Adventures In Keeping House

Nice things come out UK, too, like this magazine, for instance! I first bought a Christmas edition last year, and fell in love immediately, but then it disappeared from the store and now finally I found it again. It's quite expensive but I thought I deserved a present:)


LandLove has beautiful pictures and articles about gardening, nature, crafts and seasonal recipes:


My husband liked it, too!

I have been planning to write about it since forever but felt no inspiration. Last year my vacuum-cleaner broke down unexpectedly so I had to buy a new one and this model was the only decent one  I encountered at the shopping mall.

On the positive side, it was cheap. It vacuums quite good and it looks like R2D2. Here is a close-up:





The bags are expensive, but they are huge and can be reused at least once. If you take the bag out, you can use WD2 for water (after all, it is a Kärcher):





(Yes, my drying rack isn't in optimal condition, either:)

On the negative, first the cord is short. Like, really short, which makes vacuuming the stairs very uncomfortable. And I have three of them in my house, so it's now mostly the task of the housekeeper who doesn't come that often. You can't regulate the suction power, either, which isn't good from the point of saving electricity and your money.

The only attachments it has are those shown in the pictures. Finally, the thing is clumsy and prone to falling. When it falls, the bag moves and suction power goes down to zero, so you have to open and reassemble it.

Would I buy it again? Probably not, but I'm more or less content with it, except for the short cord. It really is a bother. I hope this info will be  helpful to some of you!

While reading Katholieke Illustratie from 1935 for my research purposes I came across a story by one J. Peerdeman which I thought illustrates nicely the difference between the society built on traditional values and what we are witnessing nowadays, even though in the 1930s it was already crumbling.

The story features a girl who pretends to have a headache so that she can stay behind while the family go visiting and meet her boyfriend. She knows that "a Catholic girl isn't supposed to do such things" but she tells herself that as a modern woman she shouldn't be held down by silly conventions and after all, they are only going to play the piano and talk about Mozart. Surely, there is no harm in that?

Well, the maid has the same ideas and meets her fiance in the kitchen thinking that no one is at home, but they get caught by the girl while eating chocolate pudding left over from the family dinner. The servant confesses and the mistress wants to warn her about falling into sin and good Catholic girls not meeting their boyfriends while nobody is home but realises her own hypocrisy and leaves.

What's a girl to do? It's too late to phone the guy and tell him not to come as he is on his way. In the end, she goes down into the kitchen and tells the maid not to allow the visitor in as it would be indecent for her to receive a man while her parents are not present. The servant takes a hint and does exactly as she's told. Virtue won this round.

It was then. As for now...Well, we all know  the difference even though we are trained to notice it any more.

and other things.





King Leopold III of Belgium with his wife Queen Astrid. The photo above was taken in somewhere in spring of 1935 and published in an April issue of the Catholic Illustration, a magazine I wrote about last year. He is 33 in the picture and she is 29 and they have just being the king and queen for a year, since Leopold's father King Albert's death.

They had three children together, one daughter and two sons
(Here is Astrid with their youngest)




and lived in  the palace Stuyvenberg in Laeken. Raised in Sweden in all simplicity, Queen Astrid cooked for her children herself and took them out for a walk, saying that she was just an ordinary mother.

Here you see her arranging flowers.

The queen was raised Lutheran and had to convert to Catholicism in order to marry Leopold. Their marriage took place in 1926. According to the article, this was one of the pictures she kept in her bedroom, presumably it was of her father? Or may be her father-in-law?





They were a beautiful couple but she had only a short time to live after that article was written. In August of the same year, they went on vacation to Switzerland where the queen died in a car crash when her husband lost control over the steering wheel.

Here is King Leopold working:



He mourned her for several years but remarried again in 1941 and had three more children.

Since it was an Easter edition of the magazine, there was an article about a special form of Easter Liturgy taking place in Sint Andries Abbey.

Taking the Holy Communion:



It included, among other things, blessing of an Easter lamb on the church altar:




The end of the Mass, the deacon is singing Alelluia



 The monks awaiting the blessing of their abbot:





That was about all for today, till next time:)

First of all, these two books:






One is called Country Christmas Dreams and has really great deco ideas for outside and inside:





The other one I'm reading at the moment. It's name is The Best Of Herbal Witch and I'm planning to write a review of it as soon as I've finished:

As usual, I bought several lifestyle magazines:




This one I only discovered recently and it quickly became one of my favourites:





It features houses in Scandinavian style and had some really great articles, including one about a Dutch housewife, and, as usual, great photography:





Wohnen & Garten must be known to my long-time readers, since I mentioned it before:





This summer, it ran an article about Jane Austen. The topic Mr Darcy is being milked for all it's worth:





The big news is that, apparently, someone published Jane Austen's mother's cookbook with authentic recipes. I'm sure, all the lovers of Pride And Prejudice are going to rejoice in this news. Me, I'm planning to write a post about it soon. (The novel, not the cookbook).

And, of course, there were some cool ideas for summer outdoor gatherings, table settings and stuff like that:

Ladies and gentlemen, that was all for today. Stay tuned!

As promised, it's the time for another historical post which will contain highlights from the next issue of the Catholic Illustration (Katholieke Illustratie). 

Among other things, we read more about the Liturgy of Holy Suffering,


a reportage about a flight to Berlin with F XXXVI "Eagle",






the continuation of a novel about the Danish king Waldemar which gets kidnapped together with his son by one of his German vassals, an article about how not to make photos,

a story about the then recent plane crash, with the pictures of the victims,


(the first pilot Piet Soer on the left),

an article about a wellness hotel in Switzerland, the events of the last week in pictures,

(the funeral of five scouts who died in a car crash)

(the Queen visits a flower exhibition)

(Lord Eden arrives in Prague and meets Dr. Benesch (on the right)), and then finally, we get the ladies' section.

So the ladies are given advice on how to save money while buying curtains, how to excercise the stomach muscles after childbirth and how to make this great tea cosy:

Because, as the article states, who wouldn't want to have it?

We now get to the fashions review. In the morning, you wore a woolen skirt with a dark blouse and a small hat, in the afternoon, a wide dress with enormous sleeves in black, or white by a black dress, in the evening, linen, cotton and artificial silk dresses with lace.


The menu for the week was:

Monday
Spinach soup, beef rolls with field peas, oranges.

Tuesday
Pork cutlets with rapini, bread pudding.

Wednesday
Ground meat with cabbage, pearl barley.

Thursday
Beans with fatback and onions, rhubarb.

Friday
 Atlantic cod with carrots, rice cake with apricot jam and warm vanilla sauce.

Saturday
Hutspot with  brisket, rice with butter and sugar.

Sunday
Bouillon (from the brisket) with egg cheese (omelet prepared au bain-marie), veal steaks with broad beans out of a jar, compote.

One of the last items of this issue is a legend about Doubusz, a hutsul living in Carpathian mountains. He once saw Saint Elias  arguing with the Devil and shot the Devil with his rifle. As a reward, an angel of the Lord made him impossible to kill with bullets, fire and steel  and Doubusz lived as an outlaw with a band of brave and strong men whose leader he became. He helped people in need and avenged crimes and injustice, however, as so many men before him, he was ruined by a woman.

Doubusz fell in love with Axenia, a sweetheart of another man and strange enough, when her original boyfriend Stefan decided to take revenge, Axenia agreed to help. She found out that the only way to kill Doubusz was to shoot him with a silver bullet  sprinkled with juice of the magic herbs over which twelve masses were read and well through his armpit.

So the next time when Doubusz came for his nightly visit, she mocked him and shut the door in his face. Doubusz raised his arms to break it and at this moment Stefan shot him with a magic silver bullet exactly through his armpit. And thusly ended the story of Doubusz.

Ladies and gentlemen, this was all for today.

And it's summer, too - the 11th of July. The students of the University of Delft have a celebration. The theme is medieval Italy, so it was a sort of a Renaissance fair:)






This issue of De Prins has an article about life in Indonesia,  a story about a gentleman whiteknighting for a pretty girl who turns to be a thief and some cool photos, as the one below featuring rock climbing in England:





and the new railway water tower, designed by Mr. Humbolt from Cologne:






The idea of beauty contest is apparently more than a hundred years old. In 1908, you could enter your kid for one and get a chance to win 100 f:





The kid on the left won. He (or at least, I think it's a he) wouldn't be my first choice, but may be, I'm just being mean. Or the beauty standards change. Or whatever:)

We then encounter an article about the city of Alkmaar and another sentimental story about a young lieutenant. Those young lieutenants seemed to be the staple of the romantic fiction of the period. As usual, he is deep in love-connected problems. After a fight with his spoiled fiancee he leaves and breaks her heart. They meet again 12 years later, she a young widow, he a colonel (he made quite a career). She apologises. He apologises. They marry. Happy End!

Below is the photo of Queen Mother in Rhenen after a charitable visit:





And some of our officers who took part in horse riding competition:





From left to right, 2nd lieutenant C.H. Labouchere (10th prize), Mr. Lachlan, a member of the welcome committee for foreign participants, Colonel Punt, a jury member, 1st lieutenants Mathon and Van Welderen Baron Rengers, who both took part in the competition.

Some other highlights are this picture of the then recently deceased K.J.G. Baron van Hardenbroek van 's Heeraartsberg and Bergambacht, the chairman of the Dutch Red Cross:





and a photo from a regatta organised by Dutch Royal Marine:





We then come to the next chapter of the novel by Ms. Heimburg about the difficult paths  (Langs moeilijke Wegen)  of Henk van Buchen, a young lieutenant whose bride-to-be ditched him because he refused to leave the army. Here is what his father said when he heard about her ultimatum to his son (translation mine):

...our ancestors  all served the king...all Van Buchens were proud that they could serve the king and fatherland. We have always been poor and not one of us married for money. And you, my only son, the last one bearing the name...you come to ask me if you should put aside your uniform? And why? Because of a pair of pretty eyes and a bag of money?...This girl doesn't love you, Henk! The woman who is in love says: wherever you go, I will go...Tell her that she must follow the ages old law, that she must follow you, that your honour as a man, your pride as an officer forbids you to follow her. 

The last picture I'm going to post is one of Father Kieft and his seven sons working in a field:




They  were apparently already featured that winter while skating. And that was about all for today, till next time!

The year is 1935 and you are a Catholic in a Protestant country. What do you do? Simple, you read Catholic Illustration (Katholieke Illustratie).

No. 27 which appeared on the 4th of April, 1935 begins with a short story about a tailor who has all sorts of aristocratic clients but refuses to dress well in real life with his fiancee leaving him as a result. She stays with her father and keeps his house until the two meet again when she is 45 and he is nearly 50. This time it ends with a wedding and the tailor is invited to make a suit for the King of Belgium.

Next comes a story about the meteorological service in aviation. Below the picture of a pilot studying the weather map:






Since it's nearly Easter, the next item is an article about a special form of liturgy called The Liturgy Of Holy Suffering. The photo below shows a part of it called the adoration of the cross:




Then we are treated to the second chapter of a historical novel about one Count Hendrik from Germany who is apparently going to start a fight for freedom against the King of Danes. After this comes an article about a health resort in Switzerland:



It is followed by a true story about the fireman who encounters a body in a coffin in the burning house and nearly loses his mind but manages to take the coffin out just on time before the roof collapses. There is also an interesting collection of facts (did you know that in 1935 in one hour there happened 1200 marriages and 85 divorces), a couple of opinion items and the events of the week in pictures. Below the new Belgian government:






Next comes the last chapter of a novel which, as far as I can understand, was about a Dutch businessman who went on a business trip, got drunk and enlisted in the Prussian army. After several months, though, he was allowed by the King of Prussia to return and to marry his fiancee and he also stopped drinking.

Then we read the reportage of a football (soccer for you Americans:) match between Holland and Belgium. Below the picture of the Dutch national football team (our guys won 4:2):



After the chess problem, a story about the new stamps, an article about the hard life of Chinese people, and and the bridge column there finally comes the women section. First we get an article about saving money while cooking on gas, then a piece of advice for the new mothers (as little visiting as possible, so as to protect the baby from infections and let the new mother to regain her strength), a column about keeping the private information about other people private, a craft feature about embroidering a linen tablecloth, and a weekly menu among some other things.

What were you supposed to serve each day of the week?

Monday
Pork fricandeau with winter carrots, oatmeal.

Tuesday
Cold meat with canned green beans, rhubarb with custard.

Wednesday
Hachee (stewed meat) with beet salad and mashed potatoes. Griddle cakes

Thursday
Ground veal with black salsify
Apple pancakes

Friday
Buckling (a form of herring) with red cabbage, rice pudding

Saturday
Beef escalopes with  canned endive. Fruit.

 Sunday
Vegetable soup. Veal steak with broccoli rabe.
Orange custard with biscuits.

Next comes the article about new fashions:

Below are the patterns you could order:







The women section ends with an article about Primula Orbonica (a house plant) and then we read a story about a Catholic saint Veredemus, a short sermon about the importance of social cohesion, a reportage about a hotel in England for poor but genteel travellers where Ch. Dickens once spent the night, and humour from different countries. And that was all for today, till the next time.



P.S. in other news, today is the Liberation Day.