Getting There

Not my brightest moment.

Last Saturday, I spent the afternoon driving around to all the different grocery stores in our area, stocking up on all the sale items at each store. I do this every week in an effort to stretch our grocery dollars as far as possible. The roads were wet and sloppy that day. One turn in the road before our driveway, our van slid to the side in the wet snow, and smashed quite hard into the curb. The wheel rim was pretty damaged - a big crack and dent.

My husband, I must say, was very nice about it. He didn't even frown. But I felt so foolish!

At first we thought maybe it wouldn't matter - but as the week progressed, the crack grew and Chris had to leave work early yesterday to visit the junkyard for a new rim. It cost $125.

Ironic, isn't it? Here I was trying to hard to save every penny, and instead I ended up costing us over a hundred. I was so ticked at myself. We are supposed to be saving everything we can right now for a downpayment, not plunking down money for car repairs. 

Oh well. These things happen. Let's hope I can manage the rest of the winter without any more mishaps...

Getting started on my boy's quilt.

After taking a week off homeschooling, I feel better. Not only did it give me a bit of a breather, which I really needed, but I trained the boys to put away their own laundry and clean their own room, and Kira to do the laundry. This is a big help, and I feel content.

Another thing I feel happy about: I have finally gotten started on the quilt I wanted to make Jasper for Christmas. I know, I know, I'm starting late...it's just going to be a simple patchwork of squares, but I did want to make it full size (to fit on a twin bed) and I also am not exactly experienced. The only other quilt I made was a doll quilt.   And I guess I made a quilted purse too, although it wasn't very impressive--the seams were all crooked.

Plus, I am planning on embroidering his name over a few squares...and hand quilting the entire thing. Hmmm. Well, it's good to be ambitious, right?

The past few days I have left my cutting mat out on top of the freezer in the back room, and I have been cutting a few squares every time I go in there to do laundry or get something out of storage. At least I am getting started. I will just have to see how far I can get by Christmas.

I was lucky to receive some really cute fabric from a kind reader to help with this project. I really appreciated that because cost is an issue for me--the entire reason I decided to make a quilt to begin with was that we needed more blankets and I wasn't able to spend the money on all-cotton bedding. I did however, decide to buy just one yard of fabric to add in. It was only $5. Jasper really has a thing for horses, and I found this fabric on Etsy that I think he will love. I hope it gets here soon!

I still haven't decided if I will stuff the quilt with sewn-together old cloth diapers, or if I will use two flannel sheets sewn together. I am leaning towards the sheets though, because I don't want to make this project overwhelming for myself.

Is anyone else working on gifts for Christmas right now?

Just a little thing.

Our house has been so chilly the past few days...and I am loathe to turn on the electric heaters, because I know that once I do our utility bill will suddently skyrocket.

I worry about the children though, so I have been trying to make sure everyone is warmly dressed. I didn't have a hat for Amy--I had plenty of newborn hats, but none of them fit anymore. And I didn't really want to buy a hat. I thought of making a cute aviator style cap, with a ribbon tie, but I couldn't find any patterns that didn't look much too complicated for me.

The house was really quite cold yesterday afternoon, and I wanted a hat for her pronto! So I grabbed an old plum coloured work shirt of Chris's that had done that annoying thing that shirts do--become wide and short. I laid it out flat, cut out a rough hat shape (I didn't even bother to draw it first) and then sewed both sides together. It took me more time to find a chopstick to turn the end out than it did to make it, for real!

Amy seems to like it. Now I want to make more hats. It really struck me how easy it was for me to find a solution to the problem at hand (cold, bald baby head) using what I had, without spending a penny. I know I know, it's just a hat, it took zero skill, but a few years ago I wouldn't have even thought of doing that. I would have dragged the baby out to a department store and spent $5 or $10 on a little hat which might have looked fancier but wouldn't have been any more serviceable.

I am inspired. From now on, I will look at every cast-off T-shirt as potential baby garments. I can't wait to experiment!

Thinking toward Christmas.

Last year Chris and I made most of our children's gifts, and we all agreed it was the best Christmas ever. This year, we would like to make gifts once more. So I am trying to get my act together and get some things started. Last year, I pretty much waited until early December and ended up regretting that!

One reason I haven't done anything yet is that still, my sewing machine has been giving me problems. Maybe I am not mechanically inclined, but I seem to have nothing but difficulties with sewing machines! I thought it had been fixed back in the summer, but it still jammed up, and also had a new clicking sound--the repairman that came to our house and charged me an arm and a leg turned out to be rather unscrupulous, it would seem. This time Chris took the machine to a reputable shop and they gave it a complete overhaul. It now runs perfectly (for the first time ever), and no weird clicking sounds. I am so excited about this!

I have learned my lesson. If I ever have problems with it again, I will not mess around and take it straight to the professionals!

The first thing I want to make is a quilt for my youngest boy, Jasper. We don't have enough bedding in our home and lately when I tried to look for blankets in the store, I was disappointed to find that bedding made of natural fibres is beyond our price range. My boys sweat a lot when they are sleeping; it seems cruel to wrap them in polyester at bedtime! So I thought an all-cotton quilt would be a nice thing to make for either one of them.

I don't have much to spend at all, but I do have a good quantity of fabric that was given me by a friend earlier in the year before she moved. I looked through the bag, and there are a number of fabrics that would be all right for a little boy.

Yes, it's a bit of a loud combination, but as a simple patchwork it might look okay, and besides, it's what I have to work with. :) I was thinking of purchasing maybe one yard of fabric in a horse print to add in, since Jasper adores horses. I think that would make it special for him.

I found a navy flannel sheet I can use for the back. For the filling, I had a weird idea--somebody tell me please if this is crazy. It's necessary for me to do this as inexpensively as possible. I have a lot of cloth prefold diapers from Jasper's baby days that are not being used. They are quite worn and I don't know if they would survive another baby. So I thought it might be possible for me to sew together the cloth diapers to create a nice warm center for the quilt. Is this a bad idea? I am well aware that it would probably look a bit lumpy, but I don't think my boy would mind. Anyhow, my main concern is to keep him warm, more than anything else, since our house is very drafty and cold in the winter.

I have a small quilting project in mind for my eldest, too--but of course I can't say what it is, because she reads my blog!

That's all I have planned for now. But I will continue to look for more ideas. I have placed a button on my right sidebar for Handmade Holiday 2011, which is organized by Tonya of Plain and Joyful Living. If you click on it you will see a list of blogs that will feature posts this holiday season on making handmade gifts.

Is anyone else planning any handmade gifts yet? Please tell me about it!

Thinking about thrifting.

Buying needed items second hand fits into my philosophy of living a simple, frugal lifestyle, and I try to do it whenever possible. I am currently in need of fall clothes, so I betook myself yesterday to the biggest Value Village in town. The one I went to is quite huge and I hoped I'd get some great deals.

I hoped I'd get some deals even though, I have noticed over the past couple of years that the prices in thrift stores have been rising alarmingly. Granted, the only stores near me are part of this particular chain. Maybe I need to shop around more. But still, there it is. I did buy myself 3 long sleeved shirts, and they were $8 each. In fact, all of the reasonably decent women's shirts were that price. This seems kind of high to me for someone else's half-worn-out shirts, especially once you add in the 13% sales tax, but it's still a little bit cheaper than getting a new shirt for $12 at Walmart, so I paid it, although not without qualms. (There was one sweater I really liked that was $15, which I refused to pay.)

I also got a few other things: a hairdryer for $5, some pajama pants for $5, and a cake plate for $3, since I am planning on making a pumpkin cake for Thanksgiving and I don't even own a plate large enough to put a cake on! I actually wanted to get one of those ones with a glass dome, and they did have one--but the store wanted $10 for it. That seems silly when they are $15 brand new.

One thing I got which seemed like a good deal was two sewing patterns for 69 cents each. One is for a blouse, and the other is for a long skirt, since I can never find nice, plain long skirts in any store, thrift store or otherwise. The skirt pattern envelope says the original price was $14.95. Is that really how much sewing patterns cost new? That seems outrageous, when the fabric and notions still have to be purchased after that! (I don't feel bad now about charging $5 for vintage patterns in my Etsy shop.)

I am planning on making some quilts for my boys for Christmas, and I picked up a navy blue flat sheet for $5 to use as the backing for at least one of them. But after I bought it I realized that it was 50% polyester and the tag says no ironing. I guess I can't use something in a sewing project that can't be ironed, right? I will have to think of some other use for the sheet then, and keep a lookout for something else I can use for the quilts.

My favourite purchase was a sturdy square basket for $3, which I am using to store Jasper's bedtime story books in. Before, they were scattered all over the boys' room and quite messy. Baskets are good for containing mess, I have learned!

So I did make some decent purchases, but long gone are the days when I could leave Value Village with a bag full of clothes for $20. I was thinking on the drive home, is it really worth it to shop there anymore? Because as a homeschooling mother of four, my time is in high demand. Is it worth it to drive there, and then search through endless racks of shrunken and misshapen (and often bad smelling) clothes to find those few nice looking pieces? The line ups are always long too, and the customer service stinks. Maybe it is just not the best use of my time.

(And by the way, the cynical part of me can't help but wonder if stores like Value Village have doubled their prices in the last couple of years--and yes, they have because I have always shopped there often and I remember what things used to be priced at--I wonder if they have doubled their prices because they know that a large part of the population today is really counting their pennies, and needs to buy things second hand because it's all they can afford? And so the stores are taking advantage of this, and pricing things as high as they can and still be less than retail? Although in many cases, things there are higher than retail at a sale price!)

Coincidentally, yesterday evening I read a blog post about thrifting, and the writer mentioned something called "flea market style." When I looked it up I realized that that is my style...I like comfortably old, mismatched things in my house. Even on my back, for that matter. New, perfectly matched things look glaringly...new to me! Also yesterday, at Homesense (do they have that store in the US?) I bought a brand new set of stainless steel salt and pepper mills. I've wanted some of those for a while, and they're nice, but they look so out of place sitting on my diningroom table, since the table came from a garage sale, the plates are mismatched and second hand, the tablecloth was a handmedown, the silverware is thrifted, we use mason jars for glasses...you get the idea.

So after thinking about it, I came to the conclusion that yes, it is worth it to continue shopping at thrift stores even if sometimes the deals aren't that great. Because sometimes I do find good deals, and it's important for me to use our limited funds wisely.  I like the look of previously used things, and I like owning things that are unique. Getting things secondhand is good for the environment. And lastly, it is rather fun searching through all the junk looking for a treasure. I just think that I need to find other places to buy secondhand things--Value Village is too expensive anymore.

Where do others like to buy secondhand things? Do tell...

Basic white bread: A tutorial.

In my online travels, I have noticed that a lot of folks consider baking your own bread as an almost essential ingredient to living "the simple life." While I would certainly not say it's essential, I do understand this sentiment. Baking your own bread is a deliberate step away from the predominant culture of consumerism and instant gratification. For those with large families to feed, baking bread can really save money. And it must be one of life's simplest pleasures to enjoy the yeasty aroma of freshly baked bread filling your home. This is a pleasure that people have enjoyed for many centuries.

It's a pleasure I think everyone should enjoy at least now and then. So I decided to do a basic bread making tutorial. Of course, most of my readers already know how to make bread...but perhaps there are a few out there who aren't sure how to go about it. If you are one of those timid souls, this post is for you. :)

I am by no means an expert, and in fact I have only been making my family's bread for a few months. So I am only sharing how I do it. There are infinite variations on baking bread, and many of them are probably better than my own method! But here we go:

 

Basic White Bread: A Tutorial in 10 Easy Steps

1. First, I take the yeast--I use the traditional kind, not quick rising--and stir it into 1/2 cup of warm water until it is dissolved. I have found the the amount of yeast needed varies according to how warm the house is. On a warm summer day, 2 tsp is enough. In the winter, 4 tsp is a good idea. I know this is less yeast than most recipes use, but I find this amount works just fine. Honestly, I don't think it matters much how much yeast you use, unless you want to be able to time things exactly. If you don't use quite enough, you'll just have to wait a bit longer for it to rise. So I prefer to use a smaller amount most of the time, since it saves money.

2. In a large bowl, I mix 2 cups of unbleached flour, 2 tbsp wheat gluten (optional; this makes the loaves more chewy), 2 tbsp sweetener (I use organic cane sugar, but honey would work too), and 2 tsp sea salt.

3. I measure out 2 cups of warm liquid--it can be milk, water, or half of each. What I normally do is measure out 1 cup of cold homo milk, and then add 1 cup of boiling water. This gives a nice warm temperature without being hot (temperatures too hot will kill the yeast). I have found that the coconut milk you buy in cartons at the grocery store works nicely for making bread too, but it is sweetened, so if I use that I leave the sugar out in the second step.

Milk obviously makes a slightly richer tasting loaf. Bread made with only water is still good, just lighter.

I add some melted butter to this liquid. Or sometimes olive oil. I never measure, but I guess I'm using around 2 tbsp.

4. I pour this liquid mixture into the dry ingredients, and stir it up. Then I add in the yeast and water, and stir it up again.

5. I add scoops of flour one by one (not measuring), until it gets too difficult to stir. Then I dump it out on the clean countertop and start to knead. I scrape the bits out of the bowl with a butter knife.

6. I knead the dough for around 10 minutes, sprinkling it with flour as needed to keep it from being sticky. This is a nice time do some daydreaming. When the dough looks and feels smooth and springy, it's done. If you aren't sure how to tell if it's done, just keep an eye on the clock. 10 minutes will usually do it.

7. I cover this lump of dough with butter or oil, and place it back in the bowl. I cover it with a damp dish towel and let it sit until it looks about doubled in size. This takes around an hour, or less if the house is really warm.

8. I punch down the dough, divide it into three parts (using a sharp knife), form these chunks into rough loaf shapes, and place them into greased bread pans. This will make 3 small loaves. Or you could make 2 larger loaves, it's up to you.

I have done some experimenting over time, and I found that butter is by far the best thing to grease pans with. It's the only thing that works perfectly every time.

9. Once the dough has doubled in size again (it should be at the top of the pan), I bake it at 345 degrees for 30 minutes. (I used to bake it at a higher temperature, until Melanie shared that you have to bake bread at a lower temperature if you want a soft crust.)

10. As long as the bread looks nicely browned, I take it out, put a towel over the loaves, and let them cool at least somewhat before slicing into one. Very hot bread does not slice very well. But don't let it cool down all the way! Fresh, warm bread spread with soft butter is one of the tastiest things I know.

I hope this little tutorial will encourage a few people who have never baked bread before to give it a try. It really isn't difficult. As long as you don't kill the yeast with too much heat (something I did the first time I made bread, or rather bricks), I guarantee you'll end up with something that your family will enjoy. Happy baking!

A birthday boy!

Yesterday Jasper (who these days refuses to answer to any name but 'Jappy') turned three years old. My, how time flies! That chubby baby who didn't want to ever leave my arms is now a rough-and-tumble three year with a mischievous grin and an artistic flair.

I have to admit, that when I placed those three beeswax candles on the cake...I burst into tears. How can it be that my little baby is three already? Some days it seems almost frightening how quickly my little people are turning into big people. (Okay, it may have been that hormones had something to do with my tears, as well...)

As with all holidays and celebrations, we like to keep birthdays simple, and keep the spending to a minimum. Instead of focusing on gifts, we try to put the focus on special time spent together as a family.

We did get him a couple of things though. We bought a small toy train, and I put together an outfit for him--from other clothes. I know I said quite recently that I was going to stick to sewing with patterns for a while, but I happened to look at the idea for cutting toddler pants out of a man's shirt in Amanda Soule's The Creative Family, and remembered a shirt I bought for Chris at the thrift store that ended up being too small. What's to lose?  I thought, since the shirt wasn't being worn anyway.

The instructions said that it would work for pants up to size 3--but I found this didn't really work with this particular shirt. To make the pants long enough, I had to cut into the armpit area of the shirt, and this shirt didn't have a straight seam down the side--it was the kind of shirt that had 2 seams on the side going up into the arm. This gave me a lot of difficulties, and when the pants were finally done they looked kind of saddlebag-y. But, they're pants, so I'm happy. I also cut off the arms of the man's shirt and sewed them into a plain t-shirt to make "fooler" sleeves, and then top stitched a letter "J" on the front of the shirt. Overall, I'm pretty pleased with how this outfit turned out!

I was afraid it might be difficult sewing knit fabric, but I didn't find it much different at all. However, if I try making pants from a man's shirt again, I'll stick to smaller sizes.

Happy Birthday, Jappy! *sigh*

Harvesting lamb's quarters.

I had heard of lamb's quarters many times in the past, and I was aware that it was a weed that was commonly eaten in the Great Depression, but I did not realize until quite recently that that is the weed which tries to take over my garden every year! Chances are, they are in your back yard too. Here is a page which can help you to identify the plant.

It's also called Goosefoot, because the young leaves are the shape of goose feet.

Lamb's quarters, apparently, are highly nutritious--the leaves contain more calcium than kale, for one, and are also high in B vitamins. So, since my little herb gardens were full of lamb's quarters, I decided I might as well go ahead and give it a try.

This morning I pulled out a big handful of lamb's quarters, washed the plants very well, and then pulled off all the leaves. I sauteed the leaves with a bit of sweet onion and some olive oil, salt and pepper, and then added this mixture to some brown rice. Topped with a piece of fish, it was the perfect lunch! I only wished I had picked more lamb's quarters, because they cooked down quite a lot.

The cooked leaves tasted similar to spinach, but I also thought I detected the taste of asparagus--maybe that's just me. They were tasty, anyhow, and I would recommend giving this "vegetable" a try, if you are sure you can positively identify it. You can't beat the price!

After this delicious lunch, I had a piece of scrumptious homemade bread and strawberry jam for dessert. I wanted to thank once more everyone who gave me bread-baking tips. This time I made bread, I made 3 loaves instead of 2, and they were a better size. And, I set the oven at 345 degrees. What a difference that made!

The crust was totally soft and the bread was perfect. After taking it out of the oven, I did a bit of an experiment: I wrapped one loaf in a cloth, I spread butter over one, and I left one alone. I found that it made no difference at all to wrap the bread in a cloth. It did make the top of the bread a bit softer to put butter on top, but the main factor, it seems, is how hot the oven is. I'll never bake bread at a high temperature again--unless, of course, I want to have a crusty loaf.

Making homemade napkins.

First of all, let me say thank you so much for all the lovely and encouraging comments I received on yesterday's post. I really, truly appreciate it, and you all made me feel much better about where I am right now. :)

So today I was in the mood to do something self-sufficient-ish. I decided on making homemade napkins. I have wanted to make some cloth napkins for a while now, but I couldn't find any that were affordable at the thrift store (really, the Value Village near me is ridiculously expensive), and I wasn't sure what I could make them out of. I knew I wanted it to be something soft and absorbent, and preferably free.

Finally I figured out what to do. I had an old cotton tablecloth that my grandmother had given me. It was already quite old when she gave it to me, and at our house it's been washed and used so many times that it had developed a few holes (see picture below). And it had some pretty bad stains, too. But I was able to cut 5 good sized squares out of the good areas.

That part was easy. After that, the frustrations began. First of all, this fabric was so old and worn and soft that it was very hard to work with! It was difficult even to press the hems, it just kept rolling all over the place. And while I was doing that, I accidentally melted my new seam gauge with the iron. I was trying to make mitered corners, using these instructions, but I accidentally cut way too much fabric off the first corner...No big deal I thought, on to the sewing, which is the fun part! But then when I was trying to fold over the messed up corner and sew it, my needle broke. I put in a larger size of needle, and then that one immediately broke! (I'm not sure why...are the really cheap needles really not able to go through several layers of fabric?) I put in one more needle and that one allowed me to finish the first napkin, but alas, by then the baby was crying...so after about an hour of work, I only had one napkin complete.

Well, at least it's a start!

(Before taking this picture, I carefully hid the one mutilated looking corner!)

I thought making napkins out of such an old tablecloth was a great idea, but I think next time, I won't bother doing this with something so very old, because such worn and thin fabric is so challenging to work with. Lesson learned.

What we do without.

I was recently rereading this old post of mine, in which I mused on the meaning of "simple living."  I wrote that to me, simple living means

"embracing a basic, fundamental form of living--shrugging off all the excess complications of modern society, and instead living in harmony with the land and the seasons, rising with the sun, growing one's own food, enjoying the company of family and friends, staying close to home. This type of life that I picture seems to me to be the way people have lived for hundreds, even thousands of years, before modern technology changed our basic patterns of life."

Then I got to thinking: What "excess complications of modern society" have we, as a family, shrugged off? I write often on this blog about the things we do, but rarely about the things we do not. And I think the latter is an important point too. Life is so busy and crowded in the 21st century, that we can all benefit from being selective about what, among all the abundance of everything out there, we allow into our lives.

1. Electronic gadgets. Although we love our home computer and use it for so much, we have never felt the need to own any kind of hand-held electronic gadgets. To be perfecty honest (and I know this will make me look silly) I'm not entirely sure what a Blackberry is. The kind I am familiar with is normally used to make jelly...

2. Cell phones. Neither Chris nor I has ever owned a cell phone. I just don't see the point. Yes, there have a been a few times he was at the grocery store and it would have been nice to be able to tell him to pick up something extra that I remembered, but in our view, this very occasional convenience isn't worth a monthly payment, as well as another object to carry around and try not to lose (I lose my keys often enough as it is!). We have a basic landline to our house, with one phone--which I bought second hand for $4--attached to it. This works just fine for us.

3. Two cars. We only drive one car, which is 15 years old. To me, one car is expensive and troublesome enough. I don't think I would want to have two cars to keep repaired and insured. Having only one car has the added effect that we tend to spend more time together, because we aren't able to go in different directions at the same time.

4. Television. We canceled our cable tv about 3 years ago, and never looked back. I love not having so much noise and so many advertisements floating throught the air in our home, and I especially love that my kids spend more time on imaginative play than they did in the cable tv days. We do have an old second hand tv that was given to us (just a regular tv, not wide-screen) that we use for occasional videos or DVDs.

5. News. We don't read the newspaper, listen to the radio, or otherwise seek out news at all. The constant stream of ready information today, I find to be overwhelming. Not to mention the fact that much daily news is depressing or upsetting. I have enough to worry about in my own daily life without worrying about what's in the news, too. Yes, I am often the last to know about important events, but if something truly monumental happens I'm sure to hear about it from family or friends--and much sooner too, than people would have heard of important news in previous times, when information might take months to make its way across the globe.

6. Extracurricular activities. We do put the kids in various activities at our local community centres (soccer, swimming, etc.) but never more than one activity at a time. With multiple children, our family life would quickly become far too busy if we put each of them in two or more activities. And I don't believe that the children themselves really like to be in a rush all the time. Right now the only thing going on is Owen's swimming lessons, and they are a fun weekly event, to which Kira often tags along to watch.

7. Fashion. Chris and I have never been the least concerned about the current fashions in clothing, furniture, home decorating, or vehicles, and I'm glad, because this has saved us so much fuss and bother over the years, and allowed us to be perfectly content with owning mostly inexpensive second hand possessions.

Those are just some of the common elements of modern life that we are happy to do without. We enjoy living our life simply, being together most of the time, working with our hands, and appreciating the things we have and the beauty of the natural world. Our children spend most of their free time doing things like digging in the sandbox or making play forts, rather than rushing around on a schedule. Although we have little money, overall our stress levels are very low.

I would love to hear my readers' comments on this topic. Please, share with me what things you have chosen to do without, in an effort to keep life simple and joyful.