Grandma’s Apron

Published by admin under Cloths and Shoes, Grandparents, Parenting, Simple Pleasures on June 17, 2009

Do women wear aprons anymore? I think they do, in fact, I know they do, but when I put an apron on, it doesn’t look anything like the apron’s my mother or grandmother used to wear, and doesn’t get used nearly as much.  My mother always, always dressed nicely each day, wearing a dress or skirt with a sweater or blouse.  It was only in the later years when teens had moved on to wearing jeans in high school that I remember my Mom finally wearing pants or slacks.

But an apron was very important if you wanted to keep your dress clean, and I suppose it still is.  I read a little write up in a recent newsletter from a quilting club I belong to that was so nostalgic, and I thought I’d share it with you, it’s called “The History of Aprons”...I’ll give credit where it’s due…as soon as I find out who wrote this!

“I don’t think our kids know what an apron is.  The principal use of Grandma’s apron was to protect the dress underneath, because she only had a few, it was easier to wash aprons than dresses and they used less material, but along with that, it served as a potholder for removing hot pans from the oven.  Here’s some other things Grandma’s apron was good for:

• It was wonderful for drying children’s tears, and on occasion was even used for cleaning ears.
• From the chicken coop, the apron was used for carrying eggs, fussy chicks, and somtimes half-hatched eggs to be finished in the warming oven.
• When company came, those aprons were ideal hiding places for shy kids.
• And when the weather was cold, grandma wrapped it around her arms.
• Those big old aprons wiped many a perspiring brow, bent over the hot wood stove.
• Chips and kindling wood were brought into the kitchen in that apron.
• From the garden, it carried all sorts of vegetables.  After the peas had been shelled, it carried out the hulls.
• In the fall, the apron was used to bring in apples that had fallen from the trees.
• When unexpected company drove up the road, it was surprising how much furniture that old apron could dust in a matter of seconds.
• When dinner was ready, Grandma walked out onto the porch, waved her apron, and the men knew it was time to come in from the fields to dinner.
• It will be a long time before someone invents something that will replace that ‘old time apron’ that seved so many purposes.

PS - I don’t think I ever caught anything from an Apron”