Tuesday, August 31, 2021
My Favorite Podcasts - Seasonal Selections
Monday, August 30, 2021
Our Autumn and Winter Home Apothecary
This year I added Four Thieves vinegar to the mix. The origin of the name is a little dark. The story goes that during the 18th century plague in Europe, four thieves robbed the homes and graves of those who were sick and dying yet never became sick themselves, supposedly attributed to their consumption of this herbal tonic. So while I won't be using it for that purpose, **wink wink**, I decided that I would give it a try as well. This vinegar is made with garlic, a strong antibacterial in its own right, combined with four different herbs, one for each thief, but many recipes call for more.(see below). *It is used to help to prevent the spread of communicable diseases like the common cold and influenza.
So as you can see, both of these vinegars serve similar purposes, and perhaps making them both might seem like a bit of an overkill, but since I'd never tried Four Thieves, I decided to give it a try and see how I like it. If you're interested in adding one or both of them to your home apothecary, here are the recipes I used. This week I'll be adding Elderberry Syrup and Fermented Garlic Honey to our apothecary and I'll share those with you, as well!
1 organic lemon with peel, diced
½ cup fresh ginger root, grated
½ cup fresh turmeric root, grated
¼ cup fresh horseradish root, grated
¼ cup fresh thyme, chopped
2 teaspoons fresh ground black pepper
A few fresh cayenne or jalapeño peppers
Raw, unpasteurized apple cider vinegar
This recipe is VERY flexible. These are the ingredients I use, but you can substitute some and add others. Just google "Fire Cider" for a wealth of variations and choose the one you like best. Last year I used an orange instead of lemon, and may still add it back in!
Once you’ve finished infusing the herbs, add warmed raw honey to taste, I usually add about a 1/3 of a cup. Mix thoroughly, and bottle. It will keep for several months unrefrigerated if stored in a cool place, but longer if you do refrigerate it, perhaps indefinitely!
4 cloves of garlic, cloves separated, skins removed, and crushed
If you or any other person has a medical concern, you should consult with your health care provider or seek other professional medical treatment. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something that have read on this blog or in any linked materials. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor or emergency services immediately.
Saturday, August 28, 2021
My Favorite Autumn Playlists
September arrives this week, and summer slowly fades into that most beautiful of seasons, Autumn! I'm planning on putting out all my favorite autumn decoration on Tuesday, and to help set the mood I'll turn to some of my favorite vintage autumn playlists.
I discovered Jake Westbrook's lovely assortment of seasonal music during Thanksgiving last year and I've been listening to them several times a week since. They provide the perfect background for writing and crafting, and for helping to lull you back to sleep at 3 a.m., which seems to be happening to me a lot lately. World events and my own struggles, which are nothing in comparison yet still personal to me, has made for some restless nights and jaw clenching days of late. It's just how my body processes stress, no matter how small. I'll feel a headache coming on and realize I've had my jaw clenched for hours. My paternal grandmother did the same thing, and the older I get the more I find I am like her. That being said, I'm taking a mindful approach to combating stress and approaching it with an even more heightened awareness of my daily habits and routines. I'm making adjustments as needed, and listening to my favorite music is part of that plan.
The links below are from You Tube, which is where I originally discovered them, but I've since found them on Spotify, as well. I chose to link to You Tube in case some of you might not have a Spotify account, but if you do and you'd prefer to listen to them there, just search for Jake Westbrook, or "Vintage Autumn Playlists" and you should be able to find them pretty easily. Also, if you do happen to have a Spotify account, I've created a few seasonal playlists myself, you can find the Autumn edition, here. I also have it linked in the left side bar. I hope you'll enjoy it!
Friday, August 27, 2021
Monday, August 23, 2021
Simple Vanilla Syrup
Wednesday, August 18, 2021
Alone, But Never Lonely
- ELLEN BURSTYN
Monday, August 16, 2021
Thinking Ahead To Autumn
I had to make a special trip to Dollar General this morning for coffee filters. I've had it on my list the last three times I was out, and I STILL forgot to pick them up. But not being able to make coffee tomorrow morning made the trip today a necessity. I try to avoid having to make special trips for one item, but in this case it was a happy inconvenience as they had just begun to put out their autumn decor.
I don't know if any of you frequent Dollar General. They get a bad rap for often being dirty and disorganized. But luckily we have a fairly new location just a few blocks from the apartment that is well managed and always well stocked. I buy all of my cleaning products and toiletries at DG as I haven't found the prices to be cheaper anywhere else, and with their weekly $5 off $25 coupon every Saturday, it makes it even more affordable.
But the thing I think I love the most about DG are their seasonal decorations. I've been shopping there for years now for cute additions to my decor, especially for autumn and Christmas. They always have a few pieces every year that I just can't resist, and almost always for under $10, and often even $1-3! They only had a few items out today, but already I picked up these cute little buffalo check pumpkins. They were in a bag, 6 for $3 in two different sizes, small and large. I put them out as soon as I got home, because I didn't see the point of pulling out the bins when my plan is to decorate in just a few weeks. I hope to have everything out and ready for the season by September 1. Thankfully I don't have nearly as much autumn decor as I do Christmas, so it's easy to do in a day.
In the mean time I've still got a few projects on my summer to-do list that I hope to finish up this week. On today's agenda was to FINALLY paint an old bookshelf that used to belong to my grandmother. I remember it well from my childhood, it's where she kept her stacks of favorite back issue magazines, and my grandmother LOVED magazines! It's also where she set aside some copies just for me, especially McCall's so that I could cut out the monthly Betsy McCall paper doll! Such fond, sweet memories.
I've had it ever since she died, and originally I painted it white and distressed it to match the other items in my daughter's nursery. It housed a small collection of her books for a number of years, until finally she decided she didn't want it in her room anymore. I've wanted to paint it black and had it on my to-get-around-to-someday list for about five years now, and over the weekend I decided that it was high time. I had some left over paint, just enough to get the job done, and so this morning that is exactly what I did. It's drying now, and then this afternoon I'll check for the places that need a little touching up, and then tomorrow I'll distress it and then put it back in its place and fill it with my favorite books.
So what about you, are you trying to wrap up summer projects, are you excited for autumn and have you started decorating? I'd love to hear from you!
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Friday, August 13, 2021
Small Things That Fill My Days
This past month, in addition to single handedly moving all-the-things that we still had in a very large storage unit into the apartment, stacking them in one room, temporarily, until Kate's room mate moved out, and then completely tearing down my bedroom and moving into the larger one that her room mate vacated, and moving everything from storage AGAIN, and organizing it all in my old bedroom which is now our "in home" storage unit, I also found time to
.. . . do some thrifting, and was so happy to find the little tray you see in the second picture that says, "Bless Our Home". One of my all time favorite finds and only $1.99.
. . . do some reading, Liturgy of the Ordinary, I'll be sharing more about that soon. I also found the bookmark you see in the first picture. My absolute favorite that I thought I had lost.
. . . . I cross stitched. I made up the three red work pieces you see above. I'm going to work on finishing them off this weekend.
. . . . and I painted. I've had a box of "thrifted" items that had been collecting in a box for months now, so one afternoon I took several of the items out and finished them up and now they've all found a place in and around the apartment. I'll share some pictures of them in another post.
What projects have you been working on this summer?
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