Daughter #1 texted me this photo yesterday of Mother Earth News magazine. She said “I didn’t know they still published this.” I looked at the text and smiled. It hit my “mom feels” for a number of reasons.
First, because I just wrote in my book the other day about a time when the Mother Earth News magazine was a huge part of my life. Second, because she remembered it. And lastly….she is a very busy adult, teaches full time and moms my two beautiful granddaughters and lives in Colorado…we don’t get to share moments like this very often.
I was a frustrated farm girl in the big city of Denver while my husband was in medical school. I read Mother Earth News like an instruction manual for life. I baked our bread, made homemade granola, yogurt, and even tofu. I canned fruits and vegetables, made jams, jellies, relishes and pickles. I would have raised chickens if city ordinances would have allowed it back then. When we bought our first home on two acres, I set out to make it a little farm. That didn’t really work out so well because of the semi-arid climate. But I certainly had fun trying.
The fact that my daughter remembered my penchant for this magazine just tickled me to no end for some reason. It helped me reach back across time to her youth. It was a hundred lifetimes ago…and it was just yesterday. It’s the simple things that bring the most joy, isn’t it? ❤️
“Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten, and store it up. It shall serve as food for you and for them.””
Genesis 6:21 ESV
Did you buy the 25 years of the magazine on USB stick? I love reading the issues from the 70’s over again. We are so “sisters” from another mother❤️ I’m already planning our garden , grape vines, and berry bushes at our new house.
I did not buy that, Gail. I wonder if you still can. I know I was heartbroken when my collection was ruined when the basement flooded. ?
I’ll never forget my first Mother Earth News included an article “How to survive a sub zero out outhouse” and how to winter chickens without a lot of water. I loved that magazine. I still pick one up now and then.
That’s classic! ❤️
I so identify with this post, Ginny. Let’s call it like it is: we were hippie chicks with all the good, natural lifestyle that encompassed (bread-baking, butter churning, etc.), & hopefully not so much of the “questionable,” (free love, drug culture, etc.), but I now get so much enjoyment from watching my daughter practice some of what I preached to her all those years ago. She rejected it for a long time but she gets it now! Congratulations to you on this reward from your daughter!
❤️