Very Responsible

Sunday November 19, 1995   Laura is 11 years old.  We are very near selling our house.  We have had to replace the shingles.  In this case Steve had to scrape off with a shovel about five layers of shingles and then put on a fresh layer.  He did this all by himself--noone offered to help and we couldn't afford to pay anyone.  My sister and her husband loaned us their small pick-up for me to use in my 45 mile-each-way commute to my new job.  We couldn't afford to repair or replace the transmission in our van and overnight our debt-to-income ratio (a term which was foreign to me up til now) made it impossible to buy another vehicle.  During this time we came up with homemade Halloween costumes and pulled off a birthday party for Trina on a very low budget.  Our apple tree produced its one and only bumper crop so we survived on apple meals and garden produce that others shared with us.  Here is a short letter I wrote to Laura...

Dear Laura,

Thank you for taking care of our Creative Memories booth at the David Gourley Craft Fair on Saturday.  You did a great job--handing out nearly 100 fliers.  You were there eight hours!  I had to work at the library in Springville.

Daddy needed to load the rest of the old shingles into the Gibson's truck and take the load to the dump.

You were very responsible.  Thank you.

Love, Mom