Saturday, September 02, 2006

Writing Life Stories
When writing your life story, you decide what you want to include. One lady never mentioned anything relating to religion. Another lady has about a quarter of her stories relating to it. They are your stories.

The next posting is pictures of my mother as a child. After writing my stories I have also written one about my mother's life.

"Mom told me they brushed their teeth with baking soda. Once she got enough money to buy some tooth powder at the store. This was very special to her. Her brother got mad at her and poured it down the outhouse."

And this one could be called a quilt story.

"This story is about sleeping in the winter. Mom said the children had to sleep in the attic which was not heated. In the winter she got ready for bed downstairs by the stove and took wrapped coals with her to bed. There she would cover her whole head with a quilt and sometimes in the morning there would be ice over the quilt. She would run downstairs and dress by the stove. Her mother begged her father to let the children sleep downstairs on the coldest nights but he would not allow it."

3 comments:

Finn said...

It fun to hear more about writing life stories. I've heard the unheated upper rooms very common. Don't know about them personally, but have read that in the Laura Ingalls Wilder book.
I can't imagine how they heated even the downstairs with just a cookstove and/or a parlor stove.
Hard times in deed.

Libby said...

Writing life stories (or recording them) is so very important. So much history can simply be lost without it.

Fiona said...

I like your stories. What a great idea to write down stories of your mother's life too.