Moolie - Happy Thanksgiving :)

[moolie]

Been keeping busy, doing some "fall cleaning" and just generally the same ole same ole.

Sewed up the girls' Hallowe'en costumes--they both love the Harry Potter books (and movies) and wanted Hogwart's robes. I picked up some bargain wall dark dark navy heavy satin for $2.50/metre and a pattern and set-to on Friday. Got the robes done, picked up a couple of $10 white men's dress shirts from Zellers, and the girls had previously purchased Gryffindor House ties from a costume shop while we were on holiday this past summer, so all they needed to do was don some black trousers and off they went.

Oldest went to a Hallowe'en event at a local Historical Village with some friends on Saturday night and handed out our candy last night, youngest had a school dance and also hit the Historical Village event on Saturday night with some friends. Got lots of hugs and thank-yous for the robes, and I think they turned out really well

Been working on organizing my pantry and canning storage and it all looks so pretty--although we've already dipped into it here and there for pickles, tomato sauce, and summer fruit. Got a new pressure canner/cooker (in the pantry photo) from a second-hand store and I just love it because it is Harvest Gold!

The canning shelf is in our spare bedroom in the basement, right under a drafty window so it's a fairly cool area. It's a little nook in the bedroom that we keep a curtain in front of to keep the bedroom warmer. The closet is by our back door to our garage (the one we usually use). The shelves hold our "staples", our canners, and some canning jars. On the floor are several gallons of vinegar.

The items to the right are mostly our emergency prep items: yellow box = camping dishes/pots, two clear boxes with pink lids on top of yellow box = more camping stuff, cat carrier contains food and water bowls, jug of water, and ice cream bucket of dry food, green bucket = "hunter's loo" bucket toilet and is filled with: toilet paper/hand sani/wet wipes/bleach/garbage bags etc., we also have a large "deck box" in the garage where we keep our tents, camp stove and coleman oven, lantern, folding chairs, and coolers.

 

[snapshot]

That looks wonderfully organized to me!!! I so look forward to working on projects!

 

[Wannabefree]

MOOLIE You tryin to make me look bad? It looks GREAT! I'd be proud to have that clean of a shelf...but I'm just not particularly willing to work for it at the moment Wanna come do mine?

 

[justusnak]

Looks GREAT!! please, please, please come do mine!!!! Mine is a train wreck right now, just thrown in there, for the time being. I will get it organized this winter.

 

[Britesea]

Are we competing for whose stores are the most disorganized? I have bags of stuff just sitting around in the dining room. I've been waiting for this paycheck to buy some mylar and lids for my buckets- then at least SOME of it will be in buckets in the crawl space.

 

[moolie]

Thanks everyone, glad I didn't take "before" photos LOL! (Especially the jar of peaches that wasn't sealed and had a lovely fuzzy science experiment growing in the top of it )

Like I said, I've been doing some "fall cleaning".

I don't feel nearly as stocked up as some of the folks here, based on photos I've seen around the forum, but I think we've done ok with our short growing season and limited budget for the things we can't grow like peaches and pears. We'll be enlarging our garden next year and I'm already scheming and planning how to get in everything that I want... there's still a few empty jars that need filling up next year (I did really well finding second-hand jars this season!)

 

[moolie]

So I changed my avatar today, and feel inclined to write a little about my choice:

The image I chose is a Remembrance Day poppy. Canadians wear these from late October/November 1 till November 11 (Remembrance Day) in remembrance of our fallen veterans. November 11th has significance because the Great War (WWI) ended at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

I personally chose to wear a poppy, keep Remembrance Day by attending a ceremony of Remembrance at our local Military Museum, and teaching my children about past and current wars/conflicts because "those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it".

Getting a poppy is always a slightly emotional thing for me as well. Veterans sit at tables with trays of poppys at the entrances and exits to stores or in malls with coin boxes for donations to the Veteran's Fund. In my city, the money goes to several Veteran's charities including the Veteran's Food Bank. I always scrounge my car, change purse, sofa cushions for all the change I can find and deposit it in the coin box, then stand patiently while some lovely elderly gent pins my poppy on my collar. This year I got my poppy from an Army veteran who was probably in his 80s who had a faint scent of Old Spice, which always reminds me of my late Grandpa.

In Canada, most provinces have what my family calls "V-plates" or license plates that denote that the vehicle owner is a Veteran. It is a sad world we live in, when some of these plates are on vehicles driven my young men and women younger than myself, and I constantly pray for peace in the world so that some day no young person needs to experience the horrors of war and the post-traumatic stress that comes home with the veterans who make it through. But until that day, I will wear my poppy, donate to Veteran's charities, pray for people caught up in wars and armed conflict, and teach my children about the horror of war--hoping that others do the same.

 

[Marianne]

Yay Moolie!

 

[moolie]

Tried something "new" last night

We often have an "earth hour" style evening when we're all at home--we don't use any electronic devices for a few hours and light some candles to read or play board games by. Makes for nice family togetherness time and hopefully cuts our electric bill and our reliance on electronics for "entertainment".

I picked up a $9.99 oil lamp from Canadian Tire the other day and we fired it up as one of our lights last night and it worked just lovely!

This is the lamp we bought:

It stands just under a foot tall, and from the reading I've done on oil/kerosene lamps we should probably replace the shorter chimney with a taller one due to our elevation so we can burn it brighter without smoking.

As it is now, it would take about 4 of these to light our average-size family room, with a taller chimney we could probably get by with 2 depending on our activities. We did just fine last night because we also have several candle holders and lots of beeswax candles. I have to say the beeswax has a more pleasing odour, but the lamp really didn't make much of a smell which was a pleasant surprise.

 

[justusnak]

Beautiful! I have 7 oil lamps, I sorta collect them. LOL If I see one at a yard sale...or auction, I snap it up! Most of mine are antiques, but I use them, we have lots of power outages. :/ I like your idea of "earth hour" We should all do that....nice.