There are 30 pioneer skills we cannot lose at the very minimum I want to address today. Here’s the deal, I grew up sewing my own clothes, making bread, canning food, and gardening. Now, some of these skills we may perform every day, once a week, or some we have never done and don’t want to do them.
I understand, I totally do. I’m left-handed, and I’ll tell you, I have always wanted to knit or crochet and I could never understand how to do it because I was always being taught by a right-handed person. If I have a special baby I know that is being born I have my friend Kathleen make a pair of knitted or crocheted booties. Oh my gosh, when I go to her house she’s always knitting or crocheting something.
She made a hat she knitted for me by measuring my head and it’s my favorite because SHE made it for me. I have a blogging friend I purchased some crocheted hand warmers, and I treasure them because Janet Garmen made them.
She spins the soft wool and these keep me warm every winter. Timber Creek FarmsI love how she designs them. I hesitate to say she has a homestead because to me she has a HUGE farm with every animal known to man.
I’ve yet to figure out the difference between a homestead and the old-fashioned word FARM. Hence, her blog is called, Timber Creek Farms. There we have it.
When I was younger, my mother always wanted my great-grandmother’s spinning wheel. After my grandmother died, my mom received the spinning wheel she had always wanted. Now, keep in mind none of us knew how to spin wool, but we would visualize doing it.
It’s called making wishes into dreams. Well, the dream never came to fruition, but when my mom died I asked for the spinning wheel. It’s quite large to put on display in my small home, but I am waiting for some inspiration on how to frame it so I can put this special family treasure on display.
As I remember, years and years ago, there was one restaurant drive-thru with some girls on roller skates carrying trays filled with hamburgers, fries, and drinks level with their shoulders to each car in the parking stalls.
We still have some of those today, maybe not with rollerskates, but it was a big deal back in the day. Could this be when people started doing the drive-thru dinners? I don’t know.
What I do know is the fact that we are becoming an overweight country from eating unhealthy food from drive-thrus, restaurants, and cafes that add possibly way too much butter (trust me I love butter) and salt. Why do the food outlets do this? It’s quite simple, it makes the food taste better, not to me, but to some people.
I think this is why Mark and I seem to get an upset stomach eating out because we only eat out once a month, if that, and the food is too rich.
I don’t know if you remember when I told you this, but when I used to work crazy hours I would pick up “takeout” on my way home and eat at 10:00 P.M.
Well, I started putting on weight with the food I picked up. It was delicious but packed with lots of yummy butter and salt, probably more than I care to know about. I had awesome neighbors who would bring some homemade meals occasionally, they were gold to me.
Nothing is better than homemade dinners! Mark and I would rather eat at home and just relax in the comfort of our homes. When I decided to semi-retire, I said: “I never want to stand in line or wait for any meals ever again.” I have followed this statement for over 8 years now. We live about ten miles from town, and there isn’t one place I would rather eat than at my home. Ron Brown reminded me about Olive Oil Lamps
Pioneer Skills
- Baking: I realize baking overlaps with cooking, but there is something about the feel of bread dough in your hands. Or, grab a bowl and cream the butter with sugar using a wooden spoon or a Danish whisk. Then add the remainder of the ingredients. Then have the kids use two spoons to drop by teaspoonfuls on the greased cookie sheets. I feel like making some pumpkin cookies right now. My friend, Melissa Richardson taught me how to use this: Danish Dough Hand Whisk / Mixer 11″
I prefer the 11″ inch size because it fits inside a wide-mouth quart jar and it’s easier for my hands to mix up cookies, and brownies, or muffins. - Bartering: Bartering is great after emergencies or to trade teaching skills to one another. Store coffee and liquor because people will really want or need those items. I traded a few bread-making classes I taught for a brand-new red KitchenAid stand mixer.
- Beekeeping: I follow a friend over in Colorado via FaceBook and watch her progress through the different steps of beekeeping.
- Blacksmithing: I love going to places that know how to do this, but I do not have horses, and I love watching this skill.
- Bread making: As you know I love making bread, any kind of bread. Please remember to use fresh bread flour and fresh SAF Instant yeast and your bread will never fail. I remember one blogger sent me a rather mean email accusing me of never having made my one-hour French bread because hers did not rise. Well, guess what, I got over 20 emails telling me the recipe was the best recipe they had ever tried. That same recipe was used when my girls sold door-to-door when they were younger to earn a little extra money. I do believe if it’s overcast my bread will not rise, old wives tale or not, I don’t know. I never make bread when it’s overcast. My bread always turns out. Now, not all the loaves are perfectly shaped, but the taste is awesome.
- Building: Mark and my family have built out basem*nts in so many houses, we have lost count. I am now going to have one of my sons-in-law build me two 3-bed bunk beds. Yay, we can then sleep six in the grandkid’s room!
- Canning food: I’m so glad Mark and I took the Master Preserver Canning class here at the Utah State University extension service education center. I knew some of the articles I was reading on some websites were dead wrong. They told me about canning some foods that I knew could not be safely canned. Yes, people will argue about it, but as one registered nurse said: “I hope they make it out of the ICU alive to tell about it.”
- Cooking: I wrote this one because I feel like we need to bring back cooking from scratch. You know by grabbing something from the pantry and/or refrigerator and throwing dinner together quickly, and healthier.
- Cooking outside: If you have charcoal, matches, tinder, and a Dutch oven, you are ready to boil water and cook outside.
- Dehydrating food: I love dehydrating food, although it doesn’t have a long shelf life like commercially processed foods.
- Family meals together: I think eating meals together as a family is something that people are not doing as much anymore. Is life too busy, or are there too many lessons on the calendar? I don’t know.
- First aid and medical care: I have neighbors on my street that call when they need a bandaid, cold medicine, or Benadryl. Life is good if you have a good first aid kit if the pharmacies all shut down for days, weeks, or months. It’s the prepper in me, always be prepared.
- Fishing: Mark goes fishing about once or twice a month with one of his best friends who owns a fishing boat. What joy fishing brings to both of them. I know we could eat as long as there are still fish in the lakes near us, and there are a lot of them. We are blessed with a lot of water where we live. How long the water will be here is a good question. Right now they do “catch and release,” but we could have them start bringing the fish home if the need arises.
- Gardening: I wish more people would garden, there’s something really awesome about digging with your hands in the dirt, then watching the seeds sprout and picking the fresh fruits and garden veggies. Life is good!
- Grinding Wheat: I’m all over this. You can put “wheat grinder” in my search bar and I show you several ways you can grind wheat.
- Growing fruit trees: this is something we used to do, but our lot is so small. I’m hoping to trade or barter homemade bread for a small box of fresh fruit when our friends’ trees start to produce. Yay!
- Healing our bodies: I am big into this, but I do have Dr. Alton’s book: The Survival Medicine Handbook: A Guide for When Help is Not on the WayI love essential oils, but that’s about all I can say or the FDA may shut down my website, enough said.
- Hunting: oh my gosh, my nephew Collin is a hunting hero of mine, and they eat the meat they shoot. I still can’t believe that we once cut up the dead deer spread out on my kitchen table that Mark shot the first year we were married. I get the giggles thinking of it.
- Knitting: As I said above, this is an awesome skill, just think about how we could use this with yarn that goes on sale. Or better yet, we can buy the soft awesome yarn from Janet’s Timber Creek Farm above.
- Know your neighbors: I know I have talked about getting to know your neighbors. That guy down the street with a chainsaw may be your next best friend. Get together and make teams with people near you and exchange your skills and ideas. Trust me, we will need those people living near us after a disaster or unforeseen emergency.
- Manners: I love hearing children say please and thank you. It’s hard when I see kids screaming back at their parents at the stores I frequent. It doesn’t happen often, but we do need to teach children to respect grown-ups, other people’s furniture, and school property.
- Quilting: Do you remember your grandmothers using every scrap of fabric and hand-piecing them together?
- Raising animals: the only animals we can have where I live are two pets. I couldn’t kill a chicken or goat to eat it anyway, but I have wonderful friends that have the skill and knowledge to do this.
- Repurposing old clothes: I love that some of my grandkids buy clothes from thrift stores and cut them down by sewing them to fit family members, if necessary.
- Saving garden seeds: I’ve personally never done this, but I know people who do as long as they are not Monsanto GMO seeds. Please see if you can get Heirloom seeds, they are the very best.
- Sewing: this proud grandma loves hearing when her grandkids are learning to sew, woohoo! If you can take lessons from someone on how to sew, do it. My hands aren’t that great anymore, but I used to love sewing. I could sew anything, with or without a pattern. I realize it is not relaxing for some people, but it is for me. Having the right sewing machine makes all the difference. I learned on a Singer, then BabyLock, and when my mom died I used some inheritance money to purchase a Bernina sewing machine I have always wanted. Be sure and keep all your sewing machines, cleaned and oiled. Don’t forget to use good needles and thread, it makes all the difference in the world. And another thing to learn is mending clothes either with a sewing machine or with a needle and thread.
- Sharing: I love sharing my talent for making bread with people. I love to share my time to show people how to organize just about everything in their homes, or garages. Sharing meals with the sick or elderly brings everyone joy and blessings.
- Stonework: This is a great skill because we never know when we may have to do some stonework, inside our homes or outside.
- Water gathering and storage: Luckily today we don’t have to haul water, but we do need to store water for emergencies. I wrote about storing water a few days ago. Please don’t stand in line waiting for water bottles from your city if the water becomes contaminated. Not fun.
- Welding: this is an awesome talent and my son-in-law uses this skill to this day! And it will come in handy when we construct the strong sturdy new bunk beds.
- Comment from Bryce:Two other skills I think you should mention are sharpening a knife for the job at hand and rope skills, whether or not it is a simple splice or a knot that is easy to untie after it is used.
- Comment from JB: Weaving!! I love her reminder.
I prefer the 11″ inch size because it fits inside a wide-mouth quart jar and it’s easier for my hands to mix up cookies, and brownies, or muffins.
I love essential oils, but that’s about all I can say or the FDA may shut down my website, enough said.Final Word
May you think of your own family pioneer skills that you can bring back to life, and maybe you can teach some pioneer skills to your neighbors, family, and friends. May God Bless this world, Linda
Vintage Skills by Food Storage Moms
Copyright Images: Bread Making Woman AdobeStock_128083119 by Zoran Zeremski
