The ceremony over, the mother of the bride builds a fire under the baking stone, while the daughter prepares the batter and begins to bake a large quantity of paper bread. After this practical and beautiful starting of the young folks in life the mother returns to her home. But there is much more to do before the newly married merge into the staid married folks of Tusayan. The wedding breakfast follows closely on the heels of the ceremony and the father of the young man must run through the pueblo with a bag of cotton, handfuls of which he gives to the relatives and friends, who pick out the seeds and return the cotton to him. This cotton is for the wedding blankets and sash which are to be the trousseau of the bride.
The practical side and the mutual helpfulness of the Hopi come out strongly here, when a few days later the loud-voiced crier announces the time for the spinning of the cotton for the bride's blankets. This takes place in the kivas, where usually all the weaving is done by the man, and with jollity and many a story the task is soon finished. The spun cotton is handed over to the bridegroom as a contribution from the village, to be paid for, like everything else Hopi, by a sumptuous feast which has been prepared by the women for the spinners. Perhaps ten sage-brush-fed sheep and goats, tough beyond reason, are being softened in a stew, consisting mainly of corn; stacks of paper bread have been baked; various other dishes have been concocted, and all is ready when the crier calls in the hungry multitude. They fall to, like the genius of famine, without knives and forks, but with active, though not over-clean digits, at the start. When they are through, there is little left for the gaunt, half-starved dogs that scent the savors of the feast outside the door. If one desires to see the Hopi at his happiest he must find him squatted on the floor before an ample and well-spread feast.
With the spun cotton serious work begins for the bridegroom and his male relatives lasting several weeks. A large white blanket five by six feet and one four and a half by five feet must be woven, and a reed mat made in which the blankets are to be rolled. A white sash with long fringe, and a pair of moccasins, each having half a deerskin for leggings, like those worn by the women of the Rio Grande pueblos, complete the costume. The blankets must have elaborate tassels at the four corners. Shortly before sunrise the bride, arrayed in her finery, performs the last act in the drama, called "going home." It must be explained that up to this time the bride has remained in the house of her husband's people. Wearing the large white blanket picturesquely disposed over her head and carrying the small blanket wrapped in the reed mat in her hands, she walks to her mother's house, where she is received with a few words of greeting, and the long ceremony is over.