“A Look At the Colonial World Through the Eyes of….”

My name is Lucy Smith and I am 14 years old. I am a middle class girl living in colonial America. It is 1634, my parents are both European and came from Europe, but I have been living here in Virginia my whole life. Life has been good here in America so far.

I am not planning on working in any trade because my mother does not. Since I was a little girl I always stayed home and helped my mother with her household chores. Everyday I help her cook our meals which are often soup and bread. I also help her with cleaning the house and planting and harvesting vegetables in our garden. I help her in our kitchen which is small but has everything we need including a fireplace, oven, cooking utensils and a table. My mother and I try to keep the house neat, but it is very hard work. Every morning my mother and I start by doing laundry. We must hand wash all of our families clothing. This can sometimes take up the whole entire day! I live in a medium sized home made of wood. I share a room with my older sister who is 19 years old. She will be getting married soon, although she has not met the man yet she is very excited for her wedding day. I want to be just like my mother, get married and have children because if I don’t I will not be respected by all of my friends and family. I wonder who I will end up marrying. My father is an architect, but I do not see him very often because he is always working.

It is about seven in the morning when my mother shook me awake. “Lucy, we have a big dinner party today. Your cousins and grandparents are coming,” my mother says. I pulled myself out of bed and put on a clean shift, (which I also wear as a nightgown), followed by a stay, then a petitcoat, and lastly my light blue gown that buttons down in the front. I felt the dusty would floors against my bare feet. I walked into the kitchen where my mother and sister had already started cooking. “Good, your awake,” my sister, Jane, said.

“Will you go gather some wood for the oven?” my mother asked me.

“Of course,” I said.

I pull open our heavy door to outside and took a big handful of chopped up wood. I lifted them up with all my strength hoping I would not get a splinter in my hand. I entered the kitchen and put the wood in the fire one by one. On top was a pot filled with chicken broth and vegetables. I stirred it around with a wooden spoon. Tonight we are going to eat bread, chicken, soup and corn pudding. As my mother and sister continue cooking I start working on the laundry. When we are finally done with all of our chores the guests start to arrive. In the end we had a very nice dinner party.