Archive for April, 2008
Vintage Weekly Schedule
These days we find great interest in the fact that women of time’s past had specific home duties they did on specific days. It’s really ingenious if you think about it. Something about applying a rhythm to your homekeeping duties not only brings order to your days but a connection to the past.
Here are a [...]
Vintage Daily Homemaking Schedule
from The New Housekeeping Efficiency Studies in Home Management
1912,1913
(take with a grain of salt and do try to remember she did not have the internet, television, or mommy play groups)
Rise 6:30 o’clock.
Breakfast 7 o’clock.
Dress little boy; scrape and carry dishes to kitchen; air beds. Baby’s bath,
7:30 A. M.; the baby naps from 9 to 10 [...]
Smoothing out the Wrinkles – Tuesday Ironing Day
Box Irons Heated Internally by Patent Artificial Fuel
Today most of our clothing is wash and wear, wrinkle free, or dry clean only. In the past Tuesday was the day to take all that was washed up on Monday and iron it to a becoming crispness. There was no benefit of wrinkle free fabrics in [...]
Monday Laundry Day
Monday – Wash Day
First let me go and give my washer and dryer a hug…
During the 19th and the early part of the 20th century Monday was known as washday or Blue Monday. Without the benefit of a washing machine, running water, hot water and ’stain lifters’, this meant time consuming duties such as lugging [...]
Victorian Era Recipes
Some basic choice recipes from a compilation by
Elizabeth Ellicott Lea
Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers
I specifically like these vintage recipes because they are simple which was her intent. Not to overwhelm with scientific information.
Enjoy…
To Brown Flour for Gravy, &c.
Put some flour in a dutch-oven and set it over some hot coals; keep
stirring [...]
Cooking Ingredients from the Past
In Pioneer days (1700’s) the homemaker had no refrigeration and had to be prepared and preserve foods for the coming winter.
Skills such as salting, drying, smoking, pickling, and preserving were a necessity rather than an interest as may be the case for some of us today.
This hardworking cook was also not as blessed with [...]
To Dust a Room
The dusting of a room during the Victorian era was serious business.
Here is a systematic list for dusting the parlor courtesy of …
TRIED AND APPROVED.
BUCKEYE COOKERY
AND
PRACTICAL HOUSEKEEPING.
COMPILED FROM ORIGINAL RECIPES
C.1887
The sweeping and dusting of a parlor seems simple enough, but is best done systematically.
“Dusters,” made of old prints, with which to cover books, statuettes, and [...]
General Rules for Cleaning a Room
THE CLEANING OF ROOMS
In the The American Woman’s Home
Catherine E. Beecher lays out an orderly manner of cleaning a room
General Rules for Cleaning a Room.
Dust and remove or put under cover small articles and bric-a-brac.
Dust or brush furniture; [...]
Autumn Cleaning
“In October and November, it will be necessary to prepare for the cold weather, and get ready the winter clothing for the various members of the family. The white summer curtains will now be carefully put away, the fireplaces, grates, and chimneys looked to, and the House put in a thorough state of repair, so [...]
Vintage Summer Cleaning
Although the onset of summer does not begin the same frenzied housecleaning as that of spring it still holds a few choice housekeeping chores of it’s own…
“The summer will be found, as we have mentioned above, in consequence of the diminution of labour for the domestics, the best period for examining and repairing household linen, [...]
