Saving in case

Almost 10 years ago we lost my Grandpa K to cancer, ten years before that we lost his cousin, Auntie M, and my Grandma K. One of the things I distinctly remember before Auntie M died, was him, my mom and my Auntie E, all in her house looking at all her belongings thinking, how are we going to sort through all of this. When my Grandpa K died, we had that thought all over again. Auntie M, had no children, her husband had passed a little over 10 years before and lived in a one bedroom house they had either bought or built in the 1940s or 50s. My Grandpa lived in a farm house he and Grandma had bought and added on to in the 1980s and 90s. Inside were the belongings of about 4 houses, Grandma and Grandpa K’s, Grandpa’s mom, Grandma’s parents, and one of her cousins, Anton. When M died, a lot of her belongings moved into GK’s house, so when we cleaned it out we were really cleaning out the belongings of 5 houses. Luckily that didn't mean we had 5 couches, and 5 dining room tables but it feels like we did sometimes.

My Grandma's clock that hang over her kitchen sink.

There are things I distinctly remember beyond all that too. They all had a garden, they all had laundry lines outside, tools with easy access, didn't turn on lights until they absolutely felt they needed them, they saved everything, were good with their money, careful with their money, were handy in their own ways and they took care of family no matter what. A lot of that I have taken into my own daily life but still wish I had a bit more of them in me. One thing I have noticed myself doing most recently is the light thing. I am currently on the hunt for a laundry line set up for my new home, meanwhile I have jerry rigged a clothes line through my laundry room and my back yard. (I have to take it down when I am not using it or I will clothes line myself) I am planning a garden. Some of the things the previous owners left behind will make up the edges of the garden. I save things I should throw out, and reuse as much as possible. The thing that I most proud of is the fact that my family still takes care of each other. I do wish though I could cook and bake as well as my Grandma but I am working on that.

Luckily because they did save everything, and although they died long before I found my own place, when it came time for me to be on my own feet, I didn’t have to buy a thing. I had a whole house of furnishings, a dining room table, a couch, a sewing machine, a sewing table, silverware, plates, pots and pans, dressers, and knickknacks. Some of it needs little repairs, like the clock my grandma had over the sink, but other pieces are still as nice as the day they purchased them.

My Great Grandma E'ssewing machine. It works better than my newer one.

As I am learning and working, I think one of the reasons that they did things the way they did, was when they grew up, the 1930s. My Grandma was the daughter of Swedish Immigrants, she worked hard and most of the food I remember eating at her home was made from scratch. Her father sent her to finishing school (but not college, so she made sure we could all go if we wanted too) and she could speak 5 languages. Grandpa was the second son of Chicken farmers. He didn’t talk a lot about his childhood but I know him and M were as close as brother and sister, I know he was close to his father and was a little trouble maker in his own right. (That last trait I see in his son and grandson.)  I think growing up in the Great Depression is what really helped them with their “saving in case” mentality. It was the hardest time financially in history. We were coming out of World War I and the Roaring 20s. Credit was the word, and in the end the disaster.

A common enough siteduring the 1930s which had a 25% unemployment rate,

Unemployment rates where at a record low and the fear of getting from day to day was almost traumatizing for many. Father’s left home to find work elsewhere. It was common for housewives to sew, do laundry and even keep chickens for eggs for extra money. Hobo’s appear for the first time in American History, making the way across the country doing work here and there and camping out where they could. Any work was good work, even if all you got paid in was a loaf of bread.

My Grandfather’s family made it through as chicken farmers. I guess they did pretty good because my Great Grandpa stayed home and didn’t have to go elsewhere for work. During World War II my Grandpa still had his mind on the chickens. His letters often referenced his work at home. Asking how the chickens were, and saying he’d be on leave for a week so he’d come home and help clean out the coop. Letting his dad know about the best truck out there, When his dad wrote to say the truck had broken down again and he was thinking he’d buy a new one. (As farmers during the War they would have been eligible to purchase a new automobile where others weren’t.)

A 1940s World Wortwo poster that encoraged citizens to be thrifty where they could.

Now we are in a new age of rich and poor, as not only is the gap getting larger but so is the difference between what $1.00 would have gotten you 20 years ago verses now. With the advent of the TV. we are bombarded with buy now and save, or this limited time offer, or my favorite buy one get one free. Most of them are for things we don’t need, or things that we buy maybe a few times in our lifetime, like cars or couches. We spend half our time blocking  out advertisements and the advertisers spend a fair time trying to find new ways to grab our attention. So we struggle through. We are told to save, but it is hard sometimes as we live paycheck to paycheck. Those of us who are clever and want to save money by keeping a garden, mending our clothes and looking at packages of food and thinking how many meals is this good for. It seems for an information society we still don’t have all the answers do we?

Finding time

I think one of the hardest things, no matter who you are or what time period you live in is finding time. There are some days I feel like my mind is in a thousand locations. Thinking, what do I still have to do, how much time does it take, why does my to-do list never get any smaller. I look back at my life and I have been busy and I remain busy. I have learned to compartmentalize, prioritize, and be somewhat organized. Between baking, cooking, gardening, sewing, tatting, spinning, knitting, learning new things, reading, studying, and remembering what I need to do at work sometimes I will admit I do feel a little stretched thin. It is finding balance though that keeps me from going crazy and shutting down.

So how do I find time for it all? Well first is by knowing how long things take and setting time limits. Like tonight, I came home from work, I typed up my blog, giving myself only until 6:45 to type up them. This doesn’t mean I am posting, I am just typing up the rough draft, and thinking what I will need for pictures, and then by Tuesday when I post it will be already to go and I can just click publish. After that I am making supper, now when I cook I make big things, tonight is leftover chili. This means I spent one day cooking it, making a lot which means I have lots of meals for the future, and all I need to do is heat it up. After dinner, I can knit, or sew until bed. Now tomorrow when I come home, I will do some cleaning, maybe work in my garden, then eat dinner and sew, knit or spin.

To keep track of my projects, I write. All over my house I have note pads. I have a note pad by my computer with my blog ideas. I have note pad on my kitchen counter where I note items I need to buy and what I need to do before a certain date. On my calendar I note where I need to be on different days so I can keep track. In my purse I keep a green note book. Inside it are tools for my purse knitting project, (the one I keep in there in case I have spare moments), and a list of every project I have yet to do or need to do. There is no order to the list but it helps me keep track of what yarn or fabric is for what project and what I need to do.

Some project take forever for me to do. A cousin is getting married and I have no clue what they are getting yet and I still haven’t finished the last cousin’s gift. (I promise I will finish it soon-ish,  maybe, someday). Keeping track isn't easy but neither is finding time but if you spare a moment here, and a moment there, it doesn't pile up so bad. (Hopefully)

So how do you find the time? Do you set times for set things, or do you follow your heart, or are you like me and halfway between the two? Do you keep lists everywhere, or think, I’ll remember? Do you struggle to find the balance or is balance in the disorder? I am kind of the later. I’d rather be disorderly balanced then have nothing to do. Life is more interesting that way. 

Lay my sewing down...

No matter what century or world we talk about there are always things that get left behind. Sometimes it is because something better comes along, sometimes because we forget about it and sometimes just because. I am always on the hunt for these little treasures of things that we have long since stopped using. One of them I discovered three years ago was the sewing pillow. Yea you read that right. It is one of those items that aren't talked about in sources. I know a lot of what I talk about isn't well documented but this is one of those items we can source but not in the written word. It is however documented in a number of paintings from the 1500s and 1600s hundreds.

Nicolaes Maes 1634-1693. Not only is she sewing with a sewinp pillow she has a bobbin lace on a pillow sitting on the chair 

When I was first shown this helpful tool I shrugged it off. Why would I need such a thing? Yet as time went one I grew to love it so much that I made myself one for my home use. They are pretty easy to make, just stuffed a square pretty good with wool, cotton or if you’re adventurous scrap cloth. This little pillow sits on your lap and holds your project in place bringing it to a more comfortable position for your body and your eyes. I have even pinned my project to the pillow so that it wouldn't blow around in the wind when I was working outside or was setting a seam.

The Needle woman (1635-1643) by Diego Velazquez hanging in the national Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.. sewing on a pillow

Now the word pillow according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is a bag filled with soft material that is used as a cushion, usually for the head of a person who is lying down. They are filled with feathers, down, sponge rubber or plastic fiber, (it forgets to mention wool). It also refers it to “a cushion or pad tightly stuffed and used as a support for the design and tools in making laces with a bobbin.” (It should read making bobbin lace, since that is really the only lace that requires a pillow but then again I am being nit-picky.) The noun comes from the Middle English word,  pilwe or Old English, pyle and the Latin word pulvinus and predates the 12^th Century. As a verb it isn't seen until 1629 but you can guess that it was probably in use about 20 years before that.

Gerard Terborch (1617-1681) Woman sewing. Not only is she sewing on a pillow, but she hasa baby next to her, she has an awsome coif and well look at the color of the pillow, it is blue.

What has all that to do with sewing pillows? Well evidence of them being used in sewing is seen in engravings and paintings by Johannes Stradanus, Jacob Cats, Phillipe Gale and more. Some of them have tassels hanging off the corners making them a bit fancier, while others are appear plain. They seem to be in the shapes of squares and rectangles and about a lap’s width. They appear to bring the women’s project up more to the waist line as they work. They are very well stuffed, almost appearing firm, and are most likely stuffed with cotton or wool. My first attempt at one, I stuffed with bits of cloth that were in my scrap pile. It worked well but is too heavy for my lap and so I re-stuffed it with stuffing from Jo-Ann’s. I have a few different sizes, so depending on my project I can pick one over another. Plus I can leave them in all my different sewing locations and kits.

So why have sewing pillows become a forgotten tool among sewers? That I don’t know. What I do know is I love my forgotten useful tool. 

Yarn bowling... Strike!

We have all got that fear in our heads, You’re knitting in church, at a town hall meeting, at the office meeting or on the train and our ball of yarn falls out of our laps rolls down the aisle and stops right at whomever is talking’s feet. You turn beat red as you make your way up to the evil ball of yarn pick it up and slowly wishing the earth will open up and take you, make your way back to your seat. For a brief moment you consider maybe this isn’t the place to knit, and unless you are at Church (where you take it as a sign from God that this really isn’t the time despite your deadline), you say nah, and keep knitting. Now at home it is a whole different story. You are knitting in your home, because you don’t want to do your chores, and there goes the ball off the couch where you are sitting and rolls to the dirtiest corner in your living room, or through the dirt if you are outside. In that case you might think I might need to clean but I’d rather be knitting so after you pick up your ball and brush it off you keep knitting. If you have a cat or dog you might have to chase them down first to get the ball.

Have you experienced any of that? Yea it has happened to me a few times, though never at church. One of the other things that must have gone through your mind is there has got to be an easier way. 

Now Modern methods for winding balls of yarn have made this problem a bit less but some companies still sell their yarn in skeins that you must wind yourself, so those are usually the biggest culprits of this problem. Well believe it or not there are some solutions.

A hook version I found on Pintrest. Find in on my knitting gadgets board.

On the market there easy to find are yarn bowls, and sacks. One of the ladies in my NH knitting group has a plastic one that she can set on the table or hang around her neck that also holds her tools. I have a yarn sack I can loop through my hand and knit with when I am in public. I found it among my Grandma’s stuff. It has proven very handy with some of my smaller projects, such as socks and mittens. Then recently a friend of mine, who does pottery, traded with me a pair of mittens for a gorgeous and may I say ever so useful yarn bowl. I feel a little bad because every time I see her I thank her, because oh my god do I love it. Now it doesn't work if you are doing multiple colors but I am not panicking every second that my yarn is going to do it’s traveling act on to my dirty rug and under my coffee table or to the worst possible spot where I have to preform yoga to reach it. I think the only reason I am flexible is because I am forever getting things out of the most inconvenient places.

My new Yarn Bowl

Now to find time to knit.

Yarn bag

Got any .useful tools you think I should try out or find out about, let me know in the comments.