“I think you’re a mean boy!” stormed poor Twaddles. “You and Meg are selfish. You have all the fun—you went to a party yesterday and Dot and I didn’t go.”
“No, but you had a party home with Mother,” Meg told him. “Norah said you had cocoanut layer cake and cocoa in the yellow pot.”
“Yes, we had a lovely party,” said Mother Blossom cheerfully. “And twinnies, if you don’t go skating this morning, I’ll think of something pleasant for you to do in the house.”
“It’s a very cold day,” said Father Blossom, folding up his paper and taking his fur-lined gloves (which Santa Claus had brought him) from the window sill. “Quite too cold for anyone to go out who doesn’t have to. I don’t think Meg and Bobby will stay at the pond very long; and small folks like Dot and Twaddles mustn’t think of taking such a long walk.”
“Oh, Daddy!” cried Dot, disappointment in her voice.
“Oh, Dot!” said Father Blossom, kissing her. “Be a good girl, honey, and tonight when I come home, we’ll pop corn at the fireplace.”
Sam brought the car around in a moment and took Father Blossom off to the busy foundry. Dot, with her nose pressed against the window pane, was trying not to cry when her attention was attracted by a farm wagon going slowly past.
“What a lot of noise that wagon makes!” she said aloud. “Why doesn’t the man oil it the way Jud used to oil Aunt Polly’s wagons?”
“That wagon doesn’t need oiling,” Norah answered. She was clearing the breakfast table and had heard Dot’s remark. “Wagons always creak like that in cold weather. You can tell by that it’s a very cold day.”
Bobby and Meg bundled up warmly and taking their skates from the hall closet, hurried off to the pond. They promised Mother Blossom to come home the moment they felt cold.