tips from grandma
December 15th, 2009 | Uncategorized
Today my friend Erin Bried’s book How To Sew A Button comes out.
She talked to grandmothers all over tarnation and compiled their very handy and wise instructions on how to do all sorts of things younger people either never learned, or forgot along the way. Making gravy, balancing your checkbook, how to waltz, all kinds of useful stuff. Check out the Nifty Button YouTube channel for delightful instructional videos shot by Erin’s girlfriend Holly Bemiss. My favorite is How To Fold A Fitted Sheet, a topological problem that has confounded me my whole life.
112 Responses to “tips from grandma”
My mom taught me how to fold a fitted sheet, and it’s a skill I’ve actually shown off in front of others.
What? It’s not like I can cook or anything.
Yeah, my fitted sheets are always so well folded that Boyfriend has to pull them apart to figure out which are the flat sheets and which are the fitted….This results in a closet full of no-longer well folded sheets….ugh.
I’ll have to check out the book and see if the other grandmas’ way is as good. Slight OCD-ish tendencies run in the family, though, so the other grandmas might not do things like iron pillowcases and make the bed with hospital corners…
watched the demo on Erin’s site, and yes, my grandma (hence, my mom, hence I) folds the fitted sheet the same way. I wonder if there are other ways??
I must ask, in all honesty:
Why would anyone want to fold a fitted sheet?
What a great idea for a book! Especially for those of us who can’t turn to Grandma anymore!
Excellent question, Dr. E! One can cram more sheets into a closet if they’re flattened, instead of semi-folded into a puffy road map sort of thing. This doesn’t matter at my place – the cats will sleep on them in the closet regardless of whether they’re neatly folded or not – but does matter at my mother’s joint, where she has an actual linen closet that tends to run short on space. And guests who will be sleeping on said sheets, so God forbid there should be wrinkles. And Kat, my mum does iron the sheets and pillowcases as well. And she taught me how to do it and I can’t unlearn it. Which is kind of annoying, because I could really use that brain space for other things.
I dunno, though. In Erin’s demo of tying a tie on another person, the “kid who likes wearing ties” looks like a cute baby dyke to me.
Hahahahaaa! Dr. E, I had the exact same reaction. I have to say/admit/say-it-loud-and-I’m-proud that I never iron sheets or pillowcases. What IS the point? Maybe I might stretch to it if the Queen was coming to stay or if a new boyfriend was coming to spend the night for the very first time.
I could really use the knowledge of how to sew on buttons though. I’ve got a button dangling half off the cuff of my suede leather jacket and I’ve no idea how to re-attach it.
That’s EXACTLY the question I’ve had — folding a fitted sheet — I usually just ball the thing up and fling it into the laundry basket ..
I had to figure out the folding fitted sheets thing for myself as Mother wasn’t much on instruction and my grandmother wasn’t local. This video shows exactly what I do. And the tie vid was adorable!
I am almost compelled to buy this book just for the nerd factor alone. 😉
Imagine being so wealthy that you own so many sheets that storage space is an issue!
Ironing: That’s a whole ‘nother deal!
I do own an iron. When I used to sell homemade t-shirts outside rock concerts I needed the iron to heat-set my screen prints. Don’t recall where I got it, though. I certainly didn’t BUY it!
In the extremely rare event that I have to wear a dress shirt, I occasionaly have to iron the couple of square inches that show between the tie and the jacket. This is invariably done at the last possible moment before running out the door.
And on the issue of wrinkled bedsheets:
Wouldn’t it be easier to iron them AFTER you put them on the bed?
What is this “folding” thing you people speak of?
My mother operates a bed and breakfast. Hence, the quantity of sheets and the critical eye toward their appearance. You’d think it would be easier to iron a sheet if it’s all spread out, but you’ve never seen my mother in action. She was raised during the ’40’s and ’50’s; so many more kinds of fabrics back then had to be ironed that she became a veritable artiste at it. You should see her with the sheets, for example – she has an origami-like way of folding & unfolding only parts at a time while ironing yet somehow the whole thing gets pressed. It helps that Mom’s tall and has a long “wingspan” – short me ends up floundering and tangled, looking like a bad sitcom. Well, not that bad, but surely not as efficient as she.
Fitted sheets are ironed and folded so they look fetching in your lavender-scented linen closet.
My poor mother is probably spinning like a top in her grave over the household-ly chores of which I am blissfully ignorant.
Thanks so much for introducing me to Nifty Button! Great videos! I am planning to make for the first time a chocolate espresso pecan pie to bring to a party, and I really appreciated seeing Erin’s video on making a pie. Shall I share the recipe?
I hope Erin keeps making more videos since I already watched all of these. Love the baby toy. And the pie. Cathy, you should share your recipe for sure, and try to make us a video demo too.
“Imagine being so wealthy that you own so many sheets that storage space is an issue!”
Um…..quite the contrary. In a tiny apartment where the “linen closet” is the only place to store anything that’s not clothes, the bedding gets one shelf. It must, therefore, take up as little space as possible.
Besides, some of us like our things, however few of them there might be, to be neat and tidy.
@14 / NLC:
Marry me.
Kat, 19, I think what Dr E had in mind was something like this. You take the sheet off the bed. You wash it. You dry it. You put it back on the bed. No storage involved. The need to store your sheets would imply that you had at least two sets of sheets, which is extravagant.
Of course, I’m just speculating. No one should take this to imply that I would use the system described to get by with only one set of sheets. Oh, no. Nothing like that.
Alex K, 20, Alison should get us all together and hold a mass wedding, sort of like Sun Myung Moon used to do. Except everybody would marry everybody.
@Alex K (20): That was pretty much my reaction to Dr. E’s post! Sadly even if he was single, I’m not entirely sure he’d be looking in my direction …
C’est la vie.
my “linen closet”
Wow, Alison, you used “topological” in conversation! I have even more of a crush on you than I had before.
However, you didn’t use the word correctly :(. Topology is the study of properties that are not changed by continuous transformations — roughly speaking, by bending or stretching. Imagining a fitted sheet made completely of rubber, it’s clear how to fold it — stretch it until it is flat and then fold the flat sheet. It would be more correct to say that this is a _geometric_ problem that has confounded you for your whole life.
Since I know you love dictionaries and pedantic trivia about language, I thought you might actually want to know this! Obviously I am correcting this because I am pedantic as well; and I happen to know this stuff because I’m a mathematician.
Does this book say how to darn a sock? That is the grandma skill I wish I had.
— Sue
PS We have met, once upon a time. In the early 90s I was the treasurer of the Oberlin LGBU, and you came to campus to do a slide show. (Which was fantastic, of course.) You may remember our interaction because I was very dilatory in writing your honorarium check, and you had to call me up, early one Saturday morning, to follow up on where the heck it was. I am still embarrassed by this all these years later.
@Kat(19) Okay, let me rephrase that: “Imagine being so wealthy that you own so many sheets that you need a shelf!”
@Andrew B(21) My system is a little more complicated. One set of sheets on the bed, another in the laundry hamper (well, okay, laundry pile). Whenever the dirties find their way through the laundry, they are exchanged for the ones on the bed. See, sheets are much more likely to get themselves washed if I don’t have to remember to strip them off the bed before doing laundry.
@Ian(22) Yeah, that’s really not how my sheets get rumpled. Sorry!
Yeah, yours looks pretty much like mine, Alison.
Wait…rephrase…
Watching the folding of the fitted sheet (I think we called them contour sheets) was very touching. My mom taught me this very same folding technique.
She, in turn, learned it from our next door neighbor, Ginny Handel. My mother is dead now and Mrs. Handel has Alzheimer’s, but I imagine them both, back in 1960, 30 years old, mothers of three and four children. Did Mrs. Handel pass along her knowledge over coffee, over drinks, over the split rail fence between our homes before the trees and bushes grew in so thick?
I’ll never know the particulars — if Ginny explained the folding method in a few words or if she demonstrated as Erin did in her video. Yet it remains a fond memory for me. Something about the closeness of women, about friendship in the day to day.
Thanks for posting.
It’s too late at night here for me to watch the video, but I’m eager to learn how to fold fitted sheets so it will be easier to stuff them into our tiny hall closet. There was an explanation in print cartoon when the New York Times magazine still had cartoons, but I couldn’t figure it out. I suppose this means I’ll have to separate the single bed sheets we don’t use from the double bed sheets we do. Maybe Alison could h sponsor a linen closet photo show?
Ellen – i find your post so moving. i was talking to my girlfriend yesterday about the importance to all women of having other women as friends. I know that when I used to work with the elderly, the women that survived so much longer and with more of a sense of purpose when their husbands died were those that had kept close to their network of women friends. And it was amazing how lots of friendships between women in old age become as close as or probably (who knows, who am I to assume) closer than the relationship with their late husband. I am so eternally grateful that I have the best of both worlds (gay and a woman!) – sorry Ian et al, i’m sure it’s great being a guy too, just not my kinda thing!! ;)Thank you for sharing,Ellen
Mark, I find your comparison unneccessarily graphic, but yeah, it’s like that. For a lot of reasons.
Ellen – “Something about the closeness of women, about friendship in the day to day.” Your post was lovely. (I do think the folding technique can only be demonstrated, though!)
So…..owning 2 sets of sheets makes one wealthy? That’s not a description I’ve heard before…
And Andrew B, I’ve been getting the feeling that you go out of your way to correct me or put me down, and I rather wish you’d stop.
Kat, 31, I have never tried to put you down. My comment above was intended to be funny, a comment on my own poor housekeeping and possibly Dr E’s. I’m sorry it didn’t come across that way.
I have never gone out of my way to correct you specifically. Again, I’m sorry it has seemed like I was. My comment above wasn’t supposed to be serious at all.
In other contexts, in which we are trying to be serious, we all have to find a balance between politeness to the person we’re talking to and careful discussion of the issue we’re talking about. It must be obvious to people who read these comments that I err on the side of discussing the issue more often than I err on the side of courtesy. I do that no matter who I’m addressing — at least, that’s my intention. Perhaps I need to strike a different balance. I will keep your comment in mind. I just do want to say that there is a difficult balance to be struck. Understanding the issues matters. E.g. in my exchange with Ellen O in the previous thread, I think it matters what image of men is being broadcast and how it has changed over the past few decades.
Anyhow, I’m sorry my comment in this thread didn’t come across the way I meant it and I will keep your comment in mind in deciding what to comment on and in what terms in the future.
Seeing the photo of your linen closet reminds me of a nifty tip I learned from a good friend. When you wish to store a set of linens, first set aside one pillowcase. Next fold the sheets and any other pillowcases. Finally, stack the folded linens and place them inside the pillowcase you set aside. Now the set won’t come apart when you store it or retrieve it (how annoyed I was to grab a set of clean sheets, only to have part of it topple onto a cat-hair-covered closet floor).
My mom taught me a different technique… when I have the time I’ll video and post… however, this one seems better than ours… hmmm… have to try both and do some assessing… though, generally, I am one to have my sheets in a clump in the laundry basket…
Also, I enjoyed how to wear red lipstick!
@Dr. E: It’s ok. I’ll struggle on and survive the disappointment … somehow … 😉
On wealth: After a decade of putting myself through school, three years of postdoctoral squalor and another decade working for a nonprofit, I finally have my first real job.
A while back I bought a deodorant stick. I found I really hated the scent, and it stuck with me all day, so intense it made my food taste bad. It took me over a week to realize that I could just throw the thing away and buy a different one.
This was a major epiphany for me. I was so fabulously wealthy that I could afford to buy unscheduled deodorant! Such extravagance!
I still find myself doing without things because it doesn’t occur to me that I can afford them. So while I was just goofing around with the sheets thing, as was Andrew, at the same time it accurately describes a long-held mindset; one from which I’m still working to wean myself.
great thread. so much coming through.
my mama was OCD about how to fold a towel, and i definitely absorbed it, to the point that when characters on TV “misfold” a towel i feel distress.
to use my words:
(1) fold in half so it is a nearly square rectangle.
(2) fold in half again so it is a rectangle for sure.
(3) fold this into thirds with one flap on top of the other, but that upward facing flap has to be the corner so that if you grab it and shake once, the entire towel comes open.
feel free to post your own deviant patriarchy-soaked christianist approaches to distorting the body-towel continuum.
@37 / Dr Empirical:
You THREW AWAY a DEODORANT STICK?
—
Poverty, particularly the newly experienced poverty of those who’ve come down, been thrown down, in the world — it never lets you go.
My grandmother lost everything but the home farm when her husband died. When a pneumonia carried him away, she found out about debts that he had juggled — he had speculated. To pay those back (no legal obligation, but she saw what was right as what was right) took a long, long time. To save money, she rented out the farmhouse and lived in a Quonset hut…
And she, and my mother, shook out and washed out and rinsed out and hung out to dry the plastic wrappers that bread came in. Why buy plastic bags when the bakeries hand them out free?
My father’s father had been a banker. The bank failed. He became the schoolteacher, staying in the same town. Perhaps a mistake. A couple of pot shots taken at him during deer season, near-misses, he believed from men whom the bank had taken down with it in its fall, and my grandmother forbade him to go hunting. So… fatback, for flavour / gravy, but no meat, month on month no real meat, my father would reminisce. At least on my mother’s side they had the farm.
It was from my mother that I learned about oysters on the half-shell. Don’t tell your father we came here to eat oysters, she said as we left the oyster bar on my first encounter with the lovely salty slippery things. Why?, I asked, they’re so good! Because they cost more than hamburger, she said.
And then she added, reflectively, Never marry someone who’s been really poor. They never learn now to spend money.
—
I don’t know what would have become of that partly used deodorant stick in my parents’ house. Adopted by my father — regardless of whether or not he found the scent acceptable — because, after all, it would only be six months till it was all gone? Handed down to the next child, with an admonition on thrift?
—
Oysters for dinner tonight. On the half-shell.
@Maggie
Did we all inherit housekeeping OCD from our mothers?
You wanna start some spirited discussion around here? How about the “correct” way to install the roll of toilet paper on the spindle? Paper coming over the top or from underneath? Full disclosure: I am a “from underneath” TP person, straight from my mother’s teaching.
Of course, years of living with a feline prevented me from exercising this bit of OCD, because either way I installed the TP, he would yank the whole damn roll into a pile on the floor, thus the roll lived sans spindle on top of the toilet tank.
How about the “correct” way to squeeze the tube of toothpaste? Another mother-infused bit of OCD, I squeeze from the bottom and roll up. That’s also the mother-influenced frugality at work, my parents were raised during the Great Depression, and there’s no end to how many cost-saving measures they embedded in my psyche and I have yet to unlearn.
I can relate to Dr. E’s revelation that he could just throw away a stick of deodorant he hated. It took me decades to realize that I could throw away the little slivers of soap instead of soap-gluing them to the new bar.
As for ironing sheets, I don’t do it (my mother ironed everything, including underwear), but I do fold fitted sheets correctly. I put the fitted sheet together with the top sheet and the pillow cases as a set, but not in a linen closet. They live in one of those covered plastic Rubbermaid storage bins. I like the idea of putting the whole set into one of the pillow cases, I might adopt that strategy.
I think the book would make a wonderful gift for people starting out on a new journey, like college grads, new couples, newly divorced people and so on. I am dismayed that AB’s linen closet did not have the requisite cat sleeping on the cleanest and newest linens.
I wish she’d included How to Wear Black Eye-Liner. That’s a skill that belongs in everyone’s toolkit.
And it’s probably my raised-by-second-generation-immigrants-who’d-lived-through-the-Depression mindset, but I think frugality is still good. We throw too much stuff away.
Alex K(30) That was the reaction I was going for. Thanks!
And aside to Aunt Soozie: Alex’s line “They never learn how to spend money.” explains why I insisted on picking up the check the time we went out for drinks. It’s not a behavior that comes naturally for me, and I felt I needed the practice.
@43 / Dr Empirical:
The oysters, a dozen each (£13.60 for 25, and no, I got only 12 as my share. Remember LOVE STORY? The hell with never having to say you’re sorry. More like never getting to sit next to the window. More like always giving up the spare oyster), were delicious.
My order at the fishmonger’s went in yesterday, long before this thread was spun. But as I stood at the sink tonight, levering oysters open and with that little *snick* of the oyster knife severing the foot front and back, flicking out the not-shell-yet crunchy bits at the hem of the skirt, I remembered my mother.
She’s gone now, and she ate a lot more hamburger than ever she did oysters. All our lives, poor short things that they are, should have more oysters in them.
Dr. E and Alex (39) that combo exchange made me laugh out loud!
All this talk of linens reminds me of a woman I worked for in the late 1980’s. I was going to school and did domestic work for seniors. Julieanne was a retired psych nurse and very particular about how stuff got done. I worked for her for four years, and every time I put away towels, I think of her. They had to be faced the same way, all lined up neatly. If I sat on her bed to change out my shoes, I had to remember to fluff up the comforter again. But, I “got” her, and did it right.
She was awesome, and became a good friend. While I ironed her sheets and clothes, we would have great conversations. I became a social worker because she introduced me to someone who was friends with the SW admissions coordinator. She had a profound impact on my life, and the connection began because of mutual love of good, crisp sheets.
@Andrew B #21: “Alison should get us all together and hold a mass wedding” AB as cult leader! Why had I never thought of this image before? Could it be that I never thought of it because I am in fact a member of a cult she leads, and so am blind to the fact that it is a cult? Er- no, of course not! Impossible! Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go email my credit card and bank account numbers to Alison for safekeeping.
In the name of bacon, maple syrup, and back issues of MAD magazine, amen.
I’ve just been reminded – I think I still have Victorian-era linen sheets that belonged to my great grandmother with her name still inked on them in permanent ink! Over 100 years old and in the summer they’re still a lot cooler and more comfortable than modern cotton for some reason.
I think I still have them. I don’t have a linen cupboard – just laundry bins, but one’s for clean and ones for dirty. I’m going to have to go and check …
Next time I’m at a bookstore, I’ll pick up a copy. But my suspicion is that this book is filled with lies. To wit: There is no way to fold a fitted sheet. I sleep on a pile of socks rather than give into the Sheet/Industrial Complex on this one.
Just watched the fitted sheet youtube, and was blown away, as promised. No OCD mama for me – the one I had died when I was 7 and I don’t think she kept house much prior to that. As a result, I’ve been stupid about things like this for far too long. Loved the channel, loved Erin’s vibe, and will check out the book! It’s never too late to learn how to be a proper grown up, I guess…
Andrew B., thanks. I appreciate it.
I wonder whether the book addresses something that many have mentioned (no, not OCD housekeeping….though it’s fun that many of us seem to have inherited that one): Being thrifty.
I suppose it comes from the Depression era, but maybe it started earlier. The idea that one should not spend unnecessary money, and should conserve and be efficient so that one can accomplish the goal.
Maggie’s mentioned the phrase “Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without” (did I get that right?), but it seems that a lot of grandmothers have if not that strict a mentality, then something close to it.
Is being thrifty a value that is still taught? (from some of the conversations with my students, I kinda doubt it).
Mine not only rolls the toothpaste tube from the bottom, but puts a rubber band around it as she rolls. That way, you REALLY squeeze every bit out.
I definitely got the OCD from her, through my mother. We also maintain that there is ONE TRUE way to fold a towel.
It’s different from Maggie’s Mother’s One True Way, though, so the universe will have to go to battle over it!
“Mine” being my grandma…..must.learn.to.preview.
my father saved the flat styrofoam inserts that come in the bottom of meat packages, washed them with a touch of bleach in the dish water, then would bend them around cans of cold soda, holding them in place with saved rubber bands, to create a homemade coozie (g*d i hope i’m using the right term there, it looks nasty in typeface). it worked beautifully even in texas summers, and of course he’d carefully save the styrofoam and rubber bands when done with the soda to use again. he claimed it was his own invention, and i believe.
his father survived the depression in oklahoma as a dominoes shark. when he finally got a legit job with the highway department around 1950, he brought home everything he found alongside the road in the back of his yellow pickup. family gatherings always had an interlude of being led out to the garage where he’d force discarded crap on us — he kept the good stuff for himself. i hated dolls, but i especially hated dolls missing a leg with tar in their fake hair.
i have here beside me in my medical supplies box bedside an almost full tube of KY jelly that the gyn-onc used for his exam of me in the emergency room two months ago. it got sent home with me and despite, i promise you, no chance of it ever being used, i’ve kept it with the bedpam, hospital foam soap, etc. i am now going to take an obkect lesson from dr. e and THROW IT AWAY.
Go on, Maggie, you can do it! Chuck the stuff in the bin!
@47 / Ian:
Aaargh!
New-made linen sheets run £120 each. A sheet and pillowcase set, near £300. YOU GO FETCH THOSE SHEETS FROM WHATEVER YOU’VE CONSIGNED THEM TO RIGHT NOW, YOUNG MAN, AND IN FUTURE YOU TREAT THEM WITH PROPER REVERENCE. Yes, you heard me.
And: Before you ladle out any of your sauce, I walk the talk. A seamstress near me just encashed my cheque for £60. My own linen sheets, of around the same age, are of two lengths of cloth, sewn together on their longer sides. (In use, you don’t notice the central seam. Trust me on this one.) The seam was starting to gape in one sheet. She spent four hours at £15 the hour whipstitching the two lengths together again, first mending and then re-inforcing, all along the almost invisibly fine seam. Hers is such beautiful work, and the cloth itself, with very finely slubbed fibre and the tightest, crispest weave — well, let’s just say that if deodorant sticks were crafted to this standard, Dr Empirical wouldn’t dare throw one away.
Mending shows respect, I reckon. So cherish those heirlooms.
It’s a fun thread, but also gives me pangs, because my dad really does have OCD, and it comes out in thriftiness overdrive, and it makes me sad, and it interferes with the pleasure of life.
Just one example: turn off the (electric) stove just moments before the tea kettle boils , because it will still come to a boil. Pour your tea to the absolute uppermost level of the mug. Then pour the excess water into a thermos so it will stay hot for later (and not cool down uselessly in the tea kettle).
OK that sounds almost rational, but really, it’s over-the-top and I struggle against many of the same tendencies. It’s all about anxiety in my world. My kin we are not fit for the throw-away world of today’s society.
(I remember the epiphany in a therapy session where I was crying because I’d soaked my socks to the gills – weird metaphor – in the pouring rain, and my therapist said: why don’t you go buy a new pair of socks? I didn’t think I could because I had a drawer of dry socks at home. Makes ya crazy, I tell ya…)
I felt relief & familiarity when I read Spiegelman’s description of his nutty father in Maus…..
I also hate to throw things away. I even miss cheap whiskey when I’ve poured it down the drain.
Am I the only one who squeezes the toothpaste tube between the toothbrush handle and the edge of the sink to make sure it’s COMPLETELY flat?
While thrift is indeed a virtue, I’m more likely motivated by the fact that I haven’t remembered to buy a new tube yet, so I need to milk the one I have for just ONE more day, day after day.
The toothbrush handle is for amateurs. I use a pair of pliers to squeeze the last toothpaste out of the tube.
Coozie = my new name for my vagina
@Ginjoint: It takes real courage and comfort in your body to give any of your orifices a name that includes the sound “oozie,” IMHO. Three cheers to you!
I’m struck by the disturbing mental image of Ginjoint trying to insert a beer can into her…
Ginjoint…. coozie is cute… did you have me in mind? I’m flattered! What do you think of cooter? it’s one I’ve heard and enjoyed lately. I’m partial to ‘gina myself…
Dr. E… I am with you on the forgot to replenish the product thing. WIth expensive facial scrubs, etc. I’ll use a scissors to cute the tube open and scoop out every last drop of the precious. So, uhm, no, you are not alone, not here, nope, never!
ps… nice to recall our little soiree in the city after Alison’s reading/signing! It was lovely and you were so gracious to treat!
well, generally I CUT the tube open, I don’t cute it open, but, I’d try that… c’mon lil tube, c’mon now… be a good lil toobie…
Ginjoint:
And what form of address would you recommend for those of us who were brought up too well to presume a first-name basis without a formal introduction?
aunt soozie, in this part of the country, cooter is a widely-used term for edible freshwater turtle.
as in “You wanna hear my Gramma’s recipe for cooter?”
and TOOTHPASTE? what spendthrifts. baking soda is the answer.
@59 / Ginjoint:
Rhymes with “chanteuse”.
@R2A (#55)
As you were having your theraputic epiphany, did it occur to you that you were paying $125/session to discuss why you didn’t feel free to spend $4 on a dry pair of socks? Buy the socks, they’re cheaper.
I’ve had very similar revelations about over-the-top frugality and over-the-top spending (I’ve been guilty of both sins in my life, sometimes simultaneously). Somehow, my parents, upbringing, and early life financial circumstances have managed to infuse every spending decision, and either I deny myself basic stuff (e.g. the dry socks in your example), or I over-compensate by denying financial reality and blowing wads of money.
Fortunately for my finances, I got a handle on the over-spending first, and managed to get myself in a financial place where my recent job crisis didn’t have me in panic mode with bills up the wazoo and the looming threat of no money coming in.
It’s all about balance, something I work on (with varying degrees of success) every day.
What about those plastic tags that they use to close bags of bread? Do you save those? K does, and has a mustard jar full of them. Oddly, we do use them again, to close plastic bags of vegetables.
I’m trying to think of OCD-style saving habits I have .. saving old bottles of ink when they’re empty? There’s one.
@40 / H_o_H:
Little slivers of soap… My grandmother had a wire cage on a handle at the kitchen-sink drainboard. She pumped, later ran, a sinkful of water and adjusted the temperature of the sinkful with water from the kettle that always sat atop the woodstove. The cake of soap lived inside the cage. She grasped the handle and swished the cage and its occupant through the water a few times. That and elbow grease got the dishes washed.
When they dwindled to a size at which they might slide through the cagemesh, the little slivers of soap went inside a wide-necked screwtop jar, with enough water to let them deliquesce. The resulting soap-paste was sluiced into the sinkwater after the next meal, used to wash the next round of dirty dishes.
I don’t even know the name of the tool, of the… “soap cage”. Lost, gone. Life interplaying with language.
My niece, who at age three years lacking the word “crown”, referred to that part of what she INSISTED on wearing AT ALL TIMES as her “queen hat”. We’re not averse to improvisation in the family, but there’s a charm about having exactly the right term at hand…
“Soap cage”. “Sudser”. Anyone out there with a bent for historical research, or for antiqueing, who can help?
@MC (#68)
I save and reuse the wire twist ties, not the plastic things with the date stamped on them. Also save and reuse bags, although I don’t buy bread that comes in plastic (local bakery or Zabar’s bakery, bread comes in a paper bag).
And of course I save/reuse food containers. Why do people think they need to buy those Gladware plastic containers to take food to work? Someone told me it was because they were inexpensive and she didn’t have to worry about losing a “good” plastic container (e.g. Tupperware or Rubbermaid). She looked dumbfounded when I said I didn’t worry about losing the container, it originally held takeout or freshly-ground peanut butter and cost me nothing.
I think Kat’s observation that folks are not teaching their kids to be thrifty is at odds with the perceived “coolness” of the so-called green movement. I don’t think people make the connection between the two. Being a good steward of our physical resources is also another key to being a good steward of one’s financial resources, and vice versa.
Right now, thanks to our economic implosion, it’s cool to be thrifty/frugal, or at least to claim to be thrifty. I don’t actually see that in practice (witness every other person on the street with a Bluetooth headset glued to her/his ear and ringing up the cell phone bill on the iPhone or Blackberry).
The au courant thrifty/frugal coolness factor will die quickly once the economy recovers.
My observations of the folks I see who consider themselves to be “eco-consumers” is that they are consumers first and foremost, and that’s bad for both their wallets and the environment.
(… cynic alert …)
My take on the typical “green” consumer is this: Let’s buy a Prius and the latest electronic gizmos, and lots of new stuff instead of repairing the old stuff. Gotta have the latest iPhone, iPod, and Macbook Pro. Gotta have lots of stuff, all of it new stuff, never anything old, repurposed, or repaired. Last year’s gizmos end up in the trash or recycled in a third-world country, where folks get exposed to dangerous levels of lead and other hazardous materials.
Oh, but we’re green! We drive a Prius! We sip our single-serve Keurig coffee as we drive to the mall to buy more crap. We donated our old clothes (really pretty new clothes) to Goodwill. Aren’t we swell?
(… awright, I’ll stop ranting now …)
NB, I am sure Alison is going to mention this but this item just popped up on the Comics Journal Blog:
http://www.tcj.com/?p=1610
Inconsistency. Butternut squash tonight, and I catch myself as I eviscerate the vegetable — the seeds and pulp are going into the compost tub and not into the frypan for roasting, salting, snacking.
For a moment I think seriously about fishing them out of the tub, giving them a rinse, and basking in smug.
Naaah.
I think I might have to buy this book. All around me is chaos. I’m afraid I lost both my grandmothers before the 90s. And I was male so not generally considered suitable to pass on household wisdom to, although I did receive life lessons.
I was also brought up by a woman who was too depressed to do anything that wasn’t strictly necessary – only the dishes, the laundry and ironing and the rubbish into the bin once a week. I very rarely remember dusting and hoovering would be done sporadically. My job used to be brushing (not hoovering) the stairs and I enjoyed it, to the point that even when we had a hoover with the long attachments, etc, I would still use a brush because it was more fun. I’d start at the top step and watch the dust and debris accumulate and get bigger and bigger as I worked towards the last step. I later learned that our house having 15 steps on the stairs was unusual and every new house has 13.
Apart from dusting and hoovering, and the dishes, laundry and ironing (ha!), I’m not exactly sure what else you’re supposed to do around the house.
A.B.’s linen closet is about as organized as my own!
While I was tracking down the censorship of this website on my university’s server, I came across a picture of A.B. in an empty room with bare wood floors and wallpaper that featured big green flowers. I seem to remember that pattern on a wall in one of the panels of Fun Home, but at the time I just thought it was some kind of artistic allegory! My gosh. Green flowers. Green flowers just like the ones on the rug in my home, where I am now, the home I grew up in. I guess that it’s just fortunate my parents never discovered that wallpaper, and that A.B.’s parents never discovered that rug, or the entire space-time continuum might have been disrupted! Or, just maybe, anytime that almost happens a disruptive signal travels backward in time to prevent it from ever happening!
I don’t think fitted sheets arrived in the UK until after I’d left home. I embraced them with alacrity (and a lack of ironing); to my mother they remain a source of bafflement.
Acilius, I was a little more worried about the similarity to “cooties,” but it also reminded me of “cozy”, which I liked, but then – your correlation…GAH! Now I can’t use the word!
NLC, just throw a “Ms.” in front of it, and we’re good to go. And Dr. E, if you’re feeling adventurous, just Google image “bizarre insertions.” (NO, you’ll not find an image of me, smartass, but you’ll stumble backwards away from your computer, I guarantee it.)
Hey Alex, thanks for introducing me to “deliquesce.” And Maggie, I’m sinfully extravagant – I use baking soda, THEN toothpaste!
I just find the whole thing so impractical, Ginjoint. A “coozie” is an insulating sheath in which one places a beer can to keep it cold. Then you went and repurposed the word!
Aside from the logistical impracticalities (perhaps you could recover Maggie’s discarded KY Jelly), I don’t think beer would stay cold very long in your coozie.
O.K., now even I’m grossed out.
*Sees a tone and decides to take the challenge to see if he can lower it …*
Well, using beer instead of urine in a watersports session would make the whole thing much more fun!
(I did warn you)
Hairball (#70) said:
“I think Kat’s observation that folks are not teaching their kids to be thrifty is at odds with the perceived “coolness” of the so-called green movement. I don’t think people make the connection between the two. Being a good steward of our physical resources is also another key to being a good steward of one’s financial resources, and vice versa.”
I hadn’t thought about it in that context, but yeah. For sure.
oh, Dr E… I thought that was charming… but then again, I’m like that…
Well, Hairball (#67), I’d say it was worth every penny (at the time, $50/session) to wrestle with some of the ways in which my parents raised me — and to reclaim myself fully empowered.
OCD as expressed through thriftiness overdrive and hoarding is really really painful to be a part of. (Does anyone know what I’m talking about when I reference Art Speigelman’s Maus I and II? re: his neurotic father who has PTSD? — Speigelman is one of Alison’s inspirations, if I’m remembering correctly.)
#58 + #59 = major laugh out loud. Thanks! 🙂
Aunt Soozie, I’m enjoying your esprit de vivre these days.
And may I respectfully observe that Erin Bried is totally and utterly cute? I loved her videos.
Nice work, Ian 🙂
Thanks R2A. I try my best. Or worst, as the case may be …
@Ginjoint: Sorry I ruined “coozie” for you. Or maybe I’m not sorry. When I was about 13, many of my classmates used to say “cooze” as a slang term for semen. I’m not sure how widespread that use is, and of course if you tried to avoid every word that had ever been adopted by a group of 13 year olds as slang for semen you would fall silent. Still, I for one would hesitate to recommend “coozie” as a nickname for your vagina, unless of course you were coming out as heterosexual. Then you might want to celebrate its occasional cooziness.
I grossed out Ginjoint! I’m strangely proud.
This morning there wasn’t enough shampoo in the bottle for repeated squeezes to puff out any, so I added some water to the bottle, swirled it around and dumped it on my head. This is the second morning in a row I’ve done that, and I doubt it will be effective a third time. Again, no frugality involved. I really have to get to the store.
The post is titled “Tips from Grandma.” Looking at the last 25 comments or so, I’d have to say Grandma’s getting pretty frisky.
Yep, thanks R2A. I’m simply feeling blessed, lucky and happy. I’ll attach a photo so you can see how (and why) I’m all aglow. Dr E… I so totally relate to that scenario… but take my word for it, when all else fails grab a pair of scissors and cut that thang open. You won’t believe how many usable little dabs of product are hiding in there.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2541/4182059919_520b01e65d.jpg
Aw, Aunt Soozie, that’s a beautiful picture!
Mazel tov, Soozie! you go, girl.
Congratulations Soozie!
She’s cute, and knowing you I’m sure she’s vivacious and kind.
Three cheers, Soozie!
@sue(24)
There is a whole set of sock darning instructional videos here:
http://community.knitpicks.com/video/video/search?q=sock+darning
It’s best to get to them when it’s just a worn spot and not a hole. (I need to practice what I preach soon on a certain pair of knee-length hand-knit socks.)
Pardon my ignorance, but which stunner is you in that photograph Aunt Soozie?
Auntie is the red-faced one on the right. As for what made her face red, that’s none of our business and you should be ashamed of yourself!
Thanks Dr E. I assumed the red faces were something to do with coozies …
How did I know that someone called “Aunt Soozie” would have curly hair and a roundish face?
If that ain’t some lovin’ in them their eyes, well I’ll be! (Am imagining your new love feels mighty swell about dating a Beaver Queen, Aunt Soozie!)
@R2A (#83)
Yup, Speigelman nailed his father’s OCD/PSTD perfectly in Maus. The screwy thing about growing up in that situation is that the kids never realize how aberrant it is, despite having other reference points such as friends and relatives who don’t hoard and save compulsively. Then they end up as adults with these strange habits and values instilled by the parents.
Your therapy bills were a good investment (and a lot cheaper than mine). I should have sent my parents my therapy bills, I could have bought a couple of brand-new Mercedes-Benzes with what I’ve spent on undoing their handiwork.
Did you read Speigelman’s post-9/11 book, ‘In The Shadow of No Towers’? The guy is amazing.
Very pretty picture, Aunt Soozie! I am so happy for you!
Thanks All. Yep Ian, that’s me on the right. Just flushed with happiness… or maybe it was something about coozies… I take the fifth. : )
all happiness, aunt soozie! what a sweet pic.
the sweet japanese actually have contests for this folding thing. there are vids on the net. -g
I finally remembered to view the video on how to fold a fitted sheet. I’ve been folding mine just like Erin did before her research, I’m afraid. This is totally cool! I’m going to practice as soon as my partner wakes up from his nap, and fold along with Erin.
You warm and wonderful people make this blog such a joy. “Coozie” That’s a Cirque de Soleil show, or something you pull over your teapot, no?
My eyes would glaze over when my mother would attempt to show me how to fold a fitted sheet. I feel so inept! But now my slothful and rebellious nature is indulged by my modest collection of flat linen sheets, some of which used to be estate-sale tablecloths.
My daughter made linen sheets with lengths of yardage, but says they’re still a bit stiff. (There is “softened” linen available online though.)
As a grandma, I offer my latest handy tip: When the tiny hinge-bolt was suddenly gone, I repaired my glasses with a twist-tie, trimmed with scissors. It works so well I’m leaving them like that (at least until my next visit to the optometrist).
I’m so looking forward to reading Erin’s cool-sounding book.
Prediction: Alex, you are going to have a fabulous crop of butternut squash in your compost heap!
Greetings,friends. Monday morning found me perusing handicraft booths in Mexico City (D.F.),and late that night I arrived at the San Jose,CA airport. I’m now at the home of my sister and her family in Mt. View,which is south of San Francisco. Enjoying the 60 degree CA sunshine.
No,I’m not trying to make the rest of you feel bad. From about 2000-2006,my sister and I did long distance elder care for our parents. This entailed a number of trips to our hometown of E.Lansing,MI,including at least 5 in the winter. While we did manage some fun times,like watching Monty Python DVDs and taking walks, after spending much of the day doing errands and visiting the nursing home,it was a very emotionally difficult time for us.
A comment about the OCD: I think there’s been a lot of misuse of medical,especially psychiatric diagnoses,for a number of years. OCD is a serious medical issue whose cause isn’t entirely known. My sister’s diagnoses are bipolar depression,anxiety,and OCD. She has been a regular warrior about dealing with her issues.
So folks,please be careful with your terminology.
I do much better in sunny weather of any temperature as it balances my serotonin levels. Also,it’s been fun to spend time with my sister,brother-in-law,and 20-something niece and nephew.
when my friend was helping clean out her great-grandma’s house she found a box labelled “pieces of string, to small to be used”. depression-era hoarding!
How funny, Oprah Winfrey is giving out the same book recommendations as Alison Bechdel. Or vice versa. (That would be the December 2009 issue of O Magazine, p. 66) Btw, that was also the issue of O Magazine that had Ellen Degeneres on the Cover.
My copy just arrived and it is awesome! hurray. Thank you for the great tip.
hahahaha, how did I miss this post. I’ve never been able to fold a fitted sheet either. Thanks to Erin, I now have at least one unusual skill I can show off. I laughed some more at Alison’s linen closet. What a ‘topological’ mess but still nice and warm and cozy.
The foam thingy that gets wrapped around a can of soda ( or beer) is a stubby holder (or stubby cooler) to Australians. It probably started life as the kind of recycling described above, but has taken on new energy as a form of marketing (cheap to produce and infinitely used). Stubbies are what australians call 375 ml bottles of beer.