The Beauty of Womanly Arts

When my grandmother was a girl, she had a class called "Home Economics". There she learned to cook and manage a household. Nowadays, most women don't know how to do either. What happened?

Today I just want to talk about womanly arts like cooking and sewing and how those things are being lost in today's culture. I'm not trying to make anyone feel guilty or anything, I simply want to share what I've been thinking about lately.

There are things girls don't learn anymore. A hundred years ago, women were learning how to sew, paint, sing, dance, play piano, and run a household. In Victorian times, a woman was judged on how she hosted dinners and made toast. Literally, making toast was an art back then.

Compare that with today, where take out and microwave dinners are acceptable meal options and most people couldn't fix a hole in their clothes. Being able to sew clothes or run a household or raising children are things that people don't know how, or desire to know how, to do.

I think part of this might stem from our obsession with erasing genders these days. You can't do household chores if you're a woman. That's saying that you're not good for anything but servitude. And a guy can't be the only one supporting his family. A woman needs to be able to make her own career in the world.

Women and men aren't allowed to fall into the familiar gender roles they used to, because assigning roles based on your anatomy is considered wrong in this culture. Thus we have all the issues springing up today, including the fact that women and men aren't allowed to do their God-given roles. That's why we have a lot of lost, drifting people.

Consider the Daya song that was so popular a few years ago, "Sit Still, Look Pretty". While I agree with the idea of the song, that girls shouldn't just be ornaments, a lot of the lyrics I actually disagree with. For example, this part- Then Snow White, She did it right, In her life, Had seven men to do the chores, 'Cause that's not what a lady's for.

True, women aren't just meant to keep house and have babies, but that is a part of what we were created for. In fact, I think women are even cooler when they are mothers and homemakers and maybe still do things on the side.

That's not the only problematic lyric in the song, but that's the one that always gets me. There's a reason the Proverbs 31 woman is held up as a symbol of what true womanhood looks like. She provides for her family. She makes clothes and food. But more than that, she's strong. She's well respected. Her family calls her blessed.

That's what a God-fearing woman should look like.

It's a complicated world, and I'm not saying that all women should stay home and raise kids. But I do feel like many beautiful arts are being lost in this world, and someday we're going to wish they hadn't.

Think about sewing techniques for example. Sure, there are still seamstresses, but most people can't sew a button hole anymore. Who knows how to darn a sock or tat a doily or knit socks? We're happy if we can knit a scarf. (Which is a cool skill I don't have, buy the way.)

Or what about home cooking a meal? My mom had to figure out everything when she got married, so she's been great about teaching me to cook. But many girls today don't get that. They leave home without any knowledge of how to properly make pasta, fry a fish, or cook an egg. And almost no one does things like making cheese or butter at home.

Even doing art is a skill many people don't have anymore. Regular people don't go around knowing how to paint, do pastels, or play piano and sing at the same time. All these wonderful arts are falling aside and I wish they weren't.

Is there a point to this post? Not exactly. I'm just saying that I wish more people would learn the skills that are disappearing and pass them on. I'm saying that women shouldn't be afraid to do beautiful womanly things. Women who desire to be mothers shouldn't be looked down on, they should be praised and admired. And maybe the world would be a bit better because of it.

Thanks for sitting through my ramblings. I'll be back next week with a new writing post for you guys.

Do you have any thoughts on this? What's an art that's disappearing you wish wasn't? Tell me in the comments.

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