What did you call what I was doing in the 80's and 90's? It looked a lot like prepping and homesteading. I didn't know what prepping was. I had never heard of homesteading. I was just living life the only way I knew.
I began to homeschool my oldest daughter in the early 80's. I continued to homeschool all 5 on my children from birth through high school. No one could understand why I didn't send my children to school. They criticized and tried to convince me how wrong I was to deprive my children of the interaction with other children. It was funny that my house was always filled with kids from the neighborhood or church. My children went on field trips, took piano lessons, participated in plays, sang in groups, and grew up just like all other children. They interacted with other children as well as lots of adults on a daily basis.
I started to study herbs. I was interested in the medicinal properties of the plants. As I became comfortable with my body and how it worked, I decided to have my 3rd child at home. Then a 4th and 5th child was born at home. This was something no sane person would do, there are hospitals for that! I was considered a different kind of person. No one had a name for what I was doing.
I had a garden. I canned food. When 1999 came, we started to store food, water, and emergency supplies. I tried to think of every possible scenario and prepare for it. No one ever called me a prepper.
I went from a 2000 square foot house to a house that was less than 1000 square foot. There were 7 of us living in 2 bedrooms and with one bath. I never thought of it as a tiny home.
What I was doing in the 80's and 90's was called living. That is the way life was for us. It seems funny to me now that people are living in tiny homes, learning about herbs, gardens, canning, homeschooling, home births and prepping. I couldn't get anyone on board back then. Now everyone is doing it. Is it a fad or a way of life? Whatever you call it, homesteading, farming, canning, prepping, I am still living the life. Now I call it homesteading!
Monday, April 4, 2016
From Park Avenue to a Life of Serenity Married to a King
No one would ever believe that I lived the first 12 years of my life on Park Avenue! All my childhood memories are from that little house on Park Avenue. Ok, so to set the record straight right off the bat, Park Avenue, Columbia, Mississippi! We lived on Park Avenue extension that went out into the country. Our house was on a one acre lot in a curve. The road went in front of our house and then down one side. We had a garden on the other side and in the back. I grew up in a simpler time with gentle parents and 3 siblings that were my best friends as we grew up.
I never saw or heard my parents yelling or arguing about anything. I always tell people I lived the "Ozzie and Harriet" life. I don't remember seeing any of my aunts or uncles arguing either.
My dad started out as a service station attendant. He went into the store that was close to the station, which had a soda fountain, and there he met my mom. Dad had 6 siblings and 5 half siblings. We visited each of them a couple of times a year but they didn't have family get togethers very often
My mom was the 3rd child of a tenant farmer who had 10 children by my grandmother. He had been married before and had 6 children with the first wife. Yes, I had 16 aunts and uncles and about 75 cousins. Easter and Christmas at my grandmother's house was a blast.
The house on Park Avenue was a 2 bedroom block house with one bath at the end of a long hallway. I remember sharing a room with my 2 sisters until after my brother was born. That is when Dad decided it was time to add on. The first addition was to the back of the house. A new bedroom for Mom and Dad and the new baby boy. I, being the oldest, got their old bedroom. I loved it until a year later they closed in the porch to make my sister a bedroom. You had to go through my room to get to hers! After a couple of months, she decided to change rooms with me. Once again, I could shut my door and read without any interruptions.
The house was heated at one time with a wood heater and later with a propane gas heater. There was an attic fan in the long hallway that kept a breeze blowing through the house in the summer. After the add on we had air conditioners in windows in the living area and back bedroom. The house withstood Camille (a furious hurricane in 1969) in August and my brother was born in September. That was a long night. It was the first hurricane I remember. My grandmother stood at the back door and watched it. We were out of power for a couple of weeks and had to go into town to get water.
I have many fond memories of that house on Park Avenue. My sisters and I playing with our Barbies, making straw houses in the yard, the switches Mom made us go break off the plum tree, shelling peas and beans under the mimosa tree, and lots of love from my parents and siblings.
That house on Park Avenue set the stage for what I wanted for my life. We moved a couple of times during my teen years but none of the houses hold such a special place in my life as the house on Park Avenue. My life has has come full circle. I don't live on Park Avenue, but I have the simple life with a loving husband, whose last name is King, in a life of serenity.
I never saw or heard my parents yelling or arguing about anything. I always tell people I lived the "Ozzie and Harriet" life. I don't remember seeing any of my aunts or uncles arguing either.
My dad started out as a service station attendant. He went into the store that was close to the station, which had a soda fountain, and there he met my mom. Dad had 6 siblings and 5 half siblings. We visited each of them a couple of times a year but they didn't have family get togethers very often
My mom was the 3rd child of a tenant farmer who had 10 children by my grandmother. He had been married before and had 6 children with the first wife. Yes, I had 16 aunts and uncles and about 75 cousins. Easter and Christmas at my grandmother's house was a blast.
The house on Park Avenue was a 2 bedroom block house with one bath at the end of a long hallway. I remember sharing a room with my 2 sisters until after my brother was born. That is when Dad decided it was time to add on. The first addition was to the back of the house. A new bedroom for Mom and Dad and the new baby boy. I, being the oldest, got their old bedroom. I loved it until a year later they closed in the porch to make my sister a bedroom. You had to go through my room to get to hers! After a couple of months, she decided to change rooms with me. Once again, I could shut my door and read without any interruptions.
The house was heated at one time with a wood heater and later with a propane gas heater. There was an attic fan in the long hallway that kept a breeze blowing through the house in the summer. After the add on we had air conditioners in windows in the living area and back bedroom. The house withstood Camille (a furious hurricane in 1969) in August and my brother was born in September. That was a long night. It was the first hurricane I remember. My grandmother stood at the back door and watched it. We were out of power for a couple of weeks and had to go into town to get water.
I have many fond memories of that house on Park Avenue. My sisters and I playing with our Barbies, making straw houses in the yard, the switches Mom made us go break off the plum tree, shelling peas and beans under the mimosa tree, and lots of love from my parents and siblings.
That house on Park Avenue set the stage for what I wanted for my life. We moved a couple of times during my teen years but none of the houses hold such a special place in my life as the house on Park Avenue. My life has has come full circle. I don't live on Park Avenue, but I have the simple life with a loving husband, whose last name is King, in a life of serenity.
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