Guest Post: Don't Repeat My Mistakes!
In keeping with our theme of encouraging unmarried women this week, Sherrin asked me if she could share the following lesson she wished she had learned when she was still single.
Don't Repeat My Mistakes!
Guest Post by Sherrin Drew
In our family scrapbook there is a picture of me holding some home baked bread. I must have been about fourteen, and Mum had decided it was time to include some household skills in her home school curriculum. Her efforts were short lived. I complained so much that this was one battle she chose to lose. Mum already had to make her rebellious teenage daughter assist with outside chores and complete her schoolwork, without adding baking to the list.
This is just one snippet of my teenage years, which were largely wasted in unhappiness and rebellion. Now, as a newlywed, I wonder how much better equipped I would be if different choices had been made over ten years ago. I have spent the last six months of married life gradually learning to clean the house, use the vegetables we grow, grocery shop, and plan meals. I have a long way to go!
If I had enthusiastically embraced Mum's plans, I would not have got married and had to learn from scratch. Marriage has quickly taught me that running a household really is hard work, and it requires practise. Even though I tried to learn some household skills in my early twenties at home, this did not make up for the lessons I missed out on as a teen when Mum and I both had more time.
I share this in the hope that it will encourage teenage girls to make the most of the time they have at home with their mothers. When you get married, you could already be an expert at cleaning a house or cooking cheap and nutritious meals. Unlike me, you will not need to invite your Mum over to teach you to clean windows! I encourage you to consider ways in which you can learn as much as possible from your Mum in this season of your life. Take over some of her work. This will make life easier for her now, and for you later! Don't repeat my mistakes.
-Sherrin Drew is a young wife from Australia who blogs at www.sherrindrew.blogspot.com
Graphic from AllPosters.com
Don't Repeat My Mistakes!
Guest Post by Sherrin Drew
In our family scrapbook there is a picture of me holding some home baked bread. I must have been about fourteen, and Mum had decided it was time to include some household skills in her home school curriculum. Her efforts were short lived. I complained so much that this was one battle she chose to lose. Mum already had to make her rebellious teenage daughter assist with outside chores and complete her schoolwork, without adding baking to the list.
This is just one snippet of my teenage years, which were largely wasted in unhappiness and rebellion. Now, as a newlywed, I wonder how much better equipped I would be if different choices had been made over ten years ago. I have spent the last six months of married life gradually learning to clean the house, use the vegetables we grow, grocery shop, and plan meals. I have a long way to go!
If I had enthusiastically embraced Mum's plans, I would not have got married and had to learn from scratch. Marriage has quickly taught me that running a household really is hard work, and it requires practise. Even though I tried to learn some household skills in my early twenties at home, this did not make up for the lessons I missed out on as a teen when Mum and I both had more time.
I share this in the hope that it will encourage teenage girls to make the most of the time they have at home with their mothers. When you get married, you could already be an expert at cleaning a house or cooking cheap and nutritious meals. Unlike me, you will not need to invite your Mum over to teach you to clean windows! I encourage you to consider ways in which you can learn as much as possible from your Mum in this season of your life. Take over some of her work. This will make life easier for her now, and for you later! Don't repeat my mistakes.
-Sherrin Drew is a young wife from Australia who blogs at www.sherrindrew.blogspot.com
Graphic from AllPosters.com
Labels: For the unmarried
posted by Crystal Paine at 4:43 PM
5 Comments:
Wow. Thank you Mrs. Drew, so very much for that convicting and much needed post! I pray that it will be as big of a blessing to countless other girls and young women as it has been for me.
The Lord pricked my heart just about a year or so ago, convicting me of the error of my ways on this very subject. Whenever Mama would try to show my how to make a pillow or try to teach me how to follow a difficult recipe, I would complain, for I felt that that was wasting my valuable time. Oh, how ashamed I am to think that I had acted that way! My dear mother was being so gracious by desiring to teach me important homemaking skills. Thankfully, I'm only 15, so I have plenty of time to learn a whole lot about the art of homemaking, as well as about how to be a good wife and submissive helpmeet to my future husband and a godly mother to my future little blessings. Homemaking truly does require much knowledge in many areas! It is anything but the "mindless drudgery" that the feminists try to say that it is! I'm so thankful that the Lord changed me in this area, and that He has fashioned me into a maiden who heartily desires to learn all she can about the beautiful art of homemaking!
Thank you again so much, Mrs. Drew, for imparting to us your wisdom!
And thank you, Mrs. Paine, for posting this much needed article!
The Lord's richest blessings to you both,
Rebekah
www.byhisgraceandforhisglory.blogspot.com
This is so true. I too, learned this lesson the hard way. And now, I am almost 30 and STILL don't know everything about how to keep a home. I don't live close to my mother so I am attempting to learn all this stuff on my own. Stuff like how to tend a garden and then cook what we grow. I wish I had been more willing to learn from my mother as a teenager.
Thank you for such a great post, Mrs.Drew. I come from a family of 9 kids, and yet I find myself often shaking my head and wondering how I came away knowing next to nothing about cooking, baking, sewing, etc. My mother knew all of those things well, but I think I was too busy designing my ambitious future to pay much attention. It is much harder to learn these things once you have little blessings hanging on about your knees...
Phebe
AMEN. I tell every single young woman I know this. I spent my single years hanging out with my friends doing so many non productive things. The week before I was to wed I ran to my mother in a panic because I had no idea how to sew on a button. I laugh now at all I really did not know how to do.
I am always telling my girls that I want them to learn now with me instead of when they have a houseful of kids and no extra time.
Thanks for the wonderful post. I am so grateful for all I have learned in blog land over the years on how to care for my home and family properly. I only wish I could have learned it sooner.
I'm right there with you Mrs. Drew. I spent my teen years in the same way. I ignored my mother's attempts to train me. I was going to have a career and live in a penthouse in NYC. I was definately not going to have children and be a housewife. Then God got a hold of me... I had to learn everything after I got married and had kids. I see my oldest daughter going the same way I did. I hope that reading some of these posts will help her not repeat my folly.
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