Silent Night...May Your Week be a Peaceful One. 'Meet John Doe' (1941)

I have the above painting on a round refrigerator magnet up year round.  A very good reminder I think of sweet Baby Jesus and God's creatures...So sweet I think.  Sleep in heavenly peace... Sleep in heavenly peace.................

This time of year makes me think of unfortunately what follows for many.  I was talking to a young man cutting my fabric in U.S.O.town Walmart a couple of years ago and he shared that he was trampled the year before on black friday as they moved the crowd to another side of the store.  The young fella ended up with a fracture.  May I say that U.S.O. town is one of your better towns and the people are for the most part polite people there?  Why, it looks as if Judge Hardy lives there, seriously.  What has become of us?



And let's not forget the warning from the old movie, 'Meet John Doe' (1941)  One of our favorites.  I saw this movie for the first time when I brought our precious little baby, our youngest, Rebecca home from a birth center that first evening almost 24 years ago.

Whatever you do this Holy season, please don't be a Heelot   



Beautiful...The end scene.  (spoiler alert)



The original trailer:



This is a Frank Capra movie and it seems most all of Frank Capra movies are total greatness.  It's interesting to read Frank Capra's biography, he is actually from my Grandpa Oddo's hometown of Bisacquino, Sicily; he and my grandpa were around the same age.   The Oddo family is actually mentioned in one of the biographies I own.  You can read more about Frank Capra, it's really very interesting on Wikipedia.

Well, I hope all is well.  Here in the Forest I'm washing dog bedding and baking apples and such as well, composing and making our nightly suppers, trying to squeeze a whimsical Christmas-dog print maxi skirt together.  No time to be bored that is for sure.  I am missing my dad these days with the holiday season, it's difficult.  We mothers are the strong ones and the bearers of everyone's concerns but so many times we too are bearing a cross as well.  But I realize there are so many things to be thankful for so I must not complain but I would appreciate prayers.

If you like, I think your family too will love the "Meet John Doe" movie.  (1941).  How can we not enjoy a wonderful movie from 1941?  Gary Cooper,  Barbara Stanwyck, Walter Brennen?  Wow.   I so long for things to be more like that these days...I try to keep it like that in my home but the culture is so different, just so very different.

I'll close with our sweet little cat, Mo-Mo.  She is my i.n.f.p. buddy, such a sweet little angel, she exudes Peace.  She never claws or behaves badly, she's never greedy, just sweetly glad to be here.  Such a dear.



I look out the window and it's such an interesting fall day...It's overcast with patches of blue.  Just enough blue to make a Dutchman's britches....

(Edit 5:12pm.)  Just looked out the window here at and it looks like mother of pearl above the winter trees...an airplane is flying...I can hear it.  It sounds like the kind my dad used to fly...

Have a sweet Thanksgiving.  ...And have a Peaceful Holiday week.  (Holy day week).

Good evening, loves,    Amelia

A Man Told His Wife: "You Need to go Back to Work, We Could Use More Money".

Michelle, one of our married daughters showed me a video she enjoyed today...She tells me:

You'll like this one mom!



She was right, I did!

I hope you too enjoy this short video.  The message is so very, very needed in my book.  There are many of us who have chosen this simple path and allow me to say, it's a fulfilling one.   Yes, despite what society or present culture tries to say, despite what the pride of life tries to say, this is truth.

His yoke is easy and His burden is light.   Enjoy...




I may not garden or can but I know how to make a dollar stretch and making things out of what I already have has always been such a blessing to me, it's fun and a great outlet of creativity.  Spying nice items that are good quality but in our budget is a blessing too.  If you've read my blog for any amount of time you can see that I am careful on how I spend, we have had to be careful in our married life for my husband works on commission only.  It takes perseverance but yes Virginia it can be done.  If that meant going without a car or whatever it took...Yes, my children were more important.

As my husband shared once:

Our children are the only thing we can possibly take to Eternity with us.



Here is an excerpt from the little booklet our pediatrician, Dr. Louis Pottkotter wrote, Caring for Your Baby:
 
3.  "Some working mothers soon discover that when they add up the cost of weekly visits to the doctor with a sick child, plus the cost of medicine, plus the cost of daycare, they are actually LOSING more money than they make.  If this happens to YOU,  I suggest a serious reassessment of how important working is to you."

That always rang true to me.


I also knew my children needed me to care for them if at all possible.  There would be no career possibility to ever change that.  As Phyllis Schaffley once said, Some one has to rock the cradle!  As Napoleon said...Give us good mothers!     



 
 


  Recipe tip:   Do you know you can use cooked lentils for a healthy meat substitute?  I'm an ethical vegetarian, so I'm very used to cooking this way and I can see how a homemaker can save hugely by this as well.  Tonight for supper I am making my Grandma Oddo's pasta gravy.  Grandma Oddo was from Naples, Italy and she could cook!  I also made lentil patties, very similar to lentil balls, I just couldn't get them into a round sphere with no glutenfree breadcrumbs on hand today. lol.  I baked them in the oven to a perfect crisp and my family can place those over their pasta and ladle the gravy over all.  Bellissima! 

  Sewing machines?    I have found a good basic Brothers from Walmart works beautifully.  You can find them refurbished for around $50 on the Walmart site.  I ordered one for Marianna's birthday, our most recently married daughter.  It was like brand new, sealed and boxed.  Bravissimo!




I definitely taught our daughters the arts of sewing and cooking in our homeschool.

It's one of the nicest blessings ever to see our grown daughters using these gifts and budgeting lessons now in their lives at whatever stage they are in.  



If anyone has any questions on being a happy budget friendly homemaker please feel free to leave them here and we can have a friendly forum. : )

I love being an encouragement to others, we've been married for over 37 years, I'm almost 57 years of age and my husband, Jem (64) and I have brought up four daughters on one income. 

And I cannot close without pressing that God was and is our source in all things. Many of you know, it's been a very, very challenging year for me to put it lightly.  I cannot thank God enough.




All great change in America begins at the dinner table.

-Ronald Reagan



Good evening, loves, and don't forget, if you have any questions that maybe I could help with please let me know here.  Pretty much the only things I will not share are my Grandma Oddo's heirloom recipes. ; )  

*Big smile*     Amelia