Living in the Countryside: Lessons from my Childhood

Growing up in the countryside was such an opportunity for me as a child. I now feel so very fortunate for the daily lessons that I learned growing up in rural Redland, Oregon in the late 1970’s and 80’s. My daily experiences as a child now provide a lot of stability and comfort for the situation we are living today with staying at home, working and learning at home. My brother and I learned a lot from growing up in the country. I feel that we had a true experience of learning how to become self sufficient, to never really be bored and we learned how to do a lot of “DIY” projects before that was a popular term.

In the 70’s my parents bought 20 acres of land which was largely forest. They fulfilled the dream of building their own home on the property, largely on their own, with a bit of help from friends and family. When she was pregnant with me, my mom was still helping to finish building the house. Our front garden was a huge vegetable patch where we would grow: berries, grapes, corn, beans, tomatoes, zucchini, pumpkins, peas, beets, carrots and much more every year. My parents also planted a full fruit orchard with apples, pears, plums, prunes, cherries, walnuts and hazelnuts. This provided a lot of lessons in self proficiency as well as delicious and fresh meals. We would gather apples each season and make our own apple cider with my great grandfather’s apple cider press, dry apples, pears, plums and prunes as well as make jam and sometimes some pie filling. We also canned and froze our vegetables and of course enjoyed them fresh in the season.

We supplemented our harvest with buik dry goods from a food buying club that my mom joined long before Costco existed. We had bulk flour, oats, herbs, spices and more. Much of the time we made our own bread and other staples. When I got older I really enjoyed learning to cook, bake and can everything. I started off with simple recipes from a sweet little cookbook that belonged to my mom when she was a child. From that book I learned how to make cinnamon toast and then lemonade that I proudly made in the summer and brought it out to my parents when they were working in the garden. I appreciate so much how my mom let me have free reign in the kitchen and allowed me to learn from all of the cookbooks we had. I made my way through whole baking books making everything from loaf breads to fancy pastries.

Later on my mom, who was a former art teacher started teaching weaving classes at our home. She still has a large studio with her weaving looms. I got to learn how to weave and as kids we enjoyed having her students come to the house once a week. We got to visit with them and they in turn loved our company.

My Dad was and still is a wood worker. He made his first boat when he was under the age of 15! He is very talented and can engineer anything. At first, he had his workshop in our home’s basement. Later on, as the business grew he built his own woodworking shop near the house. During the 70’s up until part of the 90’s he had a weaving loom business that the whole family worked on to some degree. My organizing skills came in handy when I took over the filing one summer in the office. I remember it was so nice for my brother and I to have both of our parents working at home. My mom taught weaving courses and helped my dad with the business as well as worked in the garden. My brother and I even learned a few wood working and shop skills doing some part time work for my dad later on. For a short while my dad had some employees and it was fun when I was in preschool because we would all eat lunch together in our kitchen. In the summers we often traveled together to a weaving conference (like a trade show). We learned how to set up the booth and we had fun walking around to get to know the other vendors as well. We usually made a vacation out of it and saw the local sights as well.

Fast forward to today, as we are facing a time in which we are all working at home as much as possible depending on our jobs, our kids are learning at home and learning how we do our jobs. As kids my brother and I did go to our local public school, however we learned a lot of lessons in self proficiency and hands-on skills at home. Although I have gone through some rough days adjusting as I do love to go out places and visit with friends and family, the familiarity of working at home, working in the garden and also having our son home with us is coming back to me. My growing up years provide a comfort to me that I know how to be at home, I know how to take care of the earth, grow vegetables and to create a life of my own for my family and with my family though my creativity. I think this is what we are all being called to do. I know that these are unknown and scary times, those are things that I still face every day like everyone else. However, I know in my heart that I can do this, we can do this, together.

The earth has come to a stop to teach us all something. My quiet time in the country growing up, caring for the land and living out of creativity is something I can pass on as a gift not only to myself and to my family but in writing this I can pass it on to all of you.

I know that we can do this, we can rise up out of this stronger than ever. We have to believe that the earth provides, that there is abundance for all and that we can flourish with our creative hearts. I feel so fortunate now, that even though I live in the suburbs, we have a very large garden, I am growing apples, berries, herbs and vegetables that will sustain us and that we can share with our neighbors as well.

What sustains you right now? What lessons from your past can help you right now? I’d love to know!

With lots of love,

Trista