The ultimate guide to Christian homemaking advises readers on everything from meal planning to interior decorating, biblical womanhood to budgeting, serving as a comprehensive handbook for the woman and her home.

The ultimate guide to Christian homemaking advises readers on everything from meal planning to interior decorating, biblical womanhood to budgeting, serving as a comprehensive handbook for the woman and her home.

Rosemarie Jarski, known for her many books highlighting the wit of the ages, offers up the perfect how-to guide, illuminating the darkest corner of the household with all those things our mothers never taught us. Domestic Bliss is Rosemarie's own unique and characteristically witty handbook that fills the gap left by the generation before us. The essential skills of how to keep your house from falling down around your ears are not taught in school, and our parents were so busy earning a living they had no time to pass on the wisdom the world sees as 'common sense'. Well, common sense is not so common as is commonly supposed. This hands-on, down-to-earth guide focuses on those household problems and challenges you are most likely to encounter in real life: how to cure a dripping tap, combat condensation, and unblock a sink. You'll also get to grips with a power drill, a plumb line, and a paintbrush. And find the answers to Life's little frustrations, like how to remove sticky labels, open supermarket plastic bags, and fit a duvet-cover onto a duvet without being swallowed. Many home references tell you how to do something, without telling you why. Rosemarie, though, asks 'What is the point of a detailed explanation of how to bleed a radiator if you have no idea why it's necessary?' This guide is different because it takes the time to tell you why a particular technique is needed or beneficial, giving you the background and Explaining the point of it all. Domestic Bliss is also different because it's a manual for all ages and sexes. We all have laundry to sort, stains to remove, dishes to wash, and heaven knows the essential techniques don't differ whether it's your boxer shorts or his. With clear and mercifully jargon-free directions, Ms Jarski offers more than tips and nudges, holding our hand through the process of putting up drywall, shining our shoes, braiding our hair and creating a beautiful table for a dinner party. Step-by step instructions are enhanced, wherever necessary, by line drawings, so you can see at a glance what to do. Rosemarie's indispensable manual helps us with: Getting Organized, Home Laundry, Sewing, Cleaning, Interior Design, Painting & Decorating, Home Matters, D.I.Y, Food & Drink, Style & Grooming, Scarves & Ties, Home Office, Leisure Time, House Plants & Flowers, Entertaining, Gifts & Wrapping, Christmas, Packing a Suitcase, Conversion Charts. Domestic Bliss is your guide to daily living, offering a thorough grounding in the practical skills everyone should know how to do. The aim is to demystify and simplify. Where other household manuals leave you feeling daunted and inadequate, this guide instills you with the confidence and enthusiasm to get stuck in and have a go as you sweep, shine, and stitch your way towards Domestic Bliss.

A study of what American cookbooks from the 1790s to the 1960s can show us about gender roles, food, and culture of their time. From the first edition of The Fannie Farmer Cookbook to the latest works by today’s celebrity chefs, cookbooks reflect more than just passing culinary fads. As historical artifacts, they offer a unique perspective on the cultures that produced them. In Manly Meals and Mom’s Home Cooking, Jessamyn Neuhaus offers a perceptive and piquant analysis of the tone and content of American cookbooks published between the 1790s and the 1960s, adroitly uncovering the cultural assumptions and anxieties—particularly about women and domesticity—they contain. Neuhaus’s in-depth survey of these cookbooks questions the supposedly straightforward lessons about food preparation they imparted. While she finds that cookbooks aimed to make readers—mainly white, middle-class women—into effective, modern-age homemakers who saw joy, not drudgery, in their domestic tasks, she notes that the phenomenal popularity of Peg Bracken’s 1960 cookbook, The I Hate to Cook Book, attests to the limitations of this kind of indoctrination. At the same time, she explores the proliferation of bachelor cookbooks aimed at “the man in the kitchen” and the biases they display about male and female abilities, tastes, and responsibilities. Neuhaus also addresses the impact of World War II rationing on homefront cuisine; the introduction of new culinary technologies, gourmet sensibilities, and ethnic foods into American kitchens; and developments in the cookbook industry since the 1960s. More than a history of the cookbook, Manly Meals and Mom’s Home Cooking provides an absorbing and enlightening account of gender and food in modern America. “An engaging analysis . . . Neuhaus provides a rich and well-researched cultural history of American gender roles through her clever use of cookbooks.” —Sarah Eppler Janda, History: Reviews of New Books “With sound scholarship and a focus on prescriptive food literature, Manly Meals makes an original and useful contribution to our understanding of how gender roles are institutionalized and perpetuated.” —Warren Belasco, senior editor of The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Food and Drink “An excellent addition to the history of women’s roles in America, as well as to the history of cookbooks.” —Choice

There is an enormous amount of confusion and deception about what it means to be a woman. Even within the church, women are continually struggling to define their femininity. Pat Ennis and Lisa Tatlock tackle the difficult question of 'What makes a godly woman?' with warmth, compassion, and directness in Becoming aWoman Who Pleases God. Readers will find themselves challenged to re-think their priorities, re-examine the position of the home, and re-work their definition of what it means to be a woman in whom God is well pleased.

Do unto others as you would others should do to you. You can never be rude if you bear the rule always in mind, for what lady likes to be treated rudely? True Christian politeness will always be the result of an unselfish regard for the feelings of others, and though you may err in the ceremonious points of etiquette, you will never be im polite. Politeness, founded upon such a rule, becomes the expression, in graceful manner, of social virtues. The spirit of politeness consists in a certain attention to forms and ceremonies, which are meant both to please others and ourselves, and to make others pleased with us ;a still clearer definition may be given by saying that politeness is goodness of heart put into daily practice; the.re can be no true, politeness without kindness, purity, singleness of heart, and sensibility. Many believe that politeness is but a mask worn in the world to conceal bad passions and impulses, and to make a show of possessing virtues not really existing in the heart; thus, that politeness is merely hypocrisy and dissimulation. Do not believe this; be certain that those who profess such a doctrine are practising themselves the deceit they condemn so much.

Parenting. Is there anything more important? Or more difficult? How can you help your children navigate complex situations, "gray areas," rapid change and other "danger" zones? How can you understand and apply biblical principles in today's world? This is a constant challenge for thoughtful parents. Featuring the combined wisdom of doctors, pastors, business people, counselors, homemakers, lawyers and professors, Thoughtful Parenting is an excellent guide for families. From adolescence, baptism and computer games to allowances, blessing and credit cards, editors R. Paul Stevens and Robert Banks have compiled concise summaries of biblical teaching and practical advice on nearly one hundred topics critical to parents. While providing a source for quick reference, Thoughtful Parenting also goes further than most books on parenting--offering fresh and fascinating reflection on "how come" as well as "how to." Thoughtful Parenting is essential reading for parents who want biblical, practical, balanced and reliable answers--for themselves and for their children.