A poll!

[mousme]

I like polls, so I give you another one. It seems to me that my flist comprises a bunch of very talented people, and as such I was curious about the "unsung" skills that are currently enjoying a newfound popularity. All the skills our great-grandmothers and grandmothers took for granted, but which many of our own mothers never learned for various reasons and thus never passed on to us.

So, what do you do?

[Poll #1054891]

Comments

[fearsclave.livejournal.com]

Scavenge?

[prolixfootle.livejournal.com]

Sounds right to me...

[mousme.livejournal.com]

By which I mean picking berries/other plants in the wild and doing stuff with them. :)

[prolixfootle.livejournal.com]

Sewing is hit and miss. Gardening and canning I haven't done since the divorce. I've dabbled in herbology. I do some basic woodworking (making shelves and the like) and basic electrical repairs, ummm... I can do counted cross stitch, have made dolls and puppets, and can do flower arrangements and tend to various aspects of interior decor like laying ceramic and vinyl floors and hanging wallpaper. There might also be other stuff I can't think of right now...

I have been told I would make a good wife.

Wifely qualities.

[montecristo.livejournal.com]

I don't think you could handle the sexual requirements of most straight men, nor gay men either, really, I should think. You probably wouldn't be much of a quality match for a butch lesbian, either. You'd better stick to the Straight-Husband-With-Alternative-Skill-Sets roles. Those probably fit you better.

[joane.livejournal.com]

I have had a vegetable & herb garden in the past and will again, I just have no place for it in this apartment (no balcony). I've caught, cleaned & cooked fish over both campfire and stove, and you know about all the crafty dealies. About the only thing I don't do from that category is knit, and I do know how, I just don't enjoy it enough to spend time on it. For home repairs that's a yes to thinks like hanging shelves & painting, negative to more involved things like wiring or drywall.

[pasley.livejournal.com]

"Other":
-I've made various, non-sew crafty things such as wreaths, felt dolls and plaster molds.
-I can arrange flowers

[taxlady.livejournal.com]

Cooking: all the normal stuff and I have corned beef and cut up a moose and a few deer. I always make my own salad dressing and sometimes I get around to making stock. I have also made yogourt and "ymer", a Danish cultured milk product and cottage cheese.

Baking: I bake the occasional cake from scratch, less often apple pie, but I make a really good tourtière. I only use whole grain flours when I bake. I used to bake bread and I have once successfully made chapati. Hmmm, I used to make English muffins - I should do that again. Recently I have been baking a mean jerk pork roast and pretty good roast beef.

I crochet a lot less often than I used to. I seldom knit, unless it is the cuffs and turtleneck on something I crocheted. I hooked a cushion once - didn't much like the effort to result ratio. I have sewn lots of stuff, from shorts to dresses to costumes, some of them intricately beaded.

I don't can much anymore, but I have canned everything from tomatoes to chutney, jam, ketchup, and brandied peaches.

I don't much enjoy fishing, but snaring bunnies was almost all the meat we had for two winters.

I'll only fiddle with really minor stuff on my car.

House repairs: I have replaced the guts on a few toilets and added insulation. I replace washers and stuff like that on faucets. I have painted and stuccoed and patched plaster. I will be learning to do drywall. I have installed a programmable thermostat (and replaced it with the old one when I moved). I have repaired a toaster and other small appliances. And stripped & restored furniture.

Don't really do carpentry - I don't have the space, but I have built a monitor stand and a printer cart.

Other: I make pictures out of dried flowers and I used to cut firewood with a bow saw. I cut the trees down with a bow saw too.

[prolixfootle.livejournal.com]

Ah! That reminds me - I can dress a rabbit. We raised them for several years.

[moskevyu.livejournal.com]

I do my best to maintiain computers and Internet connection so we don't have to make expensive calls to Geek Squad. :o) May not be a 'homecraft' but they are 'home' computers. ;o)

Home IT

[montecristo.livejournal.com]

Good point! I do all of my own IT work myself as well. If you're good at it, some times it's easy to lose sight of the fact that many people have to trade for or purchase such services.

Home ec

[montecristo.livejournal.com]

You left out electrical and plumbing work. Those aren't necessarilly repairs, per se.

Re: Home ec

[mousme.livejournal.com]

Not necessarily, but I felt they came under the same general heading. :)

Your point is duly taken, however.

[whiskeygirl8.livejournal.com]

I can do much of my own car repair, but I don't because I don't have the time. If I take it to someone else, then I can have my mom or dad take me to do other errands while it's being done.

[kino-kid.livejournal.com]

I cook because I need to eat.

[ladyiolanthe.livejournal.com]

I cook almost all my meals, and was awarded a ladyship in the SCA for cooking two medieval feasts (along with elanya. ;)

I can and have baked cookies, cakes, pies, homemade-from-scratch bread, and roasted fish, ham and chicken.

I sew clothes for both people and dolls, rag dolls, stuffed animals, quilts. I also know how to do basic pottery, silversmithing and stained glass, but I only practice stained glass (the least expensive of the three crafts in terms of startup ;) )

I've only done a bit of canning - a batch of marmalade from scratch and a batch of saskatoon jam from scratch, but I hope to do more eventually. I'm still working on using up the marmalade and jam. Someday I'd like to try pickles. :)

I didn't have a garden this year because I'm living in the arctic but I grow flowers and veggies at my house in Fort Chipewyan.

No livestock... unless cats count! But someday I hope to have horses, goats, sheep, chickens and cows.

I can do, and have done, really basic carpentry like shelves.

I'm working on being able to do basic stuff on my car. I can change a flat tire, so far, and I've observed how to do an oil change. Got to try it myself, though... ;)

If by house repairs you mean filling in holes in the wall and painting, then I can do that... But not electrical or plumbing work.

[ladyiolanthe.livejournal.com]

Oh, missed the hunting/fishing stuff! I don't hunt, but I have fished, cleaned and gutted my own fish. I also gather wild berries. I did learn about herbalism and can identify some medicinal plants but I've never actually used them or practiced herbalism - it can be dangerous if you don't know exactly what you're doing.

[alcinoe.livejournal.com]

I should have hit "other" too. I know how to kill and pluck a chicken and a turkey, I hang my own shelves and make my own curtains.I do most handy stuff in the house, though I can't fix the furnace or anything like that. I know how to raise pigs (through experience too) I helped build an entire house, so I know how to skin logs, I have done the maple syruping and cut firewood. I can live without hot water for many months without being bothered much by it. I lived for three years in the woods with no water/electric/telephone or septic tank. Oh, and I have been dog sledding, which is useful when you are in the snowy woods and you happen to have dogs that will pull the darned thing.

[alcinoe.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I know how to garden, I just haven't done it in a few years.

[vureoelt.livejournal.com]

Skills are matrilineal only? o_O

[mousme.livejournal.com]

*rolls eyes*

Can we accept the verbal shorthand without bitching about gender for once?

For crying out loud.

Well...

[blackbuffet.livejournal.com]

I can iron clothes. Does that count for anything?

[bodhifox.livejournal.com]

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."
- Robert A. Heinlein

Scratch the sonnet and the die gallantly and I can do this list.

[striped.livejournal.com]

This is a great quote!

[sorceror.livejournal.com]

I think I went fishing, once.

Oh God — when the Apocalypse comes, I am **so** toast. >_<

[raven-albion.livejournal.com]

Between T and I we do everything but own livestock (though we could have chickens, and probably should...). In the 'other' category, I also make pottery. We don't do all of our car repairs, but if it's something we can fix or replace, we do.

[foi-nefaste.livejournal.com]

I do very basic house repairs - at the moment, I'm re-doing the caulk in the bathroom, for example.

I'm also learning how to quilt (but, as of now, it doesn't come close to actual quilting. My sewing needs some work!)

On the other hand, I can't seem to keep a plant alive to save my life...

[urban-homestead.livejournal.com]

My "other" was homebrewing, which is kind of a cheat, because my own personal grandmothers and great-grandmothers certainly didn't do it, but it's an old-fashioned skill so what the heck.

I sort of cheated on the engine work/car-repair one too, since I don't actually have any sort of car and in fact have never owned one. But, I drove when I was in the army and did my own basic repairs, tire-changes, oil-changes etc, and I'm sure that I could get back into that if I did ever become a car-owner.

[vureoelt.livejournal.com]

I'm decently handy with easy fixes to machinery, be they electronics, pens, toys, whatever.

[luvenditti.livejournal.com]

I also paint, play music, write, and I'm pretty handy at fixing things around the house.