Hello and welcome to Grasshopper Homestead! I am so glad you are here. If you are anything like me, you admire the women of the past and feel a deep connection to them. Perhaps you are drawn to vintage and rural living. You might also find the hectic chaos of modern life takes a toll on you. If you work outside the home, you may be overwhelmed by all your responsibilities and interested in learning the time-tested, tried-and-true ways our fore mothers managed to do it all. Alternatively, you may be an old soul on the hunt for ideas to combat the fast-paced hustle of the modern world and bring a spirit of sweet simplicity and nostalgia to your home. You might even have dreams of owning a piece of the rural countryside. If any of the above resonates with you, you’ve come to the right place! I can help.
My name is Lyneisa and I live in the country on 20 acres with my husband. Even though my husband and I both work outside the home full-time, we also feel led to live a slower, more heartfelt life. While we don’t shun technology or attempt to live in a time capsule, we endeavor to keep the spirit of old-fashioned and rural living alive in our everyday life. Using vintage homemaking skills, I strive daily to create and maintain a welcoming, nurturing home reminiscent of my grandparents’ house… a sanctuary against the fast-paced distraction of modern life. Through trial and error, I have found successful ways to care for my home and family using vintage homemaking advice while continuing to work full-time. And I’m still learning more!
But it wasn’t always that way!
Raised in the rural countryside of northeast Texas next to my grandparents’ small farm, I spent many happy hours helping my parents and grandparents. By spending so much time with them, I naturally became interested in learning about their life experiences. Born in the late 1910s, my grandparents came of age during The Great Depression. I grew up listening to my grandmother’s stories about life in the Depression and the hardships she and her family endured. These stories planted the seeds of my long-term interest in the 1930s and 40s. As I read articles about the shortages and rationing of the 40s, my curiosity about the wartime era increased. Flipping through photo albums and watching films from the period introduced me to the styles and fashions of the day. I found the dichotomy of elegance and glamour during hard times endlessly fascinating. Pretty soon my interest influenced my tastes. During my visits to flea markets and antique shops, I began to notice and collect bric-a-brac of the era: dishware, art pottery, colorful printed tablecloths, embroidered linens, and sewing and knitting patterns.
In addition to learning about their lives, I loved learning old-fashioned skills from my grandparents. Consequently, I always envisioned having a simple, homemade, self-sufficient life like theirs. However, I also planned to have a career. Both of my parents worked, and I always planned to go to college and have a good career to support myself, because you just never know what life will throw at you. So, after high school, I went to college, earned my degree, and then went to work full-time in the corporate world.
Once I was out on my own and trying to keep house while working, I realized just how hard it can be to manage both home and career. Precariously perched between doing ALL the things and “I’m so tired,” I always felt internal struggle and overwhelm in trying to manage my home life and career simultaneously. Back in early 2014, inspired by my long enduring interest in the past, as well as another blogger’s experiment, I decided to finally get my house and life in order, 1940s-style. I planned to implement the household procedures commonly used by women back then to not only help me feel like I had a better handle on my housekeeping, but also prepare me for my long-term goals of marriage and farm life. Thus, I set about the task of getting my house in order using what I had learned from my grandmother and some cookbooks and homemaking manuals from the 30s and 40s, but there was one thing I did not anticipate. Later in 2014, I met Joe and the focus on my little 1940s project waned as I found myself swept up in a fast-paced and glorious courtship culminating in a Christmas engagement and April wedding.
My struggle with household management only increased after I married and became an instant mom to my stepdaughter. In trying to “have it all,” I rarely did anything as well as I would have liked. Like many other women, I juggled a demanding job while trying to care for my home and family and still find time for my hobbies and interests. From the outside looking in, it looked like I was doing well in life. However, too many days found me running behind and forgetting to do important things because I had no system in place to help me manage life. I secretly dreamed of being able to stay home and simply focus on being a wife and mom, because I thought I might finally be able to at least keep up with managing the home if I had time during the day. However, I knew we needed my income if we were going to be able to afford the homestead and acreage in the country we dreamed of.
I kept asking myself, “What am I doing wrong?” It wasn’t as if I didn’t have any domestic knowledge or ability. Thanks to my mother and grandmother, I knew how to cook and enjoyed cooking meals at home. I knew how to keep the checkbook balanced and the bills paid on time. I knew how to clean. I knew how to sew and mend. I had all these skills and yet, I couldn’t seem to piece it all together in a successful schedule and routine while also working a full-time job and being a wife and mother. Thinking that there must be some trick I was missing, I decided, once again, to seek out advice from some vintage cookbooks and housekeeping manuals. As I looked through the many books on domestic arts I picked up at local flea markets, as well as those available in the open domain on Internet Archive, a recurring theme, independent of publication date, emerged. Homemakers often felt overwhelmed and struggled to do everything they needed to do within the time they had, regardless of whether they worked outside the home or not. I began to realize that being a housewife with her days at home did not automatically ensure that a woman would be successful in managing her home well. Clearly, other factors played a part. Obviously, education and training, whether passed down directly from the women that came before her or through a more formal method such as finishing school or correspondence courses, were important. However, the most helpful advice that I read in these old texts discussed methods of improving two things: the homemaker’s mindset and routines and efficiency within the home.
And that’s what Grasshopper Homestead is all about. It’s about taking a step back in time, slowing life down a little, and learning ways to make homemaking more efficient while gaining a new appreciation for the domestic arts. Are you like me? Do you feel a kinship with the women of the past and sometimes feel like you were born in the wrong era? Do you want to learn more about vintage homemaking while also establishing routines that get you organized and reduce overwhelm? If that resonates with you, please consider subscribing. I love to share all that I’ve learned about vintage and rural living, including the old-fashioned methods that helped women create and maintain comfortable, cozy homes for their families, even in some of the most difficult circumstances.
Should you wish to contact me, please email me directly at grasshopperhomestead (at) gmail (dot) com.
Warm regards,
Lyneisa
(pronounced Ly-nee-sa)
Make it your goal to live a quiet life, minding your own business and working with your hands.
--1 Thessalonians 4:11
