Today I am thankful for...
needing to wait. Yes, to wait. According to this site, one of the definitions of wait is "to remain in a state in which you expect or hope that something will happen soon". In this instant, I-want-it-now, credit card dependent society, people don't have to wait for a lot of things. When people need something, they buy it. Now. They don't think about the time it took to make what they need, they don't understand the real process behind it, or appreciate the effort that it required of someone. In preparation for the holiday, my husband and I have been making things, things that I want to continue to make after the holiday season.
Canning and preserving food. The whole process of canning requires patience. Prepping the jars, then keeping them in the water bath for the required amount of time, then the biggest test of patience - waiting for the jars to cool. Oh, how I wanted to unscrew those rings so that I could put my cute little labels on the top! Yes, it is much easier to buy jam in the store, but the satisfaction of seeing those little jars filled with goodness that I made and that my husband canned - awesome.
Making soap. Soap making requires a LOT of patience - about 2-4 weeks worth! When you're making the soap, you have to wait for the hot lye to cool down and the cold oils to heat up. Then you have to keep the soap mixure warm for a period of time so that the saponification process occurs. THEN after you cut the bars and they look ready to use, you still have to wait several weeks for them to cure, to make sure that all of the lye has been converted.
Through the act of making things by hand - food, crafts, clothing - you learn patience. You don't have a choice - if you use the soap too soon, you may get a bad sensation in a place you don't really want to! Your prized strawberry jam would be gloopy glop that you wouldn't be able to enjoy months later, in the dead of winter when you need that sweet pick-me-up. I like the definition above because it talks about hope. "To hope that something will happen". There is an element of excitement. After you stood in the kitchen for several hours - waiting for the pizza dough to rise, roasting and then pureeing the butternut squash, making the ricotta cheese, sauteeing the onions - is the pizza even going to taste good?
I want my daughter to learn these crafts, these skills, these behaviors, along with many others that I don't know how to do (yet). I want her to learn patience. I want her to know that waiting is not a bad thing. Just like the waiting of a pregnant mother, waiting can be filled with hope and excitement also.*
What are you thankful for today?
I encourage other bloggers to leave a a link to their Thankful Tuesday post and I encourage everyone to share what they are thankful for.
(*No, I am not pregnant and not wanting to be.)