Sundays

Now the winter seemed long.

Laura and Mary began to be tired of staying always in the house.

Especially on Sundays,the time went so slowly.

Every Sunday Mary and Laura were dressed from the skin out in their best clothes, with fresh ribbons in their hair.

They were very clean,because they had their baths on Saturday night.

In the summer they were bathed in water from the spring.

But in the wintertime Pa filled and heaped the washtub with clean snow, and on the cookstove it melted to water.

Then close by the warm stove, behind a screen made of a blanket over two chairs,Ma bathed Laura,and then she bathed Mary.

Laura was bathed first,because she was littler than Mary.