Friday, Dec. 22, 1939

Put in tree & cleaned etc. Leo & Rose [Rosalia] & Marita came, brought load corn; we cleaned out basement. Received Christmas greeting from Becker of Red Bud. picture & envelope from Fr. Spors. Cloudy, looks like rain.

Thursday, Dec. 22, 1938

Raining today & foggy. Went to Smithton this afternoon. Leo & family came this eve. they helped clean turkey & trim Christmas tree; couldn’t get there car started, so pap pushed it apiece till it started, end of town.

Saturday, Dec. 17, 1938

Nice day. Fixed tree stand etc. Renneckers called this eve. to come over for a solo game. Lester Gregson Emil & Steve & pap played & Olive & Bertille & Gus & Katie Klotz played 6 hand pinochle, breaking up even. Gregson boys & Klotz’s girls played games. Served were 5 cookies & apples.

Wednesday, Dec. 14, 1938

Nice day. Baked carmel [sic] cookies; patched. Went to Belleville this afternoon. Henry & Billy [Willis] came got things for butchering. Uncle Fred & A. [Aunt] Mary came brought tree up. We received a beautiful calendar for Becker Ins. Agent. Bill [Klein] was here.

Friday, Jan. 7, 1938

Cleaned, took tree down etc. Pap cleaned barn. A man stopped in, to find the way to Mrs. Hy Braun. Mr. John Horn is very ill at present. Ed. Cortner lost small shoats – 8.

Tuesday, Dec. 21, 1937

Washed, ironed. Received Christmas card from Josie & letter from Fr. Aydt; for donations. Nice day, windy. Henry & family came brought tree up. Leona got 2 lb. honey from Renneckers, for piner syrup. Bert [Bertille] went along over there.

Tuesday, Jan. 5, 1936

We washed, ironed, patched; cleaned upstairs took the tree & decorations down. Some guys here this afternoon wanted to use our sheet [? – unclear] to unload some mules, 1 had been lying down in there, they were afraid it would get killed; & they got stuck in the yard, before they even got that far; some time, cut tracks over the whole place, & didn’t even say as much as thank you, came from way down in Mo. some place. Ed. Meng came yet to & Clarence Wagner. The St. Augustine School, they have lotto & euchre tonite given by the Young Ladies Sodality. Geo. Wagner butchered today. Found 3 doz. eggs. Uncle Fred & Aunt Mary came here, & pap & Bert went along up to the euchre party, the quilt by playing 1 game lotto was won by Joe Watchel, we didn’t get a thing. Pap had 7 & Bert 4 & A. Mary 2 & Uncle Fred 12 he got a table cloth, the prizes were nice, but not very many & hall was filled, all the tables, surely nice crowd lot of N. Athens & Paderborn. Fr. Teonnies was also down. Leo & Rose went to see Geo. Orlet by Floraville.

Thursday, Dec. 24, 1936

Cleaned & fixed the ducks, 7 & 8½ lbs. they weighed. Went to Belleville Rose went to dentist, went to church. Sure a nice day, so warm we have windows & doors open. Robert Laut has his electric put in & has a radio, installed. Slopy [sic] weather & roads. Leo came down this evening, we light the Christmas tree.

Wednesday, Dec. 23, 1936

Cleaned 2 ducks, fixed Christmas tree electric lights. Mauff vegtable [sic] man was here, we didn’t buy anything, pap went up town, got oranges, nuts. Rose got Christmas cards from Irene Helfrich. Bert got 1 from Omer. Pap tried his luck on box candy 10¢ & fruit cake .02. Pap & Rose went out to Henry’s got load oats. Beautiful day.

Wednesday, Dec. 25, 1935

Christmas Day. Went to 5 o clock mass at Red Bud. Uncle & Aunt called in then went home after church. We went out to Henry’s had dinner, Geodell’s were out to; Boys got all kind of things from Santa, wagon, coloring sets, lotto game, pocket knife, fountain pens from Grandma at Waterloo. Boy! did it get gold, snowing terrible this morning at 4 o clock it was warm at 6 & after it started in freezing & zero all day. The Evangical [sic] children have there Christmas program at the church tonite. In Red Bud they have a big lighted tree on Public Sq; drive around it.