A visit with a friend

I love it when I can visit with old friends over school breaks.  My friend Laura and her little family came a stayed a few nights.  We didn't spend much time together during the day, but we stayed up reminiscing after everyone else (that would be Les) went to bed.

We laughed at the time she filled her pockets so full of  pretty rocks at the lake that it ripped from her dress.  We remembered how scared we were the night her dad didn't come home from town and her mom had to go out and milk the cow and there was a bear in the pen!  Laura and I talked about hair color--you know, blonde vs. brown.  She always thought her sister Mary's blonde hair was prettier.  I disagreed.  I'm partial to brown myself.

Then we started talking about food-- how when she was a little girl, the attic at her house was always full of good things stored away to eat in the winter.  Her mom used to make all their cheese and butter.  In the winter the butter was pale so she would grate a carrot and squeeze out the juice to add color.  It was fun to work the dasher of the churn and wait for the butter to splash up on the lid.  Laura always wanted to sneak a taste!

Can you believe that until she was four years old, Laura only had one toy--a corn cob doll wrapped in a hanky!  I can't imagine that.  I guess that when she got her doll, Charlotte, for Christmas that made her even more special!  Laura's mom made it for her.  Her mom made all her clothes and their quilts and she even braided straw into hats for her family!

I've never moved except to college and when I got married, but Laura has moved alot.  Her family lived in many isolated places and she's far more brave in new situations than I am.  When I first met her, she lived in the woods.  Then her family moved to the prairie but when a political situation got out of hand, they moved to a slightly more settled place along a creek.  That's where she met a girl named Nellie who was very spoiled and mean.  After Laura's family left their creekside home, years later, Nellie showed up again.  Sadly she had not changed and was as mean as when she was a little girl.

We had a wonderful time during our late night visits!

Don't you love visiting with old friends?  Perhaps you're friends with my friend Laura also--Laura Ingalls.  I guess I forgot to mention her last name!  We've been friends forever and I love to introduce her to all my friends now!

We had such a good time, I'm thinking of inviting the March girls over soon.

Tell me about your forever friends who live between the pages of books!