When To Put Up Your Christmas Tree

          This is an age old question that has caused problems in families for years.  My husband’s father wouldn’t put up the Christmas tree until Christmas Eve.  The family would decorate it and they would keep it up well until January.  After he died his Mother kept it up until Easter, maybe she was rebelling.  He was a wonderful husband and father, he just had the tradition of putting up the tree on Christmas Eve. 

My family would get the tree sometime after Thanksgiving and keep it in the house until the New Year. 

            It has long been a tradition in my home to put the tree up after Thanksgiving for many people as that signifies the beginning of the Christmas Holiday.

            I put my Christmas tree up in October and have for the past few years.  You say that is too early?  Of course I don’t put up a live tree until closer to the Holidays but I get out my old “fake” tree as some call them and put it up early.  My Grand kids and I then decorate it slowly until the Thanksgiving Holiday.  We take our time and enjoy each ornament as we put it on the tree.  It takes us a while but we are not in any hurry.  I am a firm believer that Christmas is not just gifts, although that is a nice bonus; Christmas to me is the Holiday season with the family and what we do together.

  The reason I started putting my tree up so early is I am busy with work and don't get it up at all during the Holiday season. I would wait until after Thanksgiving to put it up because that is the thing you are supposed to do.  I would feel bad throughout the Holidays because I wanted a tree but didn’t have time to put it up.  The last year I put my tree up late my daughter and I were decorating it on Christmas Eve.  We were so tired by that time that we put very few decorations on the tree.  At that point we didn’t really care if we had one, we were almost throwing on the decorations.   That is when I decided to put it up early and enjoy it throughout the Holidays rather than have it a chore. 

If I have time closer to Christmas I decorate a live tree as there is nothing like the smell of a real Christmas tree to bring the Holidays to life.  I have plenty of decorations so there is always enough for all the trees and to spare.  I always take my tree down before the New Year.  I like to start the New Year fresh and new.

Do you think that all the homes in those magazines start after Thanksgiving?  No, many start in July or August to decorate the home for the Holidays and have a good time during the Holidays.

I was shopping after Christmas and was talking to a woman who was buying an artificial Christmas tree on sale for the following year.  She told me she liked to put her Christmas tree up and decorate early but her husband didn’t like it.  I told her I started in October and why.  She then told me she was going to tell her husband she was going to start earlier next year and not worry about what people think.  I’m not trying to make family problems, just want you to know that if you think you decorate early, I probably have you beat.

Put your Old Reel Movie Pictures onto DVD and Share with your Family

 

            Hopefully you come from a family that loves taking pictures of you and the rest of the family.  You may have thought it is an unpleasant thing to be posing when you are younger but you will be grateful when you get older that someone cared enough to make a record of your life.

If you are older this was not as prevalent as it is now, the movie picture machines when they first came out for the public were very expensive while now they can be bought at a very reasonable price and are a thousand times better.  I just happen to come from a family where my father got on the bandwagon and bought a movie camera and took pictures of us.  It wasn’t that we had a lot of money but to him it became a hobby, he even had a dark room in the house to develop some of the pictures.  I have the machine we used to watch them on.  You could only run it for so long because the light bulb inside would get too hot.  I got  out the old projector other day to check on some of the motion pictures he had taken and even remembered how to thread it even though it’s been who knows how many years since he taught me.

            Since it has been some time since the movies were taken and they do deteriorate with time I took them to Costco to have them put on DVD so everyone in the family who wants one can enjoy them also.  It took a couple of weeks to have them converted to DVD but it was worth the wait.  After I got them back I got an e-mail from yes video.   I went on line and sent e-mails to my family inviting them to view the videos and if they wanted to purchase a DVD they can buy them direct from yes video since I gave them permission on the share folder in my yes video.  Some of the movie pictures have cousins and grandparents in them so I am sending invitations to not only my immediate family but to cousins as well. 

            It will bring your family closer even though you haven’t kept in touch through the years.  I think it is the duty of whoever has the pictures to share them with everyone, they don’t belong to just one person; they are meant to be enjoyed by all. 



 



When Is the Best Time To Buy Christmas Presents

 

 

            Let’s say it is getting close to Christmas and you are in a frenzy trying to think what to get for Uncle John or your cousin Sue.  (Does this sound familiar?) You have one week left and you are in a panic, you have already overspent and this is not fun anymore.  To be perfectly honest, is this how you want to spend your Holidays?

            I knew a woman once who had all of her Christmas bought by August.  When the Holidays came she would wrap her presents, decorate her house and enjoy the season. 

            No, I don’t have my presents bought yet, but starting this next week I am going to put on my list start my Christmas shopping.  I have to have a list for groceries or other items needed when I go shopping or else I forget what I need and its not like I can just run to the store, the stores I shop at are about two hours away from where I live. 

 I have a few plastic totes at my home and as I buy the presents I put them in the tote.  The first year I did buy early I forgot where the presents were when the Holidays came or who I had bought for.  That is when I came up with the totes and it has made it much easier to keep track of what I have.  You may also make list of what you bought and who it is for quick scanning. 

            By doing it this way you buy a little at a time, you can get better buys and you get something that someone really wants rather than just a token to say I got you something and made myself feel better.  (I hate that)   By shopping this way I have given things to my family that have meant something to them that they can use. 

            Enjoy your Holidays.

What are you going to do when you aren't as mobile?

 

            We all know that teenagers think they are immortal.  How do you feel about you?  I think we are immortal but we have to pass this life to the next to become that way, which means we need to get through this life first.

Let’s say you are getting older and are starting to notice you don’t have the energy and your body isn’t as resilient as it used to be.  I will be working until I am physically unable to, but you have that wonderful retirement saved up and you are ready to hit the links or whatever it is you have visions of doing when you no longer have to get up and go to work or whatever it is you have to go to now.

What are you going to do when you are say in a walker and unable to go to the golf course because of energy or physical restraints?

That is what I want to talk about, starting now to get other interests that are rewarding.  Each of us has talents even though we are not all sure what they are.  Some women and men make beautiful quilts; some carve amazing things while others paint.  Have you ever watched someone spin yarn or weave?  Some people volunteer, others help with making things like blankets and hygiene kits for emergency distribution.  Whatever it is you like or would like to do, I call it "I’m going to do some day", now is the time to start so that when you are to a point in life that you are not as mobile, you have something more to look forward to than just sitting around, eating and watching television.

I think if you start thinking now about how you want to enjoy your life as you get older you will be more satisfied.  Think about it, take a few minutes a week and start something that you are going to do someday. 

Now is someday.  Let me know how it is going.       

Caramel Sauce

 

I like caramel sauce on my ice cream or other fun things like caramel apples.  If you buy it in the store it is very expensive so this is a recipe I found that is a good caramel sauce.

Recipe yields 1 1/2 cups (although I usually double it but it’s just
as easy to only make a half batch)

1 cup packed brown sugar (I use light brown or golden)
1/2 cup heavy cream
4 tablespoons butter
Pinch of sea salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Melt butter in pot, mix in brown sugar, cream and salt.
Cook over medium-low heat and whisk gently
for about 7 minutes or longer if you doubled.
I remove the pot from the heat; add vanilla and return to
cook for another minute or so to thicken a bit more.
Take it off the stove and pour into a jar then pop it into the
fridge!



Writing Your Own History

 

 

        As your getting older you think back on your life.  I have always been told to keep a journal, sometimes I do really well and then there is now where I haven’t written anything for months.  Let’s face it; my memory isn’t all it used to be.

           When you look at the above picture you see an old building and truck with a mud puddle out front.  What I see in my story is my parent’s first hardware store in the early 50’s.  The old truck we called Dinky Poo, I would love to ride in it with Dad, and I spent a great deal of time in that old truck, it was like family.  The door to the shop had a hole cut in the bottom of it later on for our dog Junior to go in and out, Dad had to enlarge it once because Junior got fat and was stuck in the door.  Once Dad gave him away and he walked around 80 miles in the dead of winter and came home, it took him close to three weeks, Dad never gave him away again.  The pipe sticking out of the old building was to an old pot belly stove that kept the shop warm in the cold winters.  I could go on and on.

            After my Grandmother died I went looking for her history.  She wrote her Dad and Mothers history but I only found a paragraph of one she had written on herself.  As far as I know she never wrote her own history.

            I have always thought to myself who would want to know about me?  Then I remind myself that I want to know about my ancestors, I would love to read about them, about their thoughts and feelings as they went through their journey in life.

            Over the years I have read various books on writing your personal history, even bought a few of the fill in the blank books, but the one suggestion for you is this one.

            Get a three ring binder, it doesn’t have to be fancy, even one you would take to school with lined paper in it.  You then go and start writing titles on each page, for example “First Day of School” on one page “Play in Grade School” on another page “First Garden” on another page, “The Drive In Theater” on another.  You get the picture, write things you want to write about and put the pages back in your folder.  As you think of a title start a new page. 

            The next step is to pull out a page and write a story about your memory then put it back in your binder.  When I started doing this I didn’t have many things I could think of, but the more I did this the more I thought of things to write about. 

            I don’t know about you, but to read I was born on this day and grew up and got married and had kids then grew old doesn’t sound very interesting to me.  If anyone ever wants to know about me, I would rather they really know about me in my stories.  You aren’t writing your history, you are writing your story.

            If you write your story this way you will find you won’t feel the pressure of having to do it, but will enjoy each memory and truly put yourself into it.

            Try it; let me know how it goes.



Cookie Cutter Shelves

     I found this cupboard at an old store, it is from the 1800's.  Sure I should have left it the way it was but I didn't like the primitive finish and if I had to look at it every day I wanted something I liked.  I use to it to display my cookie cutters and other fun things.

     I like using old candy jars for my cookie and pie cutters. If you don't have old jars just go buy an new one and they work just as well.   Candy jars look nice and keep the cookie cutters clean and easy to see. 

     The two mixers at the top, one from my Grandmother and another a find at an antique store.  I have used Grandmas before I got my kitchen aid the old ones are not quite as good.

      I have wrote about this before with the same pictures but it is my favorite and I felt it was worth repeating. 

     Many years ago I heard that if you have a memory of something and don't have that particular object, you can always get something that looks like it and even though it isn't the original it will bring back the same joyful memories.

The "Proper" Way to Hang Out Clothes

 

Not too long ago I was at a DUP (Daughters of the Utah Pioneer Meeting) and during the lesson they were talking about hanging out clothes.  I commented I always hung out my clothes even though I had a dryer because I liked the way the clothes smelled and looked plus it saved money.  One of the ladies at the meeting talked about how her mother would insist they hang out their clothes a certain way.  I thought to myself that was really weird, I hang out my clothes and put the longer ones in the back away from the sun and the shorter ones in the front so as the sun will dry them evenly and the heavier ones I put toward the ends so they don’t stretch out my line but as far as color coordinating that was way too much work for me.

            I was talking to someone in the small town I now live when I mentioned my blog and the article I wrote on teaching your children to hang out clothes.  The woman I was talking to started talking about how they used to hang out the clothes around here.  The women she was talking about are mostly no longer alive; this was back before everyone had a dryer.  When a woman would hang out her clothes they had to be just right.   They all had to be hung with the clothes at even lengths together, the colors needed to be hung together, I mean the blues with the blues and the blacks with the black, the colors evenly matched, the levis together and the whites together.  She said you didn’t leave your clothes hung out overnight because the moon would bleach then too much (I always thought the sun would bleach them out and the woman I was talking too agreed with me.)  Maybe they had another reason they didn't want to leave them overnight.  If I hang out my clothes later and they aren’t dry I will leave them on the line overnight and they smell wonderful in the morning.

When I hang out my clothes I want them to look good but that is just for me as I don’t have any neighbors and no one sees it but me and the grandkids unless the skunks come around.  I hang my socks together.

 

             Then she said something that made me realize why they did it a certain way.  She said, “When they got done hanging out there clothes they would look around at all the other women in the neighborhoods clothesline to see if their clothesline looked as good or heaven forbid better than what they had just hung out.”

I also wondered about other communities, they probably weren’t so different.  When I hang out my clothes I want them to look good but that is just for me as I don't have any neighbors and no one sees it but me and the grandkids.  I hang my socks together.

What us women don’t do to impress someone!

 

 



4th of July Hometown Parade led by the Dog

 

            All across our wonderful nation on the 4^th of July people come together to celebrate.  What makes this day different than other Holidays throughout the year?  Why do so many people donate their time and talent to something that not many see?

 If you are in a large city there is money for a large celebration with fireworks, a parade and carnival.  These small towns have to raise the money themselves for their celebrations; the local church usually has people bring food for the dinners.

I think what makes this country so special are the people that love the United States of America.  They bring their families to either watch or participate in the parade, then go to the park for lunch, games or just to visit.  They don’t need to spend a lot of money or have a lot of fancy floats, but they have pride in their community and want to celebrate with their friends and neighbors.

Don’t get me wrong, I have been at many large parades and enjoyed them a great deal.  They are also put together by people who love this country.

What sets us apart from many other nations is we have the freedom to gather, the freedom to speak as we wish as long as we don't infringe on others, the freedom to go out and start a business and work as hard as we want and hopefully be successful, and if we fail - we can pick our self up and try again.

I love the United States of America – God Bless America and the wonderful people in it.

 

Grandma's Flour Sifter

 

            When I was a young girl I would go to Grandma’s house and she would be making something and get her old flour sifter out of the kitchen cupboard.  The one thing that I thought of when I would saw it was it had flour on it.  I of course wondered why Grandma didn’t wash it as she was so clean throughout the house.

          When I asked her about it she told me you don’t wash your flour sifter that often because it clogs up and doesn't sift as well. 

          Since then I have accumulated a flour sifter of hers and then have gone about collecting ones I like.  My favorites are the sifters that have three sifters in one.  I have one cup ones and of course your old traditional sifter.  You may find them all over in different sizes.  Now using the old fashioned flour sifter has gone by the way side, all the cooking TV shows have the big strainers they sift with. 

          For me there is just something about using an old fashioned sifter that makes me feel like you are baking, it brings back those good old memories.