A Ripon Wisconsin Corn Maze To Remember

In the previous blog, I wrote about the fun we had at the Color Vibe run to raise money for educational programs and activities at the EAA in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. http://www.thecabincountess.com/2015/09/the-color-vibe-5k.html

Then later in the day after Heather and Dylan got cleaned up from the run, we decided to attempt a Corn Maze not far from their house.  Earlier Heather had bought some beautiful plants at this farm and knew the Corn Maze was ready to open.  The maze was on the property of Kaufmann Farms and Petals and Plows (https://www.facebook.com/PetalsPlows?fref=ts)

Aerial photo of the maze.

Having done a corn maze in the past, I was fairly confident that it would be a fun activity but not too difficult.  I hadn't seen this aerial photo previous to starting out.  When we arrived there were a lot of activities happening.  They have tons of pumpkins, gourds, mums and other plants and produce for sale plus live music and carriage rides.

They even had the horses ready for carriage rides.

We purchased our tickets and received the map.  My other daughter Sarah and one of her sons had joined us.  Off we went excited to start.  The maze consisted of three sections.  There was a kiddie section, a medium maze and the long one.  We thought we should start with the long one.  Only later would we realize how long it actually was.  If you can read the map, it says 4.3 miles at the far end of the maze.  We hadn't read that in advance either.

The boys took off leaving us on our own.  They would get way ahead and and then come back to check on us.  We were struggling from the get go.  Being fairly intelligent individuals, we thought we could follow the map.  It wasn't long when we realized we were following the white line like they have in all the maze books, and we should have been following the black line.  We weren't the only people having trouble.  We ran into the same people over and over again.  I guess it is called a maze for a reason.  It is AMAZING if you ever find your way out.

After quite a bit of time, we finally found our way out.  I was pretty tired, but the kids wanted to do more.  The two big boys took off to the medium maze.  Thinking it would be shorter and easier, we thought "why not".  We started off fine, but then we got really confused.  The sun went under so we couldn't navigate by the sun, the corn stalks were eight feet high so we couldn't see over them and since this was the first day open, we couldn't follow footprints in the dirt.  We went around and around.  Ewan, our five year old grandson said "I think we're lost, we keep going around in circles".  He was right.  We managed to get all but two punches but had reached the point of "forget it, get us out of here!".  We hadn't brought water because we didn't think this would be such a workout.  When we finally emerged, there was Sam and Dylan sitting in the grass waiting for us.  They had not only finished the medium maze, they also finished the kiddie maze. They were grinning from ear to ear.  Thank goodness we didn't attempt that small one, or I'm afraid we would really have been humiliated.  

In spite of sore feet,

We are still smiling and in an upright position, so all is well.

I was even able to get out of bed this morning.  It was an awesome day to remember.  Now back to reality.  I should really go out and help stain the deck railings but my husband is doing such a great job, I think I will let him enjoy himself.

Doesn't he look happy or maybe NOT.

The Color Vibe 5K

Sometimes the best days are the ones you don't plan for.  That is what happened to us yesterday, September 12, 2015.  To some this won't seem fun or exciting, but to me it was a perfect day.  We had no time constraints or anything we had to do.  Well, that isn't exactly true, staining the deck is something that should have been done on a perfect fallish day without rain.  Hopefully that can be accomplished today unless we get another offer we can't refuse.

The day started out early.  We left the house at 7:00am to meet our daughter Heather and grandson Dylan.  They were running in a 5K Color Vibe race on the grounds of the EAA in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.  It was a crisp cool morning so I put on a shirt, a sweatshirt and a light jacket.  Layering is the way to go at this time of year.  We got to the grounds and hundreds of people had already arrived.  I had not expected to see so many enthusiastic people this early in the day.  We were there to observe and take photos.  Little did we know that avoiding all the flying colored powder was going to be our biggest problem.  There was a stage set up and early on people were dancing and getting ready to run/walk.

It appeared that tutu's were the dress of the day.

As it got closer to the time of the race (which was 9:00 am), more and more people arrived.  There were a few thousand participating in all shapes and sizes.  It was a good race because it really isn't a race at all, it isn't even timed.

There were so many people that they had to start them in groups.  Heather and Dylan were in the third wave so it gave us time to get in position before getting trampled by excited people covered with colorful powder.

Ready, Set, GO!

Everyone is covered and they are just getting started. 

After everyone was on there way, we walked over to the finish line.  We knew it would take between thirty and forty minutes for most people to get to the finish line.  One guy finished in twenty minutes but he must have been a "real" runner because most of the people there weren't that serious about anything.

Yay, they finished.

A colorful ending.

It was only 10:10am and time for breakfast.  Little did I know that my day had just begun.  We had planned on attending our middle grandchild Sam's football game, but by the time everyone was cleaned up and fed it was too late.  That will have to be next weekends adventure.  Rather than go home Heather suggested the Corn Maze.  That sounded like a great idea.  http://www.thecabincountess.com/2015/09/a-ripon-wisconsin-corn-maze-to-remember.html

William's Little Store

With the popularity of the show American Pickers on the History Channel comes others who want in on the business or they have been picking forever and the show has given them credibility.  We have such a picker in our area.  His name is William Williams or at least that's the name of his place called William's Little Store.  It's not really a store, but more like several piles of stuff sitting out in the elements.   I never asked him if that was his real name.  He also says he is an arts and crafts supply store which is thinking outside the box, but I guess you might call it that.

William told us he is an art teacher at the University of Wisconsin.  I assumed it was in Madison but it may be in Oshkosh.    His facebook page says he is a lot of things.  One of his websites is a little creepy, so I won't link that site.  He is friendly as can be and has a story for everything.    I don't know how long he has been in business but he joined our Princeton WI Area Buy, Sell and Give Away facebook page, and that's how we found him.  He posts new items almost everyday.  He also has his own page called https://www.facebook.com/pages/Williams-Little-Store/162994940400054  William says the Pinterest ladies love him and are his best customers.  They get all kinds of ideas from Pinterest and come to him for supplies.  He has just about anything and if he doesn't have it, he can probably find it.

 So if you are looking for something out of the ordinary, William's Little Store is the place for you.
Almost nothing is marked so you have to ask the price.  He will negotiate.  We didn't know that until we heard another customer haggling with him.  I think he enjoys that, and we could have saved some money.

Fermented Salsa

I have a good friend.  Although we haven't seen each in a long, long time, Facebook and her website have allowed me to stay in touch.  She has beautiful flower and vegetable gardens.  She does enjoyable video tours of her gardens, she has a forum and she blogs.  The website is:  www.larksperennials.com

Recently Lark blogged a recipe for fermenting salsa.   I didn't have any tomatoes because I don't plant a vegetable garden, so I asked my daughter's mother in law.  She brought me a whole grocery bag full, plus some green peppers and squash.  It was so nice of them, and they even delivered it to our house.  I even had enough tomatoes left over to make four quarts of tomato juice/sauce with my pressure cooker and vitamix method.  http://www.thecabincountess.com/2014/10/pressure-cooker-tomato-sauce-and.html 

Immediately I got the salsa ready to go.  Culturing all kinds of food is very popular.  Cultured foods provide probiotics which are the good kind of bacteria and healthy in your gut.   They help boost the immune system and make you feel better overall.  I have written several times about the kefir I make.  I have made kefir for over eight years.  Kefir is rich in probiotics.  Recently I blogged about making sauerkraut.  Sauerkraut is also full of probiotics.  http://www.thecabincountess.com/2015/06/making-sauerkraut-in-quart-jar.html 

FERMENTED SALSA RECIPE

3 pounds ripe tomatoes chopped
½ cup chopped cilantro
½ cup chopped onion
½ Jalapeno Pepper (with seeds) chopped or more if you like it spicier
1 cup chopped sweet bell pepper
2 tsps. minced garlic
2-3 tsps. sea salt
1 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. dried oregano or 3 tsp. chopped FRESH oregano
1 lime (juice from 1 lime)
½ cup WHEY
(Whey can be obtained by draining plain yogurt or kefir through a cheesecloth.  The clear liquid is whey.  For those who are lactose intolerant, there is mixed information about whether or not there is lactose in it.  Most information I have found says there is only a trace, but that may be more than some people can tolerate.  I have seen recipes eliminating the whey and the salsa will still ferment.)

I use a food processor for ½ of the ingredients, this will make a finer and juicer blend. Then I mix in by hand, the other ½ of the chopped mixture. It gives the salsa a CHUNKIER texture. Fill jars with salsa, leaving an inch of space at the top. Push down the veggies. Make sure there is enough liquid to cover all the veggies. Put cover on. This is important for the fermentation. Leave jars on the counter and cover the jar with a towel (darkness) for two days. You will notice little bubbles forming. This is normal. After the two days refrigerate. This salsa fermentation will keep for at least 6 months in the refrigerator.
NOTE: All seasonings are to your taste.

This salsa is excellent.  I didn't use a food processor and there was plenty of juice given off.  It isn't really sour from the fermentation, but has a bite to it.  It is sort of tangy and sour mixed together.  I used the Kraut Source contraption I mentioned in the sauerkraut blog, but it isn't necessary.  Just make sure the vegetables are under the liquid. 

The Jewelweed Plant

All summer long I have been struggling with an invasive plant which has been growing in the bushes under my kitchen window.  Every now and then, I go out and pull out big bundles of this plant. They pull out super easy with a shallow root system, but I had to stomp down the bushes to get to some of them.  I never inquired as to what this plant was.  I just knew it grew everywhere.  It did have a pretty little flower which I liked, but I couldn't confine these plants to a certain area so I pulled them out.  They gave the term "wild flower" a new meaning.

Some of you may know what this is, but I did not.

I discovered this plant is a Jewelweed or a Touch Me Not plant.  It is a great plant that has value.  I had no idea.  It can be made into a salve or a tincture to treat poison ivy, nettles and bug bites.  It is called Touch Me Not, not because is shouldn't be touched, but by what happens when you touch the seed pod.

Here is a seed pod to the left of the flower.

There are five main modes of seed dispersal in plants.  They are gravity, wind, water, by animals and ballistic.  The way this plant spreads its seeds is "ballistic".  The seed pod is sensitive to the touch of your fingers or when an insect or animal brushes past.  It explodes when it is touched.  The pod is made up of five valves fused together.  When touched they twist away from each other and fling out the seeds inside.  No wonder the plant is called invasive if the seeds disperse that easily. 

Through some research, I learned how to make the salve.  Here is how I did it.

I went outside and gathered a bundle of plants.  Fortunately I haven't destroyed all of the plants.  I have been pulling these plants out for years, and they always return in abundance.

These are growing in the compost pile where I threw the dead
plants (or so I thought they were dead).

I cut the roots off and chopped up the stems and leaves.  I kept about six or seven cups, and put them in a saucepan.

To these chopped up plants, I added two cups of olive oil.  I read you can use coconut oil as well.  I then heated this to a simmer and let it cook for an hour or so.

After an hour, I turned off the heat, put a lid on the saucepan and let it cool overnight in the oil.  Then in the morning, I put a coffee filter into a fine metal sieve.  I put the cooked, steeped leaves still in the oil into the coffee filter.  I let it drain into a measuring cup until all the liquid had drained.

At this point, I put the oily liquid back in the saucepan and added one cup of beeswax beads.  I heated it until the wax was melted.  Then I put in ten drops each of lavender, tea tree and sweet orange essential oil.  I let is cool for a short time and poured the liquid into containers.  This is where I didn't plan ahead well enough.  I had some little metal Altoids boxes.  I thought that would be perfect.  I forgot there is a hinge half way up, and I filled them too full.  I had wax all over the cutting board.  Fortunately it scraped off quite easily.  Then I had to find containers for all the rest of the liquid.  I filled all the little containers I could find.  If I do this again, I will have to order some metal tins to store this salve in.

This was an experiment, and I am not even sure if the stuff works.  I am not going outside to find a bee to sting me or pull out a nettles plant just to see if it works.  When my sister visited she got into some unknown plant or was bitten by an insect.  It caused a lot of discomfort and itching.  It took a long time to heal.  I wonder if this salve would work on something like that.  I am sure that in time we will be able to test it on some bite or reaction.  Until then, it actually is a good moisturizer for the hands.  While cleaning up my mess, I was able to test it out.  Right now I have the skin of a frog.  Water just rolls right off.  Maybe I should apply some to my back so my feelings won't get hurt.  It will just roll right off my back as the saying goes.

Have You Heard Of A Product Called Drug Buster?

I think we can all agree that a lot of problems in society are created by drug abuse.  Theft in homes and robbery from people is on the news every single day.  Sometimes it results in violence and murder.  In our area they are having heroin summits to make the public aware of what addiction can do to people.  They will stop at nothing to get money to buy more drugs.  Addicts will watch the obituaries to see what a person died from and where they died.  Then they watch for the time of a funeral service.  They take this opportunity to break into peoples homes to look for drugs.  They know what drugs are used for cancer pain and other painful diseases.  This blog isn't going to be an editorial as to why there are so many addicted people, although in my experience medical doctors are very quick to write prescriptions.  I learned something new during my dad's hospice experience.  In the past we have taken our unused or unfinished prescriptions to drug drop off spots.  Every now and then the local hospital collects unwanted over the counter and prescription drugs.  They always have a police officer on hand in case someone thinks this is an easy place to get drugs.  The trouble with this is that you have to hold on to things until they offer this service.  Hospice was fine but it wasn't exactly what I thought it would be.  They prescribed a number of drugs to control pain.  They want to keep the patient comfortable, so they prepare for all scenarios.  When dad died, we had bottles of stuff I did not want in my house.  I was worried about all the things I mentioned.  I asked the nurse if she could take the excess or what I should do with all of it.  I didn't want to put it in our septic system or throw them out in the woods to get in the water supply.  The nurse thought about it and said she had something we could do.  She brought in this bottle.

It is a bottle of a solution made out of biodegradable safe products.  We opened the bottle and dumped all the pills we had in the house that weren't needed or necessary.  Then we put the cover on and turned it over a few times.  The drugs dissolve in the liquid and neutralize them into an indigestible product.  If someone thinks they can drink the solution, it will just make them violently throw up.  I don't know why this product isn't readily available or maybe it is and I haven't come across it.  Here is the website with more information.  http://www.drug-buster.com/

I checked with a person from our city to make sure it was safe to throw in the garbage.  He had never heard of it, but all testimonials say it can be put in the landfill.  The whole bottle with the solution can be tossed or you can pour out the liquid and recycle the bottle. 

Is Today's Education Better...It's Hard To Say

The schools in our area started yesterday, September 2.  Some schools around the country wait until after Labor Day, but all the kids will be back soon.  Things have changed so much.  I was getting a haircut the other day and my hairdresser was saying that third graders don't have spelling lists anymore.  Even with spellchecker, you have to get the word slightly correct or it will change it to a whole new word.  Even if you spell a word right, it sometimes gets changed anyway.  I don't know the logic behind no spelling lists, but I'm sure someone studied it and determined that it didn't make for better spellers. 

My grandson Ewan started kindergarten.

These days kindergartners go to school for the whole day.  My daughter told me they didn't need to have a nap mat because they don't have nap time anymore.  They don't teach handwriting and by the end of the year, they have to be able to read a chapter book with several sentences on each page.  They need to know the title, author, parts of a book and be able to answer questions to prove comprehension.  I guess Ewan is fine with it though.  His teacher told my daughter that Ewan had the best question of the day.  He raised his hand and asked if they were going to learn to read today.  He can't wait to read big hardcover books like his brother and his parents.

 When my daughters attended kindergarten they went half a day and learned a letter a week.  I think the only expectation was to write their name by the end of the year.  When I went to kindergarten, I don't think we learned anything.  It was so long ago I don't remember much.  I do remember wetting my pants so I could get sent home.  Why do we remember those things but not the happy things?  I know I didn't learn to read.  My husband didn't even go to kindergarten, so I guess basically we both started school for real in 1st grade.

My Aunt Agnes in 1928 when she got out of Normal School.

My mother's oldest sister Agnes was a teacher.  She taught grades 1-8 in a country school without indoor plumbing and a woodstove for heat.  She taught many of her brothers and sisters.  Mom used to say she was so hard on all of them because she didn't want anyone to think she favored her family.  I recently found her planning book from 1940.  It was interesting to read.  There was no kindergarten.  In first grade students began the year with a pre-primer called We, Look and See.  These were called Dick and Jane books and they came out about 1930.  I imagine they were the new innovative reading program.  They studied vocabulary words like oh, see, look and run.  By the end of the year Agnes wrote "drill on phonetic development and read with expression".  I learned phonics drills and had Dick and Jane books.  I remember them to this day.  Who knows what is best?  I do have to say that by 8th grade Aunt Aggie's students knew the classics, talked about current events each day, did exercises in punctuation, learned posture and manners, and did extensive drills on County and State government.  All grades had spelling lists and practiced handwriting. 

Pray Wisconsin schoolhouse

Mom's sister Agnes, the teacher, with the striped shirt in the top row, my mom in the middle with the blonde curls and her brother Eugene in the lower right corner.  My mom never did like to have her picture taken.  She always looked serious.

 It's a different world now for good or bad.  The old way probably wouldn't work now, although students were taught a lot of useful life lessons.  Things have changed so quickly.  Twenty five years ago my daughter went to college with a small computer and no portable cell phone.  I went with a typewriter and a dime to call on the pay phone.  Now small little babies can use an ipad and use a cell phone.  Imagine what the next twenty five years will bring.  I can't even begin to imagine.

What I Learned From My Parents Death

 
Last week we had a memorial service and buried my parents.  I have written about losing them and how much they were loved.  I didn't take any pictures that day because carrying a camera around changes my experience in situations.  I look for good shots instead of being in the moment.  That day, I wanted to be in the moment.  This blog is not going to be a recount of the day, but some of the things I learned.  Not necessarily what I learned from them about being a good person, but what I learned about what needs to be done when a person dies.  It is easy to be taken advantage of because of the situation.  Who knew that a regular bouquet of flowers can cost $40, but the same bouquet can cost $80 when they are for a funeral.  I learned from my husbands family that bereavement rates with an airline cost a lot more that regular rates.   I am so lucky I had to learn these things as an older person myself, and that I had my parents in my life for much longer than most people.  I also realize that the job of funeral directors is to do a lot of the work we took on, but we didn't have that option.  If you work with a funeral home, many of the costs we had are built into the final service cost.  I was just over whelmed for the moment.  Then I had to realize that we had to tackle one thing at a time.  I was fortunate to have a sister who did some of the arranging.

I may have learned some other things, but these are some that stand out in my mind.

1.  Talk about everything before your loved ones actually die.  The first thing is have a Power of Attorney and know their wishes as far as health care decisions.  If they don't want to be resuscitated, then have that information available or hospitals go to extraordinary means to save a life.  My parents had DNR's, which was fortunate.

2.  They had paid for their funeral expenses in advance.  We knew what they wanted, or at least I thought we did.  A few details were left up in the air, so if there are specific wishes, be sure to write them down.  When the time comes, the thinking process slows down a bit.

3.  Have enough money set aside to pay for all the extra expenses.  My parents moved from the area they lived and from the area they set up their pre-paid cremation.  We had to pay for transportation to the crematorium which amounted to $300.  We had to pay $150 for a cremation permit, $40 for the coroner to sign the death certificate, $20 for one death certificate and more for each additional copy.  We had to pay for a local funeral home to hold my dad's body until it could be transported.  That was $300.  We had to pay $250 for the cemetery to dig a small hole for the urn.  It was a companion urn so we didn't have to pay for two.  The cemetery director said we got two for the price of one.   Even though my parents had a grave marker that was engraved with their name and birth dates, we had to pay an additional $150 each to have their death date engraved.  That equals almost a $1000 extra dollars that wasn't pre-paid.  This is in Central Wisconsin.  It would probably be a lot more in other areas of the country.

4.  If the loved one is on Social Security, you have to pay back the money for the month they died.  My mom passed away on the 31st of January but we had to pay back the entire amount of her Social Security disbursement for the month of January.  Dad was the same.  We also had to pay back a second federal pension for the month he died.  I didn't realize that happened until we experienced it.

5.  There are a lot of decisions.  If you have a service, you need to know what kind of service, any special music and any special verses or poems, who will officiate the service and if there is a meal you need to estimate how many people to expect.   This usually has to happen within a few days.  We were fortunate to have more than a month to plan this part.

6.  Make sure there is a will, so any stipulations are in writing.  So many families come to blows at the death of a loved one.  It seems so strange to me that when someone dies, the family mourns and is sad together and then later they fight about the dumbest things and never speak again.  The person who dies would be so sad to know what can happen over a ring or a piece of silverware.  I'm afraid the world is a selfish place, and a lot of people only think of themselves and not the whole picture. My parents took care of gifting family members things well in advance of their passing.  We probably wouldn't fight, but this way that won't be tested.  
  
We had disposed of my parents house and most of their belongings well in advance.  That was a huge undertaking, but it was done before my parents passed away.  Some families are left with a lifetime of possessions to decide what to do with.  I feel sorry for my children if they would have to deal with all of our stuff now.  It is something I need to consider.  Hopefully I have a lot of life left, but it is the reality of getting older.  How many possessions does a person actually need?  I need to sit down with my daughters and make some important decisions.

http://www.thecabincountess.com/2015/07/goodbye-dad.html
http://www.thecabincountess.com/2012/12/the-white-poinsettia.html
http://www.thecabincountess.com/2013/01/in-memory-of-my-mom.html

No More Sushi For Me

Oh brother, I'm such a loser.  Less foods appeal to me the older I get.  My husband and I are boring eaters.  I could live on peanut butter sandwiches on white bread and fritos. I do like vegetables and fruit, but I dislike meat.  I'm not a vegetarian because the rest of my family are carnivores.  For example, this week we stopped at a family restaurant on our way north.  There wasn't one thing on the menu that looked good to me, but I knew I had to eat something.  I ordered a hamburger steak and mashed potatoes.  I asked for it to be cooked medium.  My husband ordered beef tips on noodles.  I got my plate of food and there was a round hamburger patty which was bright pink when I cut into it.  It was floating in au jus and covered with lots and lots of fried onions.  Really not sure if the au jus wasn't blood.  I gagged a little and my husband offered his plate of beef tips on noodles swimming in brown gravy.  I traded but didn't really like the meat, so I ate most of the noodles.  No wonder I usually eat at home and am so happy when I find something I like when we eat out.  My husband can't understand my keen sense of taste and smell.  Except today, he was glad he stayed home.  My daughter invited me to go shopping with her.  I was excited to go.  It is always fun to go shopping with her.  She is a shopper, and I can actually look around as opposed to making a bee line to the item we need, checking out and leaving.  When lunchtime came around, we met my son in law and grandson Ewan for lunch.  Ewan got to choose where we would eat.  Imagine my surprise when he wanted to eat SUSHI!  My gosh, I have never eaten sushi.  My daughters took me to a sushi restaurant one time, but I order something ordinary.  When it was time to order, Ewan wanted a salmon roll.  He wanted to sure it was wrapped in seaweed.  My daughter and son in law ordered all kinds of different sushi rolls like spicy tuna, salmon roll and an Alaska roll whatever that is.

 I just couldn't do it, so I got chicken and broccoli.  When the food came, my daughter asked if I wanted to try one.  Being the risk taker I am (NOT), I took a piece of salmon roll.  I figured if Ewan liked it, it must be a safe choice.  I can't use chop sticks either so I took my fork and was going to cut off a little piece.  My son in law Bret said they were already bite sized pieces so I should put it all in my mouth at once.  I gathered my courage and popped it into my mouth, but then I didn't know what to do with it.  I had to make the decision to swallow it or spit it out.  How would it look for an old woman to spit out her food, so I was polite and swallowed it.  I liked the white rice, I liked the avocado, but that pink raw piece of salmon just didn't cut it.  I will leave it at that, but I will never knowingly eat sushi again in my life.  I like my salmon cooked.  As for the miso soup with seaweed floating in it, I think they soak the fish in it to keep the fish moist so it rolls easily. 

My chicken, broccoli and rice was good.  I actually enjoyed it and the company was wonderful.  As I said earlier, I'm glad my husband stayed home.  He would have stayed in the car, that's for sure.

I know most people love ethnic food.  They love food that makes them sweat.  They love food they can't spell.  They love food from all different countries.  When I married my husband he didn't even use ketchup.   He has grown some in his food choices and will eat Mexican food and likes Italian food.  He has actually progressed far beyond what I can enjoy.  I must say this only applies to main dishes.  Give me a piece of pie or a cookie and it's a whole different story.  I like Danish Kringle, French Silk Pie, Belgium waffles, Mexican Wedding Cakes and other ethnic delicacies.  Maybe I'm not such a loser after all. 

Our House Then and Now...A Work in Progress

While searching through some old files, I came across the papers for purchasing our house.  Some of you may be interested in how the place looked when we bought it.  It wasn't very pretty.  The house hadn't been taken care of.  We loved the view and thought we could fix it up over the years.  We are still fixing it up.  That's the trouble with remodeling.  Just when you get the house to a point where it looks nice, then everything is out of style again.  Remember when shag carpet was all the rage.  I have lived through all the color changes too.  When I got married in 1968, avocado green, harvest gold and orange were the popular colors, then I remember mauve and blue was in, then jewel colors and now I haven't a clue.  I think it's dark brown but I'm not really sure.  

This was how the house looked from the outside.  It was built by a local man, and we don't think it was meant to be a permanent home.  It has two big fireplaces, and we think that was the main heat source.  The room with the window you see and the front porch were built on.  The furnace in under that area so that is another reason we think it was installed later.

This is how the house looked when we purchased it in 2001.

My mother thought we were crazy.  She never really liked it here.  She grew up in the country with no modern conveniences and thought this was no better than how she grew up.  At times I also wondered if we were in over our heads.  The first summer my husband worked the entire summer on chinking the house.  The person we bought the house from hired someone to put colored caulk between the logs and all of that had to be removed before the chinking could even begin.  For those who wonder what chinking is, it is the white product that is between the logs.  In the old days, it was a cement type mortar but now they have a synthetic product that stays elastic and doesn't crack with the movement of the logs.  It keeps cold air and insects from getting between the logs.  

The inside also needed a lot of work.  It was so dark.  The outside of the interior walls were logs, but they put half logs on the rest of the inside walls.  It gave the word "rustic" a whole new meaning.  We removed those and painted some of the interior walls.  As you can see in the following picture the kitchen ceiling had faux beams.  Their only purpose was to hide the seams of the drywall.  They too were removed during our kitchen remodel.  http://www.thecabincountess.com/2013/03/kitchen-remodel.html

Notice the snazzy orange counter top.  Stylish in 1970.

If you follow this blog you know I have written about many of the improvements we have tackled,  but basically the layout remains the same.  The only thing added was a dining room.  I also wrote about that.   http://www.thecabincountess.com/2013/01/putting-new-addition-on-log-house.html

Some day we may have to move but for now this is home.  

The house on August 15, 2001

Homemade Antibacterial Wipes

One of my decent qualities is that I can usually admit when I am wrong.  Usually is the operative word.  Sometimes, even if I am wrong, I hate to admit it.  Today I am stating that I was wrong.  I said I didn't use paper towels, although I qualified it with not using paper towels very much.  I blogged about buying microfiber towels at the dollar store and using them instead.  http://www.thecabincountess.com/2014/02/cloth-unpaper-towels.html

That was a year and a half ago but found that the towels were not that absorbent, and they just added to more dirty laundry.  I believe they also just spread the germs around, so I was using paper towels more and more.  I still use the towels I made for wiping my hands and dry dusting, but not for cleaning off the counter or wiping up messes.  Instead I found a blog posted on Facebook and have been using this method instead.

It was from http://www.doitonadimeblog.com
This blog is full of useful information and recipes.  This person also has several youtube videos.  These towels, resembling the antibacterial wipes sold under several brand names, are easy to make.  I am happy with how they work.  I use a lot less paper toweling this way with a good result.  They are supposedly safe on granite and other surfaces.  So until something better comes along, this what I use.

The first thing you do is find a container with a cover that will hold half a roll of paper toweling.  I found these Lock n Lock square plastic containers at the dollar store.  They are six inches tall and fit the roll perfectly.

The paper towels I use are Viva.  I like the fact you can tear off any size you need.  I think any sturdy paper towel will work.  The less expensive tend to shred so I think paying slightly more is worth it.

The only other supplies you will need are water (I used distilled because I had some), rubbing alcohol and dishwashing soap.

Cut the paper towel roll in half with a kitchen knife.

It is easy to cut the paper toweling with a sharp knife.  Be sure to leave the cardboard center inside the tube for now.  Mix together 12 ounces of water (1 ½ cups), ¼ cup rubbing alcohol and 4 squirts of dishwashing liquid.  Next place the dry toweling in your container and pour the mixed solution over the roll of towels.  Within minutes the towels absorb the liquid and the center cardboard core can be removed easily.

The cardboard center pulls right out.

At this point the towels are ready to use.  Just pull from the center as much as you need.  I find a small piece is usually enough.  I don't even wipe dry.  With the alcohol, it drys quickly.

I used the other half roll to make a cutting board cleaner.  The woman from the blog has a video on cleaning wooden cutting boards.  She uses the same process for making the wipes except she pours on 1 cup white vinegar mixed in 1 cup of water.  Every time she uses the cutting board, she wipes it off with a wipe.  Baby wipes can also be made this way.  The mixture is usually made with mild soap, some aloe vera or vitamin E oil and water.  There a many variations in the recipes but all of them use the same process for making the wipes without using all of the chemicals and preservatives in commercial wipes.  

Would you want this stuff on your babies butt
or yours for that matter?

The Cursive Debate

I have heard a lot of discussion about whether or not kids should be taught to write cursive.  Initially I thought, of course they should be able to write and not print everything.  I heard a story of a child who received a birthday greeting from his grandmother.  He did not know how to read or write cursive so he couldn't read it.  He didn't  even know who sent him the card.  That is sad but probably not totally true.  It probably didn't take him long to figure out it was grandma.  All the X's , O's and lipstick kisses probably gave it away.

I heard that people in the future won't be able to read old documents like the Constitution and Declaration of Independence.  When I was a child we practiced how to write almost everyday in school but through the ages penmanship has changed so much that some words are difficult for me to read and I'm almost as old as that document.

When I was in college, we had a class called manuscript writing.  It wasn't a class about writing manuscripts, but it was a penmanship class.  I think I helped my husband cheat in that class just a little because he is left handed and our instructor was an old guy who didn't approve of lefties.  We had to do pages of circles and slants to learn how to make the perfect letter.  What a waste of college class time.

We didn't have computers or voice activated word detection back then.  We had to write letters and send them through the mail.  In class, we had to write our notes and study for tests from notebooks.  So now I come to the point of my story.  I have been writing thank you notes to people who sent memorials for my dad.  I always thought I had good penmanship, but every note I have written looks terrible.  I am almost embarrassed to send some of them.   I came to the conclusion that I don't write long hand anymore.  I find that I rush and miss words.  We have trained ourselves to think faster than we write because most of the time we type on a keyboard.  Once in a while, we have to sign our name on a document, but even that doesn't have to be great.  Have you ever signed those credit card machines.  Most of the time, my signature isn't even legible.  We got a letter the other day with some important information for us.  This was the signature.

This is the signature of a person whose first name is Jon, middle initial is D and his last name has ten letters.  As you can see, you don't have to write perfect cursive to sign your name.  My husband taught school and noted that by middle school students were developing their own style of cursive.  At times he had difficulty reading their papers.  What good does it do to write, if it can't be read.  At least when a person prints, they usually print every letter.  Computers also have handwriting fonts, and I'm pretty sure government agencies and others use those fonts to fool us into believing we have an actual signature.

This isn't my usual type of blog, but I got to thinking about this as I fell asleep last night.  I think the reality of it is nothing stays the same and that includes perfect cursive penmanship.  My heart wants to keep things the same but my head tells me that time marches on and technology is replacing many things in life.  Sometimes it makes things easier and sometimes it adds frustration.  We aren't going back to the olden days.  Even the Amish elders probably never thought they would be shopping in peoples garages or making a trailer for their buggy's so they can take home their purchases.