1902 Charleston, South Carolina Exposition

My father, knowing that I'm something of an amateur historian when it comes to our beloved city of Charleston, South Carolina, sent me this video that was taken by Thomas Edison at the 1902 Charleston Exposition. I was absolutely captivated by it, and about halfway through I realized what was captivating me the most: the wonderful attire!

The ladies and girls are in long skirts and beautiful hats.  The men and boys are in suits, and I noticed at least one of the men tip his hat! Their more formal attire matched so prettily with the beautiful backdrop.

I was just home from a week at Disneyworld (a generous Christmas gift to our children from my in-laws!) and the juxtaposition was stark. Over the past 117 years the world has seen many great strides and improvements, but the trend to wearing as few scraps of fabric as possible isn't one of them. I'm not saying we need to dress like the Victorians (although those skirts!! I love them!!), but I do think we've lost a certain amount of grace, beauty, and propriety.  And I am inspired to do more to bring these qualities back into the 21st century wardrobe.

Here's the clip of the exposition.  Those skirts!!!

Annie (age 8) has been asking me to sew a few dresses and nightgowns for her. I am inspired to go forth and do that now!

Home Life Help: Four Efficiency Tips

Now that my husband is officially in remission (insert all the praises and hallelujahs and joy, which I continue to have all the time!!!!), we have slowly returned to a more "normal" life.  Once he returned to work in January, the children and I settled into a school and lessons/co-op routine that was more structured than the laissez-faire approach we had taken for part of the fall (but still not that structured--I like a lot of flexibility). 

With all of that, I realized needed to manage housekeeping with more efficiency. 

Now, before I get into my tips, let me say this: efficiency is not my goal in homemaking or life. I'm naturally fairly efficient and organized, but in my opinion the only reason to be efficient is in order to foster relationships.  I'll gladly do "inefficient" things when they feel right (for instance, I often handwash dishes because I like it, although it's not as efficient as using the dishwasher, and I love hanging out the laundry, and I don't try to squeeze every second out of my day--I had enough of that when I was practicing law).

Efficiency, taken to its extreme, becomes exploitative, as Wendell Berry points out. And care is often quite inefficient.

Still, certain systems do help me manage my life more efficiently, which then opens up my life to doing lovely, inefficient things like sipping tea on the deck while reading a book! 

So here are a few things that I have found helpful recently:

1) Laundry twice a week.  Since my first baby was born I always did a bit of laundry every day except Sunday (and I would wash laundry on Sunday when it needed washing!).  My babies wore cloth diapers most of the time, so that alone was a staggering amount of laundry. Add to that spit-up, two parents who exercise a lot, toddler accidents here and there, and plenty of playing outside (usually in dirt!), and we had a lot of laundry to wash! 

Now that my children are older and a lot tidier, I realized I was just running on a laundry hamster wheel by doing some every day. It never felt "done" and I nearly always had to remember to switch it out, fold something, put something away, etc.  I realized that in this season of life, that's a pretty inefficient way to manage our laundry.

So I changed my approach. On Mondays and Fridays we are usually home all day, so those are my designated laundry days.  I'll wash all the clothing, towels, and rags that need to be done, and then do 1-2 loads of sheets.  Sticking with it all day long and meeting the end goal of finishing it by bedtime is SO satisfying!  This week I left clean sheets in the dryer for a few days because I didn't have to fold them and put them away, so I didn't! But they were clean and dry, and that felt "done" enough for me.  I love this approach to laundry. It works great for us right now, and my family isn't coming to me and saying "are there any clean socks?" or "I'm out of tee-shirts!" 

2) ClickList shopping.  When I first heard of this I thought it was a nice service for the elderly, disabled, or for new moms.  I didn't even consider doing it for me because I'm an able-bodied human who can easily walk through a grocery store, and my children are no longer babies or toddlers.  But earlier this year I surveyed the week ahead and realized I needed that extra hour in my week.  I made the grocery list the night before and was pleased to see that I could clip coupons while doing the online shopping.  I wasn't sure I wanted a stranger picking out my produce or perishables, but I thought I'd give it a shot.  

I was pleasantly surprised by the entire experience!  It was super-efficient and my produce was perfect (they even got the avocados right which stunned me).  They didn't have one item that I had on my list and substituted it with a higher-priced item, but they only charge the lower price when they do that.  Also, my grocery bill was much lower than normal. I never thought of myself as an impulse shopper since I stick pretty faithfully to my list, but as it turns out, I think I do add things to the cart--often things I think we might need.  

 Once the farms are open for business, my grocery store trips slack off.  I do enjoy grocery shopping sometimes and like walking through the aisles, looking at things, and in our small community it's also a social hour :), so I like those things, but on weeks when we are pressed for time, I appreciate being able to use ClickList. 

3) Streamlining the children's chores. In our days before cancer, my children had a fairly extensive morning chore list.  I dropped that during treatments and recovery because I simply didn't have the mental wherewithal to manage chores, and they just did the most basic things (bed, teeth, hair, shower). I decided that we needed to get back to chores, but I realized that most of the things on their morning lists were things that did not need to be done daily.  Do I really need for my daughter to empty the bathroom trash cans every day? No.  Does my son really need to wipe down the bathroom sink every day?  No.  So their morning chores are bed-making, grooming, and pet care.  Then after school, they have *ONE* chore per day to do.  Each day is different.  This keeps it not overwhelming (one chore doesn't take long), helps them not feel bored with doing the same thing over and over again, and ensures that things get done on a solid routine.  I am so happy with this approach! I also have one or two afternoon chores per day, and we all take Sunday off. 

4) Kitchen helper.  Possibly the most genius idea that ever entered my brain, the "kitchen helper" has made my life infinitely easier.  I decided that my children are, at 11 and 8, quite old enough to be genuinely useful in the kitchen.  So each night I alternate having a kitchen helper.  The kitchen helper's job is to set the table, help with any sous chef tasks while I cook, clear the table, help wash and dry dishes, and do any odd kitchen jobs that need doing in the evening.  This has cut my time in the kitchen at night by half, I think!  Even Annie, who is still unable to do everything, helps a lot!  

While the kitchen helper works, the other child tidies up the living room and dining room areas and makes sure things are neat for the evening.  That way after kitchen cleaning is done, we can all relax.  

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Those are the new changes to my life that have helped me.  There are other things I do, too, like stack my errands/plan them carefully, cook ahead/make freezer meals, and try to use certain pockets of time wisely, but I've done those things for a long time, and these four tips are new to our family.  But they are reaping so many benefits that I wanted to share them in case they help anyone else who may be re-thinking along similar lines.

Now, to go watch the fireflies rise in the pasture......

The Antidote to Greed

"There is more value in a study of humility and in a single act of it than in all the knowledge in the world. The voice of greed inside us will tell us that there is a lot to do, that if we are going to achieve, to get the promotion, to expand our empire, we will need to keep working. But the voice of God tells us something different. That voice tells us to slow down, to be happy, just to be, to slowly learn the great art of doing not very much and feeling fine about it. This takes some learning, but when we do learn it, it is one of the best antidotes to greed there is." 

  --Graham Tomlin

The view from our deck, where I like to sit and "just be" and feel fine about it!

A Few Preliminary Words on Oral Cancer

Every two months my husband returns to his cancer center for a checkup.  We pray often that his cancer will never return, that it is gone for good, and that secondary cancers will not surface.

I don't think I ever actually mentioned this, but his cancer last summer was Stage 4.  As of early June, we knew it had spread (the large mass on his neck was evidence enough, but a PET scan also showed activity there), but we didn't realize it had spread so extensively, involving extracapsular spread out of the lymph nodes.  We discovered that in early July after his 11-hour surgery; the surgeon had to remove part of my husband's hyoid bone and jugular vein because they had both been encroached upon, and that was when I realized fully how aggressive this "little cancer" really was.  After radiation and chemo began, he couldn't really talk for weeks, and he couldn't eat or drink for months.

Life is such a gift. Time is the greatest blessing.  He's healing so well now. Every two months we look forward to getting the green light for another two months--getting the affirmation that there's still no cancer to be seen.  At our next check-up, in late June, he'll undergo his first chest CT scan, because if this cancer spreads, it tends to go to the lungs.  So we pray for a clean and clear scan. 

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Head-neck cancers are becoming much more common in younger people with no risk factors. In fact, not long ago I was talking to a lady I'd just met who said she knew a 17 year old girl who had just been diagnosed with tongue cancer.  Seventeen!  The girl, like my husband, had no history of smoking, alcohol use, or a viral infection. This lady theorized that cell phone use might be causing the increase, but I gently told her that my husband doesn't use a cell phone.  So much for that theory. :) 

To that end, I want to create a few posts that are specific to head-neck cancer, just in case anyone out there is going through the same thing.  This first post entails my tips for keeping up with your health in a preventative, watchful way.  (Not a worrisome way! No one needs to be a hypochondriac and I do not believe in living in a state of fear about the future or "what if" situations.)

First, be sure to see your dentist every 6 months for a cleaning and exam.  The 17 year old girl knew she had a spot on her tongue but she never told her parents and she ignored it; it was her dentist who found it and sent her to an ENT.  The dentist knows what a healthy mouth looks like, so be sure to always keep up with those visits for yourself and your children.

Second, if you have a sore in your mouth that will not heal after a couple of weeks, go to the doctor and have it checked out. My husband noticed the ulcer on his tongue sometime in the late summer or early fall, and thought it was a cold sore that would go away.  It never did, so he finally (wisely) went to the doctor later in the fall and she sent him to the ENT.  Anytime your body isn't healing up quickly, it's not a bad idea to get checked.

Third, if you or a close loved one is diagnosed with a head-neck cancer, including tongue cancer, my vehement advice is to go straightaway to a comprehensive cancer center.  They do not exist in every state, so you may have to travel (we did).  During our initial brush with cancer, we thought it was a simple Stage 1 and so we stayed in our small city, which has a reasonably good health care system.  In retrospect, this was not the best idea, and once the cancer returned a few months after my husband's initial surgery, I knew we had to go elsewhere.  And here's a fact: the course of treatment that the tumor board in our city recommended was in opposition to the standard of care, which we learned after visiting two different cancer centers in two different states.  If we'd not sought second and third opinions, we never would have known this.  Look here to find a comprehensive cancer center. I am so grateful for the care and expertise that we received. 

That's all for now, but next time I'll write a bit about the practical bits of going through treatments and some tips on that. 

Until then, I think it goes without saying how grateful I am to have my husband looking so fit and healthy, with skin healing and hair growing back and a bit of weight gain happening, as he looked at Easter (in the photo above).  And in remission!!!  Thanks be to God.