Category Archives: Hearth

Aunty would much rather spend all day weeding and planting than cleaning, cooking, or ironing. Here are bits of both home, house and garden tips.

Home Declutter

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Aunty’s house is de house of clutter, so if there is an expert in de-cluttering, it will be me one day.  Something like the way to catch a thief is to learn from a thief, or something like that.

First, take a picture of your house, room, entrance, kitchen, dining table, wherever you feel is a mess.  To feel better as you view the pictures, it really does look worse in the photo than it does in real life.  Also, what the photo will do is make you see your spaces the way others see it, and that alone may give you incentive to clear and clean it up.  It also can be a great “before” picture for the “after” you will have.

Chose a spot or a room, and start to go through.  You can do it superficially at first, but when you are serious, do a thorough job of sifting through everything, and either keep, toss, donate, or Scarlett O’hara it (think about it tomorrow).  Clean as you go so the bugs don’t have a place to party.

Make sure you are setting aside a reasonable amount of time and you tackle a reasonable size of problem area.  You must be successful.  I have decided to do 3 feet of stuff at a time – so I just did the shoes/sports shelf behind our front door.  It feels great! and the door can now nestle back to where it is supposed to be, the area is organized and even smells good.  It took me 1 hour, and I think I shall reward myself with cheetos and coke (chose your own reward).

Very important:  do what you intend with what you have decided immediately.  If you decide to throw some stuff away, toss it in the outside rubbish bin.  If you are donating some things, put it in box(es)or bag(s) and get it to Goodwill asap.  If a pile of stuff belongs in another room or to someone else, get it there.  If you are going to give items to friends or sell it on eBay, label it and make sure you do that within the week.  For the stuff you aren’t sure about (the Scarlett stuff), put it in a box, and get it out of sight for now.  One day you will go through that box and either squeal with delight or scratch your head wondering why you kept it.

At the rate I am going, 3 sq ft of decluttering per day in a 2800 sq ft house, will take me 700 days to a totally decluttered house.  Sounds horribly long, but I have a feeling it will be less time than that.  Even if it does take 700 days, the reward of a clean, clear, organized house will make me happy and full of cheetos and coke, and it will make Uncle really happy.  Happy Uncle = happy home.

Mangoes and Lost Opportunity

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2013-04-01_18-51-38We have a white pirie mango tree in our yard.  Our good friend Charin gave it to us as a sapling.  I waited for years for the little sapling to grow bigger and bigger, and one year it gave fruit!  It was delicious.  Juicy, sweet, smooth, ambrosia for the senses and tongue.

Unfortunately for any of our plants, one of my interests is bonsai trees.  I love the look of spreading branches, controlled growth and proportioned shapes.  Because of that, after a few piddly seasons of fruit, I decided to trim the mango tree into a pleasing shape that would allow for an open middle.  I removed all branches going straight up, trimmed off all branches that hung downward, and evened out the tree.  It looked quite nice!

However, the tree rebelled and stopped producing, much to the disappointment of Uncle and the kids, who were quick to blame me for not letting the tree grow and give fruit.

Just this year, my well shaped tree (imho) had a good crop.  I am in mango heaven.  I will hold off trimming the tree for as long as possible.  However, I do believe the tree has matured enough to stand for a good trimming and continue to fruit all season long.

Here is a lesson I would like to teach, if you don’t mind.

When our mango harvest was piddly – that is, I could count 12 mangoes in entirety on the tree and each was looked at on a daily basis – I longed for the day I could pick the perfectly ripe fruit off the tree and eat it.

The very first ripe mango was picked and lovingly brought into the house.  I smelled it, held it, and told the family we would eat it later when the time was right.  The second mango was ripe enough soon after, and I picked that one, put it out to show on the table, then put the first one in the refrigerator to keep it for a while.

This went on for about 2 weeks.  Meanwhile, the refrigerator had several ripe mangoes and we hadn’t cut and eaten any – I was saving it for the right time.

Uncle does not think like me.  One day, he peeled and sliced all the mangoes I had picked and stored for everyone to eat.  It was delicious, though most were over ripe because of the lapse of time from harvest to eating.  Many were too soft to slice, and a few were rotten and shriveled up from being in the refrigerator too long.

Because I was hoarding the mangoes instead of eating them right away, the majority of them were wasted.  The lesson learned is this:  Mangoes need to be picked and then eaten.  Waiting is wasting.  I now eat mango almost every day when it is in season, or I give the away to friends and family who appreciate them.

Here is the investing lesson that correlates to mango:  Learn and do your research (grow the tree, pick the ripe fruit), then do it (peel, slice, eat).  Jump in instead of waiting on the sidelines.

I meet a lot of people in investment classes that are learning as much as they can and researching this or that, but they are not investing.  They have great excuses.  I had a great excuse about not eating our mangoes – not the right time.  It was a bogus excuse and the cause of lost opportunity.

Please eat and enjoy your mangoes instead of putting them aside for a better time.  In your life, do something other than just watch on the sidelines or wait for the perfect time.  The time is now.  Get in the game to enjoy the victory and perfectly ripe delicious mangoes.

Here is a mentor minute from Raymond Aaron with the same message, though not about mangoes:  Achievements connected to Action.

Preparing and cooking with your cast iron pan

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Cooking with a cast iron pan is the best way to cook – you get a bit of iron in your food, and the heat can be really really high if you need it to be.

When you shop for a new pan you will find raw cast iron (looks like aluminum in color and have spots of rust) or preseasoned ones.  Cast iron is naturally stick free if it has been prepared right and since the preparation process can be quite time and labor intensive, you can purchase preseasoned pans for quite a hefty price.  The advantage is that you can start cooking with these heavy duty pans right away.

To prepare your “raw” cast iron pan, coat it with oil or fat.  You can use vegetable shortening (i.e. Crisco) or the old folks like lard or bacon fat.  Bake the skillet upside down, with a sheet of foil below to catch the drips, in 400º oven for an hour.  Make sure your kitchen is well ventilated with the vents going and your windows open.  It will be smokey.  Remove the pan after it is cool.

Cooking with cast iron is wonderful.  For even heating, start with low heat and then increase the temperature slowly.  Preheating the pan in the oven is great too, but be careful when you remove the hot pan from the oven – make sure you have insulation on your hands before touching, and do not set the hot pan down on your countertop or table – put it on your stove’s burner right away.  Cast iron does not heat fast, but once it is hot, it is piping hot all the way through the handle – so protect yourself and your surfaces.

After the pan is nice and hot, add your cooking oil and throw the ingredients to cook with sizzle and oomph!  Cast iron pans can go directly from the stovetop to the oven, since they are practically indestructible and 100% plastic free.

Cleaning the pan is much harder than the lightweight non-stick pans, and much heavier to handle.  The trick to cleaning them is to remove food residue without damaging the seasoned surface or encouraging rust.  The old way is to scrub with hot water and a brush or coarse salt, but no soap.  If this makes you uncomfortable, then using a mild detergent after most of the residue is gone is fine.  Never put the pan in the dishwasher.  Scrub with steel wool only to remove rust.  Uncle likes to fry steaks over high heat with the pan – so ono with Hawaiian sea salt and Canadian steak seasoning – yum!!!

Aunty has to “remind” him to put a cup of water in the pan after he is finished so the gunk gets softened and makes it much easier to clean after we have finished eating.

After washing, towel dry or set it on a low burner to remove all moisture.  Drying well and quickly will prevent rust.  Oil the pan lightly before putting away.

Aunty’s next car?

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Those words send shivers down Uncle’s back – since Aunty does have a tendency to change cars as easily as shoes.

However, this is a really neat one – and maybe in Aunty’s future one day – a self driving car…..  What a wonderful way to get around!