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.

A moving addendum: the kitchen slims down, like it or not

We had some plans for the things that would go with us to the new place. Some of those ideas have gotten a bit nipped in the bud recently.

We weren't going to take the microwave, for space reasons and because we knew it was probably not going to last much longer, but it conveniently died a couple of weeks ago before we got around to dealing with it. We went out and bought an extra electric kettle for heating water. (Our old one is at the apartment.)

We were going to take the toaster oven, but it turns out that the best space for it is too close to the fridge, and we were reluctant to take up any of the rest of the kitchen real estate with it. Besides, there is a brand-new stove/oven in the apartment. Mr. Fixit went out and bought a toaster. (Pattern here?)

We were going to take the bread machine (I love my bread machine), but we did buy a stand mixer with dough hook at the thrift store, last winter. Because of storage issues and the age of the bread machine (it came from a yard sale almost four years ago), we have decided to send it to e-waste as well.

When we said new adventures, I wasn't expecting this much of a turnover in gadgetry. But better to figure it out now, I guess, than to have a storage room full of half-working kitchen gear.

Wednesday Hodgepodge: Seasons of Change

1. Thursday (September 22) is the first official day of autumn in this part of the world...how will you welcome the season? I know some of you have been celebrating way too early, but it's official now so permission granted. House Beautiful recently listed ten ways to make your home smell like fall (you can read the list here) What's a scent you love this time of year and how will you add it to your home?

I think of the scent of baking with spices: apple cake, gingerbread, cinnamon rolls. But one of the Squirrels has developed a sensitivity to cinnamon (and, to a lesser extent, ginger), so I am trying to accommodate that. Actually, after such a long hot summer when I couldn't do much baking at all, the smell of any kind of baking makes it feel like fall. Banana muffins would do it.

Slow Cooker Applesauce Cake, linked here

2. Apple pie or pumpkin pie? Apple cake or pumpkin bread? Warm apple cider or a pumpkin spice latte?

See #1; I'd take just about any of those things except maybe for the latte. I've posted recipes for almost all of them on the blog over the years.

3. Do you suffer from what is sometimes referred to as an afternoon slump? What helps ward it off before it hits and/or tell us what helps you shake it off once it's here?

I work best in the morning, so I wouldn't exactly call it an afternoon slump, more just being done for the day.

4. Ladies-how have your friendships with women inspired you or made you a better person? For the men here today- how have your friendships with men inspired you or made you a better person?

I'm not sure how to answer that without either getting too personal (about friends who stayed loyal or those who didn't), or...well, yes, getting too personal. 

Let's just say that if you have a mutually encouraging, deep, lasting friendship with someone, or more than one someone, hang on to it.

5. Are you a people pleaser? If you said yes, do you think that's a good or bad thing? If you said no, do you wish you were more of a people pleaser? 

Somewhere in between. I aim to please the people I care about, the rest not so much.

6. The seasons are a-changin'...share a favorite song relating in some way to change (not necessarily seasonal change, it could be change of any kind).

Well, I already used "Mother Earth and Father Time" in a previous Hodgepodge ("He turns the seasons around, and so she changes her gown.."). So I'll have to think of something else. Oh, I've got one! Sesame Street nostalgia is always fun.

7. What do you wish would never change? 

Our city is going through construction turmoil these days, and certain things that just were are never going to be the same. I think families go through the same process: some change that is inevitable, and some that makes you think "why couldn't that have stayed the way it was?" In this post at To Sow a Seed, there's a quote from John Piper: “Occasionally weep deeply over the life you hoped would be. Grieve the losses. Then wash your face. Trust God. And embrace the life you have.” 

8.  Insert your own random thought here. 

If I get too random, I'll never get this posted, so I'll stick to this: if you're in Canada, Ten Thousand Villages has all its fair trade coffee on sale right now (in time for International Coffee Day?). But I can't seem to find any beverages on the U.S. site, so maybe the American stores handle coffee separately. I did find this really fun post (with photos) about an Apple Cider All Nighter.

"I just think it was a great time for friends and family to get together in the fall. We were always a mixed group from little kids to teenagers, twenty-somethings, our parents and grandparents. Sometimes we would go out into the field across the road and stargaze. One year there was a special alignment of three planets in a triangular shape. Then we went out to see it and as we were waiting for it to get dark a meteor flashed above the field and everyone saw it together."

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

Fewer but better, or just fewer? (Mid-spring musings on clothes and thrift stores)

I ran into one twist when I got myself into Project 333, and faced the multiple motivations of wanting to think both less and more about clothes. That was the simple fact of being disappointed with what's in the stores (at least those I can afford), including the few things I did buy new (on sale, but still new) over the past year.

The website photographs are lovely; the real life garments are not. The waistband of one pair of my jeggings (four months old, wash on gentle, hang to dry) has stretched so they don't jeg anymore. The wear-with-everything blouse never fit quite the way I wanted, and it slips maddeningly out of every waistband. I can hardly believe that, like Barbie, I'm sending another bag of stuff to the thrift store. (Hers is little, mine is big.)

At least my irritation with poor quality makes shopping choices easy: "only if I have to."

That brings up the old cliche about the advantage of thrift shops: that, ironically, what you're going to find there is often better quality.  Like any cliche, it's not always true: any local shop is going to have a majority of clothes coming from local stores, and probably not the higher-end ones either. But if you choose carefully, the not-rayon t-shirts are there, and the wool sweaters, and so on; and that's partly because of that other old cliche about used clothes, that the ones that make it to the thrift store are the ones that held up long enough to become used clothes.

I set my change-of-season parameters for the Victoria Day weekend, about three weeks from now; where we live, that's when we start thinking "summer." Gardens go in, sandals come out. I pulled out my summer things to have a look and do a rough Project 333 count  (at the same time as I was disgustedly filling the thrift store bag), and this is what I found: I am going to have No Problem At All sticking to 33 items this time, because that's about all I do have. And because every time I walk past the rayon t-shirts on the way to the grocery section, I increase my mental font another size on why I don't want to waste money on that stuff.

Which for me leaves, more or less, the thrift store.

Your thoughts?