But at that age, would you have felt it was important, whatever your family thought? Would you really have just stoicly accepted it? I'm not saying I think Lawrie wasn't acting like a brat for whining about it, I'm saying I can see why she feels like that.

I think I need to clarify something as well. I didn't initially bring up the clothes thing, or combine it with the horse issue - someone else did that, though I agreed that there seemed to be a bit of inconsistancy there. My original point was that it seems unfair that Lawrie ends up being the only child without easy access to a horse at the holidays, and I was surprised her mother didn't do more to rectify it. I don't think hand-me-downs per se in such a large family are unreasonable, I just think that perhaps either the horse should have been a joint Christmas present to all the younger children, in which case none of them could have complained, or if not, the money could have perhaps been better spent elsewhere. I think this opinion is a result of coming from a smallish family where nevertheless money was tight - if we could all have something, either we'd share or the money would be spent on other things. Obviously, YMMV, etc.

God, sorry, clanwilliam, I've posted this a million times because I keep messing it up.