Veteran's Day

I love Veteran's Day. For many years now I have called my grandfathers and my grandfather-in-law to thank them for what they did for me and our country when they were young men. This year I will call my grandfather in Michigan to thank him. I'll think of my paternal grandfather and the stories he told about seeing Paris at it's height of destruction after WWII. I'll also think about my husband's grandfather and all the stories he never told a soul about his four years of service in Europe during WWII. Then I'll call my little brother to thank him for serving two long deployments as a Marine in Iraq. Great courage is what it took to do their jobs to protect our country and years of great courage to come home and pick up their lives and carry on. Thank you!

Grade B Baby!

For several years I have been reading about Grade B maple syrup. The elusive syrup that is made after the Grade A syrup you find in the store, the stuff maple syrup makers save for themselves to pour on their pancakes and drizzle over their vanilla ice cream. An internet search showed where I could order some, after I won the lottery that is. I resigned myself to enjoying the regular stuff until that fine day when we could visit Vermont and hunt some down.

Well then, I was perusing our natural food store, filling up my jar with some blackstrap molasses from the bulk section, when what should I see but a spigot labeled Grade B Maple Syrup! Could it be? If you happened to see a woman crying in the bulk section, that was me. I filled up my jar, toted it home and proceeded to sample the nectar with a spoon. Of course, my husband caught me so then I had to share. Now every Friday morning you will find us pouring our Grade B (that's what we call it) over our pancakes and the person who cleans up the kitchen gets to lick the spoon!

Friday Photo

Inspired by my very own creative mother, I have been taking at least one photograph everyday. Doesn't sound all that ambitious, but sometimes I'll go several days without picking up my camera. To rectify that I have been taking daily photographs of life around me. And this, my friends, is my offering to you this week. I do hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Of Disasters, Culinary and Otherwise

Lately I have been slightly forgetful and distracted. Not too bad of a problem unless you forget to turn off the burner under a pan with a colander full of pasta in it. Then being forgetful tends to chap your hide. And did you know that after it cools, you can peel melted plastic right off of the beautiful pan you just "inherited" that same week from your mother-in-law. A great deal can be accomplished with a good dose of determination!

And a little note to self, if you put some chair cushions into the washer to clean them, check them first to see what they are stuffed with. In the off chance that they are stuffed with a million little chunks of foam, try another method of cleaning besides the trusty old washing machine. Otherwise you will find yourself scooping out wet little chunks of foam with a dixie cup for at least half an hour. And that's all the nuggets of advice from little old me today!

Thrifting Treasures

On a recent trip to see my family, my mom and I treated ourselves to a day of thrift shopping, antique browsing and non-stop talking in a town near their farm. Of course, since it was just us girls (Sweet Babe was with us) we ate yummy girl food for lunch at a charming lunch spot.

Two of my favorite finds of the day are featured in the photo above. I am delighted by the teacup from the Hotel Peabody in Memphis Tennessee which is still in operation. Of all the china patterns I have seen, this is one of my all time favorites. The weight of it is what makes it perfect. It's like those old restaurant mugs that are just the thing for a steaming mug of coffee on a cold morning. Extra cream please. In fact, I had my coffee in it this morning!

The New Encyclopedia of Modern Sewing is beautiful, full of photos and sketches from the fifties. I picked it up because it had a whole chapter about recovering furniture, something I plan to undertake quite soon. I do believe it will be right at home by my collection of Home Ec books from the fifties.

What is your favorite thrifted or antique treasure?

Read it and Weep

I have a friend here in town, she's one of the doctors at the pediatric clinic we use, and God is using her to transform ordinary lives. Without knowing what would come if it, she embarked on a short medical mission trip to Haiti last winter. Next month she will be going back for the fourth time. To say that God captured her heart through the people of Haiti would be a serious understatement. Her blog, Beyond this Mountain has been transforming my life.

We all read and hear of disasters though there hasn't been anything as devastating as the earthquake in Haiti in our time. I think it is easy to become numb to devastation and statements like "300,000 to 500,000 people died in the earthquake in Haiti". The fact that I could skim over statements like that and read the rest of the paper broke my heart. When you break it down into amounts you can visualize it's not so easy to pass over. There are about 68,000 people living in my town, if you go with the smallest number of deaths, that's about 4 1/2 times the people living here. For every person I see, there would be almost 4 other people who would be dead too. Kind of heard to swallow.

What my friend Stacy is writing about are the people who survived and are now living in what's left. This is what is changing my heart. There are very few jobs, their translators earn $10 dollars a day when they have work. One of them supports his parents and 8 siblings with his $10 a day when he can get work. Work that he has to walk up to 2 hours a day to have, 2 hours each way, in 100+ degree weather. Now whenever I spend money, I break it down into how many days it would take them to earn that. He would have to work 3 days to buy these diapers, 1 day to pay for my library fine, 1 and 1/2 days to pay for this book. Makes it all look different.

Please read Stacy's blog, really read it. Join me in thinking and praying about what you can do. Let the reality of what is happening to these people sink in.

Life

Oh my, it's been too long since I took the time to write. I do love my little bit of the blog world but I've been swept away with life and busyness lately. We've been working on school, making worm jars, eating, cleaning up from eating, cooking, doing laundry, kissing the baby and the other ones who used to be babies. I've been adjusting to our new homeschool schedule and figuring out how to teach more than one student at a time. Of course, there is the perpetual refereeing of fights and administering of justice. There's even been a bit of sewing going on. Not anything ambitious but still, it's refreshing to get out my machine and remind myself that I do love to sew.

These photos are of my kitchen and dining room/school room. I love this space, it's small but homey. We use every inch of it and lately it has been showing it. My usual means of self-motivation aren't working to get a cleaning system in place but I'm trying to get rolling. I've used several cleaning systems in the past, including FlyLady (which I love) but something in the back of my mine says the "just get up and do something" system would work just fine. Thanks for listening to my ramblings about life and cleaning. I hope your fall is off to a glorious start!