Which is worse: Luan doors or having no flour or sugar for two months?

 I am now prepared to answer this question, and the answer is this: Having to look at flat, orange-y 1990's era Luan doors every day is worse than a lot of things, including changing up your diet in a new and pretty drastic way. Really. It is. 

The Road to Hell may be paved in good intentions, but the Closet Doors of Hell are probably Luan doors

I've been doing the no flour, no sugar diet for two months now and feel great, except for the first three days, when I alternated between feeling like I had the flu and feeling like I wanted to kill everyone who crossed my path. (The body does not give up its carbs easily). 

While I was dealing with a whole new way of eating, we replaced three of our nine Luan doors, which unlike dieting, felt good from the moment we started loading the old doors on the truck to when we painted and hung the new farm-style doors in their frames. So, the verdict is obvious. New doors for the win, every time. 

Farewell, hideous doors, and may a choir of angels sing thee to thy rest.

If going through a few days of keto-acidosis felt like having the flu, the Luan doors have been like a visual flu virus in our house. They are to the eye what a hard diet is to the body, I am convinced.  Maybe I'm too sensitive about my surroundings, but I have a somewhat philosophical take on doors -- they take us into new places, welcome us back into familiar ones, and make a statement about what's inside before we ever lay a hand on the handle -- so how they look is important. They should say, "come on in," rather than "abandon all hope ye who enter here."

Was making my diet healthier for my aging body important to me, too? Sure it was. But honestly, I saw those awful Luan doors a lot more than I saw myself in a mirror each day, so that's why I'd vote on the ugly doors for being harder to live with than suddenly not being able to have bread and dessert. 

A pleasure for the eyes to behold! 

And with all this renovation going on inside, I have to say that changing my diet up for the healthier could not have come at a better time. Not a day goes by when something new doesn't get painted, hung on a wall, or moved around. It's nice to have an even energy level throughout the day as I work. We're settling in to a new, somewhat Luan-less house now (six more doors to replace before we're done) and will have lots going on in the next few weeks as we race to the finish of the dry season in Oregon. This is a magic time, when paint dries quickly and outdoor work can be done any old time, and it's quickly is coming to a close -- the leaves are already beginning to turn up here. 

So..body, lighter and brighter, and doors lighter and brighter, too, as we head into the last part of the year. Hope your late summer is filled with plenty of loveliness, too. 

I still see summer...

but it's giving way to autumn.

Still worth it?

A quart of hard work ruined.

Even if you don't do much homesteading, gardening or farming, there are times in your life when you have to ask yourself if whatever you're doing around your home is still worth the work or not. If you have raised kids and eventually move on to that Empty Nest stage of your life, you usually have to re-examine everything you are doing -- how you're cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, and even vacationing -- because while you weren't watching, your life moved onto its next phase somehow, and it all needs re-evaluation.

This is where I've been with canning the last few years. This morning, a quart jar of relish broke inside the canner, which happens sometimes (the newer quart Mason jars are usually only good for about five years before this happens), but which was very frustrating, as it represented several hours of hard work, come to naught.

Is it still worth it?

Too bad it took a quart of ruined relish for me to start pondering whether or not I actually still need that much relish stored up in the pantry. Like most people, I tend to just keep doing the same things I've always done until it becomes impractical for some reason, and then I start re-thinking whether it's needed or not. 

So after cleaning up the canner and thinking about things, I've decided that, for the time being, I'm still saying yes to canning. BUT, it's a modified yes. If it's something I can put up in pint jars, like strawberry jam, apple pie filling, blackberry syrup, etc. it's definitely worth it. Pickle relish is also still worth it -- in smaller jars. But quarts of things? Not really what is practical or needed anymore for our household of two, broken jars or not. 

So in thinking of ideas I can use to supplement our pantry in other homegrown ways, one thought I had was starting to make my own mayonnaise. I've got the eggs, and if I'm not tethered to a water bath canner filled with quarts of tomatoes all summer long, I also have the time. One other thing I've already started doing is switching our dog over to completely homemade dog food and treats, which I've wanted to do for a long time. But I'm pretty sure I can find other things that will make us more eco-friendly and healthy plus save us money if I re-order my thinking just a bit.

I'll still keep those quart jars around, though, as they're such brilliant multi-purpose containers, holding everything from flowers to leftovers to frozen broth. So the quart jars I have left will get a break from the literal pressure of canning, and I catch a break, too, in terms of workload. Less pressure on all of us. 

That's a win for everyone, I'd say.

Mason jars -- still the Swiss Army knife of household living, even without the canning.