Pass it On

Growing up, my mother had a saying. It was something along the lines of killing a bear, skinning it, and serving it for dinner, if she only had one hour. I now have a pretty good idea of what she meant. Children make time management something of an art form. A ridiculously cute and well-worth it art form, mind you.

My mother’s line came directly from her grandmother, Lucy. The hardest working woman she knew. Lucy raised six boys (one of which was my late grandfather that Margaret shares a birthday with), a husband battling MS, the never-ending task of tending to the farm where they lived, and she managed to put herself through school to become a nurse. Talk about gumption.

After having Margaret, it got me thinking about all those things we pick up along the way from family and the nuggets of information I want to make sure she retains. The saying above is important, I think, especially for girls—gossip is toxic and does no one any good. Another one I want to instill in her is the notion of how a lady dresses.

Not to sound like a prude, but I read once, and it stuck with me, that a woman should only show one asset at a time. If you choose a short hemline on a dress, a plunging neckline is a no-no … one or the other, not both. I think that’s a good rule to follow. I mean I certainly don’t want Margaret to walk out of the house at age 15 in Beyonce’s leather getup from the Super Bowl halftime show. They didn’t have that particular quote on Pinterest—Thou shall not let ye daughter look like she works in the red light district.

Image: Courtesy of fashionchalet.tumblr.com