there version of “online shopping”. Remember a basic conversion for the Inflation of the dollar is to multiply it by around $7 which was the rate from 1955. You will begin to see first that things were more expensive, but that in reality our dollar today buys very little in comparison.

Now I know it isn’t even Thanksgiving yet here in America, but with ‘Black Friday’ looming this coming Friday, its all I can do to not see everything Christmas when I went out on my errands and marketing yesterday. So with the Christmas spirit comes, I suppose, the Christmas buying. Why not enjoy the fun and odd gift ideas available back then in magazines: The online shopping of its day.

For the man who has everything? Couldn’t you just see this hung on 1950’s paneling?

Some lovely items. I adore the ‘knotty pine’ spice box. It’d be a gem in an Early American Kitchen motif with rooster wallpaper. I like the little bedroom door knocker as well. It would again go well with a colonial or Early American theme. And it be a fun way to announce your entrance to a bedroom.

I happen to love fruit cake. Well, homemade fruitcake that it. It is a wonderful treat, but one can see where the running joke that once existed of the ‘traveling fruitcake’ given as a gift over and over. So preserved and so full of candied fruit there was little cake in it. This appears to possibly be of that variety, one can never know. But, I wonder how many grannies (having her tastes from the 19th century when sugar was more scarce and such a treat a joy) happily ordered this for the young suburban 1950’s family, only to have them groan upon opening it?

I think this is a brilliant idea. I like the idea of such a sturdy magazine rack. I have tried, in the past (well the future really) various magazine racks bought at Home stores only to find they are bad at display and make it impossible to have more than one or two magazines yet the holder takes up So much wall or floor space. These look clever and would look darling in a home library a study or even the living room. I like the idea of the double sided version on legs for $29.95. I might have to make a set of plans from this and see if I couldn’t make one up myself out of simple pine.

I wonder if this was one of the first dry/paint and wipe artist set ups for children? The precursor to the etch-a-sketch? Which came first this or  the dry erase board for Father’s office? A chicken and egg situation I suppose.

This ad has some fun items and treasures that have been bought up and saved, I am sure, for many Christmas. These type of items can often be found on eBay or in antique stores. But now, due to their nostalgia, can sometimes be too pricey for what they are. But often yard sales and estate sales give up such fun little treasures that some auntie ordered with excitement to decorate for the holidays.

Some more Christmas items and some fun stocking stuffers. I would love to have known what type of plant came out of that shell you place in water. Was it a real plant that grew over time? Or was it a plastic treat that was exposed when touched by the water? Does anyone know?

Was the nativity snow globe the first of its kind? Did the Ticky Tacky grandfather watch suggested as a stocking stuffer really work? Did little Timmy ever find Papa’s ‘striptease’ knife in share it with his pals up in the Tree house? I actually recall the wooden apple/tea set. I had one when I was a child and now I see it must have been one of my older Sisters who were children in the 1950’s.

Do you see anything you like?

I promised the buttermilk bread recipe I use in tandem with my home-made butter. With one quart of whipping I cream I get one pound of butter and two cups of buttermilk. Those two cups go into these two loaves of bread. The recipe came from allrecipes.com

Buttermilk Bread

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
• 1/2 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
• 1/2 cup margarine
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 (.25 ounce) packages active dry yeast
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 5 1/2 cups bread flour

 

Directions

1. Proof yeast in warm water.
2. Place the butter or margarine and buttermilk in a small saucepan. Heat slowly until butter or margarine has melted. Cool to lukewarm.
3. Place sugar, salt, baking soda, buttermilk mixture, and yeast in large mixing bowl. Add 3 cups flour one cup at a time, and mix with the dough hook attachment of an electric mixer. Gradually add the remaining flour while continuing to mix. When dough is not sticky, turn out on a lightly floured surface. Knead for several minutes, until the dough is soft and smooth. Place in a greased bowl, and turn once. Allow to rise until doubled in size.
4. Punch down the dough. Divide, and shape into 2 loaves. Place in two well greased 8 x 4 inch bread pans. Allow to rise until dough has risen one inch above pans.
5. Bake in a preheated 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) oven for 30 to 35 minutes. Loaves are done when nicely brown and hollow sounding when thumped.

Well, happy day dream shopping in the past and Happy Homemaking.

16 November 1957 “The Adaptable Cafe Curtain”

I thought I would share this great article on the use of cafe curtains. As many of you know, cafe curtains are straight hung curtains that usually cover half a window, allowing light in, but can also be hung in tandem with multiple layers of cafe curtains.

These are great ideas no matter what age or style your house may be and also a great source for those vintage purist.

Formal to bath to

Hall And kitchen. I love this idea, too, using the colored clothes pins. I have two sizes, a standard and a smaller, HERE and HERE in the Corner store for sale. They are around $4. You could also have a lovely matching or contrasting look by painting plain wooden pins, as well. I like this idea, as if you don’t sew you could use darling vintage or vintage look towels, tea towels, small tablecloth or runners. Even if it is larger, you could double it up and hang it up to show the area of the tablecloth you like and it would still have the look and feel of a curtain.

Enjoy these images and have fun dreaming of how to use them. I am off today with Hubby and Gussie to my MIL. It is her birthday and we are celebrating before she leaves this weekend for Florida until Spring. I made a lovely Custard rice pudding I will share with you later as well as a ground lamb Sheppard’s pie that is easy and so delicious.

Happy Homemaking.

13 November 1957 “Recession Butter: A Churner’s Tale”

Often Butter is tied in a comical way to the 1950’s.

There have even been really bad modern commercials that somehow seem to represent a past that never was, spreading sticks of the stuff everywhere. Meet the Buttertons:

The irony of this situation, is of course that butter is actually better for you than margarine, yet this myth still exists today. In fact, at the turn of the last century heart disease was rare. By the end of the 1960’s it was one of our number one killers. The irony being that it was during the 1950’s that advertising told mother’s that margarine was better for you and it saw a large increase in use.

A researcher named Ancel Keys was the first to propose that saturated fat and cholesterol in the diet were to blame for coronary heart disease. Though this has still yet to actually be backed up or shown to be true, though countless millions have been spent to check this fact, we are still largely in belief that butter is bad for you and a diet in lower saturated fats is better for you. Ironically, however, “As a result, since the early 1970's, Americans' average saturated fat intake has dropped considerably, while rates of obesity, diabetes, and consequently, heart disease, have surged.”

Here is a great list of reasons butter is actually good for you:

1. Butter is rich in the most easily absorbable form of Vitamin A necessary for thyroid and adrenal health.
2. Contains lauric acid, important in treating fungal infections and candida.
3. Contains lecithin, essential for cholesterol metabolism.
4. Contains anti-oxidants that protect against free radical damage.
5. Has anti-oxidants that protect against weakening arteries.
6. Is a great source of Vitamins E and K.
7. Is a very rich source of the vital mineral selenium.
8. Saturated fats in butter have strong anti-tumor and anti-cancer properties.
9. Butter contains conjugated linoleic acid, which is a potent anti-cancer agent, muscle builder, and immunity booster
10. Vitamin D found in butter is essential to absorption of calcium.
11. Protects against tooth decay.
12. Is your only source of an anti-stiffness factor, which protects against calcification of the joints.
13. Anti-stiffness factor in butter also prevents hardening of the arteries, cataracts, and calcification of the pineal gland.
14. Is a source of Activator X, which helps your body absorb minerals.
15. Is a source of iodine in highly absorbable form.
16. May promote fertility in women.⁹
17. Is a source of quick energy, and is not stored in our bodies adipose tissue.
18. Cholesterol found in butterfat is essential to children's brain and nervous system development.
19. Contains Arachidonic Acid (AA) which plays a role in brain function and is a vital component of cell membranes.
20. Protects against gastrointestinal infections in the very young or the elderly.

 

Now, despite its good or bad qualities, butter has been around forever. It is, in its simplest terms, the fat solids removed from the heavy cream of the milk. Agitating such cream separates the butter from the milk, leaving you with buttermilk.

Butter churns have been made from everything from ceramic and stoneware, to wood and glass. Any means necessary to creating a motion that results in the butter and milk to separate.

Now, there are different types of butters depending on the cream used. Before factory made butters were introduced first in America in the 1860’s, the cream used to make butter was fermented. One collected the milk from the cow or goat or sheep and it would sit and ferment.

“During fermentation, the cream naturally sours as bacteria convert milk sugars into lactic acid. The fermentation process produces additional aroma compounds, including diacetyl, which makes for a fuller-flavored and more "buttery" tasting product. Today, cultured butter is usually made from pasteurized cream whose fermentation is produced by the introduction of Lactococcus and Leuconostoc bacteria.”

In the 1970s cultured butter was made by incorporating bacterial cultures and lactic acid. “Using this method, the cultured butter flavor grows as the butter is aged in cold storage.”

Today, however, pasteurization is the norm and butter made from pasteurized cream is called Sweet Cream Butter. This is often what is available from the store.

Ghee, is an Indian clarified butter made by “bringing the butter to a high temperatures of around 120 °C (250 °F) once the water has cooked off, allowing the milk solids to brown. This process flavors the ghee, and also produces antioxidants which help protect it longer from rancidity. Because of this, ghee can keep for six to eight months under normal conditions.”

Now, my main reason for discussing butter today was to show you how easy one can make it at home. This was not something I have always done, but necessity is the mother of invention, or at least in my case, the Mother of Need. As all of you know, grocery prices continue to rise. Butter, at least in my area, is literally twice as costly as when I began my experiment of 1955 in 2009. Then I could buy one pound of butter around $2. Today that same butter costs $4 and that is the cheaper store brand. This lead me even to consider the very cheap margarine. I saw a one pound package of a store brand for only 75 cents. This is a HUGE savings and almost lured me into is wretched quality with that low price. But, I realized it is better for me to trim the fat (pun intended) in other ways, such as reducing meat purchased and adding more beans and other protein sources.

Now, making butter at home is not hard and can be quite fun. It can take really only about half an hour total and then you have your butter for the week.

This tutorial I used the pasteurized store brand heavy whipping cream. Obviously, if one can get organic raw cream, a more wonderful tasting butter can be derived, but I wanted this to be an easy ‘anyone can try it’ exercise.

So, you can use your mixer or your blender. I have used both, but actually prefer the mixer. You can see here I am just using a Stop & Shop brand Heavy Whipping Cream. I like to not buy from larger chains too often, but I wanted this to be a good easy access tutorial. One can do it with basic whipping cream from a local convenient store.

However, if you enjoy it and would like to make your own butter more often, it is true that Butter from grass-fed cows contains higher levels of vitamin E and beta-carotene (which is responsible for the yellow color in butter). And it not being pasteurized would also allow you to ferment and get a truer old better quality butter. But for this purpose, what you get from heavy whipping cream is still a better product than the butter for sale at the store. And you can flavor it and mold it however you like.

Now why I first decided to make my butter as part of my weekly savings in my shopping was this:

1. one pound of butter costs $4
2. one quart of cream costs $4.29 From this you get one pound of butter and 1 1/2 –2 cups of buttermilk

So, really I am paying 29 cents more but getting the same amount of butter, better quality and the buttermilk adds to my milk allotment for the week going into various things. How I am currently looking at it is I have a buttermilk Bread recipe that requires 2 cups butter milk and makes two loaves. So, for that 4.29 plus a bit more for the flour and yeast, I am getting

1. one pound butter
2. 2 loaves buttermilk bread

So, to me, it is worth it both for economy and taste/quality.

So, as I said, one quart of cream makes one pound of butter.  So in other terms one US quart is =

1. 0.946 liter  or
   
2. 0.833 British quart

Pour your quart of heavy whipping cream into your mixer and set it on med. It is best to have the milk at about room temperature or around 55 degrees. If you do this straight from the ice box (fridge) it takes longer. I did it once and it took 35 minutes as opposed to about 15. Though some sites claim it can take only 10 minutes, but my mixer is very old from the early 1950’s, so perhaps it is not up to a modern version.

At first, of course, you get whipped cream. That is, after all, what whipped cream is.

Then it begins to form stiffer peaks until it starts to form thicker chunks. And you can see it becoming more butter yellow. Though it is true that it is not as yellow as butter made from organic unpasteurized butter which is allowed to ferment, it still begins to take on that lighter yellow we are familiar with from commercial grocery store cream butter.

At this point, as well, you are just watching and enjoying. It isn’t as if it is hard work to pour in cream and turn on our mixer. Think of our ancestors churning away. Although, I have to admit, that seems also a way to have a sort of relaxing zen afternoon, churning away. But, for busy modern people this is a very realistic process, just pour and turn on mixer.

So, now depending on cream temp when you begin and your room temp and speed of mixer, anywhere from 10 –30 minutes you will begin to see it hit this phase where it suddenly goes quite wet and sounds as if you have added water or are mixing up a runny cake. You can really see the liquid now separating from the butter.

Once you have reached this state, you simply pour off the butter milk. The first time I did it I put a cheese cloth over a funnel into the container I was pouring to catch any little clumps. Now, I can’t be bothered and I just use my fingers to hold most of it back, as some of the chunks into the buttermilk just makes a nicer product to cook with. You can see the butter chunks on the side after I just drained my butter milk into my bottle. Pancakes, biscuits, and bread made with this butter milk is heaven!

So, simply drain out the excess water. At this point add a bit more water back to the drained butter, say about a 1/2-1 cup or so, and run the mixer again. Be careful not to splatter, I put a towel around the mixer to help with that. Then drain this water down the sink. I don’t add this rinse water to my butter milk. You are meant to rinse it until it runs clear, but honestly that is only if you want to have a lot of butter stored longer. Some liquid left in your butter does not hurt if you are going to use it up in a week or so. Which I do. Therefore sometimes I don’t even rinse it, just drain the butter milk and go to the next step.

Now, with your strained butter, put it on a plate. This works best in a wooden bowl and spoon, but again, I wanted this for anyone to do. So here a spatula and plate work fine. You are simply going to work the excess liquid out at this state to make your final product.

You can use a towel or paper towel. I prefer an actual towel, but that is up to you, I think paper towel or paper napkins would work fine. You are just sopping up the moister. I just press down and then turn over and press down again to get most of the moisture out. You can see the pattern from my towel in it. This shows you the possibilities for molding and patterns. Homemade butter lends itself to such beautiful presentations. And there are many butter molds available, but you could use anything that has a pattern or shape you like.

Now, it is at this point that I usually add sea salt. Sometimes I make unsalted butter to bake with or you can add anything you like. Chopped nuts and maple syrup is wonderful. Or cinnamon and honey. Or chives, garlic, lavender, you name it. Mix it in after you have removed the excess water and work it into the butter. You could break it up into a four varieties easy enough.

You could easily enough just spread you new butter into a container to use, like soft butter from the store. Or you can shape it into any shape.

Here I shaped it roughly into a block, then cut that in half. This makes two 1/2 pound sections.

I like to take 1/2 pound of it and make a stick out of it wrapped in waxed paper and the other half loose in one of my Pyrex dishes. I leave the Pyrex dish on my counter for toast and other spreadable needs and the 1/2 pound goes into my fridge for baking. 

It is Very easy and cost effective and worth a try. You simply turn on mixer, wait, pour, dab with towel and put in container and you have butter and buttermilk. You should try it.

I thought I would shared these easy flavored butters from my 1950’s Dionne Lucas Cordon Bleu Cook Book. You could really add anything to make a good butter.

I hope you enjoyed this and would like to give it a try. As homemakers we have to look to what is the smartest way to deal with higher prices and buying less. It should not mean we sacrifice taste and joy in cooking.

Happy Homemaking.

10 November 1957 “Blue Green Color Scheme with Clever Wall Storage, and Scones”

Although this article was concerning acoustical tiles that allow for a more soundproof home, I was taken by its vibrant color scheme and clever storage. This home is quite small but really a normal size for the burgeoning suburbs of the mid century. Sound was an issue due to the proximity of close neighbors as well as room to room and more open floor plans. Many new home owners of the growing middle class were either old apartment dwellers, who would have found the ‘small’ home quite spacious particularly with their own garden space. While many more established middle class families fractured away from the bigger family homes where grandmother and unmarried aunts people the many bedrooms and multiple floors.

So, the need for sound barrier was enough that it could support a product line. This same sound proofing would continue on as families made ‘rumpus rooms’ in basements and made over screen porches where Father or teens could listen to their new louder Hi-Fi systems without driving mother or neighbor nuts.

I was really taken by the color scheme. We have talked about blue green as a color scheme before. This use of almost navy on the wall with a pistachio on the steel cabinet and hints of robins egg are all married in the fabric of the curtain which slides to make various ‘rooms’.

This is my favorite bit. You can see here that these very shallow built ins were part of the acoustical wallboard makeover. but, these very same ideas could easily be done by any homemaker or hubby with a more traditional drywall and stud wall. Simply finding the studs and marking out the size you would need, you could either work in the 16’ width framework or open up a section by removing a bit of one of the studs and shoring it up with a 2x4 bracer at top and bottom. It it is an interior wall, even easier as there will be no insulation in the  way. This is the perfect place to use vintage or expensive wall paper as a backdrop where you could only afford a piece. Even a collage of Wallpapers from a free sample book being tossed by your local paint and paper store.

I have yet to redo my own kitchen. It began with more glorious ideas of add on to include a mudroom and separate laundry room and pantry. Every time I reconsider and think of the waste and money, I get more clever and downsize my plans. This built in ‘laundry room’ would be a clever way to do so. I am considering buying a used stackable washer dryer and selling our current normal sized pair that take up much of my kitchen space. This I would build into a corner and with the built in wall I could add these assets here. The more we think of what we do and how we can be more efficient, the less space we can do with when we use that space to its fullest.

So, again my kitchen plans shrink, but with smaller appliances hidden or below new counter space, I may even find room for my breakfast room I always wanted. And it might not need its own room, but simply another corner of my very small kitchen.

What do you think of the colors? Do you like the idea of combining a few working rooms into one, like laundry/kitchen?

And what does one love to do most in ones kitchen? Cook and Bake, of course and so here is a simple but yummy raison scone recipe. It is quite basic and if you don’t like raisons, chocolate chips, nuts, dried fruits can easily be used alone or in combination. This is just a good basic all round scone recipe.

Raisin Scone

1. 2 cups flour
2. 1  Tbs baking powder
3. 3 Tbs sugar
4. 1/4 tsp salt
5. 5 Tbs chilled butter cut into chunks
6. 1/2 cup raisons (or similar)
7. 1 cup cream or canned evaporate milk (use full strength don’t dilute)

Preheat oven to 425 F

Mix flour, baking powder, sugar and salt and add chilled butter cubes. Using a pastry cutter or two knives, cut butter into flour mixture until it is crumbly. You want little butter chunks as that adds flakiness.

Add raisins and cream stirring to combine. Then sprinkle lightly with more flour and flour a surface to roll dough out upon. Flour hands and place dough on floured surface. Knead one or twice, don’t over work it! Press down to about 1 inch thickness and cut with biscuit cutter or inverted glass. Place on greased cookie sheet and brush on cream/milk and sprinkle with sugar.

Bake about 12 minutes, but check as you want them to just have the slightest hint of brown. Remember food continues to cook after you take it out of the oven, so take them out a bit before they look brown enough.

 

Here they are before oven. And here they are after baking and setting. Look at that lovely texture and I love a good raisin scone. I had these as part of my tea break yesterday.

I hope you enjoy these and will consider using space you already have if you are planning any remodels. With our tightening belts we don’t have to do without, we just have to do with MORE brain and planning to most likely better results.

Happy Homemaking.

7 November 1957 “A Frugal State of Mind: Prepare for Harder Times so They Won’t Surprise You”

After my last post comparing our current economy’s direction towards similarities with the Great Depression of the 1930’s, I though I’d follow up with some happier talk. There may be little we can do at present to change the world (though every little bit of knowledge followed by smarter action leads to a greater change world wide) we can still become use to frugality in our daily life.

I thought of this the other day when I had a friend over. We were chatting in my kitchen and she laughed and said I reminded her of her Grandmother.

“Why?” I asked, “Because of my clothes?”

“No,” said she, because of that. And she pointed at my dish drain rack which was currently drying three upside down zip-lock bags and a drying paper towel. She said her Grandmother was always doing things like that.

I had to laugh, because for me it happened organically. In many of my Vintage choices since my project began back in 1955 (2009) they were decisive moves to “try out” and old fashion way. To put on and get used to the actions or clothes of that era. What I have found interesting now, is, that after walking in those shoes as best as one can living in the modern world, I have found myself coming to similar choices just by the nature of my way of life.

  To me, I never buy things like zip lock bags, as my waxed paper works for me to wrap hubbies sandwiches (when he has those for lunch) or my washable glass covered Pyrex dishes serve as ice box (refrigerator) storage. Today I thought of this because we recently had a group of us together and ordered take out Chinese food. We rarely get take out so after it was all done, I saved up all the plastic lidded containers as they are very good storage.

The idea that we have easy to buy and toss storage would never have occurred to me odd in my old life. But, my doppelganger 50’s personality sees too much waste. A zip lock bag that simply held dry or veg matter is easily enough washed out with warm soapy water, rinsed in cool and let dry. It can be used again and again. When it finally gives out, then it can get tossed. A paper towel, which I don’t use to clean normally, is easily enough rung out and let dry for a second go around or a quick hand wipe while cooking.

The amount of garbage we create since my project has easily been reduced to more than half. This less garbage also means less money, because if you are throwing it away, then you are tossing away your hard earned money as well.

This really got me thinking about how we humans, creatures of habit surely, can change. We don’t have to have a drastic change as I put myself and hubby through for our experiment. It can be little things like re-using zip lock bags, buying a few ingredients to make the things you normally buy, such as tortilla ( so simple to make) or bread. HERE is a post I did with tortilla and Bread recipes.

Even the way we live with heat is greatly changed. We once though nothing of just turning on the heat, setting it to what felt good and heating an entire house or apartment. Now, though we have an auxiliary heat of propane in our fireplace and wall unit heater, we even have reduced that. We originally added propane heat as a means to not have to use the electric heat which was expensive. We simply heated the area we were and left the other rooms cold. Now, with oil and propane prices rising, what was once a cheaper choice is now forcing us to look even closer at how we live. We now have two little plug in heaters that are quite economical. We can move them about. We do not heat rooms we are not in and mainly don’t use the larger rooms as time gets cold. Hubby and I each have our own little offices. My little sitting room/office is off my kitchen and dining room and is command central to me. Luckily, though I might have once thought it a hindrance, the room is Very tiny only about 9 x 9. But, with clever planning, I have a sofa and old trunk as a coffee table, my computer on a smaller but efficient desk and one wall of shelves that hold my books, magazines, decorative items to please the eye and my files for running our home and budgets. This room is closed off with a door and can be heated up in a jiffy with our little plug in and I simply turn it off and keep the door shut. It would be so much more to heat the whole house.

I have even come to enjoy that brisk cool feeling of the rest of the house. In many ways I think of our Victorian or even Colonial ancestors and what they felt was ‘normal’ for inside temperatures.

So, though electric heat can be expensive, if one uses a unit that plugs in (There are even darling little ones that look like real fireplaces) and only heat the room you are in, then you save. And, as a family, if you heat a shared room that mum and dad and kids can all share, you not only save, but you have more together time and chances to share with one another. There are myriad of reasons why we once were more a community based culture and one of those was the simple need to share resources and heat. Bodies in one room shared can increase the heat and have a better chance of enjoying their time there than a house of separate rooms holding one person and big areas empty in between heated for no one. Another place money can slip out the window.

I know I have talked about leftovers before and once you cook more for yourself and family, you will be happy for the leftover. A frugal homemaker’s best friend can be the meat grinder. These are still made today and are fairly inexpensive. I have a version in the Corner Store HERE.  You can get simply hand crank versions that use no electricity and are easy to use. Leftover meats stored in the ice box (fridge) even ground together, poultry, beef, are easily converted to a meat pie for dinner and leftovers again for lunch. A simple attachment even allows you to make your own sausage with leftover meats, add some apples and spices or even the bottom of that jam jar you might just toss away. Give it a good scoop and add that and you will be amazed how wonderful leftovers can taste.

You recently saw a spooky cake a friend made for our Halloween party. As she was leaving she said, “Oh it wasn’t that good, you can just toss it out” and I was shocked. “No way, is that going in the trash” I said.

I divvied up a few pieces into slices into a container to save for hubby’s lunches as is. Then I cut up the remainder and put in a buttered crockery deep baking dish. whipped some eggs and milk some sugar and cinnamon and simply poured it over the old cake. Cover that and bake for 40 minutes on 350F then another 10-15 uncovered and you have wonderful bread pudding. The rest of the fondant covering and the crumbs went out to the chicken yard and they loved it. They of course will convert it to eggs for us to enjoy. Waste not Want not is truly an adage I have come to live by.

Even the use of the car can be altered. I am able to live now with one car as I work at home. So, I plan my marketing and errands in such a way that I try to do them all in one day and as local as possible to save on gas and wear and tear on the car. The old me would have felt ‘trapped’, “What do you mean I can’t just hop in my car and drive off somewhere to a shop or lunch with friends”. Well, now I prefer to walk or bike, don’t have to stress about traffic as much and we use easily half the gas. Unfortunately, as gas has risen since 1955 (2009) for us, we are spending close to what we did with two cars. So there was an example of preparedness that paid off. Had we stayed with two cars, insurance, gas and upkeep it would have been a greater burden when gas prices rose, as well as repair costs just to general inflation.

Learning to do with less or to live frugally does not have to seem like a prison sentence and in many ways is the reverse and quite freeing. And with the outlook of our future seeming more bleak than bright, it is better to get on board right away with a few things here and there. When one really just tries to think of it like this: Every trip to the garbage can, stop, think of what you are tossing and why? Did you need it? Could you still use it again? Was it a waste because you didn’t have the time or make the time to use it? Try to change that behavior or action so next week that same trip to the Garbage doesn’t happen again. It sounds simply and silly but it makes you think. And really, thinking and considering is a lost art in the modern world.

The sounds and constant noise and distraction of the modern world makes for an easy place to simply live without thinking. It is easy to grab that credit card and go or just use and toss away, why not? Its so easy and there are so many distractions. We can, however, very happily live in the modern world with cell phones and i-pads and i-pods and computers AND still be thoughtful of our use and waste on a day to day basis. Even simple things like what we spend as a nation on coffee and muffins. Coffee, though going up in price at the store, is still MUCH cheaper to make at home and take with you as is making your own ‘treats’. So, still sit on that park bench or relax with friends outside at a cafe, but let them pay $10 for a cup of coffee and muffin, you slip your little thermos out and your waxed paper wrapped treat and enjoy their company while still keeping your money. They may laugh at you or you even become the ‘quaint little old lady’ of the group, but you still enjoy the experience and have your pin money to spare.

I know these may seem like simple or silly ideas, but I thought it would be fun to start a dialogue about easy ways to simplify ones life to both save money and to make it easier. I love learning from one another and I honestly KNOW that one CAN change bad behaviors. If we want a new or better life we can work towards by being mindful and paying attention to how we live and spend. The homemakers number one tool is her Mind and Intelligence. Let’s keep exercising that muscle and see what clever and mindful things we can achieve.

Happy Homemaking.