Retro Recipes For Marriage

In contrast to the many products inspired by or incorporating vintage & retro images of female domesticity that only really offer humor, Secret Recipes for the Modern Wife: All the Dishes You’ll Need to Make from the Day You Say “I Do” Until Death (or Divorce) Do You Part, by Nava Atlas, offers some wisdom with the chuckles. Read my review here!

Ironing Board - Not Ironing Bored

A vintage tip for getting the pad on your ironing board to be tight & smooth (otherwise you actually press wrinkles into the fabric!), from a 1940's issue of Modern Woman magazine:


We don't do much ironing nowadays, but I have very vivid memories of my mom ironing around dinner time...

Sometimes she ironed while dinner was in the oven; other times, after we ate dinner. I remember sitting on the floor with my sister watching local news (very vivid memories because of Albert The Alley Cat!), while my mom stood ironing and talking with us about what we were watching. I often consider ironing again just for this reason.

In our household, we not only monitor what our children watch on TV but consider television less of a "passive entertainment evil" if our family is discussing what's on. (Sometimes this is part of educating them about what they are seeing; other times it's far more conversational.) If I were ironing, I'd be less bored out of my mind watching shows I do not enjoy but the kids do.

I would not dress like this -- nor did my mom! -- but who can pass up showing off this vintage ironing photograph from Life magazine? *wink*

Soap Saving Wash Cloths

My dad sent me this email:

I have one for your Grandma blog.

This came from the depression era and carried through the war years. (In my childhood it lasted into the early fifties.)

Two standard wash cloths were machine sown together on three sides with the forth side loosely hand stitched. Inside was placed the small leftover bits of hand or bath soap bars, that we toss out today. This was then used for your bath. No shower in our house in them days.

Dad

To which I replied:

Dude, I vaguely remember that! Did she make [my sister] and I do that too?

He replied that he wasn't sure if his mother did it that long or not... But if it wasn't grandma, then who or how?

...That woman was a saver. For example, she did hoard toilet paper. Seriously -- she had an entire pantry in the basement full of it. When she passed away, we donated hundreds of rolls of toilet paper -- in designer shades & by makers long gone by then. So it's entirely possible she had my sister and I take baths with the soap-saving wash cloths.

Thanks, Dad, for the tip & the memories!

A Wash Cloth Footnote: One of our kids continues to be confounded by the term "wash cloths" -- she calls them, much to my chagrin, "rags." This because she's almost 13 (her birthday is Sunday!) and for her entire life she's used one of those "shower gel poofs." Plus, she washes whatever dishes that do not fit or belong in the dishwasher with a sponge; so I guess the only small squares of fabric she is used to are rags for dusting, washing floors etc.

Adorable Animal Adorned Cupcakes

While this 1941 issue of Modern Woman Magazine (V10 n5) doesn't have the recipe or instructions for the adorable cupcakes, I'm inspired to try this with animal cookies and icing.

White Molds That Grow On Flower Pots

In the March 1952 issue of The Workbasket, descriptions of white molds that form around flower pots, their causes and treatments.

Vintage Felt Elephant Bookmark

I'm posting this in honor of Alan, the Bookmark Collector. Not only is he a cool collector who links to many of my columns at Collectors' Quest, but his recent post directed me to this neat bookmark design contest which benefits children's literacy. This contest is inspired by Funk and Weber's Needle and Thread: Stitching for Literacy program -- and what can be better than crafting & reading? (I guess it would be inspiring kids to craft & read!)

You cannot use this vintage elephant bookmark to win any design contest (it comes from The Workbasket, April 1952), but you can make as many as you'd like and donate them, give them to children you know -- or help children make them for other children and reading programs.

Vintage Bread Recipes

I'll admit it, I'm really just showing you these recipes because of the drawings by Florence J. Grant.

Recipes for Banana Bread, Old Fashioned Graham Bread, & Old Fashioned Oat Meal Bread found in Pot Luck.

Measure Your Knowlegde Of Measures

A quiz on the units of meausres found in that March 1951 issue of Profitable Hobbies magazine.



Answers:

1. d
2. i
3. f
4. g
5. h
6. b
7. c
8. o
9. a
10. e
11. l
12. j
13. n
14. k
15 m

Tuberous Begonias Need A Rest

Inside a 1952 issue of The Workbasket, a reminder about maple leaf tuberous begonias (often sold in those hanging baskets this time of year):