Old Style Skills

Nix143

When I was a lil Nixy I used to spend time with my Nanna and she was the one who taught me all those OS skills - she taught me how to cook and bake and sew and crochet and knit, we did patchwork and all kinds of things together

As I grew up I dropped a lot of those skills but now I am finding I'm using them again and loving it


It's made me wonder though who is teaching our kids these skills now? I know here that we're all pretty clued up but I am sure there are a generation of children growing up who don't know how to do all the things my Nanna taught me. It's made me wonder if I had had a daughter would I have done all these things with her, being a fulltime working mother? I'm sure we'd have baked (and I am teaching DS how to cook) but would my imaginary daughter have absorbed by osmosis almost the knowledge that I did from my Nan?

In today's society are these skills relevant?
Are they inherently sexist? I know my male cousins didn't spend this time with my Nanna and wouldn't have learnt the stuff I did?

Dunno, I am just musing

Loubee_2

I'm the same-have started knitting and cross-sitching again. I've always cooked. My gran and my mum (who worked full time) taught me various things. I hope that i will be able to pass these skills onto a daughter (if/when I have one).

Are they inherently sexist? I know my male cousins didn't spend this time with my Nanna and wouldn't have learnt the stuff I did?

I know my flatmate taught her brothers to cook, as her mother didn't think boys should know how to cook, and my flatmate was appalled by this! I certainly think less of men who can't or won't cook.

I shall join you in musing on it all!

P.S.- love your signature-Nick Cave is great.:)

TNG

Loubee wrote:

Are they inherently sexist? I know my male cousins didn't spend this time with my Nanna and wouldn't have learnt the stuff I did?

I know my flatmate taught her brothers to cook, as her mother didn't think boys should know how to cook, and my flatmate was appalled by this! I certainly think less of men who can't or won't cook.

Me and Mrs TNG are going to make damn sure that both our DSs can cook, wash & iron clothes, sew and do anything and everything they need to.

mirakl

I think it depends on the parents/grandparents. My OH has been a wealth of information for me when I'm learning how to make jam and chutneys etc, because his mother taught him.

My grandmother taught me a lot, however she did give up on me and knitting because I just showed no aptitude towards it whatsoever! lol

mikeywills

Don't know how to sew except put on a button and mend or amend a pair of trousers, but I learnt how to cook from both my parents.
When I grew up we used to do our school homework in the kitchen while one or other parent cooked.
Now that I am married with my own daughter, the chores are split, we both cook my wife does the laundry, I iron, and we share the cleaning.
I think that if both parents work as we have to, then the chores traditionally undertaken by the housewife should be evenly split.
Sexist or not its irrelevant, I am more concerned that today there seem to be so many children that don't have any home skills at all.
In simple terms I would say that there are two reasons
1 With both parents out to work the children spend time in a creche or nursery and,
2 So many of us live away from the areas where we grew up, that the contact our children have with their grandparents is limited. Hence a lot of the skills that our grandparents have the time to demonstrate do not get passed on.

mrbadexample

Loubee wrote:

I certainly think less of men who can't or won't cook.

Loubee_2

mrbadexample wrote:

unlike yourself Mr BE, who is a budding Masterchef! :beer:

recovering_spendaholic

I learned to cook from my father (who would be 90 if he was still alive), who was a chef, and he had learned from his father, who had been taught by his mother in the late 1800's. My Mother couldn't cook very well but she could sew and do alot of other, now called OS things. I just absorbed these through watching her and hope that I have passed them on to my two girls, who are 16 and 9. The 16 year old is totally disinterested in cooking or anything else really, but DD2 loves to cook and help around the house and begs to be allowed to iron!! My ex husband was raised by a mother who thought that it was heresy to expect her little prince to cook, clean or do anything else - which is probably why he grew up to be such a !!!!less sonofab*tch. I think there are now two generations of women and girls who have no conception of how to budget (which is one of the most important OS skills), cook, clean, make do and mend or anything else. These skills have been somehow deemed to be belittling to women, with the results being beamed into our living rooms daily on the likes of the Jeremy Kyle show.

Jo138

I learnt how to crochet a doiley at Sunday School when I was 9, and a lovely little old lady living nearby taught me to knit a pair of doll's knickers when I was 11 - everything else I've had to teach myself out of books.

I now crochet, knit, tat, weave, sew, embroider, work with polymer clay, draw/paint and a ton of other crafts. I taught myself to cook when I either starved or did it! I now design all my own creations, and ended in the restaurant trade, writing my own recipe book (vegan). I've given up writing as too time-consuming.

(I also taught myself to play piano from books/tapes).

I know everyone is not as gifted as me, but surely there are plenty of books around to teach oneself. It's not brain-surgery after all.

Nix143

In a throwaway society that aims to be non sexist how would you go about preserving and promoting these particular sets of skills?

I've been sat here thinking about them and wondering what worth is given, if any, to these skills within our society now. Cooking aside, which I think is becoming far more widespread across the sexes when people DO bother to cook, I can't see how these skills can be preserved and passed down on a big enough scale to make a difference.

Should they be? Obviously for this community we see the value of them but I don't see that elsewhere in my life. Hopefully with a move towards a 'greener' more environmentally aware society then their importance will grow but I hope they don't die out in the meantime

Or am I being a bit pessimistic?

broomstick27

I think with the existance of a certain clothes store beginning with "P" (that i must admit to frequenting a lot)where clothes are so cheap that they even beat charity shop prices it is really hard to justify the cost of wool/material etc. I realise there are massive ethical considerations here as well as not wanting everyone to wear the same clothes but it is hard.

I have just taught myself to crochet (Nan gave up trying to teach me to knit years ago!) and having practiced by making those little hats for smoothies I am about to start making myself one. I also love making my own clothes and adapt old clothes that i dont like or dont fit but cant afford to buy material to start from scratch.

Anyway thats some random musing from me about the subject