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Author:  Florence Slobodkin Copyright Date:  1958 Publisher:  Vanguard Pagination:  28 p. Dedication:  to my Mother, The Twins’ and Naomi’s “Great-Grandma Gersh”

Ned and Donny are twins. They live in Michigan, where it is often very cold in the winter time and there is a lot of snow and ice. Once when their Mother and Father went on a trip, their Grandmother came to stay with the boys.      Grandma took very good care of Ned and Donny.      When they went outdoors, Grandma always said, “Let’s zip you up nice and warm, and be sure to put on your red mittens.”      One day Donny could not find one of his mittens.      “I must have left it in Janey’s yard yesterday,” said Donny. “Let’s go look for it.”      But when Donny and Ned looked in Janey’s yard, they could not find the red mitten.      Janey’s mother said, “If we do find it, Janey will take it over to your house.”      And, sure enough, a little later that day Janey came to their house with a red mitten.      “That’s it,” said Grandma. “Now let me clip it to your jacket, Donny, so you won’t lose it again.”      The next morning while the twins were in school, Mrs. Brown, who lived next door, rang the doorbell.      “I heard that one of the twins was looking for his red mitten,” she said. “Here it is.” And she gave Grandma a mitten that looked exactly like those the twins wore.      “I suppose this does belong to them,” said Grandma. “Their mother must have bought them an extra pair. Thank you, Mrs. Brown.”      And Grandma put the red mitten in a small drawer.      That afternoon Ned came home from school with three mittens ... the pair he had started out with and an extra one.      “Our teacher says this must be our red mitten,” he said.      “I suppose it is,” said Grandma. “It looks just like the others.” And she put this one in the drawer, too.      A few days later, after the boys had played in the snow in their own back yard, they came into the house and brought two more red mittens.      “Are these yours,” asked Grandma.      The boys were not sure.      “But we did lose some mittens a few weeks ago,” said Donny.      So Grandma put these mittens into the drawer with the other mittens.      The postman came with the mail (mostly pretty picture postcards from the boys’ mother and father) and brought another red mitten.      “I found this on Elm Street,” he said, “and someone said it must belong to the twins.”      Grandma stared at the mitten the postman put into her hands.      “Thank you,” she said quietly.

Author’s dedication (click to view larger image)     Hand-drawn dedication illustration

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