Finding Home Again

Tonight I actually have a chance to be in bed early enough that I may get adequate sleep and not be a total crank in the morning, and want to strangle my children for saying things like, “I want berries in my porridge,” at least one hundred times in an increasingly whiny voice as I prepare their breakfast, after I’ve already said “yes”. That is if I don’t spend too long writing tonight.

So, I will be starting another blog devoted to eating nourishing foods, and finding and preparing them, as well as other little health tips I’ve picked up along the way. Anyone with a clever name idea?

On that note, I’ve been thinking recently how much I could have learned from my grandmother if I had taken the time to pay attention. When it comes to keeping a house in order, and good food on the table, she is a total expert. Also, I just did laundry for the week, and am completely mystified as to how two or three items that went in looking not too bad came out so stained I’m thinking I should just toss them. My grandmother would know how to keep this from happening, and she would never just toss it, it would be reincarnated in some sort of useful way at her house. After all, this SAHM gig is my job right now, and I am slowly learning that there is a method to it, that makes all things easier.

The one thing I did learn from my grandmother was the way she takes care of herself as well. Once when I was living with them I slept in fairly late one morning and walked out of my basement room to find my grandmother, who looks amazing and trim, and she’s somewhere around 80 right now, doing her morning excercises. This embarrassed us both, mainly because she um, well, she hasn’t ever heard of workout clothing, she does it in her underwear. I quickly detoured to the bathroom, and when I came out she was upstairs making breakfast and fully clothed. If I didn’t know how much it would embarrass her to bring it up again, I would tell her how thankful I am that I saw that, because it has helped me to value taking care of my body too. She also somehow managed to get everything done in time to go for a walk every day at around 4pm. Sure she would get the mail on the way back, but she would walk down to the river and just have time for herself for a while before going home and making dinner and cleaning up, and then picking up whatever knitting or sewing project she was working on before bed. Life with her had a pleasant peaceful rhythm that was sorely lacking in the house I grew up in, and it’s something I want to create for my children, thought I’m not doing the greatest job at it so far I don’t think. (I have no idea what it was like at her house before 11 children grew up and moved away, but my father says it was still pretty orderly.)

Here is an excerpt of a letter I received from her yesterday.

“Today it’s raining, we still have carrots turnips and beets out in the garden so it will be a few days before we can dig them up…still have to pack them into pails and store them in our well house.
Today I canned 7 quarts of tomatoes and three pints of tomato sauce, as well as baking a pumpkin pie and banana muffins. We bought a bag of bananas at a sale price and now I’ve got to find a way to use them.”

Does anyone else out there fit these kinds of things into their average day, which in her case still consists of making a hot meal for lunch and dinner? I don’t.

So, as I was thinking about all of these things and intending to write a little something about them, I ran across this site and read their manifesto. I’m very excited to find other people who are thinking this way, I expect it to be helpful. Go and read it, and goodnight.