A
Modern Hope Chest
By:
Rachel Paxton © 2002
When
our neighbors moved away, they left behind an old cedar chest
and wanted to know if our family would like to have it. I was
sure I could find some use for it. They're not that easy to come
by, and it was still in pretty good shape.
I
already had an older cedar chest, handed down to me from my father's
mother. It had some old keepsakes in it--a framed pressed flower,
a Dutch Bible, a household expense record my grandpa had kept
long before I was born. To these treasures I added my mother's
wedding dress, my high school year books, and my daughter's handmade
baby dresses and blankets.
The
new cedar chest ended up in the living room as storage for extra
blankets. Every once in awhile I glance at it and think I should
use it as a hope chest for my daughter.
My
daughter is 14 now, and she's going to be grown up and moved out
before I know it. I've always toyed with the idea of giving her
a hope chest, but it seems so old-fashioned.
My
daughter is a normal Christian teenage girl, trying to hold on
to her faith while living in a world that is constantly sending
her mixed messages. "Date," "Don't date,"
"Experiment," "Wait until you're married."
She and her friends struggle with these life-changing decisions
every day.
My
daughter dreams of the day she gets married. She hopes to meet
her husband in college, settle down, and raise a family. Any choices
she makes along the way could change the outcome of her dream.
All
she has to hold on to are "faith" and "hope."
Faith that she will be faithful to wait for the man God has intended
for her, and hope that her dreams of marriage will some day come
true.
This
is partially where the term "hope chest" originated.
Originally they were called wedding chests, but Americans later
called them hope chests as in "hope for marriage" and
the promise of love and security.
If
we as parents want to reinforce these values in our children,
we must come up with ways to get these ideas across to them without
shoving them down their throats. They have to share the dream
with you and make it their own.
One
way to share your vision of your daughter's wedded future, is
to prepare a hope chest for her. Hope chests were traditionally
used to store hand-embroidered linens, to protect them until the
bride was ready to use them in her new home.
What
you place in your daughter's hope chest is up to you and your
daughter. Handmade items seem to be the most meaningful. It would
also be a good place to store family photographs and albums for
safe keeping.
When
my daughter was about seven we started a tradition of buying her
a Christmas ornament every year. When she leaves home she will
take with her a collection of her own ornaments, each with a memory
of a unique year of her life.
I
will give her the baby dresses and blankets, and any other childhood
mementos I have saved, like her birth sampler or favorite childhood
storybooks for her own children.
Anything
your daughter takes with her will help her to make her new house
into a home. The memories she brings with her will be the start
of new memories in her own family.
The
more you and your daughter can share the dream and the hope for
her future, the more likely she will be to hold on to the dream
and carry it into her adulthood.
******************************************************
Copyright 2002. Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom who
is the author of the Creative Homemaking Recipe of the Week Club
Cookbook, a cookbook containing more than 250 quick easy dinner
ideas. For recipes, tips to organize your home, home decorating,
crafts, and frugal family fun, visit Creative Homemaking at http://www.creativehomemaking.com
******************************************************
Back
to top
