Domestic Derring-Do

Integration

2008-01-05T13:22:00.000-05:00

Okay, I admit it. I can't keep my interests separate. They just get muddled with each other.

So, as much as I'd like to spare Linguini-ites the overpowering nesting tendencies of Domestic Derring-Do and spare the Do-ers from my occasionally caustic, decidedly canine, usually puzzling life on Linguini On the Ceiling, I'm beginning to feel fragmented. They keep spilling over into each other.

And so all future posts will be over on Linguini and we'll all have to live with the fact that sometimes I'm not pithy and clever and I really do have a side of me that wishes she never had to leave her little hill for the real world.

So, if you're a regular of Domestic Derring-Do, Welcome, and don't let the residents there frighten you. They're harmless, old friends, many related and all hold down normal lives. Well, relatively normal.

Like angels on the head of a pin...

2008-01-02T17:46:00.000-05:00

Ya know what really tickled me when Chuck and I picked out this land four years ago?

Moss.

I love moss, but haven't lived anywhere with moss since I was nine years old. I missed having moss. Now I have lots of moss and I never fail to get a 'heart val-ump' whenever I discover another patch.

When I was very little my mother told me that at midnight the elves come out and dance on the moss -- a strange memory in that my mother was not given to stories of fantasy. Most of her stories dealt with evil little girls who get their proper come-uppance -- like the one about the cranky little girl who wouldn't let her mother comb her hair, so she left the house without her hair combed and the birds mistook her head for a nest and started dropping worms and bugs and bird poop on it.

Perhaps because it was so out of character for her I believed her story well past the time I should have known better. I think some part of me keeps hoping to find a tiny shoe left behind.

Or some other evidence...

This is Gnome Hill, after all...

A Peaceful New Year's Eve

2008-01-01T15:16:00.000-05:00

No, really. Even with a party going on downstairs, for Chuck and me things were calm and quiet.

We played Scrabble and I made some homemade caramel popcorn and we toasted in the New Year with sparkling fruit juice (we were, after all, responsible for all those kids downstairs, who were remarkably well-behaved).

Not a bad way to spend many people's least favorite holiday. I think there is just so much pressure put on the New Year, it's hard to get into the required festive spirit. There is all this baggage of the previous year to reconcile and huge expectations for the coming year. It does us good to remember January 1st is just December 31st's tomorrow. That's all. No more onus on the day than any other day -- and just as much promise.

My caramel corn recipe, for those interested:

In a brown paper grocery bag put 16 cups air-popped popcorn (approx. 1 cup unpopped)

Place in a glass microwave safe bowl:

1 cup brown sugar
1 stick butter (1/2 cup)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup light corn syrup

Microwave on high for about 5 minutes, stopping to stir at 1 minute intervals, until bubbly. (Alternatively, you can do this on the range top in a heavy pot until bubbly).

Take off heat and stir into mixture:

1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Pour this over popcorn in bag, close bag and shake well. Place in microwave on high for a total of five minutes as follows: 2 minutes, shake; 1 minute, shake; 1 minute, shake; 30 seconds, shake; 30 seconds, shake.

Pour into large bowl and stir a little more. Allow to cool and stir to break up.

(You can also add up to 2 cup of whatever nuts you may want. I like cashews, personally...)

Match and Swatch

2007-12-31T15:21:00.000-05:00

I'm always surprised when I'm working on several projects at once, how they end up having some kind of common denominator.

In this case, the off-white fabric for the library would go wonderfully as a pair of pants or a skirt to go with the Evening Breeze tank. At least color-wise. Weight-wise, though, the fabric is much too heavy for the kind of weather in which you would wear a cotton tank. Maybe layered under something...I don't know how much I'll have left after finished the library. I'm not real anxious to put the lightest color in my outfit on my bottom half...'nuf said...

So...the off-white squares for the window seat cushion are cut and I've knitted my swatch. I've gotten this week's column roughed out and have successfully kept my husband and son from killing each other while they prepare the rec room for my son's party tonight. In addition, all six dogs are napping at one time. I'd do a general purpose happy dance if I didn't think it would wake them all up.

Tonight Chuck and I will be propping up our eyelids and policing Joe's lock-in party. Back in my youth I also stayed up all night and watched the sun come up on the beach on New Year's Day. These days it's an effort staying up awake after midnight. Thank goodness for a husband who is a 'night person.'

Full Steam Ahead

2007-12-29T12:24:00.001-05:00

Spent the day preparing the fabric for the library decor project. This must be pretty old stuff, purchased while my sons were quite little and the most I could do with fabric I'd just bought on a whim was throw it into the linen closet and hope I'd remember it later.

Certainly at the time there were people waiting in line to tell me how to better run my home and life so that perfectly good fabric would not languish for over a decade. I think I chose the better part in spending that organizational time with my sons instead and, if I failed somewhat in keeping all the plates spinning smartly at one time, at least I don't pretend that I did by editing the past. I remember this when I get the urge to "advise" young mothers, who need, instead to hear how well they are doing, not how well I did.

Anyway, the fabric had not been through a pre-wash and, therefore, still needed the edges zigzagged. These days I do all this within a few days of bringing the fabric home whether I know what I'm doing with them or not.

In the meantime, I chose this winter's large knitting project, a tank from the Spring 2004 Knitters. If you think it's too early to be knitting for summer, know I am the world's slowest knitter, partly because when I broke my wrists a few years back I didn't get it set for a month and some of the muscles simply don't work, and partly because I just am. I haven't knit a swatch yet to see if I have enough to complete the tank. I don't even know what this yarn is (I at least know it's cotton) or remember where I got it. It's pastel, which is unusual for me to buy, but so was all that blue fabric. Obviously I have a split personality with a totally different skin tone.

Since I don't possess a ball winder and swift, this was put away in hanks, also evidence that I did not buy this at Knitting Addiction while vacationing at Outer Banks because she always winds the hanks for her customers.

No problem, though. It gives me the chance to use my new stationary yarn swift that my nephew got me for Christmas. It only looks like a step stool so that it blends in with the rest of the kitchen equipment. To each his own...

Miss Whiskers thinks it's a kitty tent.

I certainly don't want to be the one to tell her otherwise.

The Stash

2007-12-27T11:44:00.000-05:00

Anyone having anything to do with sewing, knitting, crocheting or crafting knows what a 'stash' is. Most of us have one of various sizes, some having transcended the name and blooming into a full-blown compulsion.

A stash can be comforting in that you always have something to do if, say, you are snowed in for a few weeks and there is nothing to do but sit in front of the fire and knit or sew. That's the thought anyway.

Personally I find that whenever I am in a position where I can't go anywhere and I try to fall back on my stash, I usually can't find a pattern to match or I have the wrong needles or I have the pattern and needles but something has gone awry with the supplies I do have like someone has used my fabric scissors in their tackle box or used my size 4 double pointed needles to build a miniature log cabin for a project.

And if all the elements come together for the actual project, being snowed in with a husband, two teenagers and six dogs means you spend the entire time wiping down counters, putting dishes in the washer, mopping the floor and cooking.

So I've never really worked at building up my stash and I know that, compared with most, it's a sad little pile indeed, built over the past 20 years out of fabrics that were timeless, at a ridiculously low price and in abundance or one-of-a-kind fibers that instantly brought its use to my mind's eye.

One of the first projects I plan to do in 2008 is to decorate our library which currently, while serving its purpose of accessibly housing our books, is otherwise a barren, uninviting tunnel that right now is merely a conduit to my office. There is my off-white recliner in there and every now and then I try to cozy it up by sticking the recliner in front of the fireplace and plopping a basket there, but that doesn't to more than take up a tiny percentage of space in a room with so much potential.

I have been making it a policy, however, to not purchase anything new if I could make what I already have work or if I already had something functional even though it may not be cosmetically aesthetic. I'll admit it was with a heavy heart that I approached my meager stash of fabric, needing a good bit for curtains, a window seat cushion, pillows and a throw. It had to have a wine color to it, since that's how the couch is upholstered and it needed to match up with the beige walls that have a blue-tone to them. Oh, and some off-white to bring in my recliner might come in handy too.

I was pretty much resigned to pigmental discord in the library. After all, my palette, at least on the first floor, leans toward the earthy green, red and brown.

Tell me the universe doesn't cooperate when you're on the right path:

All of these fabrics were bought at different times years apart. And there is enough for all the projects.

So I'm feeling right proud of my "foresight." At least, that'll be my story next time I want to add to the stash...

No Photographic Evidence...Sorry

2007-11-05T10:45:00.000-05:00

Someday I will post photos of pasta-making. This weekend's foray was impressive, but certainly not graceful.

I've made pasta before using a rolling pin and knife, but since Christmas the pasta maker that attaches to my mixer has been taunting me from the cabinet. After all, on the Food Network, pasta-making is nothing: slap the egg and water into the flour, commercial break, there's a nice, smooth dough, knead it around, commercial break, now it's sliding smoothly through the pasta machine and Presto! Chango! Fettucine!

Need I say it's not all that simple?

There I was surrounded by Joy of Cooking, the pasta machine manual and Lidya's Kitchen cookbook advising me what to do, and the first quarter-batch looking like a rat had gnawed on it. I think at some point Joe, my youngest son, started pounding it into the machine, laughing maniacally.

He finally gave up and left the kitchen saying, "Break out the San Giorgio, Mom."

Undaunted, I shut all the books and let The Force take over.

And that's my advice to you. Once you have a general recipe, use The Force and your own common sense.

The last three quarter-batches should have been filmed for Food Network -- or at least for Domestic Derring-Do. And if, at that point, I'd have had the energy to climb the stairs to get the camera you would now be seeing pictures of waves of fettucine pouring fluidly from my pasta machine and me with a serene smile on my face. You would see a big photo of steaming pasta with a simple tomato sauce and husband and brother with happy faces. I would be writing about how simple it is to produce a bowl of pasta and how I do it all the time: Presto! Chango!

I aspire to get to that point where I can be smug about pasta-making ("You mean you buy boxed pasta? What's wrong with you?").

Why I do what I do (be-doo-be-doo)(...sorry)

2007-10-31T15:36:00.000-04:00

It's a puzzle for non-knitters. Why do knitters knit dishcloths? And why to knitters knit socks?

You can purchase both commodities at your local Walmart (if, indeed, I shopped at Walmart, which I don't. Did back about five years ago. Since then I've not set foot in one. Ever.) at 54,679 of them for a dollar. Of course they're worth about that much...

Okay. Not always. You can get cheap dishcloths and socks at stores that don't aim to fill our landfills with useless crap, exploit their employees and trade with unethical manufacturers. And they will be functional and you can buy a ton of them.

So why knit them?

On a personal level, I prefer hand knitted socks, since my feet are shaped like squares and I when I buy socks I always have an abundance of toe fabric at the end or the heel is halfway up my leg. And I do prefer the heftiness of a knitted cotton dishcloth.

But that's my personal preference and I realize not everyone appreciates the difference between hand knitted and functional store-bought socks. And that's okay. You like what you like.

I think, though, another reason why I knit these things (other than the fact that I like to knit) is that this is another way of keeping close to the items I use during the day. By putting so much work into this common, everyday household item, I become more mindful of the task I use it for.

It's easy to take silly things like socks and dishcloths for granted. They mean nothing. Throw them away, tear 'em up. Doesn't matter at 54,679 for a dollar. But it matters if you've put a few hours into them and while you knitted you watched a Jane Austen movie and thought about all you've heard about Austen and whether it was true that she recognized the societal hypocrisies of her world or just inadvertently included them in her little romantic story*. Or this sock is the one knitted during as waited for your son to arrive back at school from a track meet so you could take him home.

I think of how many things I wasted because they are so cheap. I can afford paper napkins, paper towels, disposable dust rags and -- and this one really annoys my brother -- plastic straws. (I wash my plastic straws, especially because I usually use them only to drink water. This drives my brother crazy. When he comes over he always tries to throw out my plastic straws while I always try to give him drinks with the rattiest looking straw I can find. What? You were expecting the warm fuzzies?) But I'm slowly weeding them out of our lives because I think we have a responsibility not to use up resources.

And so I knit dishcloths and socks. And I darn socks. And I take more care of them than with the store-bought variety.

*In the movie Sense and Sensibility my favorite line is when Mrs. Jennings asks what is the occupation of the man who was interested in Elinor and Marianne replies, "He has no occupation," to which Mrs. Jennings exclaims, "Oh! Then he's a Gentleman!" This little piece of irony, though, belongs to Emma Thompson, who wrote the screenplay, not to Jane Austen.

Well, Bread

2007-10-20T17:19:00.000-04:00

I love to bake bread, a task that forces you to putter at home as you wait between steps. With two puppies to train, I'm confined a lot to the kitchen. Might as well make good use of the time.

I'll admit that I used to be intimidated by the first steps in the process, the proving of the yeast and the forming of the dough. But I've overcome my fear of my yeast dying a horrible death -- an error that I commonly made during my early (12 years old) attempts at bread making and my Artisan, once again, has eased the tension over the rest. After that it's pure bliss to knead bread dough. It's almost alive with warmth and bounce and I love that when I put it to rise it does just that, like it knows. But between you and me, my very favorite part is punching down the risen dough. Don't ask me why. I just love letting my bread exhale.

I know a lot of people make this part of their chores and the bread becomes a staple for the family. But I think the very best thing about making your own bread is eating it fresh out of the oven. After that, it's really okay and all. It's that half hour after baking that makes homemade bread an unforgettable treat.

This is cinnamon raisin bread made with the standard white bread recipe out of Fanny Farmer with the sugar and butter doubled. Then, prior to shaping the loaves, I roll each half of the dough into a rectangle, spread with butter, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar and a handful of raisins. Then I roll up and shape my loaves.

Needless to say, one loaf is gone. The other will be breakfast.

A Mom's Got to Do What a Mom's Got to Do

2007-10-19T15:53:00.000-04:00

So what was this week's project?

A new dress? The beginnings of a quilt? Hair for poor, bald Eleanor?

Alas...this is Homecoming week. So this week's project?

Black pants.

Hemming black pants. Lots of boring black pants.

Sigh.

Gnome for the Holiday

2007-10-14T12:49:00.000-04:00

For our anniversary, Chuck and I decided to buy each other a gnome. We have been steadily building our collection, tentatively at first because of our first experience with populating our property. But now we know to secure all known gnomes and use signage to remind people we do, in fact, have large dogs on the property.

So we’ve happily been adding to our collection, aided by friends, and when we passed a store with this fellow sitting outside, well, we couldn’t resist.

Then the dilemma became whether or not to paint him.

I know there is something very dramatic and earthy about leaving him gray. I can imagine moss or lichens or really organic stuff growing on him and giving him character.

But…

Remember during the sixties when Disney Wonderful World of Color came on the television? There it was: the Disneyland Castle with Tinkerbell flying around splashing color all over the place. My mother would sigh and say, “Wouldn’t this be lovely in color?” and then turn on something else because we didn’t get a color television until 1970. When every year we watched The Wizard of Oz on television my parents would describe to us about how pretty the movie was when Dorothy opened the door to the land of Oz and suddenly everything was in color, a feature we were missing because we were seeing it in black and white.

I blame this color depravation with my preference for things being in color. I may admire the texture and nuances of the halftones, but really I’m just waiting for the door to open and to see the beauty of color.

And so I painted our gnome.

It was a pretty mundane task until I got to the face. The beard really needed enhancement. And then there were the eyes.

Eyes are always a challenge because if you get th

em wrong you end up with

a frightening lawn ornament rather than the kitschy fantasy that is a garden gnome.

I don’t think he’s all that scary, do you?

Certainly Fluffy doesn’t

think so.

Though I’m sure, having two teenage boys around, the poor fellow will be subjected to some disturbing situations…

A work in progress

2007-10-08T19:31:00.000-04:00

I'm taking a big chance. I'm showing you a work in progress. Were my mother alive and here, she'd be rolling her eyes and saying, "You know you never finish anything you start."

I do have a problem in that area, mostly because in the back of my mind I think, if I don't finish it, it's always got potential. Once I finish it, it might be lousy and that's that. But, unfinished, it still has a chance to be wonderful.

At any rate, this is going to be a doll house doll for the doll house several of the men in my life have promised to build me, but as yet none have delivered. My husband came closest when one winter when we would go to the high school's open shop night. We built the frame of a three-story Victorian, but choked when we got to the roof since it required beveling and a very scary saw. So now it holds a bunch of his old papers at our old house that has yet to be cleaned out.

Still, I persevere and yesterday sculpted this out of polymer clay. Turns out my oven doesn't go low enough to bake it, so now she awaits the purchase of a toaster oven. But am I daunted? Was my mother right after all?

Beats me. I haven't figured out anything about the body other than it's going to be cloth and stuffed. I still haven't decided whether to sculpt the upper arms and hands, just the hands or use cloth for both. I haven't the foggiest idea what I'm doing. I'm sure there are classes and books for this, but I tend to get too hung up on directions from other people and think I can't do something if I don't have exactly what they say I should have.

She has turned out older than what I was aiming for, but I decided I like her that way. Her story is already forming in my mind.

It's a sad story, though. She's had a hard life, what with marrying for convenience rather than love, failing at becoming a mother, and running a huge Victorian home on very little money. They live with her husband's ailing mother, the owner of the house and provider of most expenses, since the husband is not a great success in business, as the old lady never ceases to remind him. His father, she nags, was the great builder of the empire that now supports them all and junior cannot ever hope to fill his father's shoes. And he accepts that version, and it makes his wife sad and a little angry. But she has long since given up trying to bolster his ego after his mother is done with it. So she saves her strength for running her household on the meager amount alloted to her with very little help.

She wishes she lived in a world where a woman of her station could go out and get a job. But this is the 19th century and to work outside the home would be unthinkable for someone in her class. So at night she writes little stories that she sells to a small publisher under a nom de plume. Even though she is exhausted, this at least gives her money that she stashes away, just in case her mother-in-law dies and her husband grows a backbone. Then she will reveal her savings to him and they will travel together and, maybe, she'll fall in love with him.

Or maybe he'll die.

Her name is Eleanor.

Bare Minimum

2007-09-14T08:58:00.001-04:00

Sometimes acts of domestic derring-do require considerably more time and precludes posting on a blog. Such was the case the past few days, during which I was not actually in my physical domicile, but more outside maintaining the spiritual concept of my domicile.

What I mean is that we’ve been attending to extended family matters for the past week. Emotionally exhausting but very necessary.

When I was younger I thought times like these qualified as “emergencies”: an illness, a family member in crisis, or a death. Having weathered enough of them, though, I know they are just a part of the flow of everyone’s life. The rest of the world keeps spinning on its axis, the illusion of the sun coming up and going down continues, and the dust keeps piling on the end table even though I have no time to dust it. Only back then I figured I was exempt from day-to-day maintenance. So the dishes would pile up and the clutter would accumulate as I flitted out the door on my way to make everything all right somewhere else.

The problem is that eventually you have to return home to face the music, so to speak, and when you do, you are already emotionally bereft. Yet there they are: the sink full of dishes, the mountain of clutter, a fetid pile of laundry. The elves of compassion did not show up while you were gone to make them go away. Just when you need relaxation the most, the backlog screams at you from every corner.

And, since the aforementioned circumstances are a constant part of life, things can truly get out of hand and beyond even a rested person’s ability.

So I’ve learned that, no matter what, some basics have to be done, even if it means spending an extra exhausted half hour sorting laundry after a sitting in a surgical waiting room all day or getting up 10 minutes earlier to wash up the dishes.

Basically, I deal with my “hot points,” chores that, if left undone, are guaranteed to drain me of any positive emotion I have left. The mail piling up is one of mine, along with dishes in the sink and an unmade bed. So I make sure these get done.

And I delegate even more than usual. My boys are old enough now to know that, during times like these, I don’t care who did “it” last, how much he did as compared to you, or whether or not “it” is important to the overall condition of the universe. Just get it done and we’ll sort out justice later. There was a time when I had to quote the previous sentence in order to see some action, but thankfully they’ve memorized it as Mom Quote #34. (Mom Quote #17 is: “Put the laundry in the hamper. Not by the hamper. Not near the hamper. Not on top of the hamper. Not in the vicinity of the hamper. In the hamper.”)

What I aim for is that feeling of “ahhhhhhhh” when I come home, not a sinking feeling when I open the door and am reminded of all I have to do just to catch up.

More than anything during these times I need my home to be a sanctuary.

Orange you glad...

2007-09-06T09:45:00.000-04:00

We are not layer cake people, but pound cake? A whole other story. This is Ina Garten's Orange Pound Cake from The Barefoot Contessa Family Style.

It requires quite a bit of rind, not to mention fresh orange juice (which, admittedly, I wouldn't have the patience to squeeze out if I didn't have a juicer on my KitchenAid Artisan). But the payoff is that it makes two loaves, so I can freeze one for hosting emergencies.

As with most cakes, this is best if left to sit for 24 hours before eating (making the spare loaf a Godsend if you're trying to save this for a special dinner and other family members are moping around the kitchen acting like poor starving orphans who only get gruel for dessert and begging for "just a taste").

The icing for this loaf, if you notice, is rather thick. This is because it is custom-made for my husband, who likes a little cake with his frosting. So this is double what is recommended by the recipe and decency.

Do I actually have any china?

2007-08-29T12:40:00.000-04:00

No, I don't. So I guess I can't actually use this tea towel. I mean, when you had that underwear labeled with the days of the week, did you wear Thursday on Saturday? All right, then.

I do like the kitschy-ness of the pattern and it was quick to embroider. The pattern came from Lanetz Living, where there are all kinds of fun vintage stuff to play with.

Container herbs

2007-08-27T14:44:00.001-04:00

I've never been known for my green thumb and, since this is our first full summer here on Gnome Hill, the only progress we've made with a vegetable garden was to use the back hoe to stir up some rocks.

There are Uber-Gardners out there somewhere "tsk, tsk"-ing, I know. We managed to pull rocks out of a 3'x8' patch and added some mulch and manure, but by the time we managed even that much is was too late to plant anything.

But herbs are very forgiving and I plant several pots around my deck. I even started these seeds rather late, and the pot of oregano at right came from a meager two seedlings that actually germinated in June. Don't ask me what happened with the rest of the seeds, but this is plenty.

I planted a huge amount of basil and, even though I gave away as many plants as I could, still should have been thinned more. Two basil pots stand guard at the back door because the herb is supposedly disliked by flies. But we apparently have vegetarian flies who, in fact have no problem lying in wait in the pots to fly in the house and give the cats something to chase.

My boys and I love dill in cucumber salad and on fish, so I was a little disappointed more of this didn't come up. But it is going to seed if I get the ambition to make pickles, which probably won't happen because I don't eat a whole lot of them and everyone else is rather ambivalent about them.

The Italian flat leaf parsley did well as soon as I transplanted it into a large pot. The original batch of seedlings, started in my deck planters, are sad, sickly things, probably because the soil was used up from last year and because I never fully thinned them out. Still, these few plants have served me well.

Chives were an herb I never really used and planted just because I could. But now I'm hooked on them and I love how they just kind of replenish themselves.

Then there's the mystery of the rosemary. Now, I love rosemary, especially on roast chicken. Out of all the herbs I planted, the rosemary was the one I truly wanted to have fresh. But it never came up. June, July -- nothing. Then, suddenly up pops this little seedling.

Well, there isn't much time for the poor thing to become established, so I may bring it indoors and pray I have a sunny enough window for it to grow happy...and large.

I'm afraid that's all we have by way of "crops" here at Gnome Hill, at least for this year. Unless you count the rocks.

Clean, cleaner, cleanest

2007-08-24T09:05:00.000-04:00

When it comes to guerilla domesticity, nothing brings enthusiasm to a screeching halt like the subject of cleaning.

Oh we homemakers love the baking, the cooking, the crafting and the decorating. But cleaning? Mundane, routine, boring, exhausting.

Don’t worry. I’m not going to lecture about finding the positive aspects of scrubbing a floor. Maybe that works in the moment, but certainly doesn’t overcome the feeling that cleaning is something that is better left for tomorrow – and you know what they say about domani.

It took me a long time to come to terms with cleaning…or not cleaning…mostly because there is no justice in the subject, particularly for women. You have to clean messes you didn’t make. Sometimes you have to clean when you can barely see the dirt, knowing that dirt begets dirt, even though you don’t get the satisfaction of seeing a noticeable improvement. And don’t get me started on the sisyphean task of doing laundry.

Strangely, it is women who are hardest on each other when it comes to housecleaning. I suppose it’s because most guys are perfectly happy to live in chaos so long as the television remote can be found. And while guys can find the most creative ways to turn anything into a competition, a bacteria-free living space is not among them. Conversely women can be downright smug about being cleaner or, God help us all, The Cleanest.

Even stranger is the fact that I find the most critical among us are women who have a cleaning person, I suppose meaning that, while they don’t have the gumption to bend at the waist themselves, at least their standards are above the rest of us slobs.

It may come as a comfort for my fellow slobs to know that we are actually more akin to the obsessively tidy than they would like to believe. Both of us want to achieve sanitary perfection but, while the obsessives are constantly striving for it to the point compulsion, we know it will never be achieved and just give up.

While we all have had times that household chaos drowns us in waves of everyday detritus, it would be nice if we recognized when someone truly has a problem manifesting itself in a messy house, but rooted in something far deeper like depression or illness. While I love to watch the show How Clean is Your House, if only to assure myself that at least I’m not that bad, it doesn’t take a psychiatric therapist to know most of these people would do better to see one.

That being said, and since Kim and Aggie aren’t going to fly over here with their team and turn my house into a showplace, I have come to terms with the fact that I’ll just have to do it myself.

Yes, yes, there is a certain amount of designation around here. My boys are responsible for their bathroom and do their own laundry. My husband is good about spot vacuuming (an absolute necessity with four dogs), throwing in a load of laundry now and then, helping with the dishes and, rarely but it has happened a few times in twenty years, making the bed.

I accept, though, that as the designated homemaker, the bulk of the chores are mine and, frankly, I’m the only one who sees when the toilet paper roll needs to be replaced or the cat threw up in the corner. Men are genetically incapable of these two tasks, at least the ones around here.

I have what I call a “light routine.” Too rigid and I know I will revolt. Certain areas are done certain days and, if the schedule won’t allow it, it’s not. Somewhere in the rotation it will all get done, along with a quick vacuum here and there, and that’s what I can live with.

Anyone can come over anytime without absolute panic setting in, so long as they’re okay with the fact that: 1.) four people live in this house and we do more than sit in a chair; 2.) four dogs live in this house and sometime between the 2 p.m vacuuming and now they have probably shed on the carpet; and 3.) two teenagers live in this house and their idea of “cleaning up” means they’ve left crumbs on the counter and a filthy pan full of water in the sink because “I left it to soak.”

Oh – and I promise not to judge your house when I come to visit because I’d much rather think you are living your life in your house and not for your house.

Be happy; be well.

Starter...

2007-08-22T13:16:00.001-04:00

Or appetizer. Or, paired with some good quality bread, lunch.

Prosciutto on roasted red pepper topped with mozzarella, drizzled with olive oil and wine vinegar and sprinkled with fresh oregano and basil. In the best of all possible worlds, I would use fresh mozzarella and slice it in slabs. Since my cheese intake is limited, though, I shred it and sprinkle it lightly and pretend I'm sinking my teeth into soft, creamy mozzarella. A girl can dream...

A Little Light Knitting

2007-08-20T15:19:00.001-04:00

There’s not much you can do about a rainy day, when the barometric pressure tanks and it’s all you can do to keep your eyes open. Best to find an activity that can be done, given those parameters.

Last night I started this:

I’ve knitted blankets, sweaters, socks and pillows but, believe it or not, I’ve never knitted a scarf. Since I have a proclivity toward losing unattached apparel, I’ve always been reluctant to sink the time and effort into something handmade that will end up in the lost and found. I picture someone picking up my creation using just their thumb and forefinger, like you do when you’re picking up someone else’s tissue, and saying, “No wonder they left it behind.” (I know, I know. I won’t be there to hear it. But, still, I worry.)

I found this mohair at the Mountain Heritage Arts and Crafts Festival in Harpers Ferry, W.Va., a few years ago and I wish I could find the card of the lady who spun it. It’s lovely and earthy, which will hopefully make me so fond of it that I will think about the scarf constantly and be immediately aware of its absence when I try to leave where I’m wearing it.

Since I find most television is, for the most part, annoying, my preference while knitting is recorded books. Today is perfect for a mystery, something with very British overtones, given the weather. Something suggesting fog, damp and moodiness. Something Doyle-esque.

Alas, I’ve read and reread all of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes. So, we have the next best thing: Caleb Carr’s The Italian Secretary.

Carr was chosen by Doyle’s estate to continue Holmes’s adventures, though Laurie R. King’s series in pretty interesting also, even if it is doubtful that Doyle would have ever allowed Holmes to marry.

And so, having completed the weekly Cleaning of the Bathrooms, you will know where to find me.

A Manifesto, Sort Of

2007-08-17T09:10:00.000-04:00

Once upon a time, a very long time ago, even before I was born – so we’re talking ancient history – everyone didn’t “go to work.”

Oh, they worked, all right. Mighty hard. They just didn’t leave to work for someone else in exchange for wages. There was some minor trading back and forth, but work was what you did to put food on the table, protective clothing on your families’ collective backs and maintain a roof over their heads.

There is a population of people who would love to return to those Little House on the Prairie days (everyone was so eerily clean in that show). I am not one of them.

That being said, Laura Ingalls Wilder, perhaps as older people will often do, left out some key social and cultural issues that might make the 21^st century citizen think twice about longing for such a bucolic lifestyle – the bathrooms, or lack thereof, come to mind first. Then there are the nasty issues of high infant mortality, rampant tuberculosis, racism, women being treated as chattel and the fact that nobody bathed much.

I do, however, understand the lure of what is presented as a simpler time and, frankly, the wardrobe would have covered my legs, no small consideration for me when choosing where on the dial to set the time machine.

At the core of this fantasy, though, is a valid longing to be more closely connected with that which sustains us – our home.

Oh, you say. Of course I’m connected with my home. I live there.

Really, though, how much of your home are you truly connected to? First there are the utilities: your electricity come from elsewhere, your water from elsewhere, unless you have a well, in which case someone else came and dug that well and installed a pump which is dependent on that electricity.

Okay, utilities are a necessary evil if we want to live in comfort. There are a hardy few who manage to pull themselves off the grid, but I am not one for extremes, at least in the area of basic needs.

But, look around you. Your furniture is probably made by someone else. Maybe you picked out a “suite” of items that were matched up in the store by someone else. You may have even painted your room the same as the mock room in the store. Or maybe you hired someone to decide the décor for you.

Apply this concept to your wardrobe, your yard or your food. With each step dependent on some outside contractor you distance yourself further and further from the reality of life. There is a reason why celebrities are so dysfunctional and a reason why, when they go into rehab, the most basic therapy is having to “do” for themselves.

Don’t worry. I’m not suggesting we all live in a hut where chickens roam free as we spin sheep’s wool for underwear. Unless you're into that sort of thing, in which case, God bless. I do feel, however, that the more connected you are to the creation of your surroundings, the less likely you will have an existential crisis.

While I truly believe you cannot state definitively what a blog will be before it’s had a chance to ferment a bit, it is my intention to document some of the domestic activities that go on around my house and the reason behind why I do them, as opposed to farming them out to someone else.

From the basic day to day chores to projects that may or may not succeed, this is the story of keeping myself grounded, in spite of a culture determined to keep us dependent and in line.

Sisiggy's Alter Ego

2007-08-16T16:19:00.000-04:00

Welcome to one of the few nondenominational homemaking blogs on the web. I won’t go into the strange connection there seems to be between care of the home and Christianity, but let it suffice to say I don’t believe you have to be born again to be able to run a household and do it with style.

The fact is that, if you are reading this, you probably have a home of sorts and this blog is for those who prefer to live in the best possible way in that home. Simple as that. This is a blog for the “nester” that all of us have inside to a certain extent, but that seems to be a very large part of me personally.

I also do not believe I am required to go above and beyond basic maintenance or that it is my “role” as a woman to do so. And I certainly don’t believe that my way is the only way. But I also think that too many people are reluctant to give their hearts over to the idea of nesting because Martha Stewart has made it so intimidating (more on that later) or it’s equated with the perceived victimization of women or for whatever reason. So they miss this valuable resource of comfort and creativity.

As the daughter of an Uber-homemaker and a man who saw the value in the ability to create a home, I was trained from toddler-hood how to “keep house,” the goal at that time to raise husband-bait, preferably rich-husband-bait.

I was halfway through childhood at the dawn of the Women’s Movement when somehow creating a home got mixed up with living your life for the sole pleasure of your man. I could always see the difference between the two, but I’m amazed at how many women assume that pleasing your tyrannical husband and spoiled rotten kids is what homemaking is all about.

What I bring to this blog is fifty years of life, a 20-year marriage and the wisdom required to raise two boys successfully. I believe you will find me pretty grounded and not given to flowery, sappy sentiment. There will be no teddy bears for those over the age of 18.

So I hope we become well acquainted with each other. For anyone coming here from Linguini on the Ceiling, this is the softer side of Sisiggy and she’s hoping you accept that, but suspects you knew about it all along.

Oh...the photos are of my own house so you know that I do, in fact, have one and that I'm not a 30-year-old guy living in my parents' basement and writing this in my underwear from atop a mountain of dirty laundry.