Remembering The Old Apron
These days you don’t see many aprons around, except maybe in commercial restaurants. Even then, they are a solid color and very basic.
I remember my grandma and aunts wearing their aprons, far from a basic design. For them it was a part of their every day attire, covering their dresses and keeping the day’s dirt and grease away from the fabric beneath.
Grandma was born in 1904, and came up in the Edwardian period. She grew up with the proper dresses of the time, handmade by her mother on the family’s treadle Singer machine. Photos of her show her in her prim and proper pinafore apron over her dress.
Grandma grew up and had her first daughter in the mid 1920’s. She made her clothing by hand, including the hand sewn aprons she wore for her day to day chores. She worked hard in the home and on the farm, her apron helping in her duties. She gathered eggs and small pieces of fire wood, she harvested her garden produce, wiped down a table or two in a hurry when she heard a neighbor coming up the driveway for a social call.
Her aprons covered her work dresses as she washed her and her growing family’s laundry on the washboard over hot, lye soapy water. She used the pockets to carry clothes pins for the line.
Her aprons covered her as she cooked over the wood stove. It protected her from the wood ashes, the black soot. Folded over, the skirt made a make-shift pot holder to grab a hot sauce pan or bread pan from the oven.
Today’s society has little regard for the dependable staple the apron was. Our clothes are disposable, quickly and cheaply made. We have closets and dressers full, no need to worry about getting a shirt or skirt dirty, just simply change into another. The apron has went to the wayside.
I’d like to revive this little piece of the past. This small piece is a monument to a simpler time, to the feminine touches of the home, to the day to day work that goes unnoticed but are very important.
In our store, I have a section for aprons. While Jess makes her homemade goodies, I prefer to sew. I enjoy making simpler items that hearken back to a more nostalgic era. Aprons fit well into this.
I would love to hear from you what you think about aprons. What kind do you like? The half, the bib, a cross back, a fancy style? What would you wear in your cooking adventures? You are welcome to comment below and share your thoughts!
Lots of love, from rural Kansas!
