1852
April 17 Saturday Julia was at work here a year ago to day
has improved very much in dress making since then
I have my black silk nearly finished. The Delaine
all done except the sleeves & buttons, am waiting
to go to Boston to get the trimmings. This afternoon
have been altering some old dresses for Susan
Hannah called to get me to go up by the school
house and select a place for a house for them
Mrs Witherell went with me A beautiful pleasant day
Sewing continued today, with Julia Mahoney again on hand to assist with Evelina’s new dresses, one of black silk, the other of a light wool they called delaine. The finished projects would have to wait for trimmings to be fetched from Boston. Evelina meanwhile refashioned some old dresses for her daughter, for “[e]very season there was a great remaking of old garments to bring them up to date.”*
The bad weather of the past two days disappeared and was replaced by fair skies. Despite continued cold temperatures, Evelina was finally drawn outside on a fun errand. Invited by her niece, Hannah Lincoln Gilmore, and accompanied by her sister-in-law, Sarah Ames Witherell, she went to the local school house to look at some property that her nephew, Alson Augustus Gilmore, and Hannah, his wife, were considering. They had been renting rooms from Col. John Torrey, but now were planning to build a house.
Everyone in North Easton lately seemed to be wielding a hammer. It was spring.
*Winthrop Ames, The Ames Family of Easton, Massachusetts, p. 127
evelinaames 