Doing things the happy home maker way

I collect old homemaking books from the early years of the 20th century. They offer tips on how to live your life in a thrifty way.

The last 24 hours have seemed like a slightly warped version of those helpful books. I baked a batch of pita in the afternoon ( Made with some home ground hard wheat added to the white flour – making sure that the food my family members eat is wholesome.) I made a big salad using left over meat and vegetables from Friday night, check for wholesome and another check for thrifty.

I did a marathon laundry fold last night.  We have had lots of company and I’m still folding laundry from my youngest’s return from camp.  I guess that gets a check in the tidy department.
This morning I mended a sheet – thrifty.

I also made this watchband – thrifty and smart. ( Smart in that 1940’s usage that has less to do with brain power and more to do with looking sharp.)


I also cut a hole in a piece of plastic to act as a vent for our portable air conditioner- handy! My son also needed help washing his banana costume/work outfit. he did OK with the washing but needed lots of instruction on drying. Blow drying does not work for sopping wet  poly + foam. I taught my son the old fashioned magic of rolling wet garments in dry towels. He was then able to go down to union square to perform double nasal recorder.

I also put in some work on Danielle's chuppah. Danielle, in this age of Bridezilla’s  is the anti- Bridezilla.  Danielle found me  because she works with a cousin I had met only this year. oddly enough, Danielle is a cousin of good friends of ours. All very sweet, but not as sweet as Danielle as a client.

Daniellle , like me is a schmatta girl. She is the keeper of the textiles for her family. she hopes that this chuppah will be used by other family members. The chuppah is incorporating an old family tallit and an old family tablecloth.

Sadie embroidered the cloth in taupe in a lovely design on linen. My job is to add the texts, the tallit and the corner loops.  Because the text is going directly onto the table cloth, there is no room for errors on my part.

I have spent a whole lot of time trying to figure out exactly how to do that.

I ended up using an old-fashioned method.
I cut lengths of tracing paper from a roll to the right size. I marked a semi circle in pencil for the arched shape. I then roughly penciled the letters onto he paper. I painted the letters onto the tracing paper, and then outlined the letters with a Sharpee.

I think you can see all of the layers of letter refinement in the photo. I had actually thought that I would cut a stencil and stencil the letters onto the linen.

This project has been on my brain’s back burner while I was trying to figure out the best way to proceed. I decided to go with yet another old –timey method…dressmaker’s carbon. I bought a yard of it last week at Daytona trim. I could have bought grey, but my eyes are no long strong enough to see such low contrast lines.
I bought red instead. all I had to do was trace the letters with a ballpoint pen.

Then I satin stitched around  the letters with  bronze metallic thread.

Here is one word, unpressed. because this piece isn’t backed I’m being very tidy with all of the loose threads.

Sometimes the hardest part of a job is getting it all figured out in my head.