Valerie Tripp

Spencer likes to make the class laugh, but when it hurts Hallie's feelings Miss Sparks helps the whole class understand the difference between joking and teasing.

"When Felicity overhears a plot against the colonists, no one believes her but Ben, her father's apprentice. So the two risk great danger to warn the colonists themselves. Soon afterward, Felicity finds a secret note from Ben. He has run away to join George Washington's army, and he is injured. Felicity is worried about him but knows it would be wrong to help a runaway apprentice. Then she is turned away from the door of her best friend, Elizabeth....

Maryellen Larkin is nine years old and longs to stand out, but in a family with five brothers and sisters it's easy to get lost in the shuffle! This is the first volume of Maryellen's stories about growing up in the 1950s.

"Felicity loves riding horses far more than stitchery or serving tea. When she falls in love with a beautiful chestnut mare, she schemes to save the mare from its cruel owner with the help of Ben, her father's young apprentice. Yet as talk of revolution rumbles around her, finds it harder to tell right from wrong. Ben wants war, while her best friend's family remains loyal to the king. Then receives an invitation to the Governor's Palace, and she...

Josefina and her sisters are excited when energetic young Aunt Dolores arrives at the rancho, bringing new ideas, new fashions, and new challenges, but they worry the changes will make them forget Mamá, especially as Christmas approaches.

It is 1934, and the Great Depression has found the Kittredges. First, Kit's father loses his job, then the family is forced to take in boarders to make ends meet.