Carrot Soup

Sweet Violets bouquet, still going strong.
Love that shade of apricot.

 We've had a cold virus in our house this week and MrBP has been hit especially hard.  I've been cooking lots of pureed vegetable soups to try to get as many vitamins into our diet as possible.

I have an abundance of carrots these days from our vegetable delivery so I made this really simple soup.
It's so easy: saute a shallot, add some herbamare sea salt and plenty of peeled and chopped carrots.  Cover with with water and simmer until the carrots are tender when poked with your paring knife.

The pureed soup.

 Leave off the heat for a few minutes before pureeing the whole business in your blender.

Of course I added some cashew cream, I usually have some in the fridge these days.

Cashew cream.

 The cashew cream adds some nice texture to the carrots.

 The texture would be fairly bland without a topping, however.  I used this nut and nutritional yeast mixture that I've been sprinkling over all of our soups lately.

I cup raw cashews
1 cup raw almonds
1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1 teaspoon coarse sea salt
Pulse in your food processor until it has the texture of fine breadcrumbs.  Store in a jar on your counter and sprinkle whenever you'd like a slightly salty, breadcrumb-like topping.

How's your day looking?  It's March already, which has me thinking about getting out my St. Patrick's decorations.  I started a Death Cleaning of my laundry room yesterday and right now it looks like a bomb has gone off in there, I'll have to work on sorting that today.  And I'd like to take some photos of those Brora tweeds and wools that arrived yesterday!

Whatever you get up to today I hope it's a success,
xoxDani

Mop Philosophy Monday

 I replaced my dishwashing brushes last week: don't the new ones look so capable and promising?

 Have you been baking granola?  Me too.  The latest batch was made with plenty of flax and walnuts, coconut oil and cinnamon.

 It did smell delicious while it was in the oven.

 Once it was done baking I added big handfuls of dried cherries.

 Have you been doing any celebrating?  We were out last night for our good friend David's birthday.  Such a fun time, and we're all looking forward to travelling to New Orleans together once spring finally arrives.

Are you a fan of sparkling wine?  I am, and so is David.  We brought him a bottle of this for his birthday:

My favourite sparkling wine: Hungaria.

Hungaria is the perfect dry sparkling, and the price point is much better than champagne.  It has the same sort of complex dry fruitiness to it without the nine million dollar price tag.

Sweet Violets outdid themselves again with a beautiful bouquet, look at these colours:

Sweet Violets Bouquet

Apricot tones with bits of violet and that dusky green eucalyptus: Bella!

How is your week shaping up?  I've got so much housework to do, more Death Cleaning of the storage room (it's taking me forever), plenty of admin tasks, Year-End work that is crossing my eyes, and about 217 loads of laundry.

It's also month-end this week, which means I'll be posting a No Shopping update.  Hang onto your seats because there was a spectacular failure of epic proportions, all will be revealed!

Have fun today, even though it's Monday,
xoxDani

Mop Philosophy Monday

Arrangement from Sweet Violets Flower Shop

 What do you think of red roses contrasted with eucalyptus in a bouquet?  I love the colours and shapes together, a perfect centrepiece for the table.

Making any healthy snacks?  I made this roasted carrot and red lentil hummus the other day and it has been a huge hit, everyone loves it, even Lil Rascal.
You can find the recipe here.

Roasted Carrots for the hummus.

 I've been plodding on with the storage room Death Cleaning.  De-cluttering takes such a long time whenever there are family mementos involved.
I have trunks in the storage room for my older rascal kids to hold various memories of childhood.  The blue trunk was Ole Rascal's camp trunk too, so it is a memory itself, before it's even opened.

Rascal Trunks

 Cooking up any detoxifying soups?  I made this one the other day and it would have been much better without the addition of beets.  I don't care for them in the slightest but I keep trying, they're so full of vitamins.

 The next time I'll skip the beets and just add more butternut squash.  Here is the recipe if you feel like giving it a try.

We've had a busy weekend not just with our rascals but with a little getaway to Langdon Hall.  I've got an overnight travel Colour Story coming up and some photos from our trip.  Stay tuned Tooties.
I hope your week is off to a terrific start.
xoxDani

Swedish Death Cleaning Magic

 I used the principles behind the Swedish Death Cleaning method to attack my armoire of dishes over this last week.
One of the ideas is to get at these projects slowly and to give oneself a week per room, or in this case, per armoire. I'm normally rushing around and generally exhausting myself when I tackle a de-cluttering project so this attitude made a big difference.

The armoire is in the dining room and held every sort of dish set we own that is not in regular use.  I would occasionally open it to pick out something to use for a dinner party, but I avoided doing that for the most part.   It made me pretty upset to see how crowded and disorganized it looked.

Here is the before picture, it looks like something from a scary tv show called Hoarders: Tipping Dishes Edition.

A scary mess.

 The armoire itself is quite pretty and fits perfectly into the corner of the dining room.  It travelled from Austria with my father-in-law (Poppa) and his family in 1938.  I don't know how old it is, but my guess is that it's at least 200 years old.

 The only change I made to the armoire itself when Poppa gave it to us was to add a tassel to the key. I really love the way the turquoise looks against the wood.

 The original gold silk curtain is still in place behind the glass front, and though it is showing some age with fray and the occasional threadbare hole I won't replace it, I find it so charming.

Here is the armoire after the Death Cleaning Magic:

Ta Da

 I took out rather a lot of dishes and all of the linen.  The linen should be stored in my armoire for fabrics and linens in my laundry room.  "Give everything a place" being another principle of Swedish Death Cleaning.

 I have a set of white dishes that I occasionally use for dinner parties when I want a really clean palette.  You can see the bowls and plates to the set above.

I tried to organize each shelf by colour so that it makes some sense to look at everything, and to find something.

 We have quite a bit of brass and I don't use it very often, but for the most part it was passed down to us by Poppa so it is quite special.  I occasionally do a mantel arrangement with those brass kettles, and I use the brass candlesticks in the fall and at Thanksgiving.

 The red glassware was a souvenir from our trip to Prague in 2008.  It looks lovely at Christmas and in the past I've filled it with port for dinner parties.

 This really sweet set of blue and white was a gift from my friend Laura, she gave it to me after her Aunt Emma died.  I guess it really was a result of a Death Cleaning!  Laura's Aunt Emma had loads of dishes and things and it was up to Laura to sort through everything and find homes for it.  It took her ages.

 This very delicate set of white dishes with the violet raised pattern was also a gift from Poppa.  It came to Poppa and my mother-in-law from their neighbour Ruth.  Ruth was an elderly lady who my mother-in-law was friends with for years, she really looked after her.  I only met her once, and it was about twenty years ago, shortly before she died.  Ruth spent Christmas with us that year, she really adored my mother-in-law and she left her these dishes in her will.
 I like to mix them with blue and white, to me they are very spring-like and look stunning with purple tulips and grape hyacinth for a dinner party.

 This asparagus set is from France, something I bought on impulse one day while shopping in Elora.  I couldn't resist them!  The large platter holds loads of steamed asparagus and the individual plates are meant for the melted butter and aioli served with the asparagus, for dipping.

 Here is a case of not even knowing what I owned because the armoire was such a cluttered mess.  I completely forgot about these mismatched antique teacups!  This is bad because my Aunt Deb asked me a couple of months ago if I had any I could lend her for my cousin's bridal shower this May.  I said I didn't own any!  I'll have to phone her today to see if she still needs some.

The teacups I totally forgot about.

 These interesting pieces were more gifts from Poppa, that soup tureen with the wee flowers is so pretty on the table at Easter, I love it.  We have a few gold-tipped dishes, a set that I split with my sister-in-law.  I use it in addition to my white dishes to fancy them up.

This little Rosenthal dish was a recent gift from Poppa.  Sometimes I bring him food in little stoneware containers that are perfect for transporting dinners.  He likes the containers for his leftovers and asked if he could keep them, but only if we made a trade!

The trade.

 I removed a giant set of Lenox toile print dishes from the armoire.  They took up loads of space and I never use them.  They are boxed up in a wooden crate for my Ole Rascal son, I think he'll like the colours.

Waiting for Ole Rascal to take them.

Now that I'm finished the armoire/dining room project I'm on to the basement storage room, aka the dumping ground of the house.  I've already started the process and I'll continue to work on it for the next week or so, bring out the paper shredder!
If you missed my original post on Swedish Death Cleaning you can find it here.

Have a lovely day today, I hope it's clutter-free.
xoxDani

Swedish Death Cleaning

This armoire of mine needs a Death Cleaning.

 I've just finished reading The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning by Margareta Magnusson ( a no-nonsense writer and artist who is " somewhere between 80 and 100 years old".). Have you heard of this book?  It's fairly new, and with the catchy title and slim size, it's just the sort of book I felt like reading before I tackle a couple of problem areas in my house.

Death Cleaning is a term that exists in the Swedish language ("dostadning") as one word, and it seems like a term that has a fairly common usage.  In English associating death with cleaning is rather morbid and grim, but it seems that the meaning in Swedish is not quite so harsh.  I wish my Swedish friend Ulrike was here so I could ask her!

Swedish Death Cleaning is a thorough cleaning of all of your belongings, with a focus on passing on items that might be of use or of sentimental value to the younger generation.  This does not necessarily include children, the author talks of passing your useful furniture, kitchenware and tools on to young people who are setting up their first place if one doesn't have children.

It also doesn't necessarily indicate the final years, but anytime your possessions are starting to control you in a way that is exhausting you.  Is your home easy to clean and tidy?  If you often have items around the house that are "out of place" it might be time for a Death Cleaning.  Is your home inhibiting you from using it to socialize and have fun?  If you feel relief when a friend cancels dinner or an overnight visit because it means you don't have to go to the effort of tidying, then perhaps it's time for a Death Cleaning.  

 The author advises going room by room and taking as long as necessary, perhaps even a week per room, and then taking a rest before approaching the next room.  She herself took a year to Death Clean her family home after her husband died, and with five children raised in a country home, full of hobbies, a large garden, every kind of tool imaginable, art supplies, inherited furniture... it sounds like it was quite the task.

I like that her focus is one of generosity.  She was not preoccupied with selling items, but rather thinking of how the objects that had added joy to her life could then go on to add joy to others.  She told stories of the objects to the new owners, emphasizing the age and provenance of furniture and therefore connecting the new owners to the object's past.  She enjoyed helping younger people furnish their kitchens with the necessary whisks and dishes, and she left many of the tools in her husband's tool shed (which she called his "mansdagis", his "male kindergarten") to the new owners of their house.  She also left all of her gardening tools to the new owners, imagining them joyfully keeping up the work of her garden, which she had so loved.

The author offers advice on ridding oneself of secret things before anyone else has to (perhaps unpleasantly) come across it.  The examples she gives?  Empty bottles of gin and vodka if you are a secret drinker, or the dildos you might keep at the back of your drawer.  Hilarious!

There is much discussion of what to do with all of the accumulated paperwork and photographs.  As far as the paper, she highly recommends buying a shredder to just get rid of things. She loves her shredder!  The photographs are another story, and she does offer tips to digitize and organize photo collections, while also acknowledging that leaving behind albums of photos is not necessarily a bad thing: they don't take up too much space, and younger relatives will enjoy the memories they will evoke.


Where to begin?  Clothes!

The author has such a matter-of-fact writing style, I loved it.  Her advice for sorting through your clothes?  Make two piles: one which you want to keep, and one which you do not.  The second pile should be donated, and the first pile should be picked through for items that might need special attention in order to increase their longevity: mending or dry-cleaning.
Sensible advice!

I recommend reading this book if you have some problem areas of your home (as I do) that you need to tackle.  This has given me the push I need to organize my armoire full of dishes.  I'm going to pull out a couple of dish sets to box and label, in order to pass them on to my Rascals as they begin to set up more "grown-up" apartments.
I'm also going to tackle my basement storage room with the large, intimidating file cabinet with a new secret weapon: the shredder!
This book would also be useful if you feel you need to do a thorough de-cluttering of your entire house: go room by room and take your time, it doesn't need to be so overwhelming.

Do you think you might read this book?  I found my copy at the library, try yours, they might have it.
xoxDani

Mop Philosophy Monday

 Today I'll be making a list of chores and tasks to accomplish in... February, now that January is nearly gone.
I'd really hoped to get more things done this month, I have some files to tackle, some areas of the house to organize, and my home office is looking a little confused.  That's fine, it's just time for a new list... onwards and upwards!

I made a big batch of granola yesterday and it filled the house with the lovely scent of ginger and toasting oats.

It was actually a fairly basic recipe for granola: I toasted oats with sliced almonds, and a teaspoon each of ginger and cinnamon, after covering them with a mixture of maples syrup and grapeseed oil.

 Once they were through their toasting process in the 300 oven, I returned the mixture to the bowl and added in about a cup and a half of hemp hearts and the same amount of raisins.

 These hemp heart seed things are quite the nutritional powerhouses.  I'm trying to make sure we eat them every day, either sprinkled on a protein smoothie, or a pureed soup at lunch, or in a granola such as this recipe.  You can read about their nutritional qualities here.

 I started reading this Swedish Death Cleaning book yesterday and I'm nearly finished, I shall report back with a full review tomorrow.

Let's just say it's the sort of book I love: it's about organizing, letting go of objects, the meaning of those objects, all told from the point of view of a lovely Swedish lady "between 80 and 100 years old".
Hope your Monday goes well with tasks and chores crossed off your lists!
xoxDani