Boston, April 8, 1908.Dear Aunt Emma:
It is about time that I answered your letter which I received a couple of weeks ago, but I do not know of much to write. Father is as usual and Walter's family are well so far as I know. Laura and her sister Addie called at the house Sunday afternoon but I was not at home and so did not see them. It was twelve years since mother died Sunday and I went out to Forest Hills. Walter is ready now to get a monument and he and I have been looking around trying to find something to suit us but I think it is a hard thing to select.
Since my washwoman left I have been having a hard time to get anyone to take her place. The woman who did the washing last week brought home the worst looking clothes that I ever saw; they looked as if they had been dyed blue, and my shirt waist and father's shirt had to be washed over before we could wear them. It certainly is discouraging to pay a good price to have work done and then have to have it done over again. My house is dirty and I don't know how I am going to get any house cleaning done.
Grace told her relatives last week of her engagement and plans to be married and to her surprise they seemed rather pleased about it. She has said all along that they would make a great fuss and would feel so terribly that she did not dare to tell them, but they were not surprised at all and even asked her to be married from their house and offered to do what they could to help her, but her plans are all made. Mr. Richards gave her last week a string of pearls four yards long to wear on the wedding day. The pearls are very small but perfectly matched and very pretty. He has also given her an aqua marine and pearl pin which can be worn as a pendant, for her birthday which comes next month. It is a beauty. Much to my relief she keeps them in the safe in town. Her teeth have been troubling her lately and she is having them attended to and is also having her dressmaking done this month as she wants to have her dresses all finished before the first of May. She did intend to be married in a blue travelling dress (which I think would be very sensible) but she asked advice of a fashionable friend of the Richards' and she told her that she must have something light so they have decided on a cafe au lait silk with a long train covered with embroidered filet lace and a Parisian hat that is most wonderful to behold. It is a rakish looking affair with a high crown and a bunch of white feathers hanging off one side of it and has strings of brown velvet three inches wide and about two yards long. I don't see how she can have the courage to wear such a looking thing. She seems to have an idea that people wear such things abroad, and perhaps they do at garden parties but I don't believe they do anywhere else, but then I have never been abroad. Then she is having a pink silk dinner gown made with a long train, a blue silk made with two waists, the embroidered batiste that Miss Richards gave her made up over pink silk, a white lace dress, a blue chiffon and silk fixed over, a travelling suit, a black skirt and several waists. Her outfit will be very pretty I think, with the exception of the hat. That seems perfectly ridiculous to me and I don't see how she can possibly have the courage to wear it.
It is almost time for me to go out to lunch and I will now stop. I hope that I shall have some work to do this afternoon for I have not had a thing to do this morning except to answer the telephone. I hope you and Abby are well and that we shall hear from you again soon.
With love,
Flora.