I Feel Like An Old Beer Horse

October 16, 1946

Dear Marie,

Sorry to be so long in answering  just one of those cases where "tomorrow" would be a better day to write.

Thank you so much for the box of things you sent. Your black dress has been worn and worn. It is certainly comfortable and flattering.

Thank you too, so very much, for your very kind offer to come and help when the baby arrives. I especially realize how inconvenient a time it would be - Thanksgiving to pre-Christmas - such a busy season in the church. However, things seem to look like they're shaping up. Good old Betts still says she's coming up. Her doctor OK'd the idea if she were to come as "supervisor" but not to work too hard. I have a woman lined up (not absolutely definite) to come in to do the washing, possibly ironing and cleaning. Also Bob and Martin will have to assume some evening responsibility with dinner, dishes, and bedding down the small fry. And, after all, I'm not helpless. By the time you have three babies, one learns to take things much more in stride.

As usual, i have lots to do before I go to the hospital. Right now I'm making Roxanne a coat. I still have pajamas to make for everyone, some dresses to make for the baby, and sewing for the Bazaar.

Now to look over your letter - Thank you so much for your very kind offer to get shirts and nighties. I have already bought shirts, and it will have an assortment of half-worn nighties, but possibly one new one wouldn't be a bad idea. Third babies are strictly utility, you know.

Thank you for the salt and pepper shears. They're darling!

Marty was in Portland a week. I went down with the kids last month for a week too. Marty does have a good winter coat.

Just a trace of alburmen (?). I feel like an old beer horse.

Write when you can.

Love, L.

Martin Jensen, patient

If Mrs. Jensen's Belonging Are Here...

Johnson - Burkhalter Wedding

Wedding Date Set

Surplus Commodities in Family Meals, Supplement

Surplus Commodities in Family Meals

My mother remembers this project of my grandmother, which essentially was creating a mix that was a precursor to Bisquick. There were successes - see below - and there were failures. (Ask my mother about those.)

While reading the recipes are interesting, I think the opening lines from my grandmother are perhaps the most fascinating:

Our cooking habits of today are very different from those of a generation ago. We are used to a great many prepared and semi-prepared foods. Many housewives have lost (or are too young to have ever had to know), the art of "cooking from scratch".

As a compomise to this situation, most of the recipes in this pamphlet are based on a basic MASTER MIX. From this one biscuit-type mix, a wide range of cooking and baking is possible with a minimum of preparation time.

Many recipes using large quantities of today's surplus products, such as scrambled edds or custard, have been omitted from this collection; beacuse they have been featured in phamplets previously circulated.

August, 1961

What is ironic is that I only knew my grandmother to make everything from scratch - sans cake. This was the one item she declared was just as good for less money to use the box mix rather than make it from scratch. But she was an entrepreneur, and this project probably paid well for the day and got food on the table for her family, too.

Birth Announcement...Mailed Off to War

Dependency Benefits

Note the date of the application...and the date of Melody's birthday...

...yes, she was born the day he had to leave for War

Orders to Report

A Grateful Nation

Robert Nathan Johnson (1915-1989)