How we became foster parents..

The children's welfare from Brandon Manitoba were looking for foster homes in places besides
the city.I don't remember just which family in our area applied to take care of children other than their own. We first had to have our home licenced and then be excepted to become foster parents. There were several family's who applied in the Oak Lake area. I know a number of the Gompf family's who became foster parents. Max brother Charlie & Evelyn,had one daughter Ferne applied first, then his older brother Elmer & Edith had three children, Beverley, Donald & Marjorie, were excepted. Next Max & I , who had one son & two daughters,Gary, Gail & Colleen relieved our licenced to have a foster home. Max parents Harry & Lena Gompf whose, daughter Eileen, was still living at home also were able to have their home licenced to look after children in need of care.
Children received foster care for different reasons, such as illness . I don't know for sure was the first to receive their child or children. We all saw the need and believed it was a way to help those in need of special care.
We were paid a small amount for each child as none of us were able do this on our own with out some help ,for these were years when cash was scarce. We all raised large gardens , had chickens, pigs & cattle which gave us our meat supply. Elmer,s lived on the edge of the town of oak Lake. Max folks lived in town & Eileen loved children.
I believe Charlie & Evelyn may have been the first to receive a foster child, they had several during the time they were foster parents, thus Ferne had a play mate thus being company
for each other. Elmer & Edith had many foster children pass through their home, which were either adopted out & they also adopted two of their foster children. Max parents Harry & Lena recieved two small boys who were brothers. Eileen loved to help care for these boys but due to Eileen's sudden death, the boys had to be given another home.
We had several children for short terms who returned to relatives or were adopted.
Barb Paterson, a neighbor & a close friend asked us if we would take some of her brothers Jack's family as there were five children in need of a good christian home .The mother Betty was too ill to care for them . Jack worked far from their home & wanted them placed in good homes. when their mother was hospitalized. Barb took one boy Rickie & Kevin was to be placed in our home. The youngest son Brad went to live with his aunt in USA. the two eldest Jackelyn and Tim live for a time with neighbors in Kenton. Later we were asked to take them so Lynne(she was called then) and Tim came to live with us,thus keeping the family closer together, by being with relatives & friends of the family. We now had a larger family as every summer my mother would spent with us in Manitoba but the winters were spent with her other daughter Clara Siggelkow in High River in Alberta..

My years of cooking at church camps.

My first time of cooking for larger than family dinner was after I had moved with the Grenfell bible School to the west coast after my year at the school there. I had been asked to travel with the presidents family all the way through the mountains by car with a family of three children plus we three adults.They were short of money so we would stop in towns where The Erickson's knew the Full Gospel pastors, whether they had let them know ahead of time that they wanted bed & breakfast, I do not remember. The next morning we would drive on the next day stopping at more friends ,until we arrived at Port Cocktails to where the Bible school was being moved to. The school was to open that fall as many had applied. The many supplies that were being move from Grenfell were being shipped by train & I believe some of the older students were traveling with these supplies. They didn't have a cook hired yet so I was asked to do the cooking until a cook would be found.It was a new experience for me. The place needed a lot of cleaning ,I manage to keep not only the family feed clothed & washed. The apartment where the family was to live had to be kept clean.
With My brother in law knowing of my having this experience ,Lewis White hading the job of finding a cook for Trossach camp, he contacted me, but I said"No" as I was a farmers wife, with 3 small children, & my mother was staying with us then as well. He said I would get paid & my children could come with me. I finally said"if you really can't find some one I would help you out." Of course Lewis stopped looking. I started cooking for Trossach camp, taking my children with I think Colleen stay at home with grandma Lincoln so Max would have a cook as we were Mixed farming with lots of chores to do. I had a helper with the food preparation, Mrs Keith of Hazenmore as the second cook. She was Isabelle(my best school friends) mother.
We cooked on coal & wood stoves & had a man who kept these old large restaurant stoves
stoked & piping hot for the to cooks to start breakfast for all the campers. We had a lot of volunteer help from campers & many helped with a lot of the job of running a large church camp on the southern Sask. prairies. It was in the only area with trees.
I cooked for 3 different church camps in my 12 or more years as a camp cook.I was a head cook at least 12 times at Trossach, then later I cooked several times at camps in Manitoba.
I first cooked at the Pentecostal camp south of Brandon & also at a camp north of Minnedosa near Gimlie near a Lake.
At these camps we would be cooking for around 60 or more campers each meal, some times farmers whose family's were at camp would come for evening meal. Sunday meals were the largest as many people came from the surrounding area came for the services. In the early years the camp grounds would over flow with people who came to see these Holy Rollers roll. The many years I attended that camp I never saw anyone roll but many came to those alter to
ask Jesus into their life & were filled with the spirit of God, went home to live better lives with Joy in their hearts ready to help friends & relatives know peace & love for others, to be a helpers to friends & family.

My sewing Machine & hand work.

I loved to sew my own clothes & those of my family. I also did a lot of knitting for myself & children and I even made a sports jacket for Max & also sewed Gary his first suit with pants and a matching jacket. Winter was times for knitting & making quilts. My mother & her mother as well as her 2 sisters were good seamstress, also did all kinds of hand work. Most women in those times made all their families clothes they made many articles by needle & thread on material they bought through the catalogue. My mother knit, crocheted & tatted
as well , made lace , which was used for dress incerts & to put on the pillow cases. I never learned the art of tating, but my sister Clara did. I inherited my mother tating shuttle which her father had hand made with his pen knife out of hard wood of that area. My nephew Murray Lincoln had learned this art from mother's sister aunt Clara, so I gave him my mother tatting shuttle, which he has made several pieces & also taught tatting in Regina University as it is getting to become a lost art.
Every winter I would make a quilt from the scrapes of materal that were left over from dress makingfor the family, nothing was wasted in those days. I even have several quilts with me here in the lodge. I made quilts for all my children & some of the grand children. Mother came to live with me for the last several years of her life, She had given me her treddle sewing machine which I believe she had sent to T Eaton catologe for. It was a tredal sewing machine & Max bought a small motor on it which worked really well.
In a few years went I went to Brandon to price or buy a new one. I bought one also entered
a sewing course which entered me into a contest where I was to sew a dress that I would enter in a canada wide contest as well.
I bought a dress pattern for a two piece summer suit of linen like cloth . I was to sewing it according to all the directions I had learned during this course. There were several ladies that entered. We took them into Brandon to be judged at Singer Store. I had to model mine. To my surprise I won first prize, a portable singer sewing machene. Then my dress was sent to the CNE fair in Ont. to be judged with ones from every provence in Canada. I did not win there .My dress was returned to me, which I had a lot of good wear. I still have that dress some where at my daughter Gail home at Millecent.
I had traded mother sewing machine on the new one I had bought but now I didn't need a second one. Max sister Clara had only been married a short time & she needed a sewing machine & I needed a electric stove for the summer months . Clara had a older model of a electric stove, so we just traded, her stove had 3 coiled burners on top & one in the oven.
I used to wish & had kept mother old treadle sewing machine as a antique but now this younger generation have no room for those old things, for they want all the latest enventions

Gary starts school in the country.

Gary was a six it was time to attend school which was around 2 mile away. This had been closed for several years .The few students who were of school age were attending the neigboring school of Ryerson . Several older farmers had retired to live in town. Two families with children bought these farms , who had school age children to attend. Harvey school board decided, our school could reopened. The former trustees applyed for a school teacher . Harvey school reopened with around 10 students.I think the new teacher was a older single lady, who boarded at one of the families who lived within walking distance of the school. Gail started her first year as well here. By the time Colleen was school age this school closed & kids were driven by their parents to Lake school as several needed to attend high school. Later school buses took the country kids to & from School in Oak Lake. They had to walk to the nearest corner to get picked up returned after school was out.
I would often take my children to Trossach camp in July, so the summer, The year Evelyn & Charlie had pray time with his sister Clara, they had felt a call to to go to a Bible school. That summer Evelyn decided she & I would go to this camp. The services were full of bible teaching
& when we returned home she told Charlie how they could attend this Bible school as it was not as exensive as other they had talked about. Clara wanted to go as well as she had just finished her high school. They attended & graduated from this school coming back to our place & worked in the Oak Lake Honey Plant each summer. They excepted a pastorate in Minnedosa, Manitoba,
where they ministored for seneral years.
The first year they returned I was execting our youngest daughter Colleen who was born on Sept 3rd. By this time we had a new pastor in our church in Oak Lake. The Crasler were a older couple with 2 small children. We had our first two children dedicated to the Lord at Trossach Camp Babys were dedicated to the Lord by their parents at a early age. Water baptism took place after their decision to take Christ as their Savior & done by immersion.
The Craslers had twin girls around the same time Colleen was born. They had their hands full with such a large family. Max tried to comfort Rev Crasler, saying you will recieve double the family allowance with two.The family allowance had been put in place when Gary was born, & he recieved one of the first of $5.00 per child a month, I don't think our pastor enjoyed Max
remark of the government help. One sunday there were three babys dedicated to the Lord by visiting pastor , our Colleen & the twins Lois & Eunice Crasler.