Minimalism and Charlotte Mason (first of three)

Minimalism defined as choice is a very Charlotte Mason concept.

That is, selecting your personal and household possessions not by trend and fad, but by individual choice based on principles of taste and suitability. As one example, Mason wrote that collections of objects are not bad in themselves; but that they should be worthwhile objects, and should be properly arranged and cared for. In her view, spending a great deal of money or travelling miles to add to the hoard may be a meaningless pursuit; on the other hand, a "free" collection of natural objects might be carefully curated and very significant. This is, in its best sense, "sparking joy."

A lesson plan on using flowers to design an embroidered book cover implies that some people, at least, enjoy designing, making, or owning embroidered book covers. It also discourages the use of cookie-cutter patterns. Aren't things more meaningful when they hold a bit of the maker's imagination? 

Charlotte Mason says that it can be fine to choose a standard  item of clothing or furniture, if that's what makes the most sense and if it means you don't have to "dither" over it. She emphasizes priorities, keeping things in proportion, and not being obsessive about perfect shopping choices. Life makes many other demands on us, and we are here to serve others--not to be served. 

But at the same time, serving others includes creating cheerful homes and classrooms, with as much comfort and beauty as we can manage. We do not default to the cheapest, plainest alternative either because we think paying the lowest price is the highest good or because our small-p-puritan ethic demands no frills or colour. In this era of madly cleaning out and embracing plain walls and white sheets (but only the best sheets), we may not realize how much we are, as much as ever, still following fashion and opinion, but missing the heart. To do what everybody's doing is to live in fear of offending, or in the self-centered wish to seem hip. We walk rather in faith, knowing that we have chosen.

Part Two is here.

Do you want a limited special edition?

Two years ago, I posted a quote from Charlotte Mason on the benefits of owning a cherished, worthwhile collection of something, vs. the continual acquisition of mindless "collectibles." For some of us, a desire to "collect them all!" began with our first commercials for breakfast cereal (with toys), and moved on from there.

Buster Baxter (unwrapping a Christmas gift): Cool, it's CyberCod!
Bitzi: I'm sorry, Buster. We can return it.
Buster: (confused) Huh? Why?
Bitzi: Because you already have that one. See? (holds up a figure that looks similar, but decidedly not the same) I found it in your room right after I bought the other one.
Buster: That's TechnoTrout, Mom. He's very different. He has a speckled belly and he doesn't have CyberCod's kung-fu feet. (He demonstrates.)
Bitzi: Oh, thank goodness!
 (Arthur's Perfect Christmas)

In Goodbye, Things, Fumio Sasaki tells about a short-lived craze in Tokyo when the transit system offered a special anniversary edition pass. The card didn't offer any more benefits than a regular pass, but people still lined up for hours trying to get one. Sasaki decided to "pass" on it.

He also gives this very C.M.-resonant piece of advice: "Discard any possessions that you can't discuss with passion." Obviously, there are exceptions to this sparking-joy idea; many things are more functional than passion-provoking. But those things that we choose to keep around us, that we use to help tell our stories--they should have meaning.  And the worst offenders are things we keep because they make us appear trendy or intellectual or rich or cozily domestic. If we let them go, we might have to admit we're not any of those things. Big ouch.

What if we decided to detach, just a little more, from "collect them all?"

What if...we decided to be comfortably ourselves, and started to see the humourous side of our innocent but humbuggish attempts to "be somebody?"

Because each of us is, already, a limited special edition.

Saturday yard saling: baskets and roosters

Today's yard saling finds: a basket divided into sections (maybe good for napkins or towels)...

And a set of three wooden canisters with roosters.

I already have some rooster things: china measuring cups, and a spoon holder. The spoon holder came from my great-grandmother's house.

I put the canisters and a couple of the china pieces on the back of the stove.

One person's excess is another person's rooster collection.

P.S.: I know, stoves, fire safety, all that. I will probably move the canisters somewhere else tomorrow, but for now I just liked the way they lined up.

Wednesday Hodgepodge: Collected Thoughts

Notes from our Hodgepodge Hostess:  "Here we go again...answer on your own blog then jump back here tomorrow to add your link to the mix. See you there!"

1. Pokemon Go...your thoughts? Are you playing? Do you even know what it is?

No, but I heard the Premier of Ontario was playing it.

2. What was something you collected as a child? Do you still have that collection? If you're a parent what's something your own children collected? Have you ever camped out, stood in a crazy long queue, or paid a ridiculous sum for a 'collectible'?

I'm married to someone who specializes in restoring collectibles. I think one of our first dates was to go yard saling.  We live with a lot of vintage things, but most of them are just what we use every day.

Childhood collections: postage stamps, dolls (earned me my Collector's Badge), dollhouse miniatures, recipes, souvenir spoons, lace hankies, pop bottle caps, postcards, hockey cards, pin-on buttons, and a large number of random things and space-taker-uppers. Old books too, although I never so much collected those as just wanted to read them. I still have the box of stamps (they're old but not worth much, dealers don't want them), family dolls, and a few other odd things. I have a small collection of vintage china kitchen knick-knacks. The only things I really add to are the books and, occasionally, the china if I see something I like. Or I bring home a few more pink pebbles from the beach, if you call those a collection.

The nicest story I have about collecting is that when I was five and got chicken pox on the first day of kindergarten, the older kids in the neighbourhood went around and gathered up a whole bagful of pop bottle caps as a get-well present.

Our girls grew up with their own collections, mostly different kinds of dolls and stuffed things. Plastic trolls, for awhile. Our adult daughters both have turntables and small LP collections.

More recently I've found a way to collect my own nostalgia, for free and without having to store or dust anything. I have a Pinterest board full of the '60's and '70's: candy bars, hair ties, paper dolls, playground slides, my Snoopy toothbrush; and another board just for picture books I read when I was little. I don't need to have the actual things (not sure where I'd put a playground slide anyway): the pictures are enough.

3. "Collect moments, not things"...tell us about a moment you've added to your collection this summer.

Our wedding anniversary dinner at an Italian restaurant.

4.  What's something collecting dust in your home right now? Any plans to do something about it?

Dust as in not getting used, or as in I just forgot to dust it? There's probably some of each. The dining table gathers dust both ways, because we mostly eat in the kitchen, and our way of remedying that is usually to have a party.

5. A favorite song relating to time?



6. What's been your most frightening or your most interesting encounter with wildlife?

Definitely the time I had to chase a baby squirrel around the house,

7.  On July 20, 1969 Apollo 11 Commander Neil Armstrong set his foot down on the moon. If you could travel to the moon would you go? Why or why not?

No, I'll stay an earth-bound-homebody.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

It's interesting that the theme this week is collections, because I've already been posting this week about collections and "stuff." I keep coming back to the idea of enjoying but not obsessing, either in acquiring or in holding onto things. Even Mr. Fixit sticks to reasonable limits (he doesn't "camp out" for things).

Linked from The Hodgepodge Collection at From This Side of the Pond.

Quote for the day: Charlotte Mason on collections and stuff

“These will be nice on the road,” she said. “We are going just where you are going — to Girgenti. I must tell you all about it. you know that my husband is making a collection of match-boxes. We bought thirteen hundred match-boxes at Marseilles. But we heard there was a factory of them at Girgenti. According to what we were told, it is a very small factory, and its products — which are very ugly — never go outside the city and its suburbs. So we are going to Girgenti just to buy match-boxes. Dimitri has been a collector of all sorts of things; but the only kind of collection which can now interest him is a collection of match-boxes. He has already got five thousand two hundred and fourteen different kinds. Some of them gave us frightful trouble to find. For instance, we knew that at Naples boxes were once made with the portraits of Mazzini and Garibaldi on them; and that the police had seized the plates from which the portraits were printed, and put the manufacturer in gaol. Well, by dint of searching and inquiring for ever so long a while, we found one of those boxes at last for sale at one hundred francs, instead of two sous. It was not really too dear at that price; but we were denounced for buying it. We were taken for conspirators. All our baggage was searched; they could not find the box, because I had hidden it so well; but they found my jewels, and carried them off. They have them still. The incident made quite a sensation, and we were going to get arrested. But the king was displeased about it, and he ordered them to leave us alone. Up to that time, I used to think it was very stupid to collect match-boxes; but when I found that there were risks of losing liberty, and perhaps even life, by doing it, I began to feel a taste for it. Now I am an absolute fanatic on the subject. We are going to Sweden next summer to complete our series. . . . Are we not, Dimitri?” ~~ Anatole France, The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard

"[Anatole France] is laughing at the craze people have for collections of any sort, worthy  or unworthy; and this craze comes of the natural Desire of possessions implanted in Mansoul. But it rests with us that our possessions shall be worthy. Let us begin soon to collect a good library of books that we shall always value, of photographs of the works of the great masters; even of postage stamps, if we take the trouble to interest ourselves in the stamps...No collection which has not an interest for the mind is worth possessing. Take this rule, and when you grow up you will not think that silver plate, for instance, is worth owning for its own sake, but for its antiquity, its associations, or for the beauty of its designs." ~~ Charlotte Mason, Ourselves

Something to think about: The Art of Clutter

From Grandpa Squirrel's weekend newspapers: a New York Times article celebrating clutter.

"In accumulating, we honor the art of the potter, sitting at a wheel; we appreciate the art of the writer, sitting at a desk; we cherish the art of the painter, standing in front of an easel. (By this litany ye shall know that I have many books, many paintings, many pots — and many more things I love.)"

It reminded me of this post from two years ago, about humans (and Squirrels) being "treasuring people."

Making the most of Treehouse collections: dolls and more

We are Squirrels, and don't forget it.  We may not be parts-stashers, but we do like to collect things.

These are Red Rose Tea Figurines. Some of them were Mr. Fixit's grandma's. Some were Mama Squirrel's. The shelf had hung in a corner of our rec room for a long time, kind of hidden and dusty. We decided to move it up to the kitchen.

Dollygirl's TY Teenie Beanie Boppers. (Also here.) She has been collecting these at yard sales and thrift shops for several years; I think only one was bought new.  Mr. Fixit helped her spray paint and frame a piece of pegboard, so now the Boppers can all hang out together.

Mr. Fixit's restorations are part of our living room decor--they come and go, and we make room for them while they're in the Treehouse.  The glass-fronted cabinet was the grandparents', and it holds a group of dolls handed down from both sides of our family.

All photos by Mr. Fixit, copyright Dewey's Treehouse, 2012.

Let's play a game: The Squirrels and the Antique Market

On the weekend, most of us (plus Grandpa Squirrel) visited an antique market in a nearby town. Mix and match what you think each Squirrel brought home (or would have liked to).

1. Mr. Fixit
2. Mama Squirrel
3. The Apprentice
4. Ponytails
5. Crayons/Dollygirl

a. plastic bag filled with tiny dolls, doll furniture, and playdough doll food
b. really cool Bakelite radio
c. 1959 cosmetics ad to use as a wall decoration, kind of like this
d. didn't come because of university orientation weekend
e. four vintage Scholastic paperbacks, found in a baby cradle full of children's books

Bonus question: which item was (reluctantly) left behind?