Clara Barton House

Ward exploring around the Clara Barton House. Notice both the American and Red Cross Flags.

 

Ward and I recently visited the Clara Barton House in Glen Echo, Maryland. The weather was sunny, but breezy for our outing and while Ward found this invigorating, I found it cold. However, as we were walking outside around the grounds before the house tour, we found some peonies blooming and a lone purple blossom on a vine . The find of those flowers made the cold wind worth it for me. The house tour was free because this site is part of the National Park Service. We had a very good tour guide and learned a lot during our hour long tour.

A welcome sign of spring outside the house.

I have tried several times to summarize what we learned about Clara Barton. However, she was too complex of a person to do justice with on this blog. I'll just tell you a few of things that I found interesting.

--In 1881, Clara Barton started the American Red Cross after gaining fame by taking supplies to the front lines during the Civil War. 

--Clara was the one that first established the Red Cross as an organization that brought relief to areas during times of natural disaster. Before this, it was only focused on soldiers.

--Clara thrived under dangerous and risky situations. War zones invigorated her and she did some of her best work there.She also liked being in charge and didn't deal well with criticism or transition.

--Clara had to be very determined because she lived during a time that women were not allowed much responsibility. For example, she was not welcomed by the military to take supplies to the soldiers on the battlefields during the Civil War. She had to do a lot of lobbying to be able to do it, and Senator Henry Wilson, chairman of the Military Affairs committee, finally gave her permission.

--When she was in her 80's, some said she was too old to sit all day to do the work that needed to be done to run the Red Cross. To prove them wrong, she cut the back off of her chair to show that not only could she sit for long periods, she could do it with no chair back.

--The house we toured was modeled after warehouses that were built for the aftermath of the Jonestown flood.

--The house ceilings were lined with muslin instead of plaster—the same material used for bandages.

--It was good to get and do something different for a change.

Enough Already

I love to save money. I hate to waste. I would rather reuse something than recycle it. I relate to the saying, “Use it up, Wear it out, Make it do, Do without.” But sometimes, I think I carry it too far. 

Case in point. I have a yellow clothes basket that has had a long life in my house. In the beginning, it worked well. Then it developed a split on the top rim. However, if I remembered to carry it carefully, I didn't get pinched and the split was only a minor problem. As time went on, that split lengthened and I had to handle the basket carefully so that it wouldn't tear any more. At this point the the fix-anything duct tape came out to repair it. That worked for a few months until the tape came off and left its sticky residue. In the meantime, the other side started splitting, and now it was easy to get pinched unless you were VERY careful how you handled the basket. Also, it developed tears on the sides below the top. I tried weaving a shoestring through it to hold it together, but that didn't work. I used the basket like this for a while until I got tired of being pinched by torn plastic.  

I've been thinking a lot about why I put up with that annoying basket for so long. In the beginning, it may have been about thriftiness, but that doesn't explain why I let it go as far as it did. Maybe it was from being raised by Depression Era parents or maybe it was from just plain simple inertia, but I think the basket represents a need for change in my life. I need to be proactive about changing the negative things in my life into positive ones. If I can do that, I think the quality of my life can change in a very positive way.

I'm going to start with simple things and hope I can build on those successes to then work on bigger issues. A few things that I can fix today are getting rid of the pinching clothes basket and the can opener that has never worked well. I can clean out the plastic-ware cabinet so I won't be annoyed by the containers that fall out every time I open it. I won't answer the phone if I don't want to talk and I'll turn off the news when they start talking about the same negative thing over and over. And the list goes on.

It all seems so simple. Why didn't I do it sooner?

Thankful Sunday--January 20, 2013

Annie is thankful for this sunbeam and so am I.

After many cold and rainy days, the sun is out again--a very welcome sight.

Food Waste Friday and True Food Confessions--Jan. 18, 2013

 It's time for Food Waste Friday, when the Frugalgirl encourages us to post pictures from the previous week of wasted food from our household. This accountability hopefully will help us to be more careful with our food and maybe save some money. Also, I am using this public forum to encourage us to eat out less which includes better meal planning. You can follow how we are doing in this endeavor by reading True Food Confessions.

 This Week's Food Waste

I was disappointed when I pulled out this piece of cheese and found mold on it. It was going to grace my tuna sandwich. Oh, well. I did manage to eat the last slice from another package before it went bad, though.
Otherwise, I think we're okay in the waste department.
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This Week's True Food Confessions

We did pretty well this week considering we're still trying to gain our footing after several weeks of holidays followed by illness and traveling. In fact, mentally, it still feels like we're in quicksand. Given that, I'm kind of proud that we managed to do some cooking this week. We had easy, but delicious tuna sandwiches one night and another night we had cabbage soup using ingredients from the fridge. We also had a vegetable quiche using the unlikely combination of spinach and peas. However, it turned out pretty good. The different part of this dish was that I made a healthy, homemade pie crust. This was mostly because we haven't made it to the grocery store since we got back and I didn't have a chance to buy the oh so tasty, but bad for you crust.

Now, it may seem interesting that we haven't made it to the grocery store, but Ward did make it to his favorite Chinese restaurant for pick-up and Theo ordered burritos from Chipotle. I have to admit that I enjoyed their take out just as much as they did.

I'm hoping once again for a calm week next week and homemade, routine food.

A Second Look--January 16, 2013

While we were gone last week, we had some unseasonably warm weather with temperatures in the 60s. This fooled some of the plants into sprouting like it was spring. However, the weather has turned cold again and snow is predicted for tonight. Brrrr.

Here's what I found this week during a Second Look.

Daffodils

Crocus, I think that's a flower in the middle of the leaves beginning emerge.

Dried sedum

Crossing juniper trunks

Bone, My wild guess is that it is part of fox's pelvis.

Fungus

Ivy

I put orange slices out for the birds about a week ago, but Mr. Squirrel decided that it would be much easier to eat them from the ground.

Maple tree buds. (That was really the color of the sky. It was raining.)