we have all heard these sayings over the years, and now they are pinned like crazy on pinterest. personally i think the proliferation of these ideas is causing a lot stress and feelings of being overwhelmed in the young mothers of today.
here are a few examples:
I am not talking about having a spotless, museum quality home. I'm talking about getting organized and making an attempt every day to keep the chaos under control. I'm talking about making sure that your priorities each day, in addition to loving on and giving your baby/children attention, also include making sure your family has clean clothes, a clean & safe environment to play in, and at least three good meals a day. This includes making sure your husband also has what he needs in order to go out into the world and provide for his family.
**note: if you are a full-time dual income family then disregard this message :)
Living in a house where just finding a clean dish or your shoes or the floor becomes an adventure is not fun. it will overwhelm you and make you and your family unhappy. while you think you are "making memories" instead of cleaning, all your kids will remember was how stressed out and overwhelmed mom was every morning or evening. they will remember the yelling. they will remember the confusion and the stress.
so my advice is to disregard all of these modern messages. THESE ARE LIES PERPETUATED BY LAZY PEOPLE!!!!! never before in history have women left their housework undone and meals unplanned and given their children 100% attention all. day. long. modern women, who have all of the modern advantages such as washer and dryers, crockpots and microwaves, still don't seem to be able to get their stuff done each day. why?!! Because they believe that its okay not to do their chores!!!! and just play.
the following is a summary of a typical farm womans day around 1900
This is a vague, general idea of how I spend my time; my work is so varied that it would be difficult, indeed, to describe a typical day's work.
Any bright morning in the latter part of May I am out of bed at four o'clock; next, after I have dressed and combed my hair, I start a fire in the kitchen stove, and while the stove is getting hot I go to my flower garden and gather a choice, half-blown rose and a spray of bride's wreath, and arrange them in my hair, and sweep the floors and then cook breakfast.
While the other members of the family are eating breakfast I strain away the morning's milk (for my husband milks the cows while I get breakfast), and fill my husband's dinner pail, for he will go to work on our other farm for the day.
By this time it is half-past five o'clock, my husband is gone to his work, and the stock loudly pleading to be turned into the pastures. The younger cattle, a half-dozen steers, are left in the pasture at night, and I now drive the two cows, a half-quarter mile and turn them in with the others, come back, and then there's a horse in the barn that belongs in a field where there is no water, which I take to a spring quite a distance from the barn; bring it back and turn it into a field with the sheep, a dozen in number, which are housed at night.
The young calves are then turned out into the warm sunshine, and the stock hogs, which are kept in a pen, are clamoring for feed, and I carry a pailful of swill to them, and hasten to the house and turn out the chickens and put out feed and water for them, and it is, perhaps, 6.30 A..M.
I have not eaten breakfast yet, but that can wait; I make the beds next and straighten things up in the living room, for I dislike to have the early morning caller find my house topsy-turvy. When this is done I go to the kitchen, which also serves as a dining-room, and uncover the table, and take a mouthful of food occasionally as I pass to and fro at my work until my appetite is appeased.
By the time the work is done in the kitchen it is about 7.15 A. M., and the cool morning hours have flown, and no hoeing done in the garden yet, and the children's toilet has to be attended to and churning has to be done.
Finally the children are washed and churning done, and it is eight o'clock, and the sun getting hot, but no matter, weeds die quickly when cut down in the heat of the day, and I use the hoe to a good advantage until the dinner hour, which is 11.30 A. M. We come in, and I comb my hair, and put fresh flowers in it, and eat a cold dinner, put out feed and water for the chickens; set a hen, perhaps, sweep the floors again; sit down and rest, and read a few moments, and it is nearly one 0' clock, and I sweep the door yard while I am waiting for the clock to strike the hour.
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| Harvesting wheat, 1915 |
I make and sow a flower bed, dig around some shrubbery, and go back to the garden to hoe until time to do the chores at night, but ere long some hogs come up to the back gate, through the wheat field, and when I go to see what is wrong I find that the cows have torn the fence down, and they, too, are in the wheat field.
With much difficulty I get them back into their own domain and repair the fence. I hoe in the garden till four o'clock; then I go into the house and get supper, and prepare something for the dinner pail to-morrow; when supper is all ready it is set aside, and I pull a few hundred plants of tomato, sweet potato or cabbage for transplanting, set them in a cool, moist place where they will not wilt, and I then go after the horse, water him, and put him in the barn; call the sheep and house them, and go after the cows and milk them, feed the hogs, put down hay for three horses, and put oats and corn in their troughs, and set those plants and come in and fasten up the chickens, and it is dark. By this time it is 8 o'clock P. M.; my husband has come home, and we are eating supper; when we are through eating I make the beds ready, and the children and their father go to bed, and I wash the dishes and get things in shape to get breakfast quickly next morning.
It is now about 9 o'clock P. M., and after a short prayer I retire for the night."
i'm pretty sure that modern housewives should be able to learn a thing or two from their great-grandmothers.
