Cultivate beauty and wisdom in and around you

I am writing this blog on Wednesday morning and there are trees down and water everywhere and I hope you are all doing OK. We are fortunate to have not lost power or had any water problems thus far.  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I learned about something new this week and want to share that today. Have you heard of Nanny Pins? Last week I posted about a blog hosted by Cee Rafuse and she has a Facebook page called https://www.facebook.com/cee.rafuse/posts/10208188050764768?from_close_friend=1 She talks about a site called http://scatteredseedsamplers.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-early-workbasket-nanny-pin.html Scattered Seed Samplers Nanny pins were brooches worn by the Nanny of the house, which contained emergency sewing sets for repairs if the children tore a garment while playing.  She has some beautiful pictures and lots of information. I think these are really cool. One end unscrews to reveal a cylinder with thread wrapped  a...

A few thoughts on Enamelware! Think about enamel kitchen utensils today, and you probably imagine something coated all over in enamel. That certainly wasn't the case in the early years. To begin with, cooking pots were lined inside with enamel, but they looked like any other cast iron on the outside. People wanted a way of coating iron to stop metallic tastes or rust getting into food: something acid-resistant and easy to clean without laborious  scouring , something more durable than the tin linings used inside copper. The story of enamel cookware begins in the 1760s in Germany. The idea of finding a safe, convenient coating first took hold there: in scientific writing and in actual iron works. Fifty years later  vitreous enamel  linings, also called porcelain, for kitchen pans were becoming familiar in several European countries. Enamelling was no longer limited to decorative arts and crafts. Were enamel-lined cooking pots really as clean and safe as ...