If you have found this blog, then chances are, you are familiar with my online store, Lovely Lady Linens, specializing in handblock printed textiles. When I began LLL three years ago, I intended my designs to appeal to young wives and mothers in the hopes of encouraging order and beauty through simple and timeless home decor items.
Interestingly, the age of women who consistently buy my linens are those in my mother’s generation (ages 55-65). This initially struck me as odd but made sense when I consistently heard comments from young moms like, “I love your linens but my kids will just destroy them” or “I wish we could have nice things like this but there’s no point with all my kids.” These were often the reasons why a mom would shy away from purchasing a table runner or cloth, or what have you.
I’d like to offer a different perspective and propose that the home needs beauty. And more specifically, your family dinner table needs to function well and have beautiful items. If you gather your family to sit down for dinner each night, then it’s not enough to simply set the table with utensils, plates, and paper napkins. The table itself needs something that will encourage your children to treat the meal as an experience - a time when the family comes together to enjoy one another’s company and share about the events of the day.
Too often, because our meals (at least in western culture) are used as a means to feed the kids so that we can move onto the next thing, items on the table that have value, inherit beauty, or quality are overlooked. But I think that if we make a little bit of effort each night to set the table with cloth napkins (maybe not on the night that you're eating Sloppy Joes, but you get my point), placemats and a runner, light a candle with a small vase of fresh flowers, then the child who might otherwise be prone to “destroying” the item will, overtime, come to appreciate the act of placing a cloth napkin on his lap; he will learn to not soil the runner with his sticky hands. If he sees the ritual of setting the table with beautiful items and if they become commonplace each night, the desire to tarnish and destroy will lessen. I think Leila Lawler sums up the point I'm trying to make perfectly,
“Our children will come to expect humble order and everyday beauty, and that expectation will stand them in good stead later on, when allurements not based in love come their way. They will already know what home looks and feels like, and they will take that knowledge with them, making it their own in their own way, which is the flourishing of beauty in the world.”
This is my humble proposal because, as you can probably tell, I’m still testing out my theory with my own small children.
1 comment
I agree!
I think that those of us who have experienced this can say that it was the case for them and likely to be the case with anyone.
I remember very well my grandmother’s beautifully set table each time we ate at her home. There was a time we ate with them everyday. And everyday she had at least a tablecloth on the table, and even though she may have used paper napkins she folded them in half and placed them on the table beside each plate. The glasses were a fine etched quality and beautiful. I remember they had to be hand washed. And the dished were set at the table on platters, beautifully arranged. I remember always a variety of dishes and also flowers. The bread basket always had a starched and pressed bread cover.
I certainly don’t make every meal as elaborate as she seems to have done. After all, I have eight children at home with me all day for every meal. But my children have certainly learned all about it because I was deeply inspired by my grandmother’s efforts and it is my desire to offer it to my children as well. I can’t imagine making a home without setting a beautiful and proper table at least sometimes. Hopefully more times than not!