Reflections of Past Post

Follow the ways of your ancestors...

This title is an old Irish proverb and very valued in the Irish community. I have traced my father's family back to Wales, but I understand that there is a strong connection with Ireland. I've yet to uncover proof of that, but I know from my own freckles and BG (before gray) auburn highlighted hair, it must be true. One of my sons is a redhead and so are all of my cousins on my Dad's side.

Do any of your relatives come from Ireland? This would come as no surprise as over 40 million Americans claim Irish ancestry. On March 17th, that number increases considerably when we all celebrate St. Patrick's Day.

The earliest recorded American observance of the day honoring St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, was in Boston in 1737. But, the Irish as an ethnic group did not begin to make their presence felt in America until their numbers began to swell during the Nineteenth century.

St. Patrick’s Day became the day the new immigrants remembered their strong ties to the “auld sod” with parades and banquets. By the turn of the century, the celebrations of St. Patrick’s Day had become a distinctly American custom, with everyone, no matter what his nationality, wearing a bit of the green.

Curiously, the celebration of St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland has evolved into a high-spirited holiday only in the past thirty years. Since the day was (and still is) a Holy day, people attended a Mass and all the pubs were closed. An authentic St Patrick’s Day observance with music, dance, food and liquid refreshment had to take place at home.

A ceilidh (Gaelic for “dance” and pronounced kali) is a gathering of family and friends to hear traditional Irish music, do a bit of step dancing, eat thick slices of soda bread slathered with butter, drink cups of strong tea or other liquid refreshments and engage in the Irish indoor sport of conversation.

But at the heart of any ceilidh is the Irish music, of which there are two distinct types: energetic dance tunes or lamentful narrative songs, usually ballads. In Irish reels, the main melody is repeated over and over again until it leads into another similar tune. The listener, who is unfamiliar with its unique circular structure, frequently comes away with the impression that he has been tapping his feet to one long Irish jig for over two hours.

Excerpts from Sarah Bainbridge

Porches

I LOVE porches!! While riding on our Sunday drives, I notice porches and windows before anything else on a house. To me, a porch makes a house a home. Every home I've lived in has had a porch. Living here for the past five years, I have been fortunate to have many porches. Every one of our five out-buildings except the barn has at least one. The cottage has two and our home has two.

If you've been a faithful reader of this blog, you will remember my post about enclosing the back porch. I really liked the open "farm" porch that was here when we moved in, but I LOVE the enclosed porch. On a blustry winter day the temps may hover around zero to ten degrees in Michigan. If the sun shines, the temperature on our enclosed south-facing porch can rise to 70 degrees. It has been my salvation this winter!

I've decorated our many porches over the years and, last year, decided to share them on Shabby Lane Shops where they have a Porch of the Month contest. I am pleased to say that Aunt May's Cottage has won this distinguished honor many times (see side bar).

I hope you like my entry for March...........

Some Details.........

Many items shown in photos are available in Aunt May's Cottage.......

After two months of physical therapy, I am now able to sew on the sewing machines, but still cannot do much hand sewing. For some reason my right hand has decided to swell like a balloon when working with it. If I am idle, it seems OK. WELL, I'm not an idle person, so most of the time it's a chore to do any intricate work with it. The doc says it will all come in time, so I'm trying to be patient (not my strongest trait). I'm so lucky to have a wonderful physical therapist that is relentless. Because of her and the hours of "homework" she gives me, I think the arm will be back to about 80% the first part of April.

VALENTINE'S DAY SPECIAL

Today only!!

20% off every regular priced item in

Aunt May's Cottage

Web Store.

The American Valentine

In 1847, a young woman named Esther Howland, who is credited with being the “Mother of the American Valentine”, received a typical commercial English valentine from a friend. Very taken with it, she was inspired to try to make some of her own.

Esther persuaded her father, who was a stationer, to order a supply of large blank lace paper sheet and other valentine materials from England. When she had finished making a small assortment of samples, she persuaded her brother, who worked as a traveling salesman for their father, to take her cards with him.

He returned with five thousand orders and Esther set up shop in a spare room of the family home. She engaged a handful of her friends to help her and began the first assembly line production of American commercial valentines. Most of Miss Howland’s cards were so elaborate they had to be packed in boxes to protect the delicate confections. Their elaborateness was matched in their price, with the majority of them costing between $5 and $10, a considerable sum for the time.

Despite their cost, Miss Howland’s valentines became extremely popular. In 1880 she sold her business, which netted her over $100,000 a year, to another American valentine producer, the George C. Whitney Company.

By the end of the nineteenth century, improvements in color printing processes soon gave elaborate commercial valentines the preference over the home made sentiments. Two companies on either side of the Atlantic competed fiercely for the valentine market: Marcus Ward in England and America’s Lewis Prang, who perfected the graphic art of lithography. Prang also began trimming his valentines with silk fringe and soon this distinguishing feature replaced the lace paper borders on the most elegant and highly desired Victorian valentines.

Gazing upon a Victorian valentine is to return to a more romantic era. To hold one today, as fragile as a dream, is to know, as the nineteenth century poet Katherine Lee Bates said, “Old love is gold love, old love is best.”

I hope you have enjoyed our journey in the discovery of the Valentine.

Excerpts from Sarah Ban Breathnach, author of Simple Abundance.