52 3/31/1945 Helen Carlson to Sadie Erwin

Helen Carlson 382 Robertsville Road, Oak Ridge, Tennessee Saturday, March 31, 1945

Sadie Erwin Box 44, Enumclaw, Washington

Saturday Morning Dear Folks, Your nice long letter came a couple of days ago so I will start answering it now while Mary is sleeping. Summer seems to be really here during the day but the nights turn chilly. Mary loves to be outside and crawls all over the back yard when I let her out but she eats everything so I can't let her play by herself and she doesn't like staying in the play pen very long since it is so much fun crawling all over. Everyone says that she and Jimmie look just alike and I think they look more alike all the time. Tomorrow is Easter and I hope you have a nice day. We haven't any plans but I boiled some eggs this morning and Jimmie and I are going to color them tonight and then I'll hide them so he can look for them in the morning. I also got him an Easter basket. Did you Folks go to the card party out at Osceola? I still remember that Christmas party we went to years and years ago and we all had such a good time. No I don't have one of those salad sets. I used to some time or other but I don't know what happened to it. I certainly was crazy not to collect all those things including silverware while I was working at General Mills. I bought Jimmie a little book of Bible Stories but after reading them over have decided not to read them to him because all the stories are about how God punishes everyone who doesn't obey him and I don't think he should start learning about God that way, do you. Elmer heard yesterday that they are going to build another plant here just like the one they are completing so if that is true we may still be here a year longer. I would just as soon stay I guess but I would like to get home during that time and maybe I can, either if we do move or if we definitely find out we are staying. If we stay here we may try to get a better house in a nicer location but still this neighborhood is so handy to all the stores and the new shopping area that it has its advantages too. We still haven't gotten our tires and Elmer heard that the amount of tires given out now is cut 50 percent so we may not even get any. All the government cars are being taken in next week so everyone has to either drive their own cars or take the bus. That is another nice thing about this house because the bus depot is right down at the corner. It is a big terminal built since you were here, Mom. If something happens you have to give points for all your meat in the locker be sure and let me know and I will send you all the stamps I have. Meat is very scarce here but when there is any in the store I stock up on it and freeze it. Night Elmer filled out the blank about his suit and put down it cost 40 dollars three years ago and had depreciated about twenty dollars. The cleaner man said he knew he wouldn't get that much back but he could put it down anyway. It makes me so mad because even though the suit was old it was still his best suit. It seems like they should give him enough to buy another suit. Mary crawls all over the back yard, right over the stones and everything but has a wonderful time. Tonight she wouldn't eat her cereal at all so when we ate I offered her some of my potatoes and carrots and she just gobbled them down. After I put her to bed Jimmie and I colored Easter eggs. Elmer is reading him a funny book. I still just stare at Jimmie and Mary and can't get over the wonder that I actually gave birth to them and that they are mine. The Easter card came today and it is the cutest card I have ever seen. Jimmie loved getting it and has been carrying it around with him all afternoon. I haven't seen Edith this afternoon but Doug's no doubt came too. He is sick in bed, like he has been off and on all winter. Edith seems amazed all the time that my kids are so well and if they are sick with a cold I don't worry about them. Doug goes to the doctor so much that Jimmie is always saying, when he scratches his finger or something, that he will have to go to the doctor but I tell him God will take care of him. I worry about maybe I don't protect them enough by doing more reading or getting to church more but then I feel as though maybe I am doing protection work by always having it in my mind. When one of them gets hurt I automatically know the truth right away. Every single day I think surely I'll have time to read but first I do one more thing and then so many times I finally get all ready to read and someone comes. Did I mention the paring knife you sent me. I am so awfully glad to have it. I just had one and it was as dull as a dinner knife. The one you sent is wonderful and I use it all the time. We had a letter from Florence today and the mother is back in Rochester. She became very bad again so they had to take her away but hope to get her back again soon. I think it would be better if she were left there because she is much better there and at home Florence doesn't dare turn her back on her and it is terribly hard on Florence and as long as it doesn't make any difference to Mrs. Carlson it seems just as well that she stayed in Rochester but I can realize how they feel about it. Elmer read the letter and didn't even comment on it so I didn't ask him how he felt about it. The old grandmother, who has been a second mother to Elmer, has had a stroke and is in bad condition and Florence said Art just doesn't talk to her anymore at all and she was very, very sad so I feel awfully sorry for her. I wish she could come and visit us because I think it would do her a lot of good to get away and she hasn't ever had very much to make her happy even if it is some of her own fault. I suppose Stella is getting pretty well settled in her new house now. What is her address. Poor Bob is writing crabby letters to all of us but I don't blame him because things don't look very pleasant to him even in the future because he has no idea when he will get home and expects to be kept over there to occupy Germany. I hope Bernice is over the measles by now. It seems like she just had them a while ago but I guess that was the chicken pox. Stella will love having so much room. How are they going to sleep? I hate to think of the girls way upstairs by themselves but maybe they are just going to use two of the bedrooms. Mom what shall I do with the fruit jars you sent the jam in. I'm afraid if I try to send them back to you they will get broken. What do you think is best? It will be nice having the slip cover for the big chair. It must be a hard job to make one though. The chair will look like new. If you should ever see a small hat with a flower on it or something I would love to have you get it for me. I could use a white one for this summer but a black one would be swell too. I like the kind that sits on the back of the head and if they should come in sizes I wear about a 21 or 22 but so many of those hats that sit on the back of the head fit any head size. I just don't buy anything here in the line of clothes because the prices are just too terrible and I never get into Knoxville. If you find one be sure and tell me how much it cost because I want to be sure and pay for it but I don't want you to go out of your way to look for one. I have been getting the winter things packed away and am a little disappointed about thinking we will be staying on here but still it really will be best if we do because we have a house and everything and the longer we stay the more we can save. Don't worry about that yellow dress. If I don't have it a short one will do just as well for the dance. I have two keys that I don't know what they are for and it could just be possible that I picked up that trunk key of yours when I was home so I'll try these keys and see which are the two that I don't use and send them to you. It will be swell if both of you can go to Portland together. It doesn't seem possible that it is time for your association to meet again. I have never had a year go so fast. I'll have to ask Glad about a tricycle. Jim would love to have one. Yes Edith's husband works for Kellex too. They are the nicest neighbors we have ever had and Edith is a real friend. Yesterday the girl on the other side of me came over crying like everything because her husband had written her out a check and told her to get out, and she wanted me to take her down to the bank to get it cashed so I did. I don't blame him a bit though, because she is pregnant and acting just terrible about it. She has one little girl the same age as Jimmie was when I got pregnant with Mary and she doesn't want the new baby at all and I have never heard anyone talk so terrible about it and she is making things awful for her husband. I told her exactly what I thought about her and expected her to get mad about it but instead she seemed to snap out of some of her ideas and she came over this morning and said they had patched things up. She is the girl who had her mother here visiting her and her mother seemed like such a sensible woman that I thought if this Esther did go home her mother would probably get her straightened out. I should write to Florence and try to cheer her up a little and then I guess I'll read one of my new magazines. You haven't mentioned your back porch since it has been built in. Has it been warm enough out there to wash clothes yet? I bet you feel like you have a whole extra room don't you? Last Tuesday night at dancing class we started in on the jitterbug and it is so much fun. I had a new girl over here because Nell went home to some part of Tennessee for Easter vacation. This new girl I had ate up almost half the cake I had and cleaned the ice box out. I was mad when I noticed it but Elmer said if she was that hungry she should be welcome to it. It was just the idea of snooping I didn't like. Nell never does anything like that. Well Folks I guess I had better stop for now but I'll write more later. With Love, Helen P.S. I have a gas stamp I can send you because I haven't been driving the car very much on account of that bum tire. If we ever get our tires so Elmer drives to work we will have plenty so I'll be able to send you more of them. I know how you Folks love the cabin and I sure wish you could get up there all you wanted too. Love, Helen