All - Home-Ec 101

Cheap Vacation Strategies: Tourist In Your Own Town

Ivy says: My cousin is coming to town sometime in the next 2 months and wanted to know what she should see and do in Nashville. She especially wantd to know if the Country Music Hall of Fame was worth the $18 admission fee. When I told her I had never been to the Country …

Taking out the trash

Dear Home Ec 101, Where I live we have to pay for trash disposal. The trash disposal company we use gives us great big trash cans that most of us around here call dumpsters. Today, I was so embarassed when I got this note from the trash disposal guys: “Could you please clean out your …

How to Hold the Mail: A Quick Tip

Heather says: Mr. Heather and I are going to be taking a short trip in the near future. Rather than pester our neighbors, I thought I would see how difficult it was to place a hold on the mail. I remember my mother having to head down to the post office, stand in line, and …

We Save So We Can Splurge

Ivy says: My mom bought a new couch for her office recently. The day her couch came, her house was hit by lightning, frying most of her electronic equipment. I joked that the gods of finance sent that lightning bolt for buying something so expensive. She was not amused. I was. But she said something …

How to Rid a Pantry of Moths and Weevils

Dear Home Ec 101, My food pantry is completely full of weevils, I tried fog bombs, insecticide, you name it, I took out the flour and pasta packages and put them in the fridge, I also put the rice and beans in air tight containers, but still the little buggers are there. What else needs …

Ask the Audience: Taking Requests

Heather says: Today’s Ask the Audience is a chance for you to help Home Ec 101 better serve you. I try to be very thorough when testing recipes for this site as we are trying to provide a resource for those venturing into the kitchen with little experience and those working toward reducing their grocery …

Weekly Project #2: The great laundry debacle

Ivy says: This week’s project is going to be loads of fun. Well, loads of something, anyway. Yes, Home Eccers, it’s time to actually catch up on the laundry once and for all, and get rid of all non-fitting, ugly, stained, or otherwise not-fabulous clothing. Let’s look at the schedule, shall we? Monday: The gathering …

Retro Saturday: Why Home Ec

Ivy says: I saw this post earlier today, and while the original poster was actually talking about something different than the rest of us thought, it did make me think. (It’s a dangerous pastime, I know) Anybody ever read Dicey’s Song? When I was younger, I strongly identified with her hatred of Home Ec. My …

Grandma’s Home Remedies: The Good, The Benign, And The Dangerous

Ivy says:

When I was a kid, my grandma had one remedy for nearly every malady that befell us kids. If my brother and cousins read Home Ec 101, they’d be laughing right about now. See, no matter what was wrong with us, she had the same advice. Sick to your stomach? You’d better try to poop. Headache? Have you pooped lately? “Grandma! I have a broken arm!” “Your arm is fine, you just need to poop.” And if you told her you didn’t need to poop, she’d come running after you with castor oil, so you were pooping whether you wanted to or not.

Now, I don’t exactly get that excited about pooping, but I have noticed 9 times out of 10 when my kids come to me with a stomachache, they do just need to poop. Ah, well, grandma was right.

Now, pooping wasn’t my grandma’s only home remedy although it was the most frequent. There are a lot of home remedies that are actually good, some that are benign and may work by the “placebo effect”, and some that are downright dangerous. Let’s explore a few, shall we? (after the jump)