Last Business of 2024

 Hello dear friends!  Happy New Year in a day advance!  Ha!  Whatever AI they have pre-loaded onto the computer just sent me a message asking if I wanted help with writing correctly.  It couldn't make sense of that second sentence.  You see, I write the way I talk, seems more personal to me, but the AI is determined to make me write in proper king's English.  I grew up in a little German community where many people spoke German as their primary language, they even held a weekly church service in the language.  My father's family is Pennsylvania Dutch.  So those two factors figure into how I form my sentences.  For instance (this is an extreme example, I don't think I've ever gone this far), most people would say, " I am going to the store.". But I would say, "To the store, I am going.".  It doesn't help that Ran is only a second generation American (his grandfather emigrated from Berlin) and speaks in much the same manner.  I thought it was humorous that AI disapproves of my writing.  Even artificial people are critics these days. Ha!

Anyway, it was a pretty Christmas and I got my snow!  It's all melted now.  We really don't celebrate Christmas, except to ponder upon its meaning, but it still was important for me to have snow this time of the year.  

Do you make New Year's resolutions?  Some people are resolute in not making them, which I find amusing.  Resolutions are just setting a goal, after all.  We should all set goals for ourselves, or we'd just be wandering about aimlessly.  My goal for the new year is to "just do better"  than the last, whether it is eating healthier, exercising more, studying  or working harder.  There's always room for improvement.

One thing I want to get back to is my extreme thriftiness.  Last year we had quite a boost in our income and I started to slack off a bit on my economy. So this year, it's back to the old nose to the grindstone. If you have read this blog for any amount of time, you know one of my strategies for living cheaply is to buy low and in bulk.  Our fiscal year begins when we have harvested the last bits from the garden.  Then I have a good study of my pantry and see what needs to be purchased for the coming year.  A few posts back I wrote about my adventure in deer carrots and canning turkey when it went on sale in November.  That was ten dollars that stretched pretty far at stocking the pantry. Then a few weeks ago I was checking out the reduced for quick sale meat at our local Walmart. And I found organic grass-fed beef for four dollars a pound!  I quickly snatched up ten pounds of that, you can be assured! So for forty dollars, I have enough beef for the coming year. We rarely eat beef.  So now I'm up to fifty dollars of my food budget for the coming year.  Next, we stopped at our local Amish bulk food store and purchased ten pounds of Irish grass-fed butter for thirty-six dollars.  Ten pounds of butter should suffice for a year, as we rarely bake since we discovered Ran is allergic to wheat.  So that brings my tally to eighty-six dollars.  I plan to make myself accountable by writing about my grocery purchases and menus in the coming year.  I really don't see the need to purchase much else; we have plenty of flour, sugar and coffee and the pantry is stocked with all those jars of canned goods.  About all I plan to  buy is some citrus and milk for one spoiled cat.  Oh!  I even have a good supply of milk canned (unfortunately Blackie turns up his nose at canned milk)!  Our neighbor Ed works at a food pantry and about a month ago he gave me several gallons as he was trying to get rid of forty gallons of milk that was left behind before it spoiled.  I canned it up in quart jars and ended up with a dozen quarts.  We are not milk drinkers, but once or twice a month we enjoy some cornstarch pudding.  And instead of buying those "cream of" soups I make a basic white sauce.  So that was a real boon to our economy.  Another acquaintance said that I could have all the walnuts I cared to rake from her front yard.  Ran spent some of the colder days cracking and shelling them, which we froze.  Another blessing.  And of course, Ran is still catching fish so our freezer is stocked with walleye and I have plenty of the salmon and pike he caught last spring canned and on the shelf.  If it weren't for Blackie being so spoiled and expecting his daily milk and our love of all things  citrus, I probably wouldn't need to spend another penny this year.  But of course you know I will!  As a matter of fact, I plan on buying ten pounds of cheese next time I'm near the Amish bulk food store.  Their supplier of cheese ends and pieces has returned and cheese is only two dollars a pound.  We love cheese!

BOOKS

Rose asked a while back if I had any book suggestions.  Here are some that I have found to be helpful on the road to self-sufficiency.:

First is Mama's Home Remedies by Svetlana Konnikova.  This book is chock-a-block full of common sense  and old wives tales remedies all rolled up in a delightful read.  So many of those herbal remedies books are filled with useless information.  I don't grow black cumin or ginkgo balboa in my herb garden, do you?  This book is just how to live healthier without all that silliness.

The Best Natural Homemade Soaps by Mar Gomez.  Or any good basic soap making book should be on your shelf if you are interested in self-sufficiency.

Farm Journal's Country Cookbook.  Probably the only cookbook you would ever need.  Just a good basic cookbook without a lot of expensive and silly ingredients.

Sewing Made Easy by Dorothy Sara.  Another one of those no-nonsense books.  The type that should be on everyone's bookshelf even if you have no desire to sew your own clothes, it is important to know how to mend clothes.

Saving Seeds by Marc Rogers.  Yet another valuable book on how to save your seeds from year to year.  Saves a lot of money.

The Return of the Puritans by Patricia O. Brooks.  This history book gives you a pretty good idea of how we got to where we are today as a country.  I found it fascinating and while the book is dated, its information is still valid today.

Stocking Up by the Rodale Press.  Everything you need to know about canning, root cellaring and dehydrating.

So Easy to Preserve by the Cooperative Extension  of the University of Georgia. This is the canning book I use.

Dressing Edwardian

I mentioned that I enjoy dressing in the Edwardian style and Cathy was curious about that, so here is a brief lesson, although not historically accurate, on how I dress Edwardian.  First let me say, all my life I tried to fit in, but I always felt that I was just play-acting and wasn't being true to myself.  For some reason, I was just drawn to this style since I was a little girl. I didn't want to embarrass my sons by being the "strange mom in the old-fashioned clothes", so I waited until they had flown the coop before I started introducing the world to the real me. Ha!  Since most of social interactions are with Amish and Mennonite people, who know a thing or two about being different, it was quite an easy transition for me to make.  The neighbors just accept me as being a tad bit eccentric.  About the only time I dress in what is considered "normal" attire is when I am going to the big city and want to blend in for safety reasons.  Here's my basic wardrobe:

Sorry it's not a better picture but it has been as dark as a tomb here the past couple weeks.  On the far right I have the three basic skirts I wear; a cream corduroy with lots of pintucks and ruffles, a brown ankle length "walking skirt" and a denim prairie skirt.  

Next to the skirts are my petticoats.  A genuine Edwardian one that I purchased at an estate sale for a dollar.  It was on a rack of kid's costumes. And the second one is a flannel one that I sewed using a Folkwear patterns, using fabric from a much too large nightgown. 

I were sweater tights under them.

For blouses I always look for something that either has pintucks or a high ruffled neck.  If you can't find any such blouses, you can always make one.  Here's a post on how I convert a regular blouse into an Edwardian one.  I always button my blouses all the way to the top button and where a cameo brooch or some other Edwardian looking bar brooch.

Over the years I have curated quite a wonderful collection of cardigans.  Just the basic style that has never been in fashion, but never really out.  I look for manufacturers' names like Woolrich, Pendelton and Cambridge Dry Goods.  They must be 100% wool.  Another hint is to look for sweaters that say they are "hand-framed" and made in Hong Kong.  Those are the the best quality.  Irish made sweaters are good too.  Just good quality classic sweaters.  On the bottom left hand corner is a sweater I knit from an Edwardian pattern. When it is really cold, I often top these with a hand-knit sontag or shawl.

For accessories I always try to wear a bit of lace and my three go-to earrings are a pair of pearl drops, some button style pearl ones and a pair of onyx oval earrings.

So there you have it, a lesson on how to be eccentric just like me.  I seriously doubt anyone is going to take my advice, but I thought I'd humor you all. Dare to be the authentic you!

Well!  This has been a long post!  I hope you poured yourself a cup of coffee before you began reading.  Thank you all for being so supportive this past  year.  It really meant a lot to me.  May you all be blessed in the coming new year!

Hugs

Jane