{No post next week! Enjoy the day!}
Today I have on my list some things to make me feel more peaceful as I’m cooking and baking:
- Finish making a couple of beds upstairs (we are expecting nine out-of-towners!) and giving the rooms final touches. I’m not the greatest at this, but I try!
- Dust and vacuum the living room. The bathrooms and kitchen will get their sparkle and shine closer to Thursday. I got most of the cleaning done last week (with help from a high school girl, the daughter of friends, who is just great).
- Bake some bread I mixed up yesterday. We left the house at 3:30 and were gone all evening, so I put my mostly risen dough in the fridge, and shaped it this morning. Usually I let it rise and shape it and then put it in the fridge overnight, but this will work too.
It’s not over-proved, it just rose up to the shelf above and so started going over the edges of the bowl!
I left it out for a bit more than an hour. Nice hot oven — 475°F with the fan on.
A tray of boiling water on the top rack, and two thick stainless steel baking trays that fit in my oven the long way facing me, so I was able to bake all four loaves at once.
I put ice cubes all around them too, and sprayed them as I put them in.
- Finish off this squash. I baked it the other evening. It sits out just fine on the cool stone.
(In this post, you can scroll down for the method, which makes peeling a breeze rather than the issue preventing people from enjoying butternut squash, which is the best squash). This past week I bought up many of these squashes at the grocery store. They were a great price and come from a local farm. They are a kind of butternut that is just so incredibly delicious, and they keep in the pantry all winter! I will probably freeze some of what I cooked here, and serve the rest with plenty of butter and salt, a little pepper, and a big bunch of fried sage leaves. The sage is doing well out in the garden!
- Decide on seating, and iron tablecloths and napkins. Ironing canNOT be left to the end! Doing so makes me feel utterly frantic.
I will have a kids’ table in the kitchen (cousins have more fun that way!) and I can fit the adults at my dining room table if I add a card table at one end. I got great wooden folding chairs some years ago at a yard sale — they come in so handy!
- Gather up some decor. I do sort of wish American Thanksgiving were in October, like Canadian Thanksgiving. I have never quite managed to be ready in all the little extra touches for the big feast and Advent. Sigh. I think I will start dehydrating some orange slices. I got a big bag at Aldi the other day!
- Maybe this evening during the Notre Dame game, I can start addressing Christmas cards, alternating with knitting!
And I have to make a list of the lists I need to make!
These “background” preparations help me be peaceful as the intensity of kitchen work revs up. There are so many things that must be (or simply are) last minute. Let’s get a lot of it done now, even in little bits of time that come our way, if possible.
If not, then not! It means it didn’t really matter! Do your best, but — and — don’t stress!
When my children were little, I came to realize that it stresses me out to abandon the house to disorder on the grounds that I was creating a lot of disorder in the kitchen! (Of course, because creativity, including in preparing a big feast, has its corresponding disorder!)
That’s the main idea behind my prep guide. Young children tend to go around undoing whatever you have so carefully arranged, but at least the corners of your mind will be unburdened!
What I mean by that is this: the normal messiness of kids is so much easier to handle without stress if you know in your own mind that the remote corners of your home are basically clean.
A mess in the middle of the room is not a big deal. The usual blocks, books, trains, coloring pages, important projects using twigs and pinecones, special castles and racetracks, and so on added to stray dirty socks and dust bunnies under the beds, bedding that needs to be washed, fingerprints on the door jambs, random debris piled up on dressers and hallway tables… that’s what make me feel like I’m gasping for air.
Putting in a bit of effort now yields a more patient attitude later in the week about normal life. Listen, even if you pop what doesn’t belong into a laundry basket or two and stick those baskets somewhere out of the way, you’ll feel better walking around seeing dusted surfaces.
At least, I feel calmer when I hear the legos being poured out of their giant bin, knowing my laundry is caught up! It’s a state of mind! Otherwise, I really don’t think guests even notice. Isn’t that a funny thing?
Oh my goodness, speaking of being peaceful, last week in the middle of supper prep, when Deirdre was here with all her six hungry kids, suddenly my stove stopped working! I had to finish the soup in the instant pot!
What the heck? My new stove!
We pulled it out a bit to check the gas valve and see what we could see about why the burners were not lighting.
Stove pulled out, mess all over, manuals on the island (why does my fridge have like 7 manuals), panic in my heart!
After much internet searching and scrutiny of the owner’s manual, late in the evening (after choir practice), Phil said, “maybe… we ran out of propane?”
What??
“You’ll have plenty” they said. “No one uses that tank in a year” they assured me.
Well, I did! Eleven months, actually…
God is good, because, people, can you imagine that happening one week later i.e. the night before Thanksgiving??
I can’t even. I am very grateful to the angels for running me out of gas this week.
Advent is indeed coming. Maybe assign one small part of your mind to be in charge of making sure you have candles (even nice plain candles if you can’t find purple and pink — you can tie ribbons on them if you need to) and are getting everyone mentally prepared for the coming time of preparation and penance right after Thanksgiving.
It’s perfect to start out slowly. Not every single thing you want to do during Advent has to be ready a week from tomorrow!
In fact, the slowness of your preparation, the gradual turning from darkness to the splendor of Christmas, follows the Holy Family on their journey to Bethlehem, just as it follows the journey of the people of God from darkness to light.
Advent is given to and for busy mothers!
bits & pieces
I only really have one link for you — please, I beg you, read it and pass it along to everyone, including all the men!
Mom: The missing ingredient in the MAHA movement – Suzanne Venker
From the archives:
- The best way to make sweet potatoes! For Thanksgiving, I peel them and place them attractively in a serving dish to be reheated on the day. You will need no extra sugar of any kind with this method!
- On the chat last week at The School for Housewives, some lovely ladies were wondering if it’s okay that their children play together without her — is this good for their development that mom is not interacting with them, “not investing in them enough” were her words.
Oh my, yes! This is the goal, actually. Mother has her activities and interests, children have theirs. During rest times, of course, they sit down cosily to read a book together, and there are many times in the day that little conversations happen and so on. But getting your kids to play — and run off to explore and adventure — together without you is actually the dream!
By the way, you do not have to subscribe to read that Substack. You do to comment on some posts and to start threads on the chat. But the content is free!
- These holidays are your extra busy days. Being free to have busy days is a precious way of life, one that doesn’t depend on riches but does depend on being willing sometimes to seem un-busy and un-scheduled and basically, almost hanging around doing nothing, or “just” chasing after kids. Don’t be fooled, though, into giving it up for something else.
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Visit me at The School for Housewives and recommend it to your young friends!
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Wow, I don’t think there’s one sentence in the Suzanne Venker article that I disagree with.
Glad your stove is ok. I love the gratitude of a crisis averted.
I like Venker! I caught a couple of her YouTube videos and she is such a breath of fresh air.
Great article! Also, can you publish a cookbook please? Thank you : )
What a great article by Suzanne Venker! I agree 100%. I was a single mother, but managed to stay home with my kids by doing part-time jobs in my home to add to child support. It was so worth it because I was there to make sure they ate, slept, learned, and grew. I have never regretted even though those years were hard.
Auntie Leila,
Can you share more details (or is there already an old post??) about what the Moderate Clean looks like in the kitchen specifically ?? I’m scratching my head on this one a bit, because we do a pretty thorough nightly cleaning of the kitchen after dinner every night, and I mop the floors weekly, but then everything else usually falls under the “do it when it tells you it needs it” category (eg scrubbing cabinet fronts, cleaning the fridge, emptying the toaster and getting crumbs from behind it, scrubbing out the dish drain pan. Stuff like that.). So I was just curious about what you do on a weekly basis that isn’t in either of those categories, or what I’m possibly neglecting 😂
Yes, all those things you mention should be done once a week. Wipe down cabinet fronts, clean counters all the way under toaster etc, wash floor.
The rest of the week (unless in case of emergency LOL), just sweep, clean counters, wash out sink, wipe off table… what you need to do to make it presentable.
A team of kids can take care of the weekly clean in about 1/2 an hour!
Ok! I have my marching orders now—and goodness knows my cabinet fronts would appreciate a weekly wipe down (and the stove grates too). I am now seeing the wisdom in having so many kids 😂
Auntie Leila, I know you have written about this before, but the bit you said about the holidays being your extra busy days as a mom reminded me of something I am struggling with. How do I keep Sunday as a day of rest as a SAHM?
My husband volunteers at church and obviously works all week, so he’s not going to be doing chores and cooking lunch.
We don’t have homeschool lessons and I don’t do laundry and I don’t shop and I don’t make the children do any special chores on Sundays.
But I don’t feel very holy! I have to get the children dressed, breakfasted, out the door, wrangle them all church, come home, make lunch (later than usual because of church), do the dishwasher, collapse briefly, then make and serve dinner alone because my husband has a church group in the evening, get them into bed, then collapse permanently!
My eldest is seven. We also have a baby. And a few in between! Maybe when they’re all a bit older I can slack off a bit on Sundays?! Or will I not get a sabbath until they leave home?!
Sounds like your husband needs to be home Sunday nights. The church group probably needs to go, at least for this season of your family’s life.
My husband works half the year on Sundays so we have a similar situation. I have worked and worked to make Sundays a truly restful day for everybody and a day of good recreation. I think last year I was about where you are now just frustrated and feeling like it was all at my expense. The biggest thing that has helped me is realizing that I need to lower my expectations of what that day is going to be. And also to spend the rest of my week as auntie Leila says preparing for the sabbath. So Sunday meals are very simple hot dogs on the grill are a great favorite, And a bag of chips. I still have my older children help with the basic chores I will just go crazy if something’s don’t get done like the dishwasher being emptied and refilled they still have to help with Clearing the table and that sort of thing. Sometimes if finances allow we meet daddy at work and get take out for dinner. I think it does get better as the kids get older and can help with things like meals. I also had to come to realize as I’ve read here on this blog that I set these celebrations both the weekly ones and the great holidays. So I have to wrap my head around that and take responsibility for that. I make myself sit down during nap time and read and do something restful. And when my husband and I have talked over the schedule I try to be realistic about what I need from him in spite of his heavy workload. We have had to say no to a lot of good things during this season of life with little children knowing that that time will come later. I don’t know what the commitment is for your husband at church, But maybe that’s worth revisiting. Also for me I make sure to have friends over or visit friends on Sundays whether or not my husband can come of course I want the priority to be family togetherness. But we can’t just isolate totally until time passes and he can be with us. We do make sure to be home when he is home. I hope those thoughts help from someone who has had to figure out similar things. I certainly don’t have all the answers . But I have been working on this very issue for A decade now. It does get better as the kids get older just by the nature of time.
How simple can you make the food?
Can you prepare a breakfast casserole the night before? Eat leftovers?
Can the 7 year old help the toddler get dressed? Are you helping a five year old dress who shouldn’t really need much help? Can the oldest two help with the dishwasher? Can you stop to buy kolaches or something simple and cheap for lunch? Sounds like getting some of that off your plate would help a lot. And, yes, as others said, perhaps re-considering your husband’s volunteer group in the evening.
I write in my book about how church programs end up stressing families who are the most in need of not being stressed!
It’s good men who want to volunteer, but the husband of a young family a) needs to be with that family on the day of rest and b) needs to rest himself, as he is working hard to provide for his family on one income.
The very people who are living as Catholics should live are the ones called upon to sacrifice their “oxygen” for others, for dubious ends.
Sure, maybe those programs do some good. The evidence is not there. If it’s a great offering, it can be done at another time (NOT the day of rest) and by someone retired or otherwise not stretched to the max.
This is something to pray about, husband and wife. Your priority as a family is to have a good day of worship, rest, and festivity (as a family! in whatever low- or high-key you would like or fits with the season). There are many good things one can do, but we must order them rightly. A good thing out of order is no longer good.
(Some husbands work on Sundays because they are church musicians, policemen, on call with the plumbing service, surgeons, etc. I’m not addressing that. God will provide the grace to figure out how to manage and balance in this case. I’m talking about well meaning volunteering.)
You need a day of rest too!
My favorite time of the year is here, in no small part because of Auntie Leila and her blog! Preparing for Thanksgiving and especially learning to live Advent are my first memories connected to this blog. That’s certainly something to be very thankful for 🙂
Slightly Foxed, which I also discovered through this blog, is offering Brandon Chase for free when ordering The Little Grey Men and Down the Bright Stream: it’s a great deal and I was happy to finally place my first order with them!
I wish you a very blessed Thanksgiving!
Venker’s mostly right– good, nutritious food can’t happen without someone to prepare it!– but “they” are making it hard! Can’t I go to the store to buy nuts, sausage, prunes, etc that don’t have a bunch of added stuff? I’m buying whole foods!
Yes!!!! Ahhh! And God forbid you need a frozen pizza or Panera bread takeout in a pinch one night, could it not be made of poison?
I totally agree, of course. There is something so wrong going on.
The thing to remember is… the market.
If the market demands pre-packaged, prepared food as well as a government that micro-manages everything, then that’s what will be supplied.
Who is going to cook the organic ingredients? Who will produce them?
If the mother is not there, the demand is not there.
Amen, amen- absolutely agreed! But just today my mom and I were commiserating about how Triscuits use canola oil- other than that, the ingredients are good, so why?? I am not making Triscuits from scratch, haha.
But, I have started prioritizing buying regular old vegetables from the store that are not packaged and wrapped in plastic for exactly the reason you mention. I want to signal that people still want to buy plain old corn on the cob in the husk and not just shucked, trimmed corn on a styrofoam tray. Very alarming
I know — we just can’t buy the “regular” things. Veggies wrapped in plastic are a pet peeve of mine!! Why, people. Why. Corn literally has its own wrapping.
Also, can you talk specifically a bit more about getting dough from where it was rising to shape into the oven?? I tried that country bread after doing the Vermont Sourdough (also KA) and I was glad to see it had much bigger holes in the crumb, but it was VERY difficult for me to get into the oven. One loaf deflated quite a bit. I used dutch ovens per the recipe– perhaps that’s part of why you do baking sheets? Parchment paper is not supposed to go over 400*.
Are you putting your dough in the fridge after shaping?
It sounds like it may be somewhat over proved.