Housewivery

The women teach their daughters from their youths vpwards, to bake bread, and to grind Millia, with other Houſewiuery; whereby it commeth to paſſe, that they haue good skill in houſe-keeping, becauſe they are brought vp therein from their youths.

So long as they can marry morally, ſuch as are free from groſſe crimes, uncleanneſſe, riot, alehouſe-haunting, and the like: ſuch as are of a ſweet carriage, faſhionable, and compleat, brought up well to a pleaſing and outwardly gracefull behaviour; eſpecially, if there be any meanes to live competently in the world, good husbandry and houſewivery; oh, they thinke their choice is excellent; yea, when children themſelves ſtagger for conſcience ſake, at ſuch offers, yet their parents are earneſt for the match, and vexe themſelves to ſee their children ſo preciſe. […] Fifthly to his family ſhee is an abſolute helper by neceſſity, and cannot be ſpared: not onely in point of houſewivery, but alſo in the diſpencing the Affayres of it within.

By her complexion, ſhe ſeems rather made of chalk or marle, than that red earth Adam was made of; though ſhe be ſo meager a ſoile, ſhe grows never the fatter by it; yet one knows not what a good Husbandman may do, for they ſay, a good Husband would remedy all; but he muſt take her on credit then, both for Beauty and good houſewivery; few elſe would venture on her complexion, and ſuch a quality, as if ſhe hold on as ſhe begins, ſhe ſoon would eat her husband out of houſe and home: […]

8. Bare walls make giddy houſe-wives. 8. i. e, Idle houſe-wives, they having nothing whereabout to buſie themſelves and ſhew their good houſewivery. […] One utterly ignorant of countrey affairs, of husbandry and houſewivery as there practiſed.

This tale, no doubt, is written in consequence of the rubbish that has appeared in the Times, in the shape of letters on the question, “Can a man marry with £300. a-year?” There are many practical replies to this interrogatory, in this country; thousands upon thousands of families are living in elegant ease and unequivocal respectability upon £300. a-year, and less; educating and supporting their children in a creditable manner, under the management of notable housewivery.

Pro-Family believes that the measure is at odds with the role of women as family makers and is, therefore, in harmony with a “radical feminism” that wishes “to change that.” Pro-Family indicts radical feminists, whatever that means, as the villains of the piece and quote a feminist author as describing housewivery as “an illegitimate profession.”

Neither seemed to understand what they perceived as the American obsession with money, the feverish emphasis on career, and the devil-may-care attitude toward family. Yet both readily will readily^([sic]) admit that America offered, and still offers, the opportunity to escape from the^([sic]) what they called the subtle imprisonment of housewivery, the Irish tradition that ties a woman to her husband’s circumstance.

Hawn’s feisty side — whether she’s rebelling against cheap caviar or overwhelming housewivery — gives “Overboard” its energy and direction.

Focus of the play’s attention is Maura Vaughn’s character of Mrs. Los Angeles, a former WAC who has so far convinced herself she’s happy to have regressed to housewivery. She is attempting to fit the contest’s vision of the typical American homemaker while remaining her own woman.

We even learned this weekend that housewivery has become so unusual that two Vassar University women were forming a group called "Future Housewives of America." You know the number of housewives are dwindling ever smaller when a two-woman college club makes national news.