Back to the Basics

So I know it's been awhile.  With the new year aren't we usually inspired to do new and exciting things?  Or at least make resolutions to change things in our lives?  I've seen a gazillion posts on facebook of people making their new year's resolutions and vowing to do things differently in 2014.  I make no promises.  Nothing about new year's really 'excites' me per say.  It's just another day, like the one before it (you know....the holiday break from school! lol It's all the same).

But something got me thinking.  I got sidetracked on pinterest one day and have been dying to make a new baby quilt/lap quilt.  Something fun and easy to throw together.  Joy and I have been sewing boutique clothing for 'sew' long....and I LOVE it!  But I needed a little instant gratification.  I've been sick for an entire month, even confined to the house.  So I figured it would be fun to piece something together.  Actually only took me about an hour (I still have to put the back on it before I share pics, but I think you're gonna love it!).
And then something else....for new years eve we spent a few hours at a friend's house.  Playing card and board games!  You know, the old fashioned kind, that don't require batteries, electricity or an internet connection.  We played spoons (the most fun!), pictionary man, and Pictureaka.  Complete with dice and old fashioned sand timers.  We thoroughly enjoyed the fun and fellowship.

And then something else....an old friend lost her grandpa.  Pappy.  Pappy was known and loved by SOOOOO many people in our community.  If you didn't know him, you at least knew of him.  His obituary talked about his life growing up, his interest in music, and his band - Dean Allnutt and the Hillbillies.  Yep.  Hillbillies.  lol :)  I have friends who are city dwellers vowing to make changes in their lives this year.  So many of them wanting to buy family farms, learn to raise goats and chickens, grow a garden.  Get back to a simpler life.

How did we get so far away from simple?  When did we round that corner of no return where our kids (and our grandkids to come) won't remember what it was like to watch their grandmother can vegetables she picked fresh from the garden.  Or what it was like to clean a chicken coop with the rats running after you.  Yes, it's true.  It can happen. I remember doing that as a kid and it terrified me.  I think it's time to put a little 'fear' back into our kids.  lol  ;)

I remember quilts on mammie's couch and button pillows, our crayons were kept in a metal coffee can with our color books under the coffee table.  Grandpa taught us how to whittle, took us on long walks in the timber to identify leaves and trees of all kinds.  He took us fishing and made us bait our own hooks.  Touching those squirmy worms was awful!  I also remember my granny buying me a 'fishing mit' so I could wear it to take the fish off my hook and not have to touch it.  lol  She went fishing.....every single day.

They lived in a house where the windows were open in warm weather and I can still see the curtains blowing in the breeze, and the smell of the wood stove in winter and the wood box in the corner.  We covered up with "na-na's" to take naps while mom was crocheting and we picked at granny while she made Christmas candy and cookies trying to steal a bite.  Which usually got us chased out of the kitchen with a yardstick, a knife (don't worry I'm sure she never would have used it on us--but it had us giggling and running scared), or her 1/2 inch fingernails would jab at us to keep us away from her work.

Someone mentioned on the photo of the obituary for 'Pappy' that all the old-timers were leaving us and things would never be the same again.  Well, I want things to be like that again.  We seem to have a new found love for all things 'vintage' in our furniture, our fashion, and our homes, men love antique cars (no matter what their age), so why not take back some of the traditions of old?  Why does it just have to be material things we 'recycle' into new trends?

For 2014 I vow, no less than once a month, to find something to do with or create with my kids that will give them a bit of nostalgia to look back on.  Some things we already do, but I want them to be bigger and better than ever this year.  I want the garden to be the best it's been and walk barefoot with my kids through it picking beans and eating fresh tomatoes with dirt still on them.  I want to go fishing more often.  Not just send dad with the kids, but be like my grandma.  Taking my 5 gallon bucket and my can of worms and just sitting with them.  Maybe, just maybe.....I can teach my daughter how to cook a little better.  She's not much on kitchen duty of any kind.  She's a farm girl for sure.  But maybe, just maybe she might take a few minutes to learn how I make homemade bread, or we can whip up a batch of noodles.  She loves chicken and dumplings and I actually love making them.  Maybe we can do it together when she comes home for a visit.  Teach the boys how to make soap with me.  I shouldn't be so worried about them using lye....after all, I don't remember any recorded disasters of people losing limbs or such from making soap.  lol ;)  I may have to reconsider letting dad teach them to drive the tractor though.

I want to make more than just clothes for other kids (can't get enough of our little boutique biz! I love it! and love that Joy and I have sew much in common and inspire one another to create such great things), but I want to make more things for my own kids and family.  Quilts.  Quilts that will be used for years and years after I'm gone.  One of my daughter's (and my) favorite quilts are the ones that my mammie made before I was ever born.  She's been gone for over 40 years....and those quilts are still the most awesome things ever.  The fabrics you'll never find again, the yarn ties on them rather than machine quilting.

I just want things to be simple again.  Lord knows they were actually harder.  But so much simpler.  Does that make sense?  I want my kids (and I need to get better too!) to read their bible everyday.  Not just when it suits them.  Actually if the truth be told my daughter is WAY better at this than any of us in the family.  My oldest son spends all his spare time when he's not working or in school at church with the youth pastor.  They have become great friends.  He even fills in teaching the kids Sunday School class when the youth pastor's family has to be gone.  My kids inspire me to be better.  To do great things.  It's never too late after all.  But the great things I want to do, may never change the world.  But they can change my family.  They can change the direction our world is going.  If more people wanted to get back to the basics.  Back to the simple life.  Back to saddle shoes and pigtails.  Gum boots and fishing poles.

I hope you'll follow along.  I promise to blog more.  I've actually missed it so much.  The irony here.....I should be writing all of this in a paper journal instead of posting to the internet where I can print it later.  But hey, baby steps, right?!  ;)  No wonder my daughter ask for a journal for Christmas.  Maybe someday her memoirs will become a book.  If not, at least it will be something simple.  Something that she can pass along to future generations.

Happy new year to you and yours.