Eleven-year-old Emma is disappointed when her mother, a doctor, has to deliver a baby on Christmas Day. But when she arrives with Mama at the house, Emma realizes she isn't the only one whose Christmas has been interrupted.

With warm pencil-and-watercolor illustrations, this story offers a glimpse of life on the prairie in the 1800s. And, like Emma, readers will be reminded that easing someone else's pain can often help ease their own.