A thaw follows Christmas, and the prairie is soon warmed by three weeks of fine weather. Mrs. Shimerda and Ántonia visit the Burdens. Still grumbling, Mrs. Shimerda complains about how her family struggles in poverty while the Burdens live in relative luxury. She snatches an iron pot from the stove and complains that Grandmother has many cooking utensils while she has none, so Grandmother gives her the pot.
Ántonia tells Jim that her father never wanted to come to America; it was her mother who wanted to come so that Ambrosch could become rich. Jim is so disgusted about the pot incident that he doesn’t care.
On January 20, Jim’s eleventh birthday, a blizzard buries the prairie. Grandfather says that he hasn’t seen a storm this bad in the ten years he’s lived in Nebraska.
