I Want to be a Homemaker

Moms are awesome. All kinds of moms. Love your kids more than you love sleeping? Yep, you're awesome.

Young Housewife by Alexey Tyranov--
Oh, that we could all rock a lady turban.

Okay. I want to be a stay at home mom. I'm not harshing on whatever kind of mom you want to be. I'm not going to say that I know better than you do about what you and God feel is right for your life --because that is crazy.  I'm just supportive of staying home when it works for you. And, being a stay-at-home, although I know that there are millions of women like me, I still feel a little...defensive about it. So there you go, no matter what kind of mom you are, you think--at least some of the time--that other people are judging you and finding your choices wanting. 

I am not a 1950's housewife. If anything I'm a 1750's housewife...or at least I'm working towards it. Let me give you a history lesson about "traditional" female responsibilities. Women were expected to feed their families. Men paid the rent, taxes, tuition, and sundry supply bills--whatever they needed cash for. Men farmed market crops, but women tended the family garden and animals. Women grew the carrots and celery, tended and butchered the chickens, hauled the water, and cooked the soup it all went in. They were expected to teach the basics of reading and math to their children, young boys and girls (because good Puritans believed that women should be able to read the bible for themselves).  They knew and prepared herbal remedies (of questionable potency, but it was almost the best medical knowledge available at the time) to combat the zillion ailments that attacked their children. Women of any kind of status were extremely well read in the classics--like knew on sight who people like Lysander, Calliope, Hygeia, etc. were and made allusions to them in their day-to-day lives (well, their letters anyway).  

So please, let's stop talking about how "limited" the traditional women's sphere is. I mean really let's keep reading past verse 10 please when someone brings up Proverbs 31: "An excellent wife her price is far above rubies... she works with eager hands. She considers a field and buys it; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard. She sets about her work vigorously;   her arms are strong for her tasks. She sees that her trading is profitable, and her lamp does not go out at night."

The combination of 1950's consumerism and pedantic feminists (the bad kind) have eroded the awesome that is real homemaking-- describing a completely fabricated "traditional" woman.  Staying at home can be so much more than providing daycare. It's not being harried by small children during the day and then self-medicating on romance novels at night. Staying home can change the world. Really. Not in the "neck that turns the head" kind of change the world. I'm not saying that I'll raise the kind of boy that will change the world *eye roll*. I'm saying that a million women who take time to mend instead of toss, to make your own home and happiness instead of purchasing someone else's marketing genius, and to read deeply and teach their kids in the everyday moments of life--to be informed for your own self. And a million other tiny habits that staying home to make a home affords--that can change the world. 

Abigail Adams was a boss.

Because this isn't 1750. We are just as capable but we've got the vote. We have college degrees. We've got microwaves. Seriously, think about what Abigail Adams could've done with a microwave and an oven that preheats itself.  

She would change the world.