Well, I guess my choice to stay home with my kiddo and make her go play outside and take care of animals keeps us from being too exposed to some of the differences between then and now.i think it's a good thing!
I try to limit technology to only what benefits. Easier said than done! Today, DS9 is working on his massive snowfort with a shovel, while the neighbor's kids are riding their snowmobiles around. DS1 and I took the dairy billy goat for a 1/4 mile walk - ended by the neighbors kids starting up the snowmobiles which freaks out the goat.
Meals as a family have pretty much gone away for many. Shame. Truly it is just one of the things, IMO, that has created many health issues and emotional ones. There was a regimentation to being there, having manners, eating & helping cleanup after. You learned from the experience & the table talk.
My mom was so excited to get her first washing machine -- with a huge hand wringer unit on it because there wasn't spin dry. Through wringer & out onto clothesline. It was a whole lot better than the tub & washboard, hand wring, then hang.
We ate out of Daddy's big garden. All winter it was the potatoes stored (from the garden) and a pot of beans, maybe a squirrel Daddy hunted or one of Mama's old hens but in the summer fresh tomatoes, green beans, squash, okra, onions, lettuce, radishes, strawberries...
When I was young (the youngest of 5 kids), I remember having Sunday Dinner at around 3 in the afternoon. While we didn't have a lot of money, Sunday was always a feast. My mother would roast a chicken or bake a ham or cook a roast pork or something like that (whatever was on sale). For dessert, she would always bake a cake, pie or cookies. Sunday's were a real treat.
When I was a kid, my Mom made "Sunday Soup". All the leftovers in a pot. Somehow she made it taste good. I do not have the same skill. My parents barely scraped by and went on HUGE grocery shopping expeditions rather infrequently. They bought what was cheap and on sale. We had a garden but the soil was poor and it didn't produce much.
In contrast, I'm honing a minimalist menu rotation and matching pantry so that I never have enough in the fridge for "Sunday Soup". Instead of preventing food waste at the leftovers end, I'm dealing with food waste by preventing it much earlier in the cycle. My family is stable, but we have a large productive garden which I can from and we raise meat animals and butcher our own. My menu is based on the meat and produce we grow.