The Laura Ingalls Wilder collection was a rite of passage for anyone who grew up in the US in the 1970’s (although, interestingly, my husband and I remember totally different parts of the books. You know, fighting Indians vs. cooking & sewing).
Ma Ingalls would have hated my sewing. She would have made me sit there for hours and rip out all my stitches until they were perfectly tiny, straight and exactly the same size. It’s funny how my perspective changes as I grow older and reread the series. I read the later books in the series and roll my eyes about what a control freak Ma was. I mean, hello, lady, fighting for survival on the frontier. If the sewing holds the cloth together, move on to your next disgusting chore, like making soap out of fat and wood ash. You know, so you can boil water over an open fire to handwash all your family’s clothes. Yeah, I don’t think I would have enjoyed that life so much.
But I digress. I am certainly not advocating that we all run our households like Martha Stewart on steroids, but I also feel that this country has much more of a Brave New World mentality than a Little House one. Our retailers sell so many cheaply made clothes and toys that are designed to break or wear out quickly that it is cheaper and easier to throw stuff out when it gets worn than to repair it. It would cost me more to buy fabric than to buy my daughter a dress at Target, let alone my labor in making the damn thing.
So what does this have to do with the Laura Ingalls Wilder approach to life? Simply, learn to do things yourself to save money and time, and always, always be prepared. Start small, with one thing at a time. Learn how to sew on buttons. Spackle and touch up a hole in the wall. Hand wash delicate clothing instead of sending it to the dry cleaner. Learn how to cook a few simple meals from scratch (pasta, soups, baked potatoes) and and keep the ingredients on hand. Nobody is asking you to become Martha Stewart, but Americans used to survive without outsourcing all aspects of their lives.
My automatic reaction whenever I need something is to run to the store, but I find that if I wait a day or two and check my storage closets, I often can cobble together a solution out of stuff I have lying around. For example, I needed a cover for the seat of my new sofa because my kids seem to think the seat cushions are an excellent dumping ground for food when they are done eating. After searching online for a throw of the right size and color, I remembered the beige velvet curtains from my old apartment. They actually worked perfectly because the fabric is so heavy it doesn’t shift around when we sit on the sofa. And they are machine washable, a nice bonus!
Little solutions like that help me save money and send less stuff to landfills. A win for my household budget and the environment that multiplied across thousands of households could have significant positive impact. It’s time for everyone to step up and see how we can help ourselves.
