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Mary Elizabeth Carolena
(Winters) Newkirk
It was early spring in 1919 and Lena knew from past experience why she wasn't feeling well each morning. She had felt this same way four times before in the past seven years. By Fall there would be a new baby. The farm house was pretty full already but there was room for one more. It was a bit overwhelming to think about managing the house and garden with a new baby on the way. Darling little Bertha had just turned two. Dorothy and Gladys were four and five and Woodrow was six. Lena would have to rely on Agnes, now seventeen, to help her with the little ones, as Willard and Harold, twenty-one and fifteen, would be busy farming with their Dad, Walter. Since this was in a time way before doctor's specializing in obstetrics, Babies-R-Us or even Target were a gleam in anyone's eye, preparing for a new baby was nothing like it is today. Lena would make a visit to the local doctor but pretty much keep her same routine following motherhood advise handed down from her mother. The white iron baby bed was still being used by Bertha. She would be promoted to sharing a bed with Dorothy and Gladys to make room for the new baby. No need for bottles as mother nature would provide formula. There were plenty of baby clothes and diapers to be handed down from the last seven years of babies. But there would need to be something new for this baby, a quilt. Given it was a 50/50 chance boy or girl it wouldn't be pink or blue. Lena would find the perfect fabric, it was a soft cotton having a white background covered with tiny purple squares. Her mother suggested using a block pattern called ocean waves. Perhaps this was a remembrance of Lena's ocean voyage at the age of two when her family immigrated to the US from Germany. Lena and her mother would pull from the family scrap bag to complete the quilt. There would be shirting fabrics in various shades of blues and reds and they would even include some black prints, possibly in memory of the earlier tragic losses of two of the Newkirk children. Gertrude, who had fallen from a wagon when she was only two and Raymond, who they had lost to a sudden illness at the age of nine only four years earlier.
Over the summer Lena, Agnes and Lena's mother, Mary Elizabeth completed the quilt. Just after labor day on September 7th, Charles Edgar Newkirk was born into Lena and Walter's family. Charles became the youngest of the ten Newkirk children. The iron baby bed was passed down to the next generation and used by Charles' children and then retired as a treasured antique because of safety issues. The Newkirk family continues to grow and we are now in the 5th generation. We are expecting our newest baby to arrive in February 2007. As I write this story my family is entering into the Advent season and preparing to celebrate the birth of yet another baby, Jesus. May this holiday season bring you the peace and joy of His love. Click here to view Charles' baby quilt. The above story is based
on recorded dates, family history, stories passed down through the
generations and my imagination. I hope you enjoyed it. |
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