Cimarron by Edna Ferber

The child Cim had got it into his head that this was to be a picnic. He had smelled pies and cakes baking; had seen hampers packed. Certainly, except for the bizarre load that both wagons contained, this might have been one of those informal excursions into a nearby wood which Cim so loved, where they lunched in the open, camped near a stream, and he was allowed to run barefoot in the shadow of his aristocratic grandmother's cool disapproval. Felice Venable loathed all forms of bucolic diversion and could, with a glance, cause more discomfort at an al fresco luncheon than a whole battalion of red ants.

There was a lunatic week preceding their departure from Wichita. Felice fought their going to the last, and finally took to her bed with threats of impending dissolution which failed to achieve the desired effect owing to the preoccupation of the persons supposed to be stricken by her plight. From time to time, intrigued by the thumpings, scurryings, shouts, laughter, quarrels, and general upheaval attendant on the Cravats' departure, Felice rose from her bed and trailed wanly about the house, looking, in her white dimity wrapper, like a bilious and distracted ghost. She issued orders. Take this. Don't take that. It can't be that you're leaving those behind! Your own Aunt Sarah Moncrief du Tisne embroidered every inch of them with her own --