A is for Apron

I love aprons. It is an addiction really. And I have no intention of quitting. I do however, need to learn to sew better or I may not be able to afford the kitchen to put the aprons in. If I could find an avatar for my blog with an apron on, that is so what would be there. In fact, I may just offer a prize if anyone can find one for me. I love the way aprons make me feel- beautiful, feminine, prepared for anything, slightly seductive, and the epitome of the Housewife. I really truly love that I am a housewife. (Note: I am not a stay at home mom). Last Christmas my husband got me this apron :




I have used it almost everyday this past year. It is made of oil cloth, and although doesn't lay as nice as a cotton apron, is water proof. I no longer come away from doing dishes soaked in water from bellybutton to inseem. It is fun, feminine, and immensely practical.

I now though have a new favorite apron. It is from this amazing company Heavenly Hostess. Yes, the price is a bit shocking. I mean, it is an apron and one shouldn't feel like you need an apron over your apron so you don't ruin it. But the quality and beauty of these aprons is unlike anything I've ever seen. Mine was an early Christmas present from my mom, along with the matching hair scarf. The slogan of Heavenly Hostess is "Serve with Grace" and in this apron that is exactly what I feel like I do.

The thing about an apron to me, is it makes me feel ready for the day. Ready to be everything that I need to be that day. Ready to always do the next thing. Ready to show my girls that being housewife, being home with them, is something that I love, something that I take seriously and something which brings me great joy. It just isn't the same on the days I never get out of my yoga pants and t-shirt. And believe me, I have plenty of those days. Which is probably why I love my aprons so much. I can see the difference in my day in how I approach it. If I get up, get dressed, go into the kitchen to start the coffee and breakfast that I prepped the night before, and put on an apron-any apron- I want to be productive. I want to clean the kitchen after breakfast instead of leaving it until after dinner. I want to do pre-school activities with my girls, and bake bread and read stories. It is just so different when I stumble out of bed, go downstairs still in my jammies (the afore mentioned yoga pants) and realize I have no idea what to make for breakfast, let alone what to do with the rest of my day. It takes me longer to make coffee and wake up, and it seems like most of my day is gone before I actually get going again.

You know, I might as well admit it- I want to be Donna Reed. Or maybe Amish. Nah, Donna has better aprons.

Because it bears repeating

I have posted these G.K. Chesterton quotes before, but they are too good not to bump up a bit. They need no commentary.

"Women were not kept at home in order to keep them narrow; on the contrary, they were kept at home in order to keep them broad. The world outside the home was one mass of narrowness, a maze of cramped paths, a madhouse of monomaniacs. It was only by partly limiting and protecting the woman that she was enabled to play at five or six professions and so come almost as near to God as the child when he plays at a hundred trades."

"When domesticity, for instance, is called drudgery, all the difficulty arises from a double meaning in the word. If drudgery only means dreadfully hard work, I admit the woman drudges in the home, as a man might drudge at the Cathedral of Amiens or drudge behind a gun at Trafalgar. But if it means that the hard work is more heavy because it is trifling, colorless and of small import to the soul, then as I say, I give [the word]up; I do not know what the words mean. To be Queen Elizabeth within a definite area, deciding sales, banquets, labors and holidays; to be Whiteley within a certain area, providing toys, boots, sheets, cakes and books, to be Aristotle within a certain area, teaching morals, manners, theology, and hygiene; I can understand how this might exhaust the mind, but I cannot imagine how it could narrow it. How can it be a large career to tell other people's children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one's own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No; a woman's function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its smallness."