100 Years

One hundred years ago today, my mother was born on the farm in the outskirts of Preston, Idaho. It got me reminiscing about all the things my mother's hands did over the years

I'm sure she helped her parents on the farm. She mentioned how far she used to walk to school and back as a child, something like a mile and a half each way, in a dress. She didn't say whether or not it was uphill both ways.

Just jotted down a few thoughts last night:

Cared for 4 newborns, sleeping on the couch

hauled hay

did laundry in a wringer washer, hung clothes on the clothesline outside even during winter
ironed on Tuesdays (including pillowcases, handkerchiefs and levis, in between cooking and working on farm chores

stoked up the coal stove after she got to sleep in until 6:00 a.m.

cooked about 6700 homemade meals

sewed doll clothes and new Christmas pajamas with flat-felled seams

canned fruits, vegetables, bread and butter pickles, and jam

ran errands for Dad and us

visited her mother once a week

bought all the groceries

made ringlets sometimes and curled our hair with pincurls on Saturday nights

made wonderful fudge...about this time of year

played solitaire

grew a big garden

rode thousands of miles on her bicycle with Dad each summer

made mush every morning, had to double the batch when my kids were there

made meat loaf (without onions though she liked them) because we whined so much about it

made the best ice cream with her Junket recipe

tended us when sick, probably even when she was sick

had the most beautiful handwriting of anybody I know except my sister, Pauline.