The Week Behind: Pollen and Blooms

Friday:  Forgot I'd told Bess to come over today so we could discuss Josh's home school agenda and my part in it.  I am glad I got myself busy right away that morning and had done all but the vacuuming in the main room.

Josh and I worked on two or three things this morning before Bess arrived.  I guess we spent about thirty minutes working.  Then he watched a video on the Kindle (actually learned something too...He told Bess and I all about it and taught us something we didn't know).   Later I was pleased to see that I was on target with my 'sample' teaching this morning, because all of what we did was in a workbook his Gammy had sent him.

The Home Stretch: Part II Making Beef Stretch

Having learned the value of a pantry long ago, I confess I've never understood why others would forgo having one.  By the same token, I grew up with a family garden...My husband, who was raised in West Palm Beach has never been on board with gardening.   Obviously minds can be changed   I'll expect that those who've never kept a pantry will plan to create one.  In the meantime, we still must eat, whether we have no pantry or no garden.

Meat is generally the most high cost item on our menu.   When there's only a very limited amount on the grocery shelves we must learn to stretch what we're able to buy.  This is where a casserole becomes your best friend.   If your family is just not a casserole eating family then I suggest you think of all the dishes you make that are not casserole like chili, spaghetti, etc.  Both can become a casserole type dish and most families do not object to such meals.  However, in the current economy it's best to figure out now how to cut back on the meat content in those dishes and how to stretch the few meals where you typically would serve a portion of meat.

The Home Stretch: Getting The Most from Our Foods Part 1

Years ago we were po'...John says we had so little money we didn't even qualify for being properly poor!  During those days we had five children, two in diapers and one of those two on formula and two adults and two dogs to feed on a daily basis.   We didn't have a garden nor equipment to do gardening and so we relied on what we could buy at the grocery for our pittance of money.  It wasn't a lot but we fed every single one of us.

Victory Gardening of Sorts

There are a great many people who are suddenly interested in planting a vegetable garden and who can blame them?   For years now, we've rather taken it for granted we'll walk into a grocery store and purchase whatever our heart desires in any season (at a price but alas, that's the cost of heart desires!) and take it home to eat.

Suddenly we're looking at bare grocery shelves...And a great many people are thinking, "Wait a minute...Grandma and Grandpa grew that!"

The Week Ahead: Blooming Season

The roses began blooming yesterday.  It was a surprise to me because the previous two nights and mornings had been quite cool.  But as Bess was heading back home, I stepped off the back porch to look the pots over to see if maybe the basil or oregano was going to make an effort to come back (yes for the Basil) and there were deep red roses blooming on the lower half of the branches.  We walked over to the Rosemary bush and the yellow rose was blooming as well.

As I looked out the kitchen window later Friday afternoon, I saw a small patch of honeysuckle had bloomed.  There is no lovelier country bouquet than old fashioned roses and honeysuckle vine in a simple glass jar together.  You can't buy that at any store!

The Week Behind: Patiently Content

Saturday:  An absolutely beautiful day today.  Ever more green with each morning, nature is showing itself bound by no man, no calendar and no virus.

No work for us today.  I do make the bed, but dishes are rinsed and stacked, meals are super easy.  Today we had frozen fried chicken.  It was okay.  Not horrible, not great.  This was an item we used to buy years ago as a treat but the quality is not the same.  It was edible but I'll not purchase this particular brand again.

Worth Sharing: Perfect English

In my searching this week on Pinterest I came across this article by Leta Austin Foster.   I knew I'd found a designer I could follow when I read her tip on using books you read and love and collect in your interior design.  Seriously.  I'm so over the backward books, the coverless books bound with twine, the designers who suggest you put the books away. 

While Leta Austin Foster is based in Palm Beach, her style is described as traditional...I think it looks very upscale British.    I LOVED this tip:

5. Forget the colour of the year! What an advertising gimmick that is, beloved by paint companies who would love for you to feel you needed to repaint all the time. But you want to decorate for the ages, not just today. Choose colours which you love and can live with. They needn’t match your fabrics – in fact, I almost never match fabrics to the paints, but of course, you would like them to look good together. And don’t tell your friends the colours you have chosen. Usually what is your favorite is not their favorite.