Prairie Girls

No one said…

our good-byes would be so difficult and have to last forever.

our journey crossing the Atlantic would be so long.

trains rides lasting days would take us across vast America.

so many hardships and crisis could be experienced on the plains.

prairie grasses waved in the wind and beauty was found as far as the eyes could see.

the family would flourish and great bounty be realized.

the snows ran deep and a pioneer Christmas could be so perfect.

how important owning land would be for Papa.

nor how I would rejoice to be a prairie girl.

…But I did and I am.

 



Richelle

 

This is the last time I will be telling you about myself for a while. I am ten-year-old Richelle and want to end with my favorite time on the prairie: Christmas. Mama and I did all of the baking and the other preparations. Many of our gifts to friends and neighbors were from Mama’s kitchen. She brought recipes from Germany to her new country. Favorite recipes for each member of the family were a part of her baking.

Mama spent weeks before the big event hand-making gifts for Papa, my brothers, and me. Papa was good at making wooden gifts to please us all. Everything was homemade because that was all we could afford. We even made paper ornaments for our Christmas tree; the tree was very different from what we remembered in Germany. I will tell you about the special gift we had at Christmas later and why Mama and Papa said I was wise beyond my years.

Spring Break

Schools for better or worse have a spring break. Teachers, school administrators and board members know more about the reasons for a spring break than I do. If they deem it beneficial to the learning process of children--then I’m all for it. However, I wish the officials guaranteed nice weather for spring break. I found when my kids spent a week in the house watching rain fall they were bored, argued, and got on my very last nerve. At least Christmas break promised the chance of snow for sledding, and there were always new toys. By spring break week, though, the toys were long broken, and there was always one child who would not play outdoors in mud.

I have my own ideas about the purpose of a spring break. Spring break was a week for me to reminisce about the past summer--to remember what it was really like to have kids out of school. I forgot from one summer to the next how many times a child whined, "I'm bored. What can I do? There's nothing to do here." I forgot how many times children opened and slammed back doors, front doors and side doors. I forgot how many friends the children invited for sleepovers and how much food kids ate.

During spring break I remembered the reasons I didn’t like it. That week, unlike summer, was not filled with swimming, ball games, golf programs or 4-H fairs. However, spring break did have hour after hour of cartoons, soap operas and game shows on television. Before that long, long week, I was tempted to think I would enjoy a quiet, serene summer at home. No hot dogs at the ball park for supper. No early morning trips to the tennis courts. No hot afternoons at the pool watching a child practice the backstroke. No arguments about the benefits of daily piano practice. It does sound nice, doesn’t it?

But after a week of spring break, I willingly signed my kids up for summer gymnastics, summer soccer, summer band, swimming and art lessons. I was ready for ball games, visits to the library and daily trips to the park. I was ready for grass-stained, white Little League uniforms; I was ready for laundry. Oh yes, active, involved children were much more pleasant to live with than bored children.