We asked readers to send in stories about old telephones and telephone party lines. Here are a couple of favorite stories we received.• Family Shared Party Line with Disrespectful Teenager• Party Line Telephone Rang Entirely Too Much

In the 1960s, my family had a beige wall-mounted telephone in the kitchen.We lived in a subdivision, where everyone was on a party line. Each family had a separate ring, and you would answer your phone only when you heard your ring. Being on a party line, the phone rang all the time — more ...

How well I remember the four-party phone line we had back in the early 1970s.Most of our neighbors were polite and considerate of the party line. However, there was one disrespectful teenager, probably in junior high at the time, who was not. Frequently, whenever we would pick up the receiver ...

In May 1984, when I was five months pregnant with our first child, my husband, Tony, was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease – a form of cancer. Fear reared its ugly head. I had so many questions. Would Tony live to see our baby grow up? Was his cancer curable? What if ... how would I ...?I ...

As a young girl, I always looked forward to spending time at my grandma’s house each summer. A kind woman raised on a farm in Kentucky, she always had a jar full of cookies and a pie on the counter.Up the street from her home in a quiet neighborhood amongst the Blue Ridge Mountains, an ...

We asked readers to send in stories about random acts of kindness, either acts they had shown, or acts shown to them. We received several stories. Here are a few of our favorites, including a story of how one reader's mother showed appreciation, a story about generous support from family and ...

My mother, who raised eight children, knew how difficult things could be, and she also realized there were a lot of thankless tasks that had to be done.So, one particularly hot summer day many years ago, she put a bottle of soda inside a paper bag filled with ice, and set it on a small chair in ...

We have four garden plots – one in our backyard, one in our front yard, and two community garden plots. In all, about 1,500 square feet of garden space, all for vegetables. We get started planning in February. Our process begins with evaluating how we did the previous year, namely what crops ...

We asked readers to send in stories about how they plan their garden each spring, asking what kinds of vegetables, herbs, and flowers they plant, when they start planting, and if they incorporate any statues or other garden items into the mix. We received several stories. Here are a couple of ...

Once Christmas is over, plants and seed catalogs start showing up in my mailbox. It’s an exciting time, as it gives me a glimpse of springtime.I pore through the pages, “oooing” and “ahhing” over all the new shades of flowers and the latest rose sensation, and then I usually end up ...

I made my first big purchase when I was still in high school, almost 60 years ago. I had learned to sew on my mom’s Singer treadle sewing machine, and she and I made all my skirts and blouses when I was in school. I traveled to Curtis, Nebraska, to attend high school at the University Of ...

My first major purchase was a 12-by-52-feet Crimson mobile home that my husband and I bought as newlyweds. We used his woodworking tools as a down payment, and we got a loan for the remaining amount.We thought the mobile home was wonderful. It had a beautiful bay window in the kitchen, and a ...

We asked readers to send in stories about their first big buy, asking what they bought, when they bought it, and if they had to borrow money for the purchase. We received several stories. Here are a few of our favorites.• First Big Buy Was a Dressmaker Sewing Machine • First Big Buy Was a ...

Four-legged companions are pretty common to life in the country. Whether calling the barnyard home or living alongside their human counterparts in the house, animals add much in the way of shaping rural life. We recently asked readers to share their favorite pet stories from life out where the ...

Millie, my beloved Golden Retriever, has been my constant companion for almost 11 years. Today I say “Goodbye,” and it is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.In past years, I had volunteered in several rescue groups for Goldens. One day, I received a call that there was a puppy ...