More Than a Dream by Lauraine Snelling

Author:Lauraine Snelling [Snelling, Lauraine]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2003-02-28T23:00:00+00:00

‘‘So did you buy Abe’s land?’’ Ingeborg asked as they made ready for bed.

‘‘What else could I do? He needs the money.’’

Ingeborg laid her head on her husband’s shoulder. ‘‘I love you, Haakan Bjorklund.’’

In the morning, after chores and breakfast were finished and as the men prepared to leave, Ingeborg brought in the first picking of beans, and she and Astrid sat in the shade to snap them.

‘‘We’ll come with dinner, so you tell Anji not to worry about feeding everyone. Kaaren and hers are coming too. We will have a real party today.’’

‘‘Good. We’re about due for a party. Should have told the others.’’ Haakan finished putting his tools in the wagon bed. ‘‘Come on, Andrew, what are you waiting for?’’

‘‘I was looking for that horse that Onkel Olaf made for me. I thought Ossie might like to play with it.’’

Ingeborg exchanged a glance of pride with her husband. Leave it to tenderhearted Andrew. ‘‘I think it is up in the attic. I’ll go get it.’’ She returned in a few minutes with the cutout horse head on a stick for riding. Olaf had even made a mane out of unraveled rope and a bridle with reins out of scraps of leather. She’d been keeping it in hopes that one day they would have another little one to ride it. Samuel had been the last one to play horsey with it. But after losing the last baby during the winter, Kaaren had not been given another either.

Those ten days of having little May had been such a joy, but her mother coming for her had been even greater. While she knew Robbie wasn’t well yet, he was sleeping better, and the rages were less intense. Mrs. Nordstrum had thanked Ingeborg repeatedly for coming to help her when she did.

Ingeborg waved her men off and returned to snapping beans. They would get the first jars canned before they left. And from now to fall, they would be canning and pickling pretty much continuously. She glanced up at the crab apple tree she had planted two years earlier. Perhaps they would get enough to make crab apple jelly this year or at least a jar or two of pickled ones. The blossoms had been such a beautiful pink, dotting the tree like bits of pink sunset cloud come down to rest.

They packed the clean jars, poured boiling water over the beans, added salt, and laid the rubber rings that had been softened in hot water in place. After setting the glass lids on top and flipping the wire bales into their upper grooves, the jars were lowered into the boiler of boiling water. Ingeborg filled water up to the jar necks and steamed them for an hour. At that point the lower bale was locked in place, and the jars boiled for another hour.

‘‘Well, we might not be there right on the twelve o’clock button but near to it.’’ Ingeborg wiped the sweat from her face.

‘‘How come it takes beans so long?’’ Astrid asked while adding more wood to the firebox.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.