Another collection of of forgotten skills or are they just wives tales. You tell me
A Mother's Wisdom:
- I grew up with 4 brothers and no sisters. I can remember as if yesterday my mother telling us if you crossed your eyes or made faces that your face would eventually grow that way.
- Or carrying my little brother on my hip all the time would make him bowlegged. ( He is by the way)
- That if you swallowed your chewing gum that you would eventually not be able to urinate because it would plug you up.
- knuckle cracking would cause your knuckles to be big or even cause arthritis.
- waiting 1 hour to swim or you would get cramps
- Or how about " A whistling girl and a crowing hen both will come to no good end"
A Mother's Cures:
- How did your mother remove ticks. Mine would smear some Vick's vaporub on them. She said it would smother them and they would fall off. Works for chiggers too. Or atleast it helps the itch. I swear my mother thought that stuff was a miracle of modern medicine.
- My mother swore my grandfather could remove warts. I guess he said some sort of prayer over them and they were gone? He died when I was young so I don't remember ever seeing this. A skill I definitely didn't inherit that I know of anyway.
- How did your mother cure fingernail biting. I grew up in South Louisiana and we cure everything with Hot Sauce. It worked and you eventually develop a taste for the stuff. Cussing too! That's why everyone there eats hot sauce.
- How did your mother treat bee stings? My mother would keep tobacco in the house and would make a paste of tobacco and spit. (ugh) My kids would run...just sayin. Then she would put it on the sting and leave it on for a couple minutes and then take it off. She swore it drew the stinger out.
- My mother cured boils with a paste made from peach leaves. She cooked them down and put them warm on a boil then covered with bandage. I have only had one in my life and it brought it to a head and popped it.
What was your mother's favorite story with a moral?
My mothers was the Little Red Hen!
Work ethic! Work ethic! Work ethic!
When you look in the fridge what is in there other than food. Let me see....
sausage casing
fish bait
batteries
Energizer says:No, storage in a refrigerator or freezer is not required or recommended for batteries produced today. Cold temperature storage can in fact harm
batteries if condensation results in corroded contacts or label or seal damage due to extreme temperature storage. To maximize performance and
shelf life, store batteries at normal room temperatures (68°F to 78°F or 20°C to 25°C) with moderated humidity levels (35 to 65% RH).
Guess I'll take the batteries out of the fridge now!
Predicting the Sex of a baby?
Predicting the sex of a baby. I have seen people do this with many different objects from broom straws to weddings rings.
To predict the sex of a baby: Suspend a wedding band held by a piece of thread over the palm of the pregnant girl. If the ring swings in an oval or circular motion the baby will be a girl. If the ring swings in a straight line the baby will be a boy.
O Wise one was reading a periodical of some sort one time and they advertised a sex indicator for $5.00 plus shipping. He bit and ordered because at the time we were raising game birds and thought this would be useful. When he got it in he felt like a number one fool.
Yep it's a piece of string a wire nut and a piece of copper wire! But guess what it works! Really...we use it on our baby chickens and you would not believe how accurate it is. We think it has something to do with magnetic fields....
Did your mother wash on a certain Day?
They that wash on Monday,
Have all the week to dry.
They that wash on Tuesday,
Are not so much awry.
They that wash on Wednesday,
Are not so much to blame.
They that wash on Thursday,
Wash for shame.
They that wash on Friday,
Wash in need.
They that wash on Saturday,
Oh, they are slow indeed!'
Mine washed on Monday and we had red beans and rice every Monday.
Okay now it is your turn......let's hear your cure, mother's wisdom, story or wives tale.
And for heavens sake get those batteries out of the fridge!
Blessings from The Holler
The Canned Quilter
These are wonderful! Many are the ones I heard all my life.
ReplyDeleteVicks was our wonder drug along with carbolic salve. The Watkins Man said Carbolic salve would cure everything but the crack in a fence post.
I heard many of these from my Momma and Granny --- the faces, the bowlegged thing, knuckle cracking, eating and waiting to swim, swallowing gum but it wasn't plugging the urination it was plugging somewhere else. lol
ReplyDeleteMy Papaw could remove warts from hands and fingers. I never knew how he did it but it involved him rubbing a penny over them and not sure what else. I was 7 when he removed one on my finger and that was the last one I had ever. I've never had another one.
Bee stings were treated with onion juice in our house. I now treat them with a plaintain leaf from the yard for my children. You chew the plaintain then smear the goo onto the bee sting - takes out the sting as well as any swelling.
I heard the baby predicting thing from my Mother but it was done with your wedding ring or a pencil. I already knew the sex of my oldest (daughter) -- just knew (didn't ask the ultrasound tech to tell me). Mom insisted on doing the ring thing. It went round and round. Alas my daughter was born and Mom said "told you so". (lol I already knew in my heart -- I knew on all my children. I can't explain it. I just knew.)
Mom washed laundry whenever. I was laundry on Monday. I think my oldest now does this in her household.
There's a cute prayer that I have framed titled "Days of Our Lives"
Monday ~ Wash Day ~ Lord, help me wash away all my selfishness and vanity, so I may serve you with perfect humility through the week ahead.
Tuesday ~ Ironing Day ~ Dear Lord, help me iron out all the wrinkles of prejudice I have collected through the years so that I may see the beauty in others.
Wednesday ~ Mending Day ~ O God, help me mend my ways so I will not set a bad example for others.
Thursday ~ Cleaning Day ~ Lord Jesus, help me to dust out all the many faults I have been hiding in the secret corners of my heart.
Friday ~ Shopping Day ~ O God, give me the grace to shop wisely so I may purchase eternal happiness for myself and all others in
need of love.
Saturday ~ Cooking Day ~ Help me, my Savior, to brew a big kettle of brotherly love and serve it with clean, sweet bread of human kindness.
Sunday ~ The Lord's Day ~ O God, I have prepared my house for you. Please come into my heart so I may spend the day and the rest of my life in your presence.
- Author Unknown
I've never kept batteries in the fridge. I can barely keep them on hand at all. lol
Now that its getting colder...
ReplyDeleteDid you ever hear of fore telling the severity of the winter by reading the colors on a wooly bear??
This time of year you can find these caterpillars that are either black, brown, or a combo of both. We were told they were called wooly bears and I was always told that you can tell how the winter will go by their coloring for instance:
If the wooly bear is brown then black then brown the winter will start mild, be bad in the middle and then end mild...
Or if its black, brown, black the it will start bad, slow down some in the middle and then end severe
If you find one all brown it means a mild winter, if you find one all black, you had better stock up because its gonna be bad plain bad winter.
Oh boy, so much wisdom. Let's see grandmama used snuff for bee stings, camphophanic (sp?) and methialade (sp?) on everything. Not to mention the same vapor rub which I still use on my children and myself. (Love the stuff!)
ReplyDeleteOn the funny side, swallowing watermelon seeds would make you swell up, going barefoot before the first bee sighting would give you rheumatism....although I must admit I broke this rule and had arthritis and fibromyalgia before 35...so maybe the last laugh was on me.
Wash day varied a tiny bit, but was never on the weekend. Because we pulled the old ringer washer up to grandmama's sink and hung the clothes out to dry the weather had to be clear.
Saturday was when we went to "town" to get groceries and you did some visitin'! Sunday was for church and the only work done was taking care of the livestock and the cooking.
There were always seeds and some bait in the freezer. Mine is pretty dull though...food items and ice....lol.
Did she use fatback to pull the poison out of cuts? My grandmama did and it worked. Would also help draw out splinters. I'd love to know why it worked from a science view point..lol.
ReplyDeleteMy inlaws still do they laundry on Monday; I'm doing it any day of the week it needs to be done. I still love that old standby Vicks; it's even good for sore muscles.
ReplyDeleteOkay, I shouldn't say this, but I have to let it out. My mom said to douche and I wouldn't get pregnant.
ReplyDelete