Thoughts and stories, by Pal

    We all wrote memories of our home life, which we gave to Mother on her 80th birthday.  I couldn't find mine, so my entry below was written in 1911, when we wrote the book of their lives.  This time, I won't underline certain parts -- It takes quite a bit of time which I don't have today.               MEMORIES OF MOTHER ON HER 80TH BIRTHDAY, BY MAVIS      I have many fond memories of you Mother, from my childhood years.  Some of these are concepts I had about you.  For example, I remember feeling overwhelmed about how hard you worked.  I remember the long days, the Saturdays, filled with cleaning, ironing, baking, and I remember feeling that you worked so very, very hard – which you did.  I was always so proud of you and the fact you were such a good woman.  You sewed so many lovely dresses for each of us.  I always felt lucky that I could usually have a new dress when I wan...

Mavis is born:       During this winter Pratt’s service connected disability check was increased from $12 to $35 a month.  We wanted more family and we decided we’d rather live on that amount than put off having another child.  So by the time school was out Mavis was on her way.  How thankful we’ve always been we did not procrastinate for we may have been eternally deprived of the wonderful blessing she has been to us.  During that winter Pratt was able to take care of the babies part time.  At other times we had a 16 year old girl.  I guess she did okay for her age, but my what a contrast from Grandma Aldridge.      By mid summer the doctor told me I was going to have twins.  (They didn’t X Ray then much.)  So I prepared and was happy with the thought of twins.  I even went up to Emily Foremaster’s to spend a few hours to see how she managed with her twins plus the 2 older ones.       We we...