In My Home This Week: Autumn Dreams

 

In my home this week:  I'm going to take a break from the vintage kitchen photos for a bit.  I've shared almost all of my most favorite ones and I find myself now sharing those I don't really like at all. I can't do them justice with my dislike of them so I'll hold off for a while.   If I come across an especially pretty design I'll be sure to share it with you.

In the meantime, what to add to this post to add a little extra interest?  There are so many things I can't trim them down.  Armstrong designer Hazel Dell Brown did more than kitchens.  She also designed basements and bathrooms.   Kohler's vintage bathrooms can be rather stunning, too.  So I'll look for some of those to share with you as time goes on.  Or a pretty set of vintage house plans.  I'll keep my eyes open and add something in but for this week, we'll go plain and simple old weekly routine post...

Work:  

I'll not do a zone work task this week.   We'll start a new month at the end of this week and overall I'm fairly satisfied with what I've accomplished in my home for September.   The shed is orderly and clean.  The kitchen is looking more shipshape.  I've decluttered various areas here and there as I had time.

I do find Caleb takes quite a bit of time and attention.   I can manage some kitchen tasks with him underfoot but I've yet to figure out how to do housework except when he's napping.  He wants to be right up in whatever I'm trying to do, so it's easier to sit and just watch him if I'm not working at the kitchen counter!   He's a curious little boy who wants to know how things work, why they make the noises they do, what's inside places I'd as soon he didn't go into, etc.  Just a normally curious little boy but smart enough to figure out just about how long a back might be turned and he can get into a space he's not wanted to go into.  So for that reason I limit my work time to kitchen tasks I can keep out of his reach and no others!

Therefore, Sunday's now become my 'reset' day for the house.  I'll do dishes, laundry, floors, and food prep to get ahead.  And that means planning out these tasks on a Saturday, as well as bringing out foods to thaw for the week so I can prep ahead those portions I need to do in order to streamline tasks during the week.

Make some adjustments on our phone account.   Get a contract number for John's paperwork that he needs to submit to another company.  Write a few checks for current bills that have come in.

Make October goals.  Golly can you believe it's time to think of October?

I'm going to try and salvage an hour to rest each day midday while he's lying down instead of rushing through tasks as I've been doing and finding that I collapse in my chair exhausted only to have him wake within a minute of my sitting down.  That's been no fun for me at all and in the end, what I got done was barely noticeable in the week overall.

John wants to patch some holes in the walls in our bathroom but I'm tired already of waiting on him so I am going to push ahead and clean and paint the walls that don't need patching.  There are several sections of wall that need no work and if I can paint those then I'm that much ahead.  And perhaps, maybe, he might feel spurred to move on to those tasks if he sees that the bulk of the bathroom is painted.   One does have hope at any rate.

Kitchen:

A small list of gathered fragments to begin the week with: Grits.  Roast with plenty of broth.   A few mashed potatoes. Some green beans.  Half the usual weekend leftovers of pizza.  A single serve of chicken pot pie, two BBQ brisket sandwiches (why John wanted to buy two each I don't know!  I truly think he was just that hungry at the time).  Some tomatoes I think might have been frozen when they got pushed to the back of the fridge.  Half a can of pineapple slices.  A heel end of bread large enough to make strata or croutons.  Most of a jar of Marinara.  Tortillas. Yogurt Whey.  Spinach Dip.  I'm sure there's more.  That's just 'top of my head' listing there...  I need to sort it out on Sunday and make a thorough list and then make my plans.

I have ideas of course, but haven't quite worked out the menu in entirety.  I'll  make a separate post tomorrow (Sunday) and share then, along with any extra things I find to add to my fragments.

I'd hoped to make bagels last week.   I know John's ready for some.  He was a sport about my Pumpkin Bread or Pumpkin Muffin breakfast choices this weekend but not likely to enjoy that twice.  I'd like to make English Muffins as well.  I am going to try to use my pizza stone for baking my breads this week.  We'll see how that goes.  I don't know if I can manage baking two batches with Caleb underfoot all in one day. 

Leisure:  

Go to my final Elijah study class.

Try to rest while Caleb is down for a nap each day.  Preferably for an hour each day but I'll take a half hour if that's as far as I can get... Rest is the priority, so I'll rest first and go back to work second until I hear him wake.

Read.  Just finished another Julia Quinn book, When He Was Wicked,  and am ready to move on to something else.  Haven't made up my mind what it shall be, but I'll let you know as soon as I do pull a book from the shelf.