Home Time

How do we train daughters to be future homemakers?  Let’s get practical. For starters, I’d like to suggest that we train them to love the home by having them spend time in the home.  Sounds pretty obvious, right?  It may be, but in the culture we live in, this doesn’t happen without being intentional.  There are so many wonderful opportunities for young women just outside their doorstep.  Without intentional planning they can easily fill up their calendar with outside activities and have very little time left over to spend with family and develop skills in the home. 

As my sisters and I were growing up, my mom kept a close watch on our activities outside the home. Now don’t misunderstand—we did plenty of stuff outside the home! We went to school, worked jobs, hung out with friends, served in the church and community. We were busy girls and Mom was a busy chauffer! But she was careful not to allow these good activities to take up all of our time. She made sure the home was not only a priority in our hearts but in practice as well.

For starters, family nights once a week were a non-negotiable. Faithful attendance at family dinner was a priority as well. We also had regular chores and responsibilities, time with Dad and Mom and our siblings, times of homemaking training, and other important activities such as reading or learning a craft or skill. Mom even helped us carve out time for simply being at home—no agenda necessary, just being there. There were also seasons when we would work part time, take a lighter load at school, pull back from various activities to focus our attention more exclusively on home pursuits. Looking back, these times are some of my most precious memories as a young woman.

The world that is opening up to a young woman is full of exciting opportunities and adventures—many of them very good. But homemaking isn’t always exciting, and it’s almost always in secret. If a young woman hasn’t learned to labor faithfully, behind the scenes, day in and day out, marriage and motherhood is going to be a rude awakening.

If Mom said it once, she said it a thousand times: You can’t learn to love the home if you’re not in the home, and you’re not going to automatically love the home as a wife and mother if you don’t start with the home and family God has given you now.

Thanks Mom, for home time. I love it more than ever now!