October: Snow, completed projects and gorgeous fall color!

 Well, October 2017 brought snow! That's early even for us. It snowed right on our fall colored trees and bushes. It was so much fun to watch, because they were wet, warm big snow 'bunches' as opposed to snow flakes. Nothing actually stuck, which is why that kind of snow is everyone's favorite.

 

 Other news of interest to my grandsons, is that Papa finally finished his shed, paint and all. He built it from his head and scrap materials, and it turned out so nice and holds lots of storage stuff.

 This was a sign that the grandsons gave him, and he's been saving it for just the right time. It now tells everyone who this shed belongs too! Looks great guys.

 This is the other shed, which we cleaned out and turned from a junk shed to a garden shed. Great to get these projects done!

 I will just leave you with a little fall color in the yard. The sedum which is lovely in the fall, and just keeps coming back each year in it's planters.

 A red wing maple tree, that is my favorite!

And a burning bush...which really looks like it is burning in the sunshine.

Have a great rest of October everyone!

A New Way of Looking at Things

A while ago, I was reading on one of my favorite blogs (Susan Branch, Millie) about using old fashioned liquid bleach on linens. I decided then and there to try it out. I remembered my mother using it, and then ironing the damp fabrics. It was a trial and error for me.

I first collected all the vintage doilies, and linens I have all around the house. This is NOT by any stretch all of them!

I then ordered the bleach from Amazon. They still make the same old stuff....who knew?

Next I washed all the linens and line dried them to get out the yellowed/rust spots and make them smell sooo good! There is nothing like UV rays for whitening and brightening. Then I brought them all in and slowly soaked them in a mix of 1 part water to 2-3 parts starch. Back out to the line to dry again. I tried bringing them in damp to iron, but it didn't really work, so I let them dry again. Only this time they were STIFF.

But the ironing was easier and they came out lovely, slightly stiff, crisp and white, and they stay that way! Now ironing is not my favorite domestic chore, but somehow ironing vintage tablecloths, aprons, clothes, doilies and runners is more fun and rewarding.

Here are a few, line dried, and waiting for the iron.

I am now in the process of cleaning the linen closet, putting some out for display, and the rest nestled in their closet.

 It feels like Grandma's house around here, but I don't care because I LOVE vintage linens. (But it was a lot of work!) A rewarding household project, completed.

It's Good To Have Family!

 We traveled to Woodland recently, to help Joy & Kirk & Macy move. They decided to downsize for a while, and sold their big house now that most of the kids are grown and on their own. I must say that I think moving is on everyone's list of NOT favorite things to do. Necessary but not easy. At least we did have beautiful fall weather, and all our moving was done between rain showers.

 We had the senior brigade helping out. The insurance man and I, and Kirk's dad Bob and stepdad Danny. Kirk and his brother Kevin worked hard while Joy and I and Macy packed and then unpacked.

 They moved into an unusual rental place. Their friend Jeff had taken an old house and renovated it (it is rented and occupied) and then built a large (2000+ sq ft) apartment over the garage. It is a beautiful place, and I thought I'd post a few photos so you can see where they moved to.

 Main Bathroom...

 Kitchen

 Main living space on 1st floor (with stairs in background leading up to the apartment)

 The room that will be their office and work space (lots of light)

 They have doors going out to balconies all around the 1st floor..

And the family area upstairs on their 2nd floor.

It is a beautiful apartment, and Jeff's work is wonderful. It's new construction made to look and feel old. Just my kind of place! 

Macy and Joy taking a quick break! 

Hopefully I can take a few photos of the place when I get there next, and after Joy has put things away and you can really see what it's like!

Feeling a Bit Domestic

 It's July and it's hot outside, so I typically garden first thing in the morning and try to be inside by around 10am. I am free from piano lessons this summer, and so have decided to do several cleaning chores and some extra cooking with some of my free time. The first thing I decided to do was to try and make sauerkraut like Julie posted on here some while ago. I cut up my head of cabbage, and decided to use the crock above to ferment it in. After adding my salt, I put it into the crock above and weighted it down with agates in a bowl. After all it is summer, and the agates remind me of the beach, the cool beach. I think I left it in the crock for 6 or 7 days. I had never done this before, and I don't think I have actually tasted sauerkraut many times in my life. Certainly never homemade. A real adventure. The insurance man was dubious....

It came out beautifully, not too strong but rather salty. I decided to add it with other ingredients my first time out, so I sliced up some sweet onion and bell pepper, and stir fried them with the sauerkraut all together and added some large chunks of Italian sausage. It was good, but could have used more seasoning. We both liked it. I am going to try a different recipe for the kraut I have left.

Another morning I decided to clean out and organize the freezer. It's so much easier to find things, and to organize the meat we have to use it better. Each year we get 1/2 of a beef, grown by some good friends in Prineville. Anyway, I found 2 packs of soup bones and decided to make my own beef bone mineral broth. 

 

I cooked the bones with lots of veggies and scraps for flavor, and cooked the whole thing for 24 + hours. My first time to cook it that long. It made a nice rich broth when strained. The recipe said that the broth would gel as it cooled, and sure enough it did. I added the veggies and spices for a nice beef soup and could just feel all that goodness going down. There was actually a lot of meat on my soup bones, not like the photo above, so the soup was really yummy. (I even shared the cooked bones with a couple of black labs visiting next door.) It made a lot of soup, so it went into my nice clean freezer for another soup day.

 

 

And finally, I made up some freezer jam. It was and is a good year for berries in Oregon. I made strawberry, raspberry and a batch of strawberry/raspberry combo. We will be enjoying that this autumn.  

 

Tomorrow I am going to polish my silver in the morning. Next week I have in mind to clean out my china hutch and wash all the dishes. Who knows?

Spring Cleaning

Can you guess what I've been doing?

I decided to get going and really do some Spring Cleaning this year. During my working years, I discovered that deep cleaning is a luxury, not a gruesome chore. When you never have enough time for it, you come to relish the time when you do get it.

Last week, I had help. My granddaughter Kory came for Spring Break, and helped me out. When people would find out what we were doing for her Spring Break, they would wrinkle their noses, and think what a terrible Grammy to make her clean.

But it wasn't like that at all. We had fun being together, talking and listening to music. And it felt so good when we would finish up a project. Of course, that wasn't all we did all week. We cleaned for part of each day (which was about all this older body could handle) then do some fun things. I took some fun photos of Kory cleaning, cooking and trying out brussels sprouts for the first time. However, I just discovered that I didn't have my camera chip in when I took the photos. They are on the small 'hard drive' of my camera, and I have no idea how to copy them off. Anyone??

Well, my bathroom, closet, bedroom and now the upper hall are finished. Sure wish Kory were still here!!

Line Drying

I'm just starting into my Spring Cleaning, and the weather last week was perfect. Warm, partly sunny and VERY breezy. I started out with washing and drying all my doilies and runners, then hanging them out to dry. I love line drying, and with the stiff breeze it couldn't have been better.

I'm so glad that clothesline time is back!

Spring Cleaning Still

SPRING CLEANING

Furniture moved

Curtains washed

Dust motes in sunlight

Clean windows

Old wood polished

Summer clothes washed

Things sorted & thrown out

A fresh beginning

Best dishes washed

Floor corners scrubbed

A new look

Silver polished

Drawers cleaned

A sense of satisfaction

Rest on a rainy night

Last week I tackled this room, and it took me all day...just one room! But it felt so good that night.
Then I did some spring cleaning in the garden. We have a row of these arborvitae that we put in late last fall. I had to wade into the middle of each, and shake out all the winter dead stuff, clip some brown branches and then rake and compost all the brown. They are definitely perky today with their new 'haircuts'.

January Cleaning

This is not MY clean house, but one I admire...

I, Jennie, sincerely appologize to those who have been watching in vain for a new blog post. Christmas, and then the following days just overwhelmed me with too many fun things to keep up with. Since New Year's, I have been struggling to creep out from under a huge pile of to-do's, and am just now seeing the light of day so to speak.

So, onward and upward in the dawn of a new decade. I am still here, and still busy, but feel like I am getting on top of things. One of the biggest things that needed doing was cleaning. I have been busy deep-cleaning everything I can find. I thought I was about to get it, and I still found a Christmas book for 2-year old Macy under something that I moved to vacuum under. We did have fun though....

I do love to clean. After the years of working and parenting, when I never had enough time to clean, it is a real joy to have the time now. I love the feeling of a thoroughly clean room, and always enjoy January when I can find more space again, and the peacefulness of clean, rightly-ordered rooms. May we all enjoy the process along with the results.

Loving and Polishing Silver

I am a lady that loves silver things, and the way they shine in sunlight or candlelight. I don't mind polishing it, as I like to see the tarnish vanish and sparkle restored. I have several items, mostly inherited and I cherish each. Above is a christening cup presented to the family upon the birth of the insurance mans' grandfather, Otto Asmussen. They were a German family, and so the cup shows his name as: Otto Detlef Cesar Asmussen, but generally he just went by Otto Carl. I keep it on top of my silverware chest with a few miscellany silver spoons inside. The silverware chest holds a set of Sterling Silver for 10, inherited from my Aunt Minnie. I believe she purchased it in the 1920's. It is always so much fun to set the table with it, and when I keep it in it's box, there is hardly any tarnish to be dealt with.

A few years ago my mother-in-law gave me this teapot, which was handed down in the Asmussen family and brought from Germany. The silver is thin, much more so than my other pieces, but so ornate and pretty.

No, this is not silver...your eyes are not deceiving you! I just snapped this photo, because I keep it next to the silver. The tray I got from Julie one year for my birthday, and I chose to fill it with sand dollars and sea shells. I will wait for another day to tell you the story of Happy Camp and finding all those wonderful whole sand dollars. All the white just sets off the silver so nicely.

And last but not least...my silver tea service. The actual service is the coffeepot and teapot in the back along with a sugar and creamer, front sides, and the tray. The insurance man and I found this one summer in Aloha, Oregon and decided to purchase it for our 25th (silver) anniversary. I have so enjoyed it...and it has had an honored place at family weddings and anniversary celebrations. After I got it home I found that not all the pieces match....they are from two different patterns, but it didn't matter because I loved them both. Also in the center of the tray is a sugar bowl that matches the teapot from Germany. The creamer was lost in the days of John's grandma Addie Asmussen. Center front is a little silver 'baby' cup that was given as a gift on the birth of my insurance man...(back in the day when silver was a special gift). All of these pieces get used, and that means tarnish...but it's not a bad chore on a rainy afternoon, and then to see them glow in that evening's candlelight is a true blessing. It made me think this morning of how God polishes the 'tarnish' away from us, to reveal not our own sparkle...but the sparkle of His Glory. I'm so glad He doesn't mind the work....

Cleaning...where nobody sees

Well, if you know me, you know that cleaning has never been one of my stronger abilities. The older I get, the better I get at it. I do like things to look nice, so picking up is something I do a lot of. But when it comes to cleaning the places that nobody really sees...I confess I rarely do it. Now, this is probably human nature and common to everyone and yet I think some people are better "cleaners" than others. SO...I cleaned behind my fridge. (I'm patting my own back so hard, you can hear it). I'm not sure what inspired this out-of-character act, but boy, did it feel good. Cleaning does feel amazingly good. And I must add that one cannot deep clean these "invisible" places without thinking of the cleaning that is needed in one's soul in the places that nobody sees. In short, I highly recommend this little ritual. How does it get so dirty back there?

A Two Saturday Project

My insurance man owns his own little office building and his own business. This means some maintenance needs to happen occasionally. The last two Saturdays we painted the interior of the office...since it had been about 14 years since it last saw a new coat of paint. This has the end result of not only a new color and feel, but it looks a lot cleaner and we threw away 14 years of accumulation also. The color is one of those nice ones that change with the light. In the strong early morning light it is a 'coffee with cream' color, and in the late afternoon it looks almost a creamy yellow. Very nice and easy on the eyes. It feels good to have that project done, and the furniture back in its place.
His office building is a former little house with the insurance office on one side and they rent out the other to a hearing aid office. We are grateful to own the building and grateful it is not any bigger! After the holidays we will tackle a little touch-up on the trim and a few other improvements. A little improving at a time does wonder for the spirit...


"When thou hast thanked thy God
For every blessing sent,
What time will then remain
For murmurs or lament?"

Archbishop Richard Chenevix Trench

Our Saturday project was to locate, purchase and bring home a good used refrigerator for an extra in our garage. Right before our trip to W.V. I found the frig in our garage running with no refrigeration. We lost a few items, but didn't have much stored there at the time. We found a new one on Craig's List, made the deal, and brought it home. Like most used refrigerators, the family did not think it important to clean the old one after getting a nice new one. And like most, I do not relish the task of cleaning out a frig. My darling husband spent the afternoon with me, and we both cleaned it and he did a little repair work on the seal. Here it is, all clean and sparkling, in place, and ready for food. Our old frig finally 'gave up the ghost'. It has been with us through thick and thin for over 30 years, doing a never-failing job. They just don't make 'em like that anymore! After growing a little too small, it retired to the garage to hold our overflow, and has carried on there for many good years. I am a little sorry to see it go...as it will be hauled away to our dump this week. It still looks so good...but farewell to a hard-working and faithful appliance.

Beauty is a well-made and functional appliance!