Why Wear a Slip?

The past several years have seen the decline in ladies wearing slips and stockings.  It used to be that women wouldn't dream of going outside the house in a skirt without them. 

Now I know the economy is bad, but back during the war years when nylon wasn't available for frivolous things like stockings, women drew lines down the back of their legs to give the impression they were wearing them anyway.

They were a fashion statement and men considered them sexy.  As for slips, no one looked better in one than Elizabeth Taylor in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

Why should you wear a slip?  Well, have you ever worn a skirt and when you stood up or straightened up it stayed hiked up on your rear end and you constantly had to tug it down? 

A slip is called a slip because it makes your skirt slip back into place.  They also prevent thinner materials from being see-through.

Somewhere along the line, hose and slips have become passé and are difficult to find in stores.  Undergarments used to located in the Foundations department of your local department store.  They were the foundation of a well put together outfit. 

These days, Sears and J.C.Penney still sell them, or you can order them online.  Modern full slips generally don't come with all the lace trim like the one in this picture and that's a shame.  The lace makes them so much prettier and special feeling. Once you wear one and see what it does for your dress or skirt, you may want to have a drawer full in different lengths and shades from white and nude to black, and if a full slip seems like too much, half slips are available.

 

Being Grateful

This photo could have been taken any time of the year, but shows how humbly most people lived during the Great Depression.

Christmas in 1930 contrasted with Christmas 2012 is sharply different.  We all are feeling the pinch of harder economic times, but we are far better off than people were back then.

When Dolly Parton sings about a hard candy Christmas, she wasn't kidding.  Most children woke up on Christmas morning to a stocking filled with hard candy, some nuts, and an orange.  That may have been all that was in it, or it may have included something like gloves or socks.  They were happy to have the things in that stocking because it was a rare treat.  They savored that orange because they were unaffordable the rest of the year.

Children today would be very disappointed with those meagre things because they can eat oranges and candy any day of the year. 

Christmas trees were normally put up just a few days before Christmas.  It would have been a live tree, usually cut from neighboring woods.  The trees were decorated with strings of popcorn or foil icicles and a few ornaments that were homemade or saved from more prosperous times.  Going to church on Christmas day was a big event and there would have been a bigger meal than the usual fare. 

Today our trees are decorated right after Thanksgiving and piles of beautifully wrapped presents cover the floor underneath.  We spend hundreds of dollars and buy several gifts for each person on our list. By October, the stores are stocking the shelves with Christmas items and the buying frenzy begins.

We would feel seriously deprived if there were no celebrations, decorations, or gifts.  As a child of the 50's, I remember receiving gifts from Santa and from my parents and grandparents, but my Christmas stocking always included an orange and some hard candy.  I am sure my parents received these as children and the tradition continued.  I also put oranges and candy in my children's stockings and told them the stories of how it used to be.  They were taught to be thankful, even if someone only gave them a pair of gloves.  Of course, as children, they wanted toys above clothes or anything else, but we should all be grateful for what we are given.   

One year after we went back to school following the Christmas holiday, the teacher had each of us stand up and say what we got for Christmas.  This would have been about 1966.  Most of the kids in our small rural town got a few fun things and some clothes.  Some only got a coat or something practical.  One girl stood and rattled off so much the teacher had her sit down 'so everyone else has a chance to tell what they got.'  There are still families today who can't afford much, but these days, organizations donate to poor families to help them out.  Back then, the poor families outnumbered the wealthy ones.  I've often wondered if that girl realized that she'd received more than everyone else combined.

No matter how little we have, most of us are better off than most families during the Great Depression.  We all love our children and want to give them as much as we can, but teaching them to be thankful and what Christmas is really all about is more important than burying them in gifts.  I'm not saying you shouldn't buy your children presents, just that they should understand why we celebrate Christmas.  It's also a good idea to have them buy gifts for a child less fortunate. Have them choose the name of a child their age from an Angel Tree and pick a gift to give them.  Talk with them about why it is more blessed to give than receive.  The feel good feeling you get when you give is a valuable lesson.  If there is no Angel Tree, take food to the food bank.  Most communities have numerous opportunities to help others.  Helping others in need is a good way to realize how lucky you are and can help children learn that lesson as well.  We all have much for which to be grateful.

Enjoy your Christmas, cherish your family, and remember this day is a celebration of the birth of our Lord.  May you be richly blessed in the coming year.

Lingerie of the 1930's

Brassieres were finally available to the general public in the 1930's.  Corsets were becoming less popular.  The earliest versions of the bra prior to 1930 didn't much resemble the bra you see here.  They were huge and restrictive and looked very hot and uncomfortable.

Underwear was more like tap pants than what we think of as panties.  Bras were unstructured.  These garments shimmering in satin and silks and trimmed with lace were very pretty.

Girdles were popular and garters held up stockings.  These metal garters were uncomfortable, but panty hose wouldn't be invented for many years.

Over all that, they always wore a slip to make their dress hang right and prevent light from showing through their skirts.

It was way more relaxed than what their mothers and grandmothers wore: think bloomers, corsets, chemises, and petticoats.  Still, this seems like a lot of garments before you even get dressed.  That explains why the underwear department at the local clothing store used to be called the Foundation department, and why the hymn, "How Firm A Foundation" makes me giggle.

I am really thankful for good fitting bras and stretchy materials that wick away sweat and stay cool, and very glad to not have to wear all these layers all the time.

Homes of the 1930's

This was an ad for a home for sale in 1935 in Oakland, California:

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1935 Oakland California English Type Home 6 rooms , 3 bedrooms, all electric kitchen, 2 car garage, close to country clubs
$5,700   

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I wondered what that house might look like.  For $5,700, it doesn't seem like you'd get much, but   electric kitchens were a new thing, so this was top of the line.  Many homes didn't have a garage and the fact that this one is close to the country club and has a 2 car garage says that it was a nicer neighborhood.  The average income for a household at this time was between $500 - 1,500 per year.  I know, it's shocking isn't it?

 

I couldn't find a 3 bedroom home that fit this description.  I found a few English Style homes that were similar in the area listed for over a million dollars in today's market.  It just shows how much prices have inflated over the past 77 years.  Of course, those homes have been updated and have newer wiring, plumbing, etc.

 

Many homes were kit homes purchased from Sears.  This one only has two bedrooms.  The rooms were smaller than most houses of today.  There were no gigantic kitchens and bathrooms or walk in closets.  People lived smaller than we do in the 21st century.

 

This says the bedrooms contain good "head room", which I supposed means the pitched roof doesn't affect the ceiling height in the bedrooms.  There is a basement to this home.  Also included is a medicine cabinet, mail box, ironing board and linen closet.  The kitchen includes two cabinets.  Two???  I must have too much kitchen stuff because I'm sure it wouldn't all fit in two cabinets.

 

With monthly payments as low as $45-60, I might be able to pare down my stuff.  This is a really cute house.  What I don't see on here is a place for the wringer washer (usually on a back porch) and there is only one bathroom and it is upstairs.  Today, we would want at least a half bath downstairs, but not too long before this, people used chamber pots and had out houses, so having an inside bathroom was a big plus.

 

When you think about those small rooms you have to remember that people lived very differently than they do now.  Everything was done manually.  If they had a telephone, it would have been just one phone, centrally located, so it could be reached from any point in the house within a few rings.  They were probably on a party line and knew the operator on a first name basis.  The bedrooms were small.  They were intended to hold the bed, a dresser, and be a place to sleep.  There was no big television and DVD player.  There was no TV at all.  Entertainment was provided by a radio that looked something like this:

 

 

 

There were table versions also, but they were still large and wooden.  This would have been in the living room so guests could also enjoy music or comedy routines or the baseball game or prize fight.

 

Life has changed over the years.  The pendulum has gone about as far as it can and is beginning to swing back.  We learned that having it all just means you have less time to enjoy what you do have.  More stuff means more to clean, organize, and insure.  Americans work very hard to maintain a certain life style, but at what cost?

 

 

 

 

Porches

Coastal LivingBack in the days when people didn't have cable TV with hundreds of channels, lap tops, and video games, porches used to be an important part of a home.  They were places to sit and visit when the house was too hot.  I remember sitting on my grandparent's porch in rockers like these.

See, in spite of having to wash clothes in a wringer washer and hang them on a clothes line, washing dishes by hand, and doing most things manually without the benefit of modern gadgets, there was still time to sit down and relax or read a newspaper. 

When most homes didn't have air conditioning, this was a place to breathe, rest, and have a glass of iced tea.  It was also a place where peas were shelled, corn shucked, and children played.

 

JSquareFront porches were generally unscreened, but back porches were screened to keep bugs out.  Many of us have eaten meals on a screened porch. 

 

In the summer when the heat was too stifling to sleep, beds were moved out onto the screened in sleeping porch to take advantage of any breeze that might be stirring.  If you were lucky, you had a ceiling fan on the porch. 






Apartment Therapy

If not, you had one of these to stir the air.


Porches have shrunk or disappeared over the years.  We are too busy to sit still and just be.  Maybe it's time to stop and smell the roses - or whatever is planted outside your porch.








Porch Swings Plus

Care to join me?

Everything Old Is New Again

In late summer, reports of what's new for fall ladies' fashions begin showing up in magazines.  After several years of the smoky eye look with pale lips, suddenly the trend has turned and red lips are the new thing for fall.  I love this look.  Pasty lips always look like you need a good application of lip balm.

Looking back, into the early 1930's, movie stars were the inspiration for the everyday woman as far as fashion, hair, and makeup.  It wasn't too long before, when only a hussy wore makeup, but the movies changed that for women.

Jean Harlow was young, sweet, and had a definite look all her own.  Platinum bleached hair and drawn on eyebrows with exaggerated Cupid's bow lips were her trademark.  She often wore white satin gowns that hugged her body and you rarely saw her wearing a bra.  That was a new thing for all women in the 1930's. 

Her eye makeup looks fairly subtle compared to the eyebrows and lips.  To get this eyebrow, you'd have to shave your natural brows off.  I hope this look doesn't come back, but the red lips are right on target.

 

Mae West was a bawdy hoot to watch.  Her makeup here could be seen in any cosmetic ad this fall.   Her skin looks perfect and this makeup is beautiful.  The hat is pulled low on her forehead, so you can't see what's going on with her eyebrows.  I'm betting they are narrow. 

 

Ginger Rogers' makeup is flawless with more natural brows, a full red lip, and Marcel perm.  This look is lovely and not overdone.

 

Greta Garbo's half closed lids show that she has eye shadow a shade or two darker than her skin tone on the eye lid and light shadow on her brown bone.  The colors look like they might be in the gray or brown family - not anything too loud.  Her brows are thin, but a more natural shape than Harlow's.  Red lips still prevail.  It looks like the ends of her hair may be permed, but the top looks natural.

 

As the decade progressed, eyebrows were allowed to grow back in and became fuller, but groomed.  Katherine Hepburn's smoky eye shadow and red lips look current and beautiful.

 

I hope the shaved and drawn on brows are gone forever, but no matter how bad the economy gets, it just goes to show you that women still will try to look their best.  We'll find ways to afford makeup and take the time to do something with our hair.  It's just the female nature to want to fix up. 

 

 

 

 

 

Saving Seeds for Next Year

As summer winds down and the garden withers, it's time to save some seeds for next year's garden. 

The cilantro has completely dried up.  A closer look reveals these little balls on top of the stems.  These are the seeds.  You can cook with them when the recipe calls for coriander, or save them to plant next year.  Cilantro will reseed itself and a fall crop will come up in most areas.  I'm hoping that will happen here.  I harvested some of the seeds and sprinkled some of them back into the pot.

 

Don't worry about the little bits of stems that come off with them.  It won't matter if you are replanting them, but if I were cooking with them, I'd take out the stems.

 

The basil still has green leaves on the plant, but these little brown tops contain seeds.  I pulled off the brown dried portions for planting next year.  Each little brown pocket contains one tiny black seed.

 

There is a lot more dried leafy matter than seeds, but it's all organic, so it won't matter when you plant them.

 

As you can see, my garden is mostly herbs.  We planned to move and I just planted things in flower pots.

 

These gorgeous peppers came from dried seeds that my mother sent me from her garden last year.  Just before frost I'll pick some of the dried pods and save them for next year.  These aren't hot and have about as much flavor as a bell pepper.  They add color to salads, stir fries, and black bean dip.  They also look beautiful and the colors make me smile.

 

This spring I planted Rosemary in a pot.  Soon, something sprouted all around the Rosemary.  I decided to watch it and see what it was.  The plant grew to cover the Rosemary and bloomed.  Before long, tiny bell peppers grew.  I haven't had bell peppers in years and don't know where they came from, but I'll save some seeds.

 

They may have come from when I tried to grow peppers from a yellow bell pepper I bought at the grocery store.  Nothing ever came up when I planted the seeds and I assumed it was a hybrid pepper.  What a nice surprise to have free vegetables.

 

When I was a child, my mother and grandmothers and their friends would give each other clippings of flowers and other plants.  It was a way of sharing and always reminded them of the person who gave them the cuttings.  These days, I hardly ever hear of someone sharing plants like that. 

 

When my grandfather died in the 1970's, someone sent a big Boston fern to the funeral home.  My mother took the plant home with her.  She still has some of that fern and has given countless numbers of them away.  She used to have huge ferns on the front porch flanking the doorway.  In the fall, she would bring them in, or when they got too big to handle, would split them up and give smaller ferns away.  Those ferns have been borrowed to use at weddings and shared all around town. 

 

This spring I bought several seed packets.  Some of them only had five or six seeds in them.  Some didn't sprout and one packet didn't have a single seed inside.  It finally occurred to me that I could be saving seeds and money at the same time.  It takes little time and the only equipment needed are some envelopes to put the seeds into for storage until spring.

 

If you are saving seeds from a vegetable or fruit, lay the seeds out on a paper plate or towel and let them dry thoroughly before placing them into envelopes.

 

About six weeks before the last frost, plant your seeds inside and watch them sprout.  Be sure to label them so you can plant like plants together.  It's a fun thing to do with kids and teaches them about gardening as well.

 

 

 

 

 

A Look Back

This post will either bring back memories or open your eyes to "new" ways of doing things and living. 

I am a child of the 50's.  My grandparents lived through the Great Depression.  Both sets of grandparents owned farms and grew, made, or canned almost everything they had.  Consequently, one of my grandmothers said that if there hadn't been news reports on the radio and in the newspapers, they wouldn't have noticed there was a depression. 

My idyllic childhood was actually a school of living frugally, and taught me how to do many things and to enjoy hard work and clean living.  I learned much of what I'll tell you about by watching my maternal grandmother do things.  I spent many hours at her house watching.  She lived within walking distance and I was there nearly every day.  After school I would stop to visit with her and she would give me a graham cracker and a glass of milk.  She could have given me sauerkraut and I would have loved it because it came from  her.  Since she was Gram to me, I naturally thought those graham crackers were "gram crackers".

Gram and Gramp lived in a big old 1917 farm house with a wrap around porch.  Behind the house was a smoke house for curing meat.  There was a large garden plot that was fenced to keep out animals.  Plum and peach trees rimmed the garden.  A cistern captured rain water and cold drinking water could be drawn from the well on the back porch.  Gram often worked on the porch in the summer to take advantage of any breeze that happened to be blowing.  None of us had air conditioning in those days, though some may have.

Behind the garden was a large garage.  I don't know what kind of car they had, but it looked something like this one.  Theirs was navy blue and had an off white interior.  It seemed huge on the inside to me and very luxurious.  I loved it.

The ceiling of the wrap around porch was painted sky blue.  I assumed that was because Gram's favorite color was blue, but later I learned it deters wasps from building nests there. 

One of my favorite things to watch Gram do was laundry.  She had a wringer washer and a metal wash tub on legs to rinse clothing in.  I mentioned that because not everyone had a special rinse tub.  Some placed a chair beside the wringer washer and put a galvanized metal tub filled with rinse water on the chair.  People learned to make do with what they had.

Wash day was a major chore; back breaking work and it took hours to do.  A hose was attached to the kitchen faucet and run out the window over the sink into the washer to fill the washer and rinse tub.   Most women designated a certain day of the week for this task.  I don't know what kind of laundry detergent Gram used or what made her wash smell so good, but that was part of the allure for me. 

It couldn't have been the scary washing machine of the day.  I am sure that after washing clothing on a wash board, this looked like the latest and greatest to women, but my grandmother had a cousin whose wife lost her hand in a wringer washer.  Can you imagine???  If the wringers were that tight, the clothing must have been almost dry when it came out the other side.

Gram strung her clothes line back and forth on the wrap around porch to dry clothing.  When the laundry was dry, the clothes line came down with the clothes, and the wrap around porch became a beautiful place surrounded by yellow chinese roses, and rosey crepe myrtle.  A big cushioned swing and a chaise lounge plus some big chairs invited visitors to sit and sip a glass of iced tea while they visited away an afternoon.

 

Another use for the electric washing machine was an ingenius contraption that saved a lot of time and energy.  This container with it's paddles fit down inside the electric wringer washer and when filled with cream and turned on, became a butter churn extraordinaire.

 

Once the butter was churned, Gram pressed it into wooden butter molds like this:

 

 

The butter was packed in tightly.  Inside the bottom of the mold was a design to make the finished block of butter beautiful to place on a plate and serve at the table.  The handle on the bottom of the mold is to push the block out once it has been chilled and set.

 

At the end of summer, the garden produce was canned and placed on shelves lining the cellar.  I only went down there a few times.  It was an earthen hole with dirt walls that creeped me out.  A lone light bulb dangled from a string on the ceiling.  Shelves lined the space and kept food cool, which preserved produce as well.  Gram said that apples wrapped in newspaper and placed in the cellar would last a whole year.  I suppose it could have doubled as a tornado shelter, though I don't remember tornadoes in that part of NE Arkansas during those years.  Maybe no one mentioned it because they didn't want to scare a child.  The cellar might have been creepy to a child, but it was a practical space and the neat shelves lined with canned tomatoes, tomato juice, green beans, peaches, and other home grown produce provided food for the rest of the year.  When Gram and Gramp went to the grocery store, they only bought a few things because the farm supplied the rest.  The grocery list consisted of things like tooth paste, toilet paper, coffee, sugar, and soap.  Gram made lye soap, but used it for cutting grease and removing stains.  It was good for getting grease off Gramp's hands after he had worked on the tractor, but not so good for bathing because of the smell.

 

With so much being done by hand, Gram had all sorts of tools.  I always loved to watch my mother wind bobbins on the sewing machine and to watch Gram grind things in her food grinder.  It clamped onto the table and a bowl or pan was placed underneath.  Food went into the top opening and when the crank was turned, came out the front and fell into the bowl.  Ground meat came out in long red strings.  Gram always made cranberry salad at Thanksgiving and Christmas and the cranberries and nuts were coarsely ground on this handy gadget.  We use a food processor much the same way these days.

 

Remember these?  Meringue didn't just happen!

It took a lot of work for those fluffy white clouds on top of your pie.

What kid wouldn't want to turn this crank?  It's almost as gratifying as cranking the ice cream maker.

 

My grandmother was an excellent cook.  Her Parker House Rolls, home made German Chocolate Cake, homemade caramel candy that was so decadent and my grandpa's favorite, still make my mouth water.

 

There were always dogs and cats around on the farm and she made food for them too.  I always wanted to taste it because it smelled so good.  I never did, but I think it was a mixture of cooked oatmeal with meat drippings and left over vegetables thrown in.  The animals loved it and slurped it down.

 

How long has it been since anyone used one of these?  If you don't know what it is, let me explain.  The red top has holes in it.  You put the cork end into any bottle:  a soda bottle, a vinegar bottle, a wine bottle - whatever you have on hand.  The bottle is filled with water and the clothing is sprinkled with water before ironing.  See, they didn't have steam irons back then.  Their irons had a flat plate with no holes, so the moisture to get the wrinkles out came from one of these handy dandy tools that you could buy in any dime store.    (In case you are wondering, the dime store was sort of a combination drug store/dollar store.  You could buy hot toasted nuts, hand lotion, plastic flowers, shower caps, gadgets, and gee gaws there.  My favorite thing to buy at the dime store was bubble bath)

 

When I visit my grandparent's house in my mind, it was a wonderful place.  I never heard any conversations about how they were going to make ends meet.  There was that huge old oak tree whose branches nearly reached the ground.  I clung to them and swung through the air with childish delight.  My cousin, Linda, and I met at Gram's house to play.  We dressed the cats in doll clothes and then had to chase them to get the dresses back.  We sat on the porch swing and wiled away the hot summer and in the fall, planned our own future floor plans by raking leaves into connecting squares and rectangles.  We didn't need a lot of toys.  We made our own entertainment.

 

So in my mind, hard times weren't hard at all.  They were magical.  I hope I can remember that when times get rough.  I've always felt that with God, a prayer, and a bubble bath, I could get through almost anything.  Faith and a sense of humor will get you far.  Always remember to be thankful whether your glass is half full or only has a spoon full left.  Someone else's glass may be empty and that makes you very fortunate.