Housewifery: for the little woman in you

Space where there wasn't

2009-10-12T18:12:00.001-07:00

As I mentioned I've been on a little hiatus because we recently moved into a new place. I've been busily working to get it set up and feeling like home. I'm almost there, but one thing that's proven tricky is our lack of space. We moved from a small two bedroom house to a 2 bedroom loft. Where the house had lots of little nooks to hide things, and even a storage unit, the loft has very very little hidey space.

I've been struggling with what to do with my "out of season" clothes. Normally, I'd just pack them up in storage boxes and put them away but the precious storage space we have is now taken up.

After tiring of clothes and shoes piled up in the corner of the bedroom I decided to try out two products that had been wooing me from afar.

They're famous little beasts from the land of late night infomercials: Shoes Under and Space Bag.

I admit, I tried one of the "knock off" Shoes Under from The Container Store to begin with. The plastic was stinky, the zipper kept sticking and it was just a smidgen too tall for under my bed. Disheartened and sweaty from dealing with a sticky zipper and packing and unpacking 12 pairs of shoes I decided to try the real deal.

I picked up Shoes Under from my beloved and I have to say I wish I had done this ages ago. Where the other brand's plastic was stinky and stiff, this one was less stinky and more malleable. The zipper is a sturdy metal one, not a plastic one that catches every few teeth. Best of all, it FIT UNDER MY BED. That's right darlings, my bed now has SHOES UNDER. I bought two and they are perfect for the shoes that I don't wear on a regular basis. I don't have to go dig them out of some far off box if the Mr and I decide to out for a night on the town either! I can spend more time on my hair and less time finding my shoes.

Excited by my journey into "As seen on TV" land I rushed to meet Space Bag. I used to watch in awe the Infomercials that showed a massive pile of blankets and pillows being reduced to mere inches with just a little switch of the vacuum. I always thought it was too good to be true. But hey, Shoes Under hadn't let me down.... maybe Space Bag would be just what I needed.

I returned again to the giver of all things good; Target. There were quite a few Space Bag boxes to choose from and, giddy with thoughts of all the things I could reduce in size, I grabbed the 5 Bag Combo Set. The box contained 2 Medium, 1 Large, 1 XL, and 1 "travel" size bag.

Wait, travel? I hadn't even considered that. Imagine how much lighter I could travel! I could actually fit everything I need for a weekend in a carry-on bag! Space Bag was opening up a whole new world to me and I hadn't even TRIED it yet!

Image Source

Tonight when I came home from work I looked at that tiny box of Space Bags and prayed to the Infomercial gods. I had probably 25 dresses to store, some belts, and a couple of sweaters. A real mish-mash of clothes with no other homes. I have to admit darlings I didn't place the articles in the bag as carefully as I could have. Things were mostly folded but I by no means did a professional job of packing. Quite honestly you probably aren't supposed to pack belts in there but I did anyway. I wanted this stuff out of my way.

It's essentially a giant Ziploc bag. You unzip, stuff, zip and re-zip (to be sure it's airtight). Then you stick the hose end of your vacuum cleaner into the plastic opening, turn it on, and watch things disappear. I actually let out a little excited squeal as I watched the massive pile getting smaller and smaller. If any of you have one of those vacuum food sealers it's a pretty similar set up.

Ooh, and according to Amazon.com you can even get Space Bags in COLORS! Imagine the color coding possibilities there!

That was it. Easy-peasy. I'm happy to report that my giant corner of clothes is now nestled safely under my bed next to my good friend Mr Shoes Under.

Back?

2009-09-08T15:49:00.001-07:00

Have you missed me? I have been an absentee Housewife haven't I? I've been so busy with "work" and we just moved to a new house so I haven't had much online time. We're finally all settled in and things are starting to get back to normal so I hope to have more time to post. *blush*

Car Show

2009-04-27T12:33:00.001-07:00

Just dropping in to share a pic or two from the 11th Annual Bombshell's Booze, Broads & Hotrods car show. It was a great time. Lots of AMAZING pre 1965 hot rods and pretty gals. :)

Online Cooking?

2009-04-14T10:09:00.000-07:00

I'm finally back up and running and trying to get back into the swing of things. I lost a lot of info in the great tech meltdown of 2009 so I'm still trying to get everything back into their right place. I'll resume regular posting soon but I did want to pop in and share this little beauty with you.

Have you checked out The Mixer? It's an online cooking school from Betty Crocker! I just found out about it today and am so excited. It's free and has great instructional videos, recipes, and some places to talk to other students. I'm definitely going to be taking a few classes. What do you think?

Have you embraced technology when it comes to cooking? I spend many hours digging through online cooking blogs and saving recipes that I want to try. I do love having a lovely "old fashioned" recipe book but there's something very easy about bookmarking a recipe, bringing the laptop into the kitchen, and cooking.

I have my staples (Better Homes & Gardens, Betty Crocker, Martha Stewart, All Recipes etc) but my absolute favorite thing about the internet is that it's like one giant cook book. Think about it. It's full of family recipes from so many different times, and from all over the world. It's full of new ideas, and old favorites! If you tried, you couldn't get through every one. Amazing.

I know you are all itching to know my favorite reads so here you go:

I love The Kitchn because it's a great mix of recipes, tips, and reviews.

Pink of Perfection is a total culinary crush for me. Sarah has an amazing way of writing about food and an uncanny knack for coming up with just the perfect recipe!

Smitten Kitchen grabs your right away with the amazing photos. If you can pull your eyes away from them then you'll find out that the recipes are delish!

If you're in a bit of a cooking rut then you should check out Eat Make Read. Kelly tries lots of different things and you'll never get bored!

I have a ton more, and if you like these and would like for me to share more, then just let me know!

Posting issues

2009-03-18T14:44:00.000-07:00

I've had a little technical difficulty lately in that my computer has died!
I'll be out of commission for a little while but I wanted to pop in and remind you all to get ready for Spring Cleaning. Hopefully I can be back on here to post some tips soon. In the mean time, use these ladies as inspiration!

Download your Perfect Pantry List

2009-03-06T14:36:00.000-08:00

I created this little "Perfect Pantry" list awhile ago and thought you all might enjoy it. It's a great tool for regular grocery planning. Click the picture below to download the pdf. Not sure how to start your own Perfect Pantry? Check out my earlier posting on how to do just that!

Sewing Back in Time

2009-02-17T16:43:00.000-08:00

You may remember that I'd been toying with the ideas of truly learning to sew my own clothes. Well about a month ago I started taking classes at a local college and I love it!

Last week as I was heading into class I noticed that they'd changed the display walls and thought you might like to see the gorgeous vintage dresses and patterns they had on display.

Needless to say, it took every ounce of willpower I had not to rip those dresses off of the wall and run away with them! ;-)

Happy Valentines Day

2009-02-14T08:00:00.000-08:00

I want to wish all of you a very Happy Valentines Day. I hope your day is filled with Pink Champagne, flowers, chocolate, and lots of love! I'm off on a surprise Valentines trip but I'll leave you all with some retro Valentines goodies.....

be my valentine?

2009-02-13T19:43:00.001-08:00

be my valentine?
Butters has his Valentines bow tie on and would like to know.... will you be his Valentine?

Giveaway Winner!

2009-02-13T17:50:00.000-08:00

I bet you all thought I had forgotten about the giveaway didn't you?

A few weeks ago the lovely people over at Swiffer asked if I would like to try out the new and improved Swiffer Sweeper. Now, I already use the Swiffer Sweeper and am quite pleased with it so I was interested to see what they might have changed. I'll be posting my review of the New & Improved version soon but in the meantime they were sweet enough to send over an extra set for me to give away!

Now I promised that I would choose someone from my previous post and the random generator chose Comment #2 which was.....

...... JOANNA EBERHART!
Congrats Joanna, you are the lucky lady and you'll be receiving a new Swiffer Sweeper as seen below. I'll be sending you over an email to get your address.

You gotta have charm!

2009-02-02T12:07:00.001-08:00

Friday night we took a little trip to our local used Bookstore to spend some store credit. I always find great things there and this but Friday night I found something amazing! I think I may have even jumped up and down a little when I found it.

There they were, in all their mauve pink glory. A full set of 4 volumes of the Nancy Taylor Course. I'd read about this course and had looked for a set for awhile and then given up when I always came up empty handed.

Back in the 50's and 60's there were numerous Self Development courses for women. Dorothy Carnegie (wife of Dale of "How to win friends & influence people" fame) had a very popular one. Nancy Taylor had another very popular one. What was great about Nancy's course was it was part of the Nancy Taylor Secretarial and Finishing School, which set up in about 300 cities in the US. Nancy offered Secretarial courses and a "charm and finishing course." It was a great source of pride for the Nancy Taylor School to boast that their graduates were well versed in proper make-up, hair, and fashion. Employers were very excited to have ladies that understood how to have "the right look".

The volumes that I found are for the Charm and Finishing course and I couldn't be more excited. There are charts for you to track your progress through the various "reducing" exercises. I was tickled to see that the previous owner of my volumes had dutifully noted her present and "ideal" measurements in blue fountain pen. Although she kept up with notating her weight measurements over the next few months, I'm saddened to say that she neglected to keep up with her ankle, waist, and neck measurements. Tsk Tsk.

I've just started reading (and attempting to complete) Volume one and I intend to share my progress with you and even some of the lessons, if you're interested. Although, I don't think I'll be notating my measurements here for you. ;-)

Until I can get some great pictures from my own set of books, you should check out this great set on Flickr.

Along the way we'll learn all sorts of great things about Hair & Makeup, choosing the right Hat and clothing, improving our speaking voice, how to be a charming conversationalist, and doing everything with poise and grace.

Check out these great images from a Charm School in the 40's that I found via Life on Google.

What do YOU want Housewifery to be?

2009-01-26T14:10:00.000-08:00

I'm so very excited.

In just a couple of days I'll be doing my very first giveaway on Housewifery. Even better, I've got a few more lined up after that. Are you excited?

Now it's time that I ask you for YOUR advice! What sort of postings would you like to see on Housewifery?

Do you like Instructional posts?
Tips?
Long rambling posts where I talk about myself?

I really want to know. Tell me, and it's yours.

Before the holidays another Blogger asked me to do use my tiny bit of experience as a Pin-up model to do a Pinup Makeup Tutorial, would you be interested in things like that? Are you all interested in other facets of "vintage" life besides housewifery?

I know that I am brimming with ideas but I really want to know what you think. So... tell me!

I'll choose one suggestion as the winner of my very first giveaway!

Vintage Goodies on Ebay!

2009-01-10T20:56:00.001-08:00

I did a little closet cleaning this weekend and thought some of you might be interested in checking out my ebay store! I have some great vintage lingerie and retro dresses listed right now. :)

http://stores.ebay.com/PinupDollyDahl

Happy New Year

2008-12-31T10:50:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year darlings!

Tomorrow is my birthday (yes I'm a New Years Baby) and so I wanted to stop in now to wish you all a very happy new year. My lovely man has surprised me with a spa day today so I'm off to enjoy some pampering and prettying before our dinner date. I wish you all a wonderful evening filled with lots of resolutions and merriment! I'm still working on my resolutions but I'll post them here when I have them finished. Maybe I'll think about those while lounging at the spa.....

Merry Christmas

2008-12-25T18:51:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas Lovelies!

Crafty Sick Day

2008-12-20T11:54:00.000-08:00

I still have this darned cold lingering so I think I'm going to stay in today and be crafty. I've got a long list of things I'd like to make this weekend but I can't list them because some are presents and I don't want to ruin the surprise! What are YOU doing today?

Budget Shopping 1937-style

2008-12-18T09:23:00.000-08:00

I was sipping my coffee and reading the Daily Mail online when I came across this little gem. A woman found her mother's shopping list from 1937. She fed a family of nine children for £2. The Mail estimated the equivilant today would be about £40. It's a lovely little article. This part really made me smile:

She said times were hard but the family never went hungry because of her mother's careful shopping.

Mrs Read said: 'We always had a full table. We never ever wanted. She never stopped working. She was the first one up at 5.30am and the last one to go to sleep.

'She lit the stove in the morning to do the baking. Breakfast was always ready for us when we got up.'

So ladies, keep in mind that every little bit DOES help and makes a difference. You should definitely go read the whole article but I wanted to share the shopping lists here.

Emily Bonwick's shopping list from August 15, 1937 - Total cost £2

1 lb tea - 2s (shillings)
1 lb butter - 1s
1 lb back bacon - 1s 5d
1 lb cheese - 8d
1/2lb lard - 4d
3 oranges and 1 jelly - 1s 3d
1 packet of dried peas - 4B=d
Flour 4B=d
12oz preserving sugar - 2s 9d
Small Rinso - 3B=d
4 lbs sugar - 9d
2 lbs tomatoes - 1s 4d
Jar of salmon and shrimp paste - 3d
Custard powder - 5d B=lb
Biscuits - 5d
Tin of health salts - 3d
Bottle of sauce - 5B=d
Tin of corned beef - 6d
2 lbs of collar bacon for boiling - 1s 9d
12 eggs - 1s 9d
Quarter of ham - 7d
Apples - 4d
Dolly Blue - 1d
Small can of Libby's milk - 3B=d
1 lemon - 1B=d
Candles - 2B=d
Rice - 2d

Equivalent figures based on average supermarket price 2008 - Total cost £41.88

PG Tips - £3.45
Anchor butter - £2.42
Unsmoked bacon - £4.76
Medium Cheddar cheese - £2.99
Value lard - 28p
Hartley's orange jelly and 3 loose oranges - £1.14
Frozen peas - £1.67
Plain flour - 43p
Silver Spoon caster sugar - 59p
Fairy household soap - £1.53
Silver Spoon granulated sugar - £1.68
Loose tomatoes - £3.41
Jar of salmon and shrimp paste - 53p
Custard powder - 86p
Plain digestives - 59p
Andrews liver salts - £1.93
HP sauce - 89p
Tin of corned beef - £1.38
Bacon - £1.27
12 free range eggs £2.72
Prince's ham - £1.40
Six Gala apples - £1.57
Thick bleach 70p
One pint semi-skimmed milk - 45p
1 lemon - 30p
Dinner candles - £1.25
Basmati rice - £1.69

Make-Do and Mend

2008-12-17T21:00:00.000-08:00

I've been toying with the idea of creating my own clothes for awhile now. I own numerous vintage sewing manuals and a fab little sewing machine. I've been a little scared to try but tonight I ordered two cute little 50s patterns from ebay. One is a skirt and the other is a robe. I think those should be easy enough to start with. I daydream of being able to create my own amazing wardrobe but I think I better take it one step at a time.

One of my favorite little vintage sewing pieces is a lovely little pamphlet from the 40s, "Build your own wardrobe; Do it thus - and Sew!" It's got so many great tips on refashioning your current clothes and "making do." that I thought I would share it with you.

Damn Good Vintage has scans of the individual pages if you'd like to see those. But I made a really high-res printable pdf version for you and you can get it right here. WARNING: This is a pretty large file - 70MB - so grab a cup of tea or get started on your cleaning.

Do you sew your own clothes? I'd love to see some of your projects and hear your advice.

Winter Wonderland

2008-12-15T11:18:00.000-08:00

12 Decorations to make in a jiffy

2008-12-03T16:37:00.000-08:00

I know we're all in the midst of decorating for the Holidays. I'm almost done and I'll share some pictures when the very last string of lights is up but in the meantime I wanted to share some really great tips from Real Simple. I just love Real Simple!

Easy Holiday Decorating 101 is a great collection of 12 decorations you can make from the craft store without lots of crafty experience. No glitter and glue to clean up after! Some of these definitely fall into the "why didn't I think of that?" category!

Here are some of my personal favs from the article...

Feathers & Fairy Lights
Wrap your banister with fairy lights and feather trim. This would also look so pretty along a fireplace!

Jingle Bell Knock
Who needs a boring doorbell when you have some sleigh-bells jingling? Thread some festive ribbon through the tops of giant bells and tie them to your front door. This is also a great excuse to use all of that ribbon I know you all have! ;)

Felt Placemats
Wow, this one really made me slap my forehead. I have PILES of colorful felt and I never once thought of creating place mats out of them. What an easy way to brighten up your holiday table.

Snowmen-scape
I can't wait to try this one out. How cute are these little snowmen? I want to perch them on every ledge in my house, especially since they are so easy to make! Join two Styrofoam balls with a toothpick and then stick them down with double-stick tape. Voila - instant festivity.

These are just some of MY favorites but there are even more to choose from, 8 to be exact. These ideas are a great way to perk your creative side into high-gear and look beyond the typical decorations and make things more personal.

Shoe lust

2008-11-28T16:57:00.001-08:00

Did any of you brave the stores for Black Friday? I stayed at home but I did spend a lot of time browsing stores online. I've spent the last few hours trolling ebay for gorgeous coats and I'm bidding on a few! I'd tell you which ones but I couldn't bear for you to outbid me. :)

Now I'm checking out some of the great deals on Solestruck. I recently learned about this store from a few friends and I'm hooked. I've been clicking around and there are so many swoon-worthy pieces that I thought I would share a few.

First up, the Betsey Johnson Geri. Oh Betsey, you never disappoint. This shoe would be so perfect with all of the wonderful tights I've been stocking up on. I'm a sucker for a mary-jane and I love the playful star detail.

I am SERIOUSLY crushing on the Nina Just Me SS but I can't decide which color. They would both be so extra cute with dresses!

These Jeffrey Campbell boots are called "Flawless" and they really are. I'll take one in each color please!

I've been flirting with the Steve Madden Impereal for quite some time. It's a gorgeous candy apple red and the cutest ruffle t-strap. I think it might just be flirting back.

Last but not least is the shoe I can never have. It haunts me. I can't find it anywhere (except overseas) and it saddens me every day. Seriously, every day. I'm that shallow. hehe. In fact all of her designs make me swoon. Introducing... Minna Parikka. <3

Happy Thanksgiving

2008-11-27T19:54:00.001-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

I hope you have had a wonderful day full of family, good food, and fun.

I'm thankful for so much this year. Not the least of all are you lovely readers that come back day after day to see if I've posted anything.

I have to admit, we had a luxuriously small and low-key Thanksgiving this year. It was wonderful not to be stressed out about traveling and cooking, but I'm sad that we didn't get to spend it with our families. I'm also a little bit ashamed that the microwave was very much my friend this year. Not much came from scratch this year but it was all served with love and that's what really matters.

This weekend I'll be decorating the house for Christmas and I'm so excited. It really is my favorite season.

Now I'm off to enjoy some pumpkin pie!

xoxo
audrey

Things to do this week

2008-11-17T11:47:00.001-08:00

Did you vote?

2008-11-04T13:07:00.000-08:00

I'm at home sick with an awful cold but I did bundle up and venture out to Vote today. Did you?

Vampire Power MUAHAHAH

2008-10-29T12:05:00.001-07:00

These days I’ve been trying to think of easy ways to cut costs and save a little money. We all know the economy is a little shaky right now and a gal should always be looking for ways to pinch some pennies. The hardest thing about cutting costs is that most of the time it requires effort and change. If something takes too much effort or causes me to have to change things dramatically I just won’t do it. I’m bad that way.

Well, gather round sweeties because I have a haunting tale to tell!
Have any of you heard of Vampire Power? Yes, yes, I know it’s Halloween and the Vamps are out in full force but this is even scarier because it happens year-round!

Vampire Power is the electricity that is used when you have your appliances plugged in but switched off or in standby mode. My mother always told me to unplug things when I wasn’t using them but I thought she was just paranoid about fires. Turns out, yet again, she knew what she was talking about.

I did a little research and it turns out that you can spend close to $1,000 a year on your electric bill by having all of these things plugged in when not in use. Things like Cell phone chargers, computers, TV, your Xbox 360, and electric toothbrush all continue to drain energy while you think they are just sitting there!

I was astonished, and curious, so I took a little wander around the house to see just how much we had plugged in. Holy cow! Our household is a veritable smorgasbord of electronic devices and all of them are plugged in all the time.
So how do we slay the Vampire power? Do we need a stake? Garlic? Buffy?

Nope, the lovely people over at Best Buy have some super easy tips on how to rid yourself of Vampire Power. They also have an incredibly cute vintage horror style PSA explaining Vampire Power.

Unplug
Unplug things when you’re not using them. Simple.

Use a power strip
Plug everything into that and then just turn the power strip off - easy peasy!
I was happy to see that most of our things are plugged into a power strip. I don’t feel so bad now.

Turn it off
Completely shut down your computer.
Oooh I’m bad at this one. When your computer is in sleep mode it can cost you up to an additional $70 per year.

Buy Energy-Star appliances
Whenever you’re in the market for a new appliance you should always look for the Energy Star products. They can reduce your energy bill up to 40%!

Vampire Power Awareness Day is tomorrow, October 30th.
So get to it ladies - unplug! Besides, wouldn’t that money be better off in your pocketbook?