Brita was the perfect oldest sibling

"Brita was the oldest one of us six kids. She was the perfect one to be the oldest sibling. She was such a neat person. She could never get dirty. In school, she hated to hold hands with some of the other kids. We didn’t have a place to do gymnastics of any kind, so sometimes we would push all the benches and desks off to the sides of the room and do something there like ringdances and such. For some of those, you had to hold hands. There was one girl who they said always had sniffles on her hands because her nose was always running. Brita refused to hold hands with her. Brita was the one who looked after us little ones. I don’t blame her for getting tired of us at times. All through the years, if we needed something and Mama was too busy, we would go to Brita.

One time, we were out riding bicycles, and Brita and Folke i Sör crashed in the corner of the house there. Brita was always such an orderly kid. She never really got dirty and always washed her hands if they got any dirt on them at all. Well, she got so mad at this crash because she hit the ground on her hands and knees. She hollered at him, “It’s your fault! Don’t you know that you’re supposed to ring your bell when you come to corners!” The rest of us sort of chuckled because we didn’t remember Brita ringing her bell either.

When we got older, Brita was the only one who gave me any kind of instruction in how I developed as a woman. My mother never mentioned a word. There was no such thing as buying sanitary napkins in the store. They used to have homemade ones. One time when they had one of the big washings

This is one type of mangle. They were used

to squeeze water out of freshly washed 

clothes before the clothes were hung up

to dry. This helped the dry faster :) 

that I’ve talked about before, Mama and Midi were upstairs working the big mangle. They would fold the sheets and tablecloths in such a way and run them through that mangle. One would stick it in one side and one would ease it out the other side, while kids turned the crank and made it go. One time I was doing the turning, and I asked about the sanitary napkins: “What is that?” Mama and Midi looked at each other and smiled a bit and Mama said, “You’re not old enough yet to need them. You’ll know when the time comes.” When I asked Brita later, she told me I wouldn’t need them until I was really a woman, and I thought I was still a kid, so then I didn’t worry about it. Later when it did come, Brita explained to me what to do and how I needed to take care of it.

Moster Brita cross-stitched these little

people who dance along the front

of one set of shelves in my kitchen :)

Brita was always really good at handicrafts. She did a lot of cross-stitch. She made some beautiful tablecloths with cross-stitch around the edges and all kinds of other things too. She taught me a lot about how to keep your thread taut and your stitches even. She could knit beautifully too.  You who know how much I have knitted in my life now might find it funny to hear that at one time, I failed at knitting in school. Girls did those kinds of things in school then. I was supposed to knit a sock. You use four needles and you knit with the fifth around in circles and I had the worst time with the heel. I knit it, and my teacher ripped it out. I knit it again, and the teacher ripped it out again. My stitches were too uneven and ugly. I don’t remember for sure now how many times this went on, but one day, I went to Mama, and I cried. Well, Mama thought that had been enough. She took the knitting and handed it to Brita and told her to do it for me. When I showed it to the teacher the next day, she said, “You didn’t do this.” I said, “No Brita did it because Mama told her to.” The teacher let it go then. I think she might have been a little scared of Mama. I was sure

grateful  to Brita for that heel.

One other thing, Brita took me to the first movie I ever saw. I think I was 16 years old the first time I was allowed to go with Brita and Sara to see Snövit och de Sju Dvärgarna! (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.)"