Joyful Simplicities

New Ideas for Women…Vintage Bliss…

Certainly some of the appeal of this week’s Simple Abundance Online feature “Mrs. Brown’s Uncommon Sense” is how revolutionary the very idea of simplifying your life in 1916 was – and still is – for many women.  If you’ve dusted a vase or pair of candlesticks for ten years, ‘why would you ever want to change’ is a mentality that’s hard to break unless moving house or moving on in life forces you.  Periodicals such as “New Idea Woman’s Magazine” and “New Thought Journal” became the rallying cry for women’s suffragettes at the turn of the century and up until after World War II and this extended into the home with literary domestics such as Eleanor Gibson Tait extending progressive housekeeping ideas through fictional women like “Mrs. Brown.”  I hope you enjoyed Mrs. Brown’s simply abundant epiphany as much as I did.
   
    It’s remarkable how difficult it really is to try new ideas and methods of ordering our days in pleasant ways.Take for example, eating outside.  With the warmer weather and longer daylight, the patio, terrace and backyard beckons each of us to try something different, but excuses are easier to come by than the energy carting the kitchen outdoors requires, which is why this vintage bliss blast “Picnics Made Easy” from the June 1934 issue of The American Home has done all the hard work—or thinking for us. It may not be a new idea but outfitting a garden shed as a picnic headquarters is a radical new thought for me—and it might be for you as well!

    “When we leave a modern kitchen, were every effort has been expended towards achieving painless cooking, to bend down over a primitive wood fire, most of the joy of eating al fresco is lost in the preparation.  But getting the outdoors meal can really be made a part of the pleasure of partaking.

    What we need primarily for cooking food is heat, water, and utensils.  Here is a transplanted bit of kitchen cabinetwork—simple, practical, and appropriate rustic—which provides all three directly and abundantly. The dimensions are approximately four feet wide by two feet deep with doors seven feet high.  Into the full-depth middle counter is let an enamel sink with waste water flowing into a French drain under ground.  Water is brought to the tap via the garden hose.  On this same counter, or on the table, coffee percolates, waffles bake, “hot dogs” grill, bread toasts and eggs boil…via electricity from the house to multiple, moisture proof convenience outlets.

    Above is shelf room for china and glassware.  In the lower compartments are shelves for trays of “five and ten” china pots, pans and containers.  For large parties, gaily painted trays make a cafeteria of the outdoor dining room.

    The really picnic-wise know that it is not so much lunch, dinner or supper, but breakfast in the freshly crisp morning air which is the deluxe outside meal.  Enough supplies can be kept in the air-tight canisters and portable refrigerator to make this very pleasant beginning of the day a regular habit.”

    New ideas, anyone?

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Pretty In Pink

I just read a survey that reported women are hardwired in our brains to select pink over other colors.  I needed no survey to prove that, just look at the cover of Simple Abundance which I’m happy is also known in bookstores as “the pink Bible”.

Scientists believe the pink color preference may be due to the fact that when Eve was out harvesting berries, the riper ones were in pink to red tones.  Personally, I think it’s because Mother Nature loves to be flattering. No woman ever looked bad in pink, wearing it or surrounded by it. A ramble through Newton’s Chapel, my garden, the field and into the back of the beyond shows the whole world bursting into pink and it’s making me giddy.

    Remember it doesn’t take a lot to make us happy, so jumpstart the transformation with pink.

    Pink has long been associated with optimism and happiness. Think of the expressions, “tickled pink”, “feeling in the pink” or even “rose colored glasses” for when we want to see the best in a situation.  Pink seems to make us more approachable and friendly…It’s also hard to be angry in pink.

  “I was shown round Tutankhamen’s tomb in the 1920s. I saw all this wonderful pink on the walls and the artifacts.  I was so impressed that vowed to wear it for the rest of my life,” the British romantic novelist Barbara Cartland explained when asked why she always wore pink, although she did get a bit carried a way.  Dusty rose, salmon, coral, ballet shoe, face power, Apple blossom pink, Dogwood, Cherry, Schiaparelli,, peony, rose…Which pink are you?  The best way that I know to find the perfect shade of any color is to visit a large paint department and pick up paint sample chips.

However, if you’ve got the perfect pink in a vintage scarf or fabric, which you’d really like on your walls, take the scarf with you as more sophisticated paint lines can scan your color into a computer and personalize your pink.  Bring home a small can of your perfect paint, and paint a footstool, a bijoux bookcase or a small wooden box and plant pink and white striped geraniums to keep inside your kitchen window.

  Take a creative excursion this week to a big make-up department and ask the different brands (all of which are now promoting their summer color ranges) to help you come up with the perfect shade of pink for your lips, cheeks and nails, on the condition that you only leave with three products.

    Take another creative excursion to a fabric store and see what pink fabric remnants are for sale.  A bolt of 3 yards of pink crepe can make a sassy sarong, no sewing is necessary.

    Next time you’re bored and at the computer, hit “vintage pink” on eBay and see what’s out there…. I found my pink mixing bowls from the fifties this way…

    Go on a hunt through your house and closet and gather up everything pink…you’ll probably be surprised.

A pink bon-bon dish at the back of your china closet could hold cotton balls in the bathroom instead of gathering dust in the dark...pink sandals just make you feel good…a flounced pink gypsy skirt is a great reminder that you still have a pulse…

    Limit your flea market and garage sale goodies to the color pink this summer.  Now is the time to find pink ornaments for a themed Christmas tree! Flamingo pink trimmed glasses elevate the cocktail hour or pink lemonade to an occasion. Begin collecting a pink Fiesta ware breakfast set for one or a collection of pink tea towels and aprons. This is so much fun and turns a Saturday or Sunday morning into a treasure hunt…Only pink, remember.

          Start a vintage pink button collection and display your finds in a large glass jar or vase.  Same with pink ribbons which you can roll around wooden clothing pins…

  This is the time of year for underwear sales…treat yourself to pink bras, panties and if you can find one, a pink taffeta slip….

Of course, pastel pink, the color of Venus, is most associated these days with the fight against breast cancer on both sides of the Atlantic and every year there are more special edition products in pink.   

I don’t know about you, but every time I really have the blues, a pinch of pink changes my mood for the better.  As the late, great fashion editor Diana Vreeland put it: “I adore that pink.  Pink is the navy blue of India.”

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Vintage Bliss…World’s Most Famous Lipstick…

Indispensable to Femme Fatales, damsels in distress, pony-tail teen homecoming queens as well as women in uniform and Rosie the Riveter, Tangee lipstick, created by George W. Luft during the long dark decade of the Depression turned women’s pouts into smiles. And still does today.  Now that’s what I call Vintage Bliss. What made Tangee the tube to lust for was the fact that this lanolin based lipstick altered its color and intensity based on skin tones.  The name Tangee came from the fact that in the tube the lipstick appears tangerine, but then gradually, after application, “it changes color to become uniquely your own.”  Tangee eventually came in seven different shades from red to cherry pink, and there was a matching rouge.  In this ad from Women’s Home Companion, December 1937, Tangee costs 39 cents.  Many women I know confess that Tangee was the first lipstick. I discovered my first tube on my Southern Granny’s dressing table and now, after all these years, I know why she was irresistible to four husbands, a shocking idea to my ten year old imagination.  Why a woman who could have four husbands, could get away with anything!

I don’t know about you, but these days shopping as entertainment has all but disappeared from my daily round.  However, one place you’re sure to be entertained whether you buy or not is at The Vermont Country Store, a fourth generation family business proud to be purveyors of the practical and hard-to-find, www.vermonthcountrystore.com.  Here’s where I found my Tangee ($14.95)—and it’s the only place in the world to get yours.  Founded by frugal Yankees Vrest and Ellen Orton as a mail order business in 1945 with 36 items chosen for their usefulness and pleasure, the Vermont Country Story now carries over 6,000 products, still chosen with care, and many items that connect you immediately to heartfelt memories.  For fragrance think Yardley English toiletries, Arpege by Lanvin, Evening in Paris, or English Tweed cologne.   For laundry, Fels-Naptha soap.  What about a manual Olivetti or electric Smith Cornona typewriter?  If it’s rainy this Bank Holiday (UK) and Memorial Day (USA) week-end, amuse yourself with a browse on their website.  (Orders for cheese and candy end this weekend for the summer on May 31st). You can also request a paper catalog, which is becoming quite a treat.  Alas, my only complaint is that packages are sent only to USA addresses. Maybe the Orton family will reconsider if they get enough email from international Simple Abundance Online members!
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Vintage Bliss: The Unseen Woman

When I was a journalist and writing a column for the Washington Post Writers Group in the late eighties, I did most of my research at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.  During those halcyon days, serious “scholars” were able to apply for “Stack Passes” and have a desk, which enabled you to peruse the Library’s vast collection on your own and keep the books handy for weeks at a time.  I was rarely ever as happy and contented as during those research days at the Library. Researching is still my favorite part of writing. Alas, the alarming theft of rare books made this coveted and controversial policy a thing of the past, which was really unfortunate because at that time the Library of Congress couldn’t really access its own archive because it hadn’t been computerized.  To this day I believe that had I not been able to wander up close in the vintage women’s periodicals sections, I never would have been able to write my first three books: Mrs. Sharp’s Traditions, Victorian Nursery Companion and Simple Abundance because I wouldn’t have discovered the abandoned dusty treasures first hand.

    But, of course, even then, the most one could do was awkwardly photocopy an article, at ten cents a page, angling a huge, heavy bound volume of magazines for a column of print. Not very practical.  However, it didn’t seem to limit my enthusiasm because I was so grateful to be at the Library of Congress, have a stack pass, a few blissful hours of silence each week, (so I could hear my own thoughts and the voice of the Great Creator) and a chance to turn the page of domestic history ever gently backwards.  My routine was so simple, yet utterly abundant:  I’d arrive at 9:00 a.m, set my desk up, break for coffee at 10:30 am, work until 1:00 pm, break for the best tuna fish sandwich in the world in their cafeteria, roam the stacks in the afternoon, have a cup of tea at 4 pm and leave around 5 p.m. loaded down with the day’s haul.  I called this procedure, “filling the well” and the next week’s writing would depend on what I could glean in one day.

     Now, of course, computers and eBay have changed all that and over the years my personal collection of vintage women’s magazines is pretty vast.  Still, it was a thrill the other day to rediscover a “New Age” series of beauty advertisements from Pond’s Cold Cream during the 1940s, which talked about “the unseen woman” who lives inside each of us—or in our vernacular “the authentic self.” (See Simple Abundance, March 11th).  The difference is that this time I can share the thrill of the chase with you in a different way.  So enjoy and hold these thoughts for today:

    “That unseen woman within you—can make you over…if you will only let her.

    Many women feel in their hearts that they have missed full self-realization.

    Many live always with a numbing sense that they are of little importance.

    Yet, they need not accept this—help is within themselves.  You can feel it within you—an inner drive for happiness.  The close interrelation between this Inner You and the Outer You, the almost uncanny power that each has to change the other—can change you from drabness to joyous self-fulfillment…”

 Ladies Home Journal
(April 1949)
Pond’s Cold Cream Advertisement

 

Vintage Bliss—Glorious Gingham…

Now that we’ve scoured, polished and shined it’s time for some vintage bliss treats.  From House & Garden’s 1920 decorating supplement a plea to reconsider gingham.  “Time was when gingham contented itself with a humble role.  It spread itself ingratiatingly over the cook’s calico skirt, it made morning rompers and play frocks for the children, it attended to house dresses and laundry bags, but, like the family skeleton, it was kept strictly out of sight.  Still there was undeniable charm about its gay fresh colors, its plaids and stripes and checkerboard effects.  Moreover, it wore and laundered well. For years it remained the fabric of childhood…

    “At the present writing we may use gingham with impunity in the living room, the hall, the dining room and the bedroom, and not to garb ourselves alone, but our chairs and sofas, our windows and our doors as well.  We may sit on it by day and sleep under it a night and even, in this topsy-turvy world, serve up dainty repasts upon it at happy meal times, with gay colored china to match…”

    I love gingham—it’s a smile trigger.  You just cannot be in a bad mood with visions of gingham dancing in your decorating reverie.  Just look at this nifty decorating idea from 1920:  “Like a garden spot is this little dining room done in gingham.  The walls are creamy buff and the curtains and chair pads gingham of turquoise and orchid, lined with soft yellow.  The cottage furniture is painted a putty color on the outside and a clear green turquoise on the inside of the dresser.  Cushions of old gold, black turquoise, orchid and the gingham of the curtains fill the window seat.”

    Yes, this is how we can play after we bottom out the house!

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Eastertide

There is much traditional lore in the English countryside connected with Holy Week which feeds my soul.  Of most importance is the reverence and quietude of Good Friday, the day of Christ’s crucifixion, the most solemn day in the Christian year. Heaven knows I’ve eaten plenty of yellow marshmallow chicks, but I never conduct business on Good Friday. Don’t even want to think about the world on this powerful, sacred day. So it’s comforting and good to know that this natural withdrawing is an ancient calling. For centuries no washing of clothes was done and certainly, no hammer picked up; no seeds  sown, nor beehives moved; all living on the land that can be still, are, between the hours of noon and three.

    And then the kettle is put on, the cat given a fresh bowl of milk, the dog is walked, the buns baked and you decide just how are you going to color your eggs this year?  Or shall you just treat yourself to flowers, a gorgeous chocolate egg in cellophane and the DVD of “Meet Me in St. Louis” starring Judy Garland  about a delightful Victorian family, who sing and have fun in each other’s company celebrating the holidays and making happy memories together.  Why not?  It’s having a tradition that counts, even if it’s only your own or on your own.  

    “Spirituality is the sacred center out of which all life comes, including Mondays and Tuesdays and rainy Saturday afternoons in all their mundane and glorious detail,” Christina Baldwin reminds us in Life’s Companion.  “The spiritual journey is the soul’s life commingling with ordinary life.”  
    
    Be blessed this Eastertide and may you know Deep Joy.

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PS Please download our Member feature article of the week, Eastertide. It contains my special Easter celebrations and how to make natural dyes for your easter eggs this year. To download your copy, click here

Caretaker’s Cup of Cheer…

The French writer Colette believed that “we only do well the things we like doing,” and creating a nest of home comforts was one of her favorites.  But in between the writing and domestic pastimes, she’d put her feet up and savor a celebratory cup of cheer known as “the Caretaker’s Café au Lait” which appeared in her novel Cheri.  While you’re bustling around with spring cleaning this week, knowing this is waiting for you to sip after the floor’s been mopped or the refrigerator cleaned out can be an inspirational nudge…

    Make a large cup of sweetened café au lait (which is equal parts hot milk and strong coffee, sweetened to taste).  Pour into an ovenproof china bowl.  Now place a slice of buttered bread cut into a circle on the surface of the coffee and top with a dusting of cinnamon. Place the bowl in a hot oven and bake until the surface of the mixture has become a crunchy crust.  Colette advises that before “breaking you bread raft, sprinkle it with salt.  The salt gives the sugar bite.”

Vintage Bliss: “Beauty Aid is Kitchen Made”

“Morning’s flower-fresh look can be recaptured any time of day,” Cameo Magazine for Women (1953) reminds those of us with time on our hands.  “In the half hour before dinner or date time, a home-made facial and mask will erase weariness from your face and give a lift to your heart.”

“For the makings reach no further than your kitchen and bathroom cabinets.  All you need is Turkish towels, Vaseline petroleum jelly, cotton, skin freshener, cornmeal and egg white.

 “Here’s how it’s done.  First, prepare the mask. Grandma’s receipt is still favored:  Lightly beat one egg white, then mix with two tablespoons of cornmeal until tick, heavy paste is formed. (Add a little water, if necessary).  Set aside and proceed with your facial.

 “Tuck your hair under the hand towel.  Wash face with soap and water.  Scoop up a generous amount of petroleum jelly on your finger tips and massage face to stimulate, lubricate and soften skin.

 “Start massage at base of throat, stroke up to chin, nose to temples, mouth to nose, brow to hairline.  Don’t rub, just pat petroleum jelly under eyes, where skin is very thin.  Now steam face with hot, wrung-out towels to open pores.  Apply mask.

 “Cover face, except eye areas.  Make sure mask covers all pores, lines, crevices.  Leave mask on for twenty minutes.  (Just enough time to sort the kitchen junk drawer.)  Remove mask with cotton pads soaked in skin freshener.  Rinse face with cold water splashes until it tingles.

“Now makeup goes on pearly smooth.  Spirits boosted, complexion clear, drawer tidy, you’re set for an enjoyable evening. “

This old-fashioned no frills facial not only works, it makes you wonder what in the world you’ve been paying for at the spa…(April Fools!)  No, seriously, I’m not about to turn down a spa interlude, and while a little spa time is always heaven sent and gratefully appreciated, just because the budget’s tighter doesn’t mean we need to forego or forget that it’s the taking of twenty minutes for purposeful puttering is the real self-indulgence and one, probably long overdue!

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What’s New Pussycat?

Another branch for capturing spring is the Pussy Willow Catkins. Luckily for all of us there are many different varieties of Pussy Willows which flower and thrive from Canada to Japan and Australia.  For Victorian women, a pussy willow spray or wreath was a charming and lucky harbinger of Spring.  This is the manner of mine:  using a circular wire wreath base (available at craft shops), overlap branches of pussy willow, securing them with florist wire.  Or just bundle a dozen slender stalks together and secure with a bow and long streamers of ribbon to whip in the March winds.  One of my favorite kitchen window bouquets are Pussy Willows in stone jugs. 

Joyful Simplicities for March 2009

As we become curators of our own contentment on the Simple Abundance path, one of the great payoffs is that we start to seek peace and comfort in the joyful simplicities—nuggets of delights wrapped up in the brown paper and string of the everyday.  Here are some ordinary enchantments I’m enjoying this month. 

      Take a Spring saunter to forage for bare boughs for forcing indoors.  After months of dismal weather, searching out slender branches and buds is guaranteed to induce smiles even on the most discouraging day. Scout your own backyard, or visit a nursery or florist for cherry, crabapple, forsythia, birch, dogwood and magnolia branches. You’ll probably be surprised at what’s hidden in your garden.  Cut the branches sharply and at an angle on the ends of the branch, then arrange them in simple containers—heavy and high enough to evenly balance the weight of spring’s tall spires.  Place your branch bouquets in a warm and sunny spot for a pleasurable lesson in waiting!