A Day in the {Vintage} Life - Top Five

The top five reasons that I'm happy I don't live in the United States in the early part of the twentieth century:

• Air conditioning
• Miscegenation is no longer illegal
• Steel belted radial underpinnings are no longer de rigeure
• It doesn't take forever to get from point A to point B
• There's no more rationing even though we're involved in three wars

And the top five things I wish we retained from that period:

• A sense of self-sacrifice and doing one's patriotic duty to help the war effort - even if you don't agree with the concept of war in general or specific
• Social propriety - I really DON'T need to know the details of your [insert private topic here]
• Modesty in dress
• The dearth of Big Box Stores and the supply of locally owned businesses
• A cultural norm of walking or bicycling to where you needed to go, less reliance on motorized transport

I'm sure you could think of other things to add to either column. What do you think? Leave your replies in the commbox and I'll respond to them next week. I'm observing "radio silence" over the weekend in observance of Good Friday and Easter.

Bake on Saturday - A Day in the {Vintage} Life

No baking to be done today. Yes, I need to do it, but I'm still recuperating from lack of sleep. I did manage to procure a new seam ripper, affectionately known as Jack the Third. He replaces Jack the {seam} Ripper v 1.0 and 2.0. Also picked up some lovely blue and white patterned fabric for an upcoming refashion. Should be interesting to say the least.

Market on Thursday - A Day in the {Vintage} Life

After running out of essential groceries like eggs and milk and not being able to serve even cereal for breakfast before school, I HAD to go to "market". Or as I like to call it SuperTarget.

Again with the morning rounds of drop offs, then to SuperTarget complete with Starbucks! then home again, home again, jiggety jog in the most NASTY weather ever. It was raining sideways by the time I got back home and unloaded. There were tornado warnings all day long, so I unplugged everything and listened to NPR on my MP3 player - yay for FM radio - and portable speakers while folding laundry, washing dishes by hand and so on.

It looked a little something like this...

Thankfully, we didn't suffer power outages like my family 6 blocks away! I was able to have a chicken in my (crock)pot with broth, onions, carrots and celery with a sprinkle of sage and salt/pepper ready for dinner with no fuss and very little muss.

I was able to finish my middle child's costume today including dance pants, crinoline and all. I must confess that it took me a WHILE to get motivated to even do anything because it was so grey and dreary today due to inclement weather. I was almost ready to pack it all in and take a nap instead, but I muddled through somehow.

Question of the day: When the weather is severe and you might be without power for a while, what do you do to pass the time?

Clean on Friday - A Day in the {Vintage} Life

Actually, Friday did NOT see much cleaning as exhaustion from dealing with lack of sleep and suspected pollen made me quite the zombie. I did manage to get to physical therapy, and then on the drive home made it halfway before realizing the office supply store was back from whence I came, so I made the grand circle tour to get the tracing paper needed to finish grading some vintage patterns up to my actual size.

Mrs. John McWeeney can take her happy little schedule and stick it today.

Mend on Wednesday - A Day in the {Vintage} Life

After an uncomfortable night's sleep on the couch and waking to the World's Most Annoying Alarm Clock Ever™, I roused the children, got them clothed, off to school in time for breakfast (we were flat out of EVERYTHING) and got myself home before 9AM.

The husband was still sick with flu, so I worked around him, taking care of laundry and dishes and starting up dinner in the crockpot: Split Pea Soup. I also managed to color my hair as well, so I'm newly fuschia up top.

Because of the bruised tailbone, I had a physical therapy appointment the next town over, so off I went at 11AM. After PT, I headed over to Chipotle in search of gluten free, dairy free fixins for lunch before heading over to the school and on my normal rounds for the day.

After picking up the girls from school, we were headed to Girl Scouts when the leader called to let me know that there was a tornado watch in effect for our area and so she didn't want us on the road. OK, so we skipped that and the dance class and went home and did homework and played for a while while we waited for the weather. Which barely skimmed by us. It was, however, severe enough that we unplugged all our essential electronics! Hence my posting on Thursday.

I did manage to do some work on my middle child's ballroom costume for her first competition in July. I guess that counts as "mending".

Iron on Tuesday - A Day in the {Vintage} Life

I'm beginning to see the wisdom in separate sleeping arrangements. With my better half sick with flu, sleeping right.next.to.him where I can breathe his viral germies all night is just not happening. So I've been on the couch for the last two nights. Which is to say, I haven't slept well AT ALL. I'm still groggy...

And of course, because I didn't sleep well AND my circadian rhythm is OFF because the living room is dark and our bedroom faces east so the rising sun helps me rise and shine to greet the day... I overslept AGAIN. Mrs. John McWeeney would be so ashamed.

Breakfast was nuked gluten free lemon muffins on the run for my girls, preschool breakfast for the boy and Starbucks oatmeal and soy chai for me. I endeavoured to stay out of my husband's way so he could rest and so I didn't have to listen to crappy daytime TV while he "recuperates". I needed to kill some time between 8:30 an 9 (when the local Fabric Mega Mart opens), so I hit my SuperTarget Starbucks. From there, off to the fabric store for an hour to get some neon fuschia sheer fabric and a leotard pattern while I waited for the optical department at Target AND my nail salon to open. Oldest child's new lenses arrived yesterday and my feet needed some TLC.

After the pedi, I headed over to Target, did the lenses thing and picked up a pack of 2 new ceramic bowls. One of mine had broken, so it needed to be replaced. Now I have a spare. I'll spare you the litany of the goodies I bought myself because I'm sure you're not interested.

Got home, felt woozy and stuffed my face with a couple bits of leftover roast peking duck (cold!?), some dairy free cheese slices, a gluten free donut, 3 gluten free chocolate snaps and a couple of handfuls of trailmix. Let's just say when my bloodsugar tanks, any semblance of a "balanced" diet goes smack out the window. It's "keep me from passing out" time.

Once I got over my low blood sugar, I headed into the kitchen to give it the old once over. Yesterday I managed to get it fairly decent, so all I needed to do was empty the dishwasher, rinse the sink and dry it and spritz the counters and wipe. Hooray for not having to hand wash!

I'm sitting here with a couple of hours to kill before heading to the bus stop to collect the children and cart them to the pediatrician for their annual checkups before taking them to Catechism class. They keep changing the name, so we call it "church school". CCD/religious ed/Catechism/whatEVER. They're going. Usually their father takes them because I do Girl Scouts/dance class taxi service on Wednesday. However, Flu Boy is staying home so as not to contaminate the faithful.

I suppose I could do the few things I had on my "list":

• Crock Pot dinner
• put away kid clothes
• mop floors
• last load laundry

But where would the fun in that be? Mrs. McWeeney is in the background wagging her finger at me, though, so I suppose I must away and deal with the last lingering bits. My poor bruised tailbone doesn't hurt if I'm standing/walking/moving, but it sure does if I sit for too long. Maybe it's a sign?

A Day in the {Vintage} Life - Wash on Monday - Recap

Ahhh....

In my comparison of my day to that of the housewife of 1946, the venerable Mrs. John McWeeney, I've found a few things to be true.

1. Things like doing dishes take a lot less time. I still have to handwash a few things, but nowhere near the volume of dishes that she did.

2. Daytime Television SUCKS. Yes, yes it does. Normally I do not partake of daytime programming, choosing instead to listen to NPR. There's something about radio that's nonintrusive to one's daily routine. It doesn't require me to sit down and look at it while I could be doing other things. Alas, my poor better half is home sick with flu, so he propped himself on the sofa to be entertained by "courtroom" dramas and the ubiquitous Jerry Springer.

3. Making beds take the same time today as they did 75 years ago. Yes they do. I dare say, though, that making our bed is easier because there is but one AND it's a Select Comfort mattress. It weighs next to nothing so when it comes time to tuck in the sheets, Bob's your uncle, up goes the end and it's a nice hospital corner.

4. Made a supply run to the "grocers". In my case, that would be SuperTarget. I had to see the eye doctor about my new glasses - surpise! I need bi-focals! So I decided to pick up a few things to see us through the week and grab some soup for Flu-Man.

5. Between coming back from the morning school runs and leaving to the SuperTarget, I was able to give the living room a once over and take the laundry to the childrens' respective beds to be put away later. After coming home from the SuperTarget, I managed to squeeze in loading up the dishwasher, hand washing a couple of items, making up the soup on the stove top and cleaning the pan.

Right now, I've got half an hour before picking up the girls at the bus stop. From there, I'll pick up the boy at preschool and head home so that oldest child can do her homework (provided she remembered it) and I can get dinner under way.

One thing I've noticed is that the internet is an amazing time-suck. It's so EASY to sit there and watch just one more YouTube video or play one more round of Tetris or farm just a few more things in FarmVille. Really, I have MORE free time in my day to do - whatever - and somehow...

Incidentally, today, before jetting out to appointments, the mail came. Instead of tossing it on the desk to deal with when I got back, I went through it, took out the one bill - Orkin, termite protection - paid it, wrote it down in the register and put a stamp on it so that when I drive by the post office later, I can just toss it in the box and be done with it.

Wash On Monday - A Day in the {Vintage} Life

Taking a page from the post over at Glamour Daze, I thought I'd compare/contrast my day in 2011 with Mrs. McWeeney's day in 1946. Bear in mind that my children are all school-aged, there are no nurselings in our house and no one comes home for lunch so there are going to be some fundamental differences from the get-go. That said, on with the show!

click image to embiggen

As you can see, her day is pretty full while mine is... not. Yet I always feel like I'm behind, behind, behind.

One thing Mrs. John McWeeney didn't have that I have is the internet and all the new-fangled things like fully automatic washing machines and dryers and dishwasher and so on. Or the internet! But she had an infant and those take a TON of work. Notice that "change the baby" was not listed on her side of the list. And she got a NAP!? I know for certain we don't do anywhere near as many dishes per week as she did.

Mondays around here are pretty hectic in the morning because I have to listen to the litany of "I HATE SCHOOL!11!" from the peanut gallery and they have to practically be dressed/shoved out the door. I usually make my kids' lunches and send them to school and my husband takes his lunch to work most days as well, so there's no "make lunch" for anybody but me. And that's usually a microwaveable something or other. If I remember to eat anything.

Today my husband is home sick, so the "routine" will change a little bit. I had to chuckle at the notion that Mrs. McWeeney makes beds. FIVE of them. We've got four beds and we're lucky if ANY of them get made regularly. Of my three children, my middle child is the one who makes her bed. The youngest doesn't have a top sheet, just a "fuzzy blankie", so his bed is generally pretty neat. And our bed isn't getting made because it's occupied.

Question of the day: Do YOU make your bed EVERY day? Do you have a truckload of toss pillows and other stuff on your bed? Or is it pretty plain?