Domesticity is something that has never come easily to me.
When I was a girl, I was (or tried to be) a tomboy like my heroine, Jo March of Little Women. That was partly because, like her, my passions are for reading, writing, and music. While my little sister eagerly drank in my practical mom's wealth of knowledge on the womanly arts, I hunkered down in front of our enormous old Macintosh and crafted tales of strong Christian girls who raced dogsleds, climbed mountains, solved mysteries, and learned about things like courage, kindness, purity, and acceptance. I wasn't overly enthused about getting married or having children, and things like cooking, sewing, fashion, and housekeeping just didn't interest me.
As I have grown older and the Lord has turned my heart toward marriage and family, I have realized that these mundane tasks - cooking healthy food, keeping a house clean and beautiful, washing clothes and caring for them properly - are really some of the most fundamental and beautiful expressions of love, servanthood, sacrifice, and femininity. I have a vision for my future family that includes a clean, sunny home; healthy, wholesome meals cooked for my husband and children; lots of crafts, nature walks, and reading times for my children, instead of computers and TV; fresh white laundry hung out in the yard to dry; and an atmosphere of godly wholesomeness that brings our family together and keeps us strong.
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I want to change that. Who knows - maybe the reason I'm not married yet is because the Lord knows that right now I'd make a crummy housewife? It's food for thought.
So how does a hippie geek with her head in the clouds discipline herself into a Proverbs 31 woman? I turn to you, my domestically-minded sisters, for advice. Does homemaking come naturally to you? If not, how did you (or do you) strive to develop it?
Thanks for your advice! I'm very appreciative! :-)
Love,
Vicki
P.S. I'm sorry I haven't posted in so long - I was overwhelmed by an unexpected deluge of homework last week, and I had to take time to surface and gasp for air before I could post ... :-P
You sound a lot like me Vicki. Domesticity has NEVER come easily to me. I've always been the kind of girl that likes to be strong, and when I was in my early teens, the thought of getting married, let alone housework, did not set well... But the LORD worked on my heart over the years, and through HIM leading me to become a stay at home daughter, I've begun to enjoy housework, and striving to becoming a Proverbs 31 woman. Still not the easiest thing for me at times. Some days I would much rather be out working full time, or hunting and fishing instead of washing that mountain of clothes in our laundry room... ;) I don't really have any advice on how to change your attitude, other than to pray for the LORD to work in your heart. That's pretty much what I did. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for this post. It was very encouraging to me. :D
Have a wonderful day my friend!
Angel
Haha, this post makes me think a lot of myself. I've never been the most domestic type...I wanted to be an author like Jo, and maybe later run a school (that would be left to me by a great-aunt March that I don't have, hehe). So I read, I drew, I daydreamed the day away...my aunt always said that the sorry state of my room was a prediction of what kind of housewife I would be! But, you know, I don't think it's too late for me to learn the skills a good housewife requires, and when the right guy comes along, I know I'll want to be a good one for him. We just may be eating pancakes and pasta a lot, though, since those are the only things I know how to cook!
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't worry about it too much. Pray about it, and let the Lord guide you, and all things will work together for good.(:
~Vicki
deckedoutinruffles.blogspot.com
Dearest Vicki. Oh I feel sorry for you my dear. Learning to be a wife and mother is a difficult task and even Meg, who dreamed of domestic bliss all life long found herself well rather muddled and mystified when married.
ReplyDeleteI must admit I was far too much like Jo and Amy in my childhood and envied Beth her sweet temperament and disposition and strove to be more like her. I was never keen on Meg, though I like her much better now, my mother hoped I'd grow up a little more like her. Instead I grew up Jo much to my shock when I read and watch Little Women, I feel like I've hatched a friend I missed in my childhood.
However Jo's shouldn't loose heart. There is plenty of us in the world and Marmee even told Jo that she was just like her when she was a young wife and mother, it doesn't mean their isn't room for change and betterment.
For me, I ran the house from age 12-almost 15. When my little sister was born...my mom was on IV's for a few months and on bed-rest for almost the entire expectancy. We almost lost my mom.... I was terrified that I'd have to raise a baby on my own...the possibly of a step-mother...all I could do was pray, and CLUNG to that. It took nearly a year before my mom felt well enough to leave the house, it was a year before she could help me with laundry - something she took back pretty quick. One thing I must warn my future husband of if he ever appears. I am horrible at laundry - it would get forgotten in the washer for days at a time....and need to get washed again. One thing she's never really taken back is making dinners...that has been my primary job for about the past 12 years with periods of fluctuation and breaks.
But just because I've had this "training" doesn't mean I am ready or accomplished or even prepared for running a household...I still had tons of help and well...don't even look at my room, I think we could call it a natural disaster.
However God will call and prepare you as He sees fit, He will direct and guide and lead. You are made perfect by Him Vicki and with Him you shall never lack or want for anything. When the time comes you will be the perfect wife and mother that God wants and has created you to bed - you children will rise up and call you blessed and thank God that a woman like you raised them, and no other and your husband also and he will praise you, for many daughters have done virtuously but you will excel them all in your own beautiful and unique way, perfectly created by God and not from a cut out and dry text book ruler created by mans silly ideals. For a woman that fears the Lord, she shall be praised.
Love,
Jessica
P.S. Thank you so much for your sweet comment on my blog the other day it made my day!!!!! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR BEING MY FRIEND!!!!
Dear sweet, kindred spirit,
ReplyDeleteI understand. For years I didn't want to get married and rather travel the world as a journalist; it was in my mid-teens when God changed my heart. He opened my eyes to the ministry and wonderful generation-changing affect mothers have. So, since then I've dreamed of being such.
But dreaming of something doesn't grant the skills for it. My mom is a total pro in this area yet I know it took her time. I wonder if simply laying your desires before God will be the most wonderful thing.
Also, I think its important to remember that our homes will be places of ministry. The home's organization, order, decorations will be made so that others can come and be refreshed and blessed. I think the kind of Jim-dear who marries you will also help form your vision and give direction in how you spend you wifely energies . . .
This post was a blessing to me! Oh, that we can just go one step at a time!
With love, Frannie
Gahh... others have replied so much more eloquently than I can... but let me add only this - my grandma is The Perfect Homemaker. If it's a womanly skill, she has mastered it, besides being one of the strongest women I have ever known. There are battles over her sugar cookies at Christmas time. Seriously. She hides them and gives each of her children their own personal box just so all survive. Three summers ago she and I went up to my grandparent's resort and moved the entire contents of a cabin into a duplex across the street in a single day - couches, air conditioners, beds, etc. She was recovering from cancer at the time. She is, in a single word, amazing.
DeleteWhen my mom got married, it took her ages to figure out how to get the macaroni and cheese done at the same time as the hot-dogs. Her mom had been so perfect at it all that she had simply never learned. Eventually, though, she figured out how to do anything she needed to in order to keep a house together, whether it was organic gardening, raising chickens, or bargain shopping. She still doesn't like cooking, sometimes our favorite clothes get bleach spilled on them when we've only had them a week, and our house does at times look like a tornado hit it. (Which is quite our fault, not hers. I'm not sure even my grandma could keep all of us children in line!)
But know what? It doesn't matter. My favorite memories as a child are certainly not of a clean house or perfectly folded laundry. (Seriously, who cares?) They're of my mom reading stories to us - whether we cried over Wolf or laughed fit to kill over Stories from the Old Squire's Farm, we loved it - or of the times she taught us how to ski or swim or do situps - or of the year we studied the history of movie-making and the history of America by watching Westerns - it was awesome. The word for my mom is, in fact, awesome, because she is, and I wouldn't trade her for worlds, let alone a perfect dinner she slaved away over for hours. (Though she does that sometimes too, because she really is awesome.)
Anyway, if it's something you need to know, so long as you are serious about following God and raising your children right, He will help you learn it! But 1930's movies can be just as important as clean dishes - and those stories you've written are what your children will remember, not that the dishes were put away immediately. :D
As for what else you said, how do I personally get through the homaking skills that seem rather depressingly necessary? (Because yeah, I'm not saying that that stuff doesn't have to be done. Sometimes. :P) Well... I've found that cleaning is ever so much more fun when you've got the Boston Pops playing something particularly motivating, Shakespearean plays make peeling carrots waaay more interesting (particularly when David Tennant is playing in them), and Kdramas make ironing simply epic, though you may run the risk of burning your clothes while bawling your eyes out. :P
And I know that's probably not going to work if I have kids (pretty sure I'm not going to let them anywhere near a computer/tv screen until they're about six years old and their brain has had a chance to develop the way it was supposed to), but then I'll probably go back to what I used to do when weeding the garden with my siblings or mowing the lawn by myself - tell stories. There's always a way to make it at the very least semi-interesting, if not plain fun. :D
And I should just stay away from blogger late at night, because my comments seem to increase in size proportionally with the time of night... LOL I've missed your posts though - hope school is going well and your homework behaved itself! :)
Good grief, that was a novel... seriously... I better go to bed.
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