Are Your Handicrafts Manly Enough?

Mitchell starting a fire.

We’ve done a lot of handicrafts. A lot! I’m tempted to start listing them all off for you, but then my perfectionist side would take over, and I’d have to spend the next hour making sure I didn’t leave anything out!

Some of the handicrafts we’ve done have been very manly. For instance, we spent the entire Fall term of this school year learning to build campfires and then to cook over them. Other times we have done handicrafts that were very girly, like knitting or sewing a pillow.

Figuring out what tinder burns longest.

Regardless of the perceived correct gender attached to each handicraft, all of my kids have been required to participate fully. And you know what? All of them have wanted to participate fully.

When I think back, I didn’t want to marry a man who didn’t have a clue how do his own laundry, nor did I want to be the kind of girl who couldn’t change a flat tire. I love taking care of my hubby, but things happen in life, and I think we should be prepared as much as we can. (I had a flat tire recently, and let me tell you how happy I was that I could handle it.)

That all said, sometimes, with this homeschooling business, I just wade in and hope it all works out in the end. So, I was thrilled recently when I received a text from one of my brothers, whom I had homeschooled from 6th grade on, thanking me for teaching him how to sew! He is at a school to become a certified welder, and he had torn his work jacket. Nothing to do about it but sew it up, and he did just that. I was so proud of him, but I was even more proud that he thought to thank me for teaching him the skill in the first place.

A few days after that, my son picked up his knitting again. I taught them all how to knit several year ago, and since then my girls have continued to knit off and on regularly. My son has made two scarves over time, (camouflage colored of course,) but it has been a while since he has done any knitting. I can’t help but show you the picture…

Do you see the huge knife attached to his left leg, and the other knife on the table beside him? I laughed so hard, and asked him if he was overcompensating, trying to make up for the fact that he was knitting. You may not know it, but he is also outfitted in full Bear Grylls attire there. Bear Grylls is a survivalist who has several TV shows including Man vs. Wild and Get Out Alive.

When Lewis and Clark and company made it to the Pacific ocean they stopped for the winter to regroup. While they were there they stayed busy taking care of themselves, among other things. They had to feed themselves, make moccasins and other clothing, including socks, and I suspect they did a bit of dehydrating.

On the flip side, I was originally one of two girls. (I say originally, because later on my parents adopted nine more kids.) When I was a kid there were no boys around to shovel horse poop, or help dad roof the barn, or feed the animals in the dark when we got home late, so my sister and I did it. We did all the things that maybe my parents would have had the boy of the family do, had there been one. Frankly, I’m grateful there wasn’t one, because I learned to do a lot of things that I wouldn’t otherwise have even thought I could do.

Last spring and summer my husband spent a lot of time out of town for work. Of course, the lawn mower chose that time to die, so I told my son, “We better figure out how to fix it.” He said, “You can do that?” and I replied, “Well, I never have before, but we can try.”

In the end, it’s all about fostering confidence. The confidence to replace a button or build a fire, knit a hat or repair the lawn mower. Whatever your gender.