Busy days followed one another in the new home in the big woods. Good smells from Mother’s kitchen drifted out to the garden where the girls were picking vegetables for her to can for winter. Beans, peas, corn and beets were now in glass jars, filling the shelves down in the cellar below the kitchen. Cucumbers and green tomatoes, made into pickles and relishes, added to the shining rows.
Out in the woods, the girls had discovered chokecherries and pin cherries that Mother had made into purple and ruby red jelly.
“Next summer we’ll be picking wild strawberries and raspberries,” Mother promised. “We’re too late for them this year. I’m sure we can find blueberries, June berries and wild plums not far away also. God provides lots of good things for us and for the birds and wild animals in these north woods.”
Rain was pattering on the porch roof one morning when they awakened. A soft damp breeze brushed across their faces. As Peggy sat up on her cot and looked out at the dripping woods, she wondered whatever could they do indoors if it rained all day?
At breakfast Mother seemed pleased with the rain. “This will be a good day to bake bread and to churn butter. You girls can help me with the churning, and I think you will enjoy it. Then it is about time for Naomi and Helen to get started with schoolwork.”
“School? But where? how?”
“Right here at home,” Mother answered firmly. “Have you forgotten I taught school before I married Father? The little schoolhouse up the road can’t seem to get another teacher since the one they had left unexpectedly. I’ve borrowed a few books, and as long as it is raining, we might as well get started as soon as we are through with our chores.”
“School at home will seem different — will we have to call you ‘teacher’? And what about Peggy?” Helen was wondering about her little sister, for she always looked out for her.
“Peggy can cut out paper dolls or blow soap bubbles, something quiet. No, you won’t have to call me teacher,” Mother said, smiling. “But you will have to remember it really is school — no whispering or even walking around without permission. Let’s hurry now. Naomi and Helen can do the dishes. Peggy, put this old coat on and run out and feed the chickens and gather the eggs. While the girls are studying, you can fill the chip box too. They’ll be wet, but will soon dry out by the warm kitchen stove.”
Before the girls were finished with the dishes, Mother kneaded and set her bread. After covering it with a clean towel, she tucked it into a corner of the counter by the warmth of the big black kitchen range to rise. A big kettle of vegetable soup was put to simmer on the back of the stove. Fresh bread and homemade soup were Mother’s “standbys” for rainy days.
“School time!” Mother called, as soon as they finished washing the dishes and Peggy returned with the eggs and had hung her dripping coat on a nail in the kitchen shed.
Before long, Naomi and Helen were busy with their schoolwork at the dining room table. At the opposite end, Peggy was cutting out chains of gingerbread boys and pretending that she was also in school.
Finally, after what seemed a very long time, Mother glanced at the clock and decided their books could be put away for the morning. “I’ll get you girls started on the churning while I make my bread into loaves.”
The girls watched with interest while Mother poured the slightly soured cream into the churn. The churn was made of gray crockery and was as big around as a milk pail, but twice as tall. The ‘dasher’ was two pieces of wood nailed together crisscross to exactly fit the bottom of the churn. To this, a long handle was fitted. It came up through a small hole in the lid.
“Splash-splash-splash” went the dasher as Mother moved it smoothly up and down, up and down, through the little hole in the lid. After a while it was Naomi’s turn.
“Not too fast — there, that’s just right. It doesn’t make the butter come any faster to splash it any faster. The secret is to keep it moving steadily. When you’re tired, let Helen take a turn while I hurry my bread into loaves.”
The girls took turns until their arms were aching. “Don’t you think it is ready yet, Mother?” they coaxed.
“No, not yet. You’ll hear a watery splash to the dasher when it starts to ‘break.’ Also, tiny flecks of yellow will begin to gather on the dasher down close to the lid. But stop a moment, I want to take some of the thick sour cream out for lunch.”
Mother lifted the lid and dasher, and they could see that the churn was full of what looked like very heavy whipped cream. After taking out a bowl full, she replaced the lid and the dasher and encouraged the girls.
“It won’t be long now before the butter comes. Call me just as soon as it sounds different to you and you see tiny specks of yellow butter on the dasher. Then it will be time to drain off the buttermilk and wash the butter with cold pump water.”
Before they knew it, the dasher and cream changed their tune and seemed to be saying, “Slap-slush! Slap-slush!” and, yes! little grains of butter were on the dasher.
Now Mother carefully lifted out the dasher and lid and put the churn up on a stool. From down near the bottom of the churn, she pulled out a cork and the white buttermilk with a few flecks of butter poured into a pitcher she was holding. Next she replaced the cork and poured cold pump water into the churn to wash the butter. When this drained out through the little hole down near the bottom, it looked like milky water, and she saved it for the pig to drink.
Finally, she put the big chunk of golden butter that had “gathered” into a ball into a large wooden bowl, where she washed it many times with fresh cold water the girls pumped for her. She used a wooden paddle, mashing, turning, pressing, until the water that oozed out was clear as clear could be. She explained to the girls that to wash the butter well was the biggest secret of all in making good butter with a fresh, sweet flavor.
Before she salted it, she took some out for Father, who liked it that way — sweet and fresh without salt. She worked salt into most of it, for the butter would keep better that way. Then she pressed the butter firmly into several crocks, covered them, and then set them on a shelf out in the cold kitchen entrance shed. It would quickly become hard and firm out there. The bread in the oven was beginning to smell so very good. The girls did not need to be coaxed to hurry with setting the table for lunch.
When the men came in from the woods where they had been cutting trees for the lumber to build Uncle Bob and Aunt Sue’s house, they exclaimed over the good smells that greeted them. As they bowed their heads to give thanks, the steaming fragrance of the vegetable soup lifted softly into their faces from the bowls placed before them.
“Say, Bob! How’s this for a dinner to come in out of the rain and cold for?” Father asked, as he helped himself to another slice of warm bread and fresh butter.
“Hits the spot, I’d say!” Uncle Bob grinned. “Think I’d like another dish of soup to prove I mean it!” As he held his empty dish for Mother to refill, he asked, “I wonder, did you girls help make this butter? I never tasted better!”
The girls had wondered what Mother had saved out the bowl of whipped sour cream for. Now they discovered they could spread a thick layer of it on a piece of warm fresh bread and sprinkle it lightly with sugar. This would be their dessert. It was so good Peggy was sure that nothing could ever taste better!
After lunch, Helen and Peggy decided to play house up in the attic. Father and Mother’s bed had an old fashioned high brass headboard. They discovered that by climbing up on it and by boosting and pulling each other, they managed to climb up into the attic. When Father wanted to get into the attic, he brought a ladder in from outside and climbed up through an attic hole, but the ladder was too heavy for the girls.
It was dusty and dim in the attic until their eyes got used to it. The rain on the roof made a pleasant drumming sound above them. The girls had pushed and tugged boxes and trunks aside until they had cleared a little spot for their playhouse area. One large box they had left for a table and a couple of smaller ones for chairs. A large oval clothes basket made a bed for Peggy if she curled her legs up. They always played that Helen was the mother and Peggy was the baby.
Many happy hours slipped by as the girls played house up in that cozy spot. But best of all, the girls enjoyed rainy evenings. The little house was snug and warm even though the wind was blowing and the rain spattering against the dark windows outside. Father and Uncle Bob would be doing “men” things — mending harnesses, getting muskrat traps cleaned and oiled, drawing plans for Aunt Sue and Uncle Bob’s house and barn and the chicken house. And the best time of all would be if Mother would turn the lamp up and read out loud to all of them.
Sometimes she read stories of great missionaries like David Livingstone, John Paton, Hudson Taylor and Stanley Arnott. Sometimes they were just stories about great preachers like Martin Luther, Whitfield and the Wesley brothers.
Peggy Jean couldn’t understand all the big words, but Mother explained some as she read. Sometimes she fell asleep, not even waking up when someone carried her and tucked her into bed.