Fantasy vs. Reality

Mary and her mother escape their harsh reality through elaborate fantasies about wealth, fine clothes, a lordly husband, and a brother returning from America, contrasting their dreams of romance and luxury with the grim facts of their daily lives.

Mary's internal conflict between her mother's romantic fantasies and the grim reality of their lives, highlighted by her lies about her mother's work.

Mrs. Makebelieve escapes her poverty by pretending to be rich, imagining grand houses and dresses, contrasting sharply with their actual life.

Mrs. Makebelieve's elaborate plans for repapering, a Turkey carpet, and a piano contrast sharply with their actual impoverished conditions, while Mary imagines stories about ducks and flowers.

Mary's mother spins elaborate fairy-tale visions of lords and trousseaus, while Mary begins to see marriage as a mundane fact among grey-lived couples.