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For the love of a Dog

For anyone who is a pet owner/lover, there are many things that you would do for your pet. But what happens when something needs tobe done but you don’t know what it is? There are many people; I can be counted as one of them that says many times, “Wow, wouldn’t it be nice to live a dog‘s life.” That is kind of like saying something about the grass being greener on the other side of the fence.

What we fail to think about sometimes are the downfalls to the dog’s life. We don’t realize the hard work, maybe chemicals that have gone into that greener lawn.

I have wondered about those things this week as I sit and watch my eldest dog suffering. Is he suffering? I don’t really know because he cannot tell me. Does he hurt, is he sad, does he know we love him? All of these questions run through my head as I watch him. If I were a guessing woman I would say, no he does not hurt, but it is irritating; he is sad and he knows we love him.

The frustrating thing is the vet says he has never seen anything like it before. Last Sunday, my daughter says to me, “Mom, I think Copper is bleeding.” I looked at his face and there was a brown spot on the side of his mouth. I took an old towel and gently wiped the area and saw the towel turn red. Yep, he had been bleeding. As I was cleaning, the area seemed hard so i wasn’t quite sure what to do so I did not look inside his mouth. I just thought that he got snagged on something which caused the bleeding.

A little background: Copper is 9 1/2 years old. He is a Lakeland Terrier, a smaller version of an Airedale Terrier. He is from Virginia and not a well-known breed in this area. He is an indoor/outdoor dog and is spoiled rotten. He does not run around loose and is very protective of his home.

He did nip a boy’s finger once when this boy was teasing Copper and the boy stuck his finger through our chain link fence. I don’t know if Copper really bit the boy intentionally or if Copper was barking at him and happened to close his mouth in a bark with the boy’s finger close. May it be noted that this boy constantly poked at Copper with sticks through the fence and would yell at him. Like I wrote, Copper was very protective of his home. Copper seems to know when the “bad boys” are walking near our fence because he will bark; he does not bark at good kids!

I haven’t heard Copper bark for days. He just does not have the energy. By Monday, he seemed ok and we decided to lay low on calling the vet. If he had injured himself, it would heal. That all changed on Tuesday.

Tuesday morning, I noticed blood coming out of Coppers right nostril, the same side where there was the blood spot near his mouth. It was time to go to the vet. The vet looked at Copper and had this concerned look. He looked up his nose and then looked into his mouth. The concern on his face grew. He said that he had never seen anything like this in a dog and asked if there was a chance that Copper chewed on electrical cord. I told him, “Absolutely not!”

Apparently, I should have looked inside his mouth; I should have been more diligent in my looking him over. The vet said that his mouth looked all cut up and bleeding. He asked if he could have gotten into rat poison; another answer of NO. A swab of his mouth and nose were taken; we received and antibiotic to treat for a viral infection, just in case and were sent on our way. I asked if I should be feeding him soft dog food and was told yes. Oh and I was told to isolate him from our 3-year-old Lakeland, Tinkerbelle.

Got home to a phone call from the vet telling is that he had contacted the lab 60 miles away and was told they needed blood work from Copper. The nurse first told us to come in at 2:00, Wednesday and then corrected herself and told us to come by at 5:30. I guess they realized they did not to expose any of their other patients if Copper was contagious.

I woke up Wednesday morning to see that his other nostril had started bleeding and I immediately called the vet. I was beside myself. I had no idea what was wrong with him and there was nothing I could do to help. He went back to the vet and tests sent out.

As of Friday here is what we know: he is not in renal failure, a couple of tests done in Nebraska are leaning towards possible rat poison based on certain levels in his blood. Because of that, he was given a Vitamin K shot and Vitamin K pills. Plus it seemed that his bleeding was lessening.

By Saturday and continuing into today, the bleeding is back, he is lethargic and to get him to eat, I have to hold his bowl in such a way that he does not have to bend his head. While Friday his tail was wagging, that all stopped on Saturday.

I know that you do not need these details. I know that Copper means nothing to you. But he means the world to me and I know that there are many out there that have an ill pet or a pet that they have lost. It means something to you to remember that loved pet.

I hope by Monday that we have more answers and that we can work on a cure. Or if there is no cure, at least we will have some answers.

I think of Tinkerbelle who has no idea what is going on. She just knows that her buddy is not around to pester her, or she him.She might be worried if she is going to disappear. She wants much more loving than usual.

No matter how much we want to believe that a dog is just a dog or a cat is just a cat, when it comes down to it, I would do anything for my dog; I have bathed his bloody front legs that he uses to wipe his nose. I make burger and rice for him because he quit eating the soft dog food that we bought for him to ease the irritation in his mouth. I cleaned his bottom because his intestines didn’t like switching from hard to soft food (another reason for adding rice to his diet). I have cried more tears than I thought possible. And through all this, Copper still looks at me with love, even through those sad eyes, I can see the love.

I pray that there is a cure and I pray that he can get back to the same old Copper that we all know and love. But more than anything, I want him to not be in pain. Maybe the answer will come soon, for that I pray.

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It’s Beginning to look a lot like Christmas! A memory of Grandma Thom.

I am not a young thaang! (Sorry about the bad slang) but conversely, I am not as old as dirt. While my children are teenagers, when my grandma was my age, she had four grandchildren ages 6, 4, 3 and 1 (I am the one year old). We would be the only grandchildren she would have; as my mom’s only sibling never married. Since there were only four of us and we lived six blocks from them (six blocks is about 1/2 mile), we saw my grandparents a lot.

I loved my grandma probably more than any other relative I had/have. She made me laugh, cry, think, but mostly grow as a person. I think of her almost every day. And I definitely miss her. Even as I write this my eyes fill with tears and I think of the empty spot in my life. I know that she watches over me and sees what I have done in my life, but my children never met her. They never got to eat her Christmas cookies or learn how to separate an egg or just sit with her and share stories. You see, she has been gone 20 years this December 26th.

I have to tell you that the tears are really flowing now and I don’t know why. I thought I was finished grieving. It has been three Christmases since last I cried while singing “Silent Night” at our  Christmas Eve service. Maybe because I have never written about her; never put my grief to paper that the tears are flowing.

I have written about traditions and many of those traditions came from Grandma (and Grandpa) Thom (Thompson). Our Christmas tree went up on Christmas Eve because when my mom was growing up, the tree went up on Christmas Eve and Santa Clause decorated it. (We didn’t leave the decorating to Santa, we did that on our own). When I was older, I found out that the tree going up on Christmas Eve was all about the 12 days of Christmas because it always came down on Epiphany (Day 12).

On Christmas Day, we always had dinner at Grandma and Grandpa’s. We would have the same meal: bone-in ham, creamy mashed potatoes, fluffy Jello salad, homemade Christmas Pudding (Plum pudding) and mincemeat tarts with Hard Sauce. And as my Grandma was a tried and true Methodist *, the Christmas Pudding and Hard Sauce were not made with alcohol.  Our evening meal was ham sandwiches, Ruffles Chips, cheese always homemade cookies with English Tea (English tea is made with milk and sugar).  So many memories… (* She told me, at the end of her life, that the reason she did not drink wine was that she was worried she would like it too much!)

Grandma taught me how to iron. I will never forget the low ceilinged, dark basement where she ironed. She would sit with the ironing board at a low position, the green 7-Up bottle filled with water and the sprinkler attachment on the end to sprinkle the item to be ironed. She would have the old vacuum-tubed television on, with its Rabbit Ears, watching “A Secret Storm”. We would talk about the characters on the television, or what was happening at school or any crazy thing that entered our minds.

She started me on my grandpa’s handkerchiefs. When I mastered those, I graduated up to trousers and then dress shirts. To this day, I love to iron. I always start with handkerchiefs, then I move my way to dress shirts. Do I iron that way because that is the order I learned? I don’t know but it is always how I iron. My husband likes the fact that I don’t grumble about ironing, because he does like his things nicely pressed. (And please no grumbling about my domesticity. I do these things with a smile on my face. Anyone who knows me knows that I am my own woman and not a domestic slave. I learned those things from my mom and grandma. I can “bring home the bacon and fry it up in the pan…” {Enjoli commercial from the 70’/80’s})

Grandma Thom was a fabulous cook. She was an artist at Christmas. Her baking began in August because she had so much to do that she had to begin that early to get it all done. She was famous for her “Christmas Cards”. These were Santa Cookies that she made for over 30 years, some years making 750 cookies to share as the Thompson Christmas Card. There were always enough for each of the grandchildren to give to their school classmates and friends outside of school. We would place our order and she would package them up to make sure we were taken care of first. Our family was known for our Santa Cookies and, even now, those cookies are remembered.

As well as taking the time to make the coconut bearded, raisin-eyed, royal icing covered cookies, she made peanut brittle, pecan brittle, divinity, 3 kinds of chip cookies, many old English favorites, popcorn balls and probably 30 other treats. She was amazing and such an inspiration. My grandpa made a Christmas Tree that would hold some of her scrumptuous gifts from the kitchen, all made with love. We looked forward to that tree appearing and were always sad when it had to be put away.  You can see that she used Spode Christmas Chinain the photo and the tree was always a short needled fir.

In January of 1992, my grandma went into exploratory surgery. I was at the hospital when the word came out that she had ovarian cancer and that it had metastasized to other parts. We were all devastated. There were many tears, but we all forged on and did the best we could for her.

As time went on, she found that the Chemo did not work and it made her feel awful and not herself. We all tried to spend as much time together as we could. In late November/early December, my sister and I went to Grandma’s home to bake. We wanted her to have those same Christmas-time smells. She was unable to be in the kitchen; she was too weak. Individually, we would go to the Living Room and spend time alone with Grandma. My sister and I both told her that she was so important to us but she needed to take care of herself and that it was not selfish to let go and be where she could be healed, where she could be whole again.

You see, she was a very faithful woman and we knew that her dying was not the end for her. She had stopped being that happy, always there for a smile and a laugh, lady. And she was a lady. She never wore pants in public, never swore or said a bad word about anyone. If she could find someone to drive her to her destination, she would. She really did not like to drive. I knew that she did not like everyone, but never a cross word left her mouth. She was the epitome of grace. She is who I want to be when my children marry and become parents.

She went into the hospital in December. I was going to my in-laws for Christmas so on Christmas Eve, I went to visit her in the hospital, as I would not able to be there on Christmas. By then, she was semi-comatose. I sat with her and talked to her and did the best I could to hold it together.

I remember her saying, “Mmmmm, good apple pie,” as I sat with her. Even at the end of her life, she was still thinking about food. She was having good thoughts, comforting thoughts. It was very hard for me, but I had to leave. I told her I loved her and walked out of her hospital room.

The doctor was there as I left, tears beginning to fill my eyes. He told me that tests showed that her kidneys were shutting down and she had very little time left. He knew I was going out-of-town and this was his way of telling me that would probably be the last time I saw her. I made it to my car and totally lost it. The tears flowed; it was that ‘I can’t catch my breath’ kind of crying. I had to sit in that cold hospital parking lot, feeling alone and so sad, until I could gain enough composure to drive to work.

I drove the mile to work and when my boss looked at me, she sent me home because she knew that I was in no position to be at work. She also knew my family, well, and knew that this was a devastating loss. This was the first time our family had had a matriarchal loss in a long time. All of the other generational losses had been at such a young age that the “matriarch” position had not been established, or so late that someone else had stepped in.

My husband and I left for Christmas, knowing that it would be hard. We survived Christmas Day but decided to leave earlier to get back home, just in case we could make it back before Grandma dies. We left on December 26th and drove to Kent’s grandmother’s home to spend the night. Almost as soon as we walked into Rubye’s home, the phone rang. She answered the phone and said the call was for me. My heart sunk. I took the phone, trying to prepare for what was going to be said. It was my dad. He had to be the bearer of bad news probably because my mom was inconsolable.

It didn’t take long for all of us to realize that my grandma was in control until the end. Christmas was her holiday. She prepared for this holiday for months. No other Christian holiday received as much time, joy and love as Christmas. While she could not control how her cancer progressed, she controlled how it would end. She was not going to die before Christmas, as we would be thinking of how sad we were instead of the anticipation of Christ’s birth. She definitely was not going to die on Christmas Day. She held on until the day after.

While I still mourn her, it was because of her death that I am who I am today. She never met my children. In 1992, I was told by my Ob/Gyn, that I would probably never have any children. Because of that, she and I had great conversations about her struggles. She would say that she could get pregnant, but being pregnant almost killed her. After my mom was born, she was told never to have another child. She went against the doctor’s orders and had my uncle. She did stop after that. I don’t think I ever would have known that if she wouldn’t have known her time on this Earth was coming to an end.

I still love her and this writing has been very cathartic for me. Today, many tears have flown and many memories, good and sad, have been shared. I thank you for letting me share this with you and I hope that it has helped you remember someone who has had a lasting impact on your life who is no longer with you on this Earth.

It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas and it has nothing to do with the decorations at Target or the advertisements that are beginning to air. It has a lot to do with memories of Grandma Thom.

Written in loving memory of Jessie V. Thompson  (photo of the Thompson family)

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I am Ready for a Storm

There has been a lot of coverage of Hurricane Sandy, and rightfully so. This was a devastating storm for the East Coast. It appears that things are being taken care of and citizens are trying to get back to a life of normalcy. That will take a long time, years in fact but just trying to find some kind of routine is important.

The Today Show, this morning, made me laugh and made me re-think my blogging for the day. Matt Lauer announced that they were going to discuss the things you need in your pantry to be ready for the next storm. The reason I laughed is because my friends know that if there is a storm, they want to be at my home because I have enough food in my pantry to feed an army.

It all began years ago when my husband worked at Lozier Corp. Lozier is a manufacturer of store shelving. If you walk into Walgreens, Auto Zone, Kroger’s/Baker’s, Target or Toys R Us, those are Lozier shelves. Once a year, Lozier would hold a sale for employees. They would sell obsolete, scratch n dent items. My husband over the years purchased many shelving components. Thus, we had sturdy shelving that could hold our “stuff”.

I purchase things on sale and things that my family likes. I always want to make sure that I have enough to feed my family and “drop-ins”, if that happens. Sometimes, in a flight of fancy, I go overboard on purchasing. Thankfully, it is always something that we would eat. I do want to be prepared if I feel like making Thai food or throwing together a Nacho Night.

Now on to the photos and then the explanation.

 

In the first photo, those are the Lozier shelves filled with purchased and homemade goods. There are a lot of soups, vegetables, starches, beans and condiments that were purchased. For the things that I made from the garden, there is salsa, pickled hot peppers, canned meat, and numerous jams and jellies. I also have plenty of sugar and flour for baking.

In moving to the freezer, there are also purchased items, homemade items and game. Yes, I have a family of hunters. I did not grow up in a hunting family but after years of being worried about eating game, I have come to really like food that is provided by my family. I still do not hunt but everyone else does. Everything that is hunted is eaten. I do not condone hunting for the kill. That is wrong, in my opinion. And for those of you who think game meat has a “gamey” taste, for some reason, the venison we eat does not taste gamey. Many cannot tell the difference between our venison and beef. (OK, I will now step down from my soapbox!) The homemade or home-grown items would include soups and vegetables from the garden. There are times that I have make-a-head meals in the freezer but in this photo.

The third photo is the new addition to our family, a wine room. This was my gift to my husband for his birthday. My father constructed it and did a great job. Not only is there wine in the room but as it is temperature controlled, I also have potatoes from our garden stored there. (Maybe some day I will learn how to make vodka). The other thing stored in there are my coffee flavorings. Why a wine room? We like wine and want a variety. It is much cheaper to buy wine in bulk so before the wine room we had cases of wine, wine stored under shelving, wine here, wine there. It was everywhere. This was we know exactly what wine we have on hand.

So you can see why I would laugh about being prepared for a storm. Our home is gas so if we lose electricity, we can start our stove burners with a match. If that is a problem we can use our outdoor grill to cook. Camping is also something that we do so we have a camp stove and a Dutch Oven that we could use. We have a gas fireplace so we can keep warm. We have plenty of food (and drink). We keep plenty of batteries around and we have chargers that can be plugged into cigarette lighters. I would say we are set.

While I did not watch the segment on being prepared for a storm, I can enlighten you on how to be prepared. Here are just a few pointers:

1) Have non-perishable food on hand and make sure you have a hand can opener. If all you have is electric, you are sunk.

2) Have water available. If you know a storm is coming and you can prepare, fill a bathtub with water or use the water from your water heater (make sure to turn off the flame).

3) Make sure you have batteries. Make sure those things that need to be charged, have a full charge.

4) If you do lose electricity, open your refrigerator and freezer sparingly.

5) If you have young children, keep them occupied with games and books. Be strong for them.

6) If you have a land line, make sure one of your phones is corded/doesn’t use electricity. A portable phone will not work when there is no electricity. (Ours is in the laundry room)

AND FINALLY,

6) Don’t panic. Listen to the officials about what to do and DO WHAT THEY SAY!

 

I hope that we never had to take advantage of our ability to be fed and stay safe but I know that we are as prepared as we can be. I know, that without even trying on purpose, I am ready for a storm.

Bless those people who are dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy!

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I am a foodie/Am I a foodie? cont…

From the Merriam Webster website, a foodie is “a person having an avid interest in the latest food fads.”  The Collins English Dictionary writes, “(Cookery) a person having an enthusiastic interest in the preparation and consumption of good food.” In the light of those definitions, I am definitely a foodie.

Sometimes, I think my avid interest in the latest fads set me a part from most in my community. Years ago (maybe 17 yrs), a restaurant opened in my town of 8000 people. This was a dream come true for me. They served Portobello mushroom burgers, bruschetta, foods that were on the cutting edge back then. I loved it and thought,’ finally a restaurant in my town that I can really enjoy.’ It stayed open less than 6 months. Residents of the community said that they just couldn’t grasp eating a “burger” made of a mushroom. My heart sank. I was once again relegated to driving to Omaha for foods that excited me. Now don’t get me wrong, I love a good steak on the grill or tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches on a cold winter day. But to have something unique, something that I would not make on an average day, does get me excited.

After living here for 21 years, I have come to the realization that the only unique foods are going to come from me. And that is what I have set out to do, serve unique, not your normal run of the mill food, when we have guests. I also make it for my family when we have a little time to share the dinner spread.

My most recent venture was during the Annual Progressive Dinner that our church holds as a fundraiser for special programs . The money generally goes to the residence facility (retirement home) that is associated with the United Methodist Church (UMC) in our community, the church camp sponsored by the UMC  and a homeless shelter where one of our parishioners works.

The dinner is all about the 3 F’s ; fun, fellowship and fundraising. On average 100 people participate annually. There are numerous homes that provide the first course, the main course and then we all meet up at someone’s home for dessert.

Over the year’s we have done the main dish but my favorite part of the meal is the first course. In the explanation of the dinner, it is usually called the salad course but I very rarely serve salad so I always refer to it as the first course.

This year my theme was mini’s. I purchased mini bowls, tasting spoons, mini plates to provide a variety of flavors but still not fill my guests so they are too full for the main course. My goal was to provide four cold soups that did not fight each other for taste and a “bite” to go with the soup. The bowls were three ozs. so there would be about 1.5 c. of soup with one bite each of 4 items. I would have extras of everything so if someone wanted more, it would be available.

The search was on for soup ideas. I decided on two savory soups and two sweet soups. My idea for the first soup actually happened in July when I was visiting my husband who was working in California. When there we ate lunch at Sides Hardware and Shoes, a Brothers Restaurant in Los Olivos. Our soup was a chilled sweet corn soup with chipotle sorbet. I decided I would do my best to copy it so I at least got the ingredients for the soup from them and then created the sorbet myself.

The second savory soup needed to be colorful. Since the corn soup would be pale, the second soup needed to POP! I chose a roasted red pepper soup. The sweet soups were fairly simple, a pale and a bright soup. The pale soup would be an apple and pear and the bright would be a mixed berry soup.

Chilled soups are fairly easy to create. Find flavors that you like, put them together, puree’ them and then strain. That really is as simple as it gets but it is time-consuming. To strain properly, it takes time. At the end of my blog I will share the ingredients for the soups.

After picking out the soups I needed to find good pairings. I already knew that with the berry soup I wanted chocolate, I decided on a chocolate mousse with fresh berries. That was the easy decision.

Next I thought of the corn soup. I wanted something like cracker sticks. Instead my thoughts went to a cracker recipe that I have used for years using cheddar cheese and Rice Krispies. I decide instead of making the crackers round, I would make them look like pfeffernusse. Pfeffernusse is a ginger-type cookie that my grandmother made at Christmas time.

 Two down and two to go. I started thinking of the apple pear soup and thought, ‘something with nuts’ oh ‘and cheese’. I then created a brie wedge with a sugared walnut and homemade caramel drizzled over the brie.

It was time for the Red Pepper Soup. My original thought was a mini cream puff with chicken salad. Then I saw a recipe for a red pepper piece with crab salad. My menu was complete!

The interesting thing about the puree’ and straining, you never know what is left. I was straining the apple pear soup and saw that the leftover kind of looked like mush. Just because I am a curious sort, I tasted the leftovers. WOW! What a wonderful surprise. It was a cinnamon-y, luscious taste of apple and pear; in essence an apple pear sauce. Needless to say, it did not go in the trash. My son actually inhaled the concoction. He has a good palette and picked out the pear first, then the apple.

Now was the moment of truth. It was the day of the dinner and I spent most of the afternoon prepping for the meal. I was excited. I had the table setting established and it was just getting all of the items set just right.

Our guests arrived and I received a positive response on the experience. While I don’t know that anyone would do this for themselves, that is what it is all about. I wanted to create an experience that they would not have in their home. Most everyone finished their tastes (there was one teenager. She tasted everything but is not a vegetable fan).

The good thing is, all of these items I would make again. They passed my test which can be rather difficult. I especially like the apple pear soup and will make that again when apple and pear harvesting comes around.

I am giving you the ingredients for the soups. Like the chef at Sides Restaurant told me, ‘I really didn’t use a recipe, but here are the ingredients.’

Chilled Sweet Corn Soup – Sweet corn, onion, water and cream

Apple Pear Soup – apples, pears, Ginger Ale, lemon, sugar, cinnamon, cream

Red Pepper Soup – Roasted Red Peppers, onion, boiling potato, cumin, chicken broth, tomato, water

Berry Soup – Your choice of berries (I used strawberries and raspberries), orange juice, sugar, fruity wine, plain yogurt.

My latte’ for the day was gingerbread.

BTW…Happy Haloween from a proud foodie!  Our three pumpkins…BOO!

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I am a Foodie/Am I a Foodie?

I am a foodie. Or am I? Food evokes wonderful memories for me. Everything about food fascinates me. I relish in learning how foods are prepared, the background/history of a recipe and the experience of a new taste. I also am a food snob sometimes. I hate it when a person tries to place their recipe or restaurant in a category that just doesn’t fit. But….they think that some are not well-educated and they think they can get away with their deceit (that explanation later).

I am in no way a gourmet but I do appreciate the finer foods of life. When I have people over for dinner, I try to make a meal that will be memorable for them. I do try to stay away from traditional Midwest cooking, the standard rump roast with potatoes and carrots or chicken and noodles over mashed potatoes. While those are foods I will make for my family, I try to be more creative with guests.

This propensity may come from my upbringing. My grandmother and mother were/are great cooks. New recipes were always just a meal away. When my grandmother died, I was chosen to be in charge of all of her cookbooks. I now have hundreds of cookbooks in my home just waiting for me to peruse. I am to look through them to make sure there are no side bar notes in recipes or loose leaf recipes in the pages. My problem is I want to look at every recipe and see which ones I want to keep.

Family dinners were always something to which I looked forward.  In my family, there were certain foods that were only made during certain holidays. We only get creamed pearl onions on Thanksgiving. Same for mashed sweet potatoes with pineapple. A full turkey was only roasted at Thanksgiving and “real” ham (bone in smoked) was only done at Christmas. Pumpkin pie…only at Thanksgiving.

When I became an adult and was married, my husband and I began our own food traditions. Some from my childhood were gone away. Others were created. For instance, we usually purchase more than one turkey at Thanksgiving so we have one in the freezer for a later roast (or smoke), likewise with ham. No one time a year, for us. Same goes for pumpkin pie, we have it when we want. There are just some foods that are too good to have only once a year. If my family like creamed onions, I would make them. As it is, I have made them only once in the eleven years that we have celebrated Thanksgiving in our home. My husband likes sweet potatoes whole with brown sugar and butter only. No fancy, mashed with pineapple, sweet potato for him. That is fine. While I do like what I grew up eating, I am also fine with undoctored sweet potatoes.

When we were first married, we split our fall/winter holidays. If we spent Thanksgiving with one side of family, we spent Christmas with the other. Our small family started celebrating Thanksgiving with just us when we lived in Spain. We liked the time together and found that, after moving home, we missed not having that intimate time to celebrate in our own home. While we have never limited the number of guests in our home at Thanksgiving, we do not go to someone else’s home. There are some years when there are just four of us. Other years may find 8-10 celebrating.

Now I get back to my food snob designation. We lived in Spain just under a year. But in that time, our life was greatly impacted and changed forever. I cannot speak for my other family members, but I found that I am truly a Spaniard at heart. When I am here, I long to live in Spain. When I am in Spain, I do not long to be back here. I often tell my husband that if he dies before me, I will move to Spain.

We immersed ourselves in the Spanish life. Our children went to a local, private school, not an American school. We lived in a Spanish community, learned the language, ate the native food, ate fast food only rarely and learned as much as we could about the history of Spain while we lived there. For all intense purposes, I became Spanish. I actually have a hard time saying Spanish, because we lived in Catalunya where the language is Catalan and it is rather different from most of Spain. (for those of you who do not know, Barcelona is in Catalunya. We lived about 26 km up the coast from Barcelona)

When we moved home, we looked for Spanish wine, Spanish food, anything Spanish and it was not to be found. As the years passed from our life there, Spanish things began to show up in our area. We were so excited when a Spanish restaurant opened in Omaha. We went there one night and found out that the owner had an uncle that owned a restaurant in Catalunya. In fact, my husband would eat there every week on the day they served paella. We had a wonderful time. It was so good that when friends, who lived an hour away from Omaha, came to visit, we made reservations.

We made early reservations so they could get home to their young children at a decent hour. About an hour before we were to arrive at the restaurant, someone calls and says that we had reservations but that we would have to give up our table after an hour! That is unheard of in Spain! Once you are at a table, for the most part, it is yours. In Spain, an evening meal will last up to 4 hours and we had less than an hour to eat (taking into consideration the time to prep the food). I explained to the person that was not the Spanish way and how could they expect us to enjoy a traditional Spanish meal in an hour. They said they didn’t care and we would have to relinquish our table after an hour. I got know where with the manager either, so needless to say, we did not honor that reservation and never went back with that owner. We went back under new ownership and the food was just not that good so now we have never been back.

Years after that fiasco, a lounge opened that touted that they served tapas. My anticipation for a true tapas bar was dashed when I went online and looked at their menu. Now if you say tapas, you should think Spanish, just like when you see an Italian restaurant, you would think pasta. Not the case, this “tapas” bar had french fries, nachos, chicken wings on their tapas menu. Those are not tapas, those are appetizers. As someone who lived in Spain, I can tell you that I never went to a tapas bar that had nachos or chicken wings on their menu. Their menu would have pan con tomate (bread with tomato), aceitunas (olives) almendras (almonds), numerous types of fish/seafood but not nachos! I really was concerned that people in the area would actually think that what they were getting was tapas. Their definition of tapas did not give a proper representation of the true experience. I frankly, was offended.

That is how I knew that I had become a food snob. I believe that if you say that you represent a certain ethnic food, you should be loyal to that country. If you are Mexican, serve Mexican, not Tex-Mex. If you serve Tex-Mex, say so. You can have other items on the menu to appeal to the masses, but don’t say you are one thing and then not have it on the menu.

Maybe that is one reason why I have so many cookbooks because I want to be an informed cook. I would not say that I am a purest because there are many times that I make a modified ethnic food. My daughter says she loves my refrigerator Chinese. That is where I open the refrigerator and see what I have that is fresh and then stir fry it with rice, definitely not authentic Chinese. But I do not represent it as anything other than what it is, using what I have in the frig before it goes bad.

I think I have gotten myself into a food blog mindset so keep checking back for other thoughts on food or foods of thought. I already have streaming in my head thoughts of food from Spain, my “mini’s” theme on a Progressive Dinner in which I had the first course, cookies and oh the list could go on….

Latte’ for the day has no name. I combined some end of the bottle flavorings and ended up with chocolate, white chocolate, toasted marshmallow and coconut. Pretty tasty!

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It Takes a Little Kneading

 

 

There are many things that I do for my family, friends and people who I do not even know. One thing that I enjoy doing for others is cooking/baking. While I like the process of taking not very good tasting ingredients by themselves (have you ever tasted plain flour or vegetable shortening, YUCK!) and making them into something that tastes divine, my joy is in the act of giving. I feel that this is one thing that I do well; people can enjoy this gift and it can nourish them both physically and emotionally. Is there a favorite food that you had growing up that when you have it now it takes you back years?

When my family smells those warm, sweet fragrances wafting from the oven, their first question is, “Is this for us, or is it for someone else?” I have to admit that more than 50% of the time, it is for someone else. I do feel guilty and there have been times when I make twice as much so they can enjoy some for themselves.

There is one smell that drifts out the kitchen and throughout our home that everyone knows is for no one else but them, bread. When that light, fresh smell melds in with the other familial scents in our home, they know it is for them and only them.

I have now gotten to the point that I make fresh bread every four or five days. It is the most basic of recipes, milk, bread four, salt, pepper, butter and yeast. How can you go wrong with that? What I have started doing is using the white spongy dough as my canvas. An artist would never leave a canvas blank. It is filled with life, their joys, and sorrows, or poured out on that blank slate. I would not say that I have gone that far, no sorrow in my bread making but I have used a lot of love and joy in this new venture.

Sometimes my bread has a theme. One loaf I named “Four Shades of Red.” (Had a hard time visualizing gray bread!) Then there are breads that are themed based on the week. There was a loaf in honor of the beginning of fall. Then there was the purple and white loaf in recognition of the high school‘s homecoming. My last loaf was orange, white and black in anticipation of Halloween. I did make a completely orange loaf of bread. The family was not very fond of that. They definitely prefer multi-colored bread.

You would think that I would have thought of this when my children were younger. How fun it would have been for them to pick out their colors for their special loaf of bread. But NOOOOO, I had to wait until they were in high school. They have a lot of fun with it though and sometimes they will ask me why I chose the colors I did. It should be noted that my children take a sack lunch to school. With the new government guidelines on school food, they say that the meals are bland and not filling. They relish the thought of taking their own food, chosen for their likes, to school. This also means that all of their friends, classmates and teachers see their artistry bread. (Notice I did not say artisan.) Teachers have walked up to them and asked, “What is wrong with your bread?” My son commented back when asked that question, “My mom is just bored.”

The funny thing is that I am far from bored. It takes a lot of extra time to knead in those colorings. I don’t use gloves so I can go a couple of days with colored hands. While to save time I do use a machine for kneading the bread, I do the last kneading and forming by hand and then bake it in the oven. This does take time out of my already busy schedule. But they are more than worth it.

I do this out of love. If my family didn’t enjoy it, I wouldn’t continue. They know that I do this especially for them. If they did not know that or appreciate it, I would still bake bread but it would probably be plain ol’ white bread. I would find something that they did appreciate. I would find a gift that would make them feel special. I have thought about marketing my artist bread but realized it would no longer be special for them.

Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming up. You can bet there will be more brown, gold and orange bread and green and red bread. I will probably even make blue and white bread as a recognition for Hanukkah. I may have high schoolers for children but I am still that mom who wants to make her family feel special. While I may bake a lot for others, I have found this one thing that is exclusively for them.

What do you do that is exclusively for your loved ones?  Do you have traditions that are a treasure for you? Let’s talk about that. I will share in my next post family traditions from when I was growing up to traditions that have been created for my family. Think hard and I look forward to sharing.

Believe it or not I have only made coffee twice this week. That is why there have been no coffee posts. It is mid afternoon so my first cup of coffee for the day, may have to contain some Irish Creme. I’ll let you know.

Bread ingredients:   4 C. bread flour, 13 oz. warm milk, 2 T butter, 2.5 T sugar, 1.5 t. salt and 2.25 t. active dry yeast.

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Humbled by Life

We all live busy lives. We all have stress. My stress maybe less (or more) than yours. But it is my stress, no more (or less) significant than yours. Years ago I had someone try to tell me that my stress wa nothing compared to theirs. I looked at this person and said, “Don’t tell me that my stress is nothing. Your stress is nothing compared to a CEO of a company and I don’t disregard your stress!” I think that we need to keep that in mind when we deal with people when we think that we have a harder life, or a more stressful life. What I do know is that I am extremely blessed.

I para subbed for the first time this week. It was for a special education classroom. I had sub taught before and thought, “I know this. I had done it before.” In fact, I have sub taught for special ed in the elementary level, the middle school level and the high school level. It was just a para job; I got this! WOW was I wrong. I mean I did my job and I felt I was of benefit to the classroom. This was not a class like I had subbed before. My previous subbing jobs in a SpEd classroom was as a resource class. Students are integrated into a class and then attend their resource class when English or Math is going on and they come to the SpEd class for help. That was my previous experience. This class was a contained Special Education classroom. These children were in the same class all day (except for P.E., Music or Art). These are children that cannot be in a traditional classroom because of developmental issues. These children are a handful.

There were 7 students in the class, 1 teacher and 3 paras. I should have known by that ratio that this was not going to be an easy day. I was assigned Mike (not his real name). It was my job to keep him on track. He is known for wandering both physically and mentally. There was a lot of hand holding and saying, “Look at me. Let’s get back to work. No we can’t be over there right now…”

The day begins with checking in on the Smart Board. They mark what they want for lunch on the SB and then go do some physical activity. Now let me tell you that the Smart Board always bites me in the hiney when I sub. I am a PC girl so I freeze up and worry that I am going to do something wrong with the classroom electronics. And here we have children that can’t even be in a traditional classroom but can work a Smart board better than me.

Next the students stand and say the Pledge of Allegiance. Not only do they say it but they sing it. When I heard those students singing at the top of their lungs the song of our country, it brought tears to my eyes. Even now it is very touching to think about.

After the Pledge, they go right to work. All 7 of these children know the routine. Even though they may lose track of what they are doing at any given time, they know where they are to be and know what they are to be doing. The next step is to go over the calendar and the weather outside. This is all done on the Smart Board and they ALL know what to do. I am considered an intelligent person and these Special Ed kids (I think kindergarten age. I was never told and it really did not make a difference) know electronics better than I. I was humbled on that day.

It might be noted, that all of these children are being taught sign language and the teacher often communicates using her voice and her hands. The purpose fo this I am not quite sure and frankly, there was not time for personal chit-chat. Throughout the day I was amazed at the capability of these children and also the lack there of.

I did have a chance to work with all of the children when they went through their stations for the core subjects of math and reading. The reading station was individualized for each student. Their skill level ranged from computerized reading to sign language letter recognition. Except for Mike who exited out of the computer program and opened all kinds of windows, the students stayed on task . One child, who I assume is autistic, would zone out, for lack of a better description, and it was difficult to ge them back on task, but I did with help from another para.

Math went well. My job was to have students look at the size of paper sea shells and estimate how many of these sea shells it would take to measure the sink. My first group guessed spot on. It was a very basic task but it was part of visualization and estimating for math. One boy was very disengaged. He has a habit of just lying down and becoming a wet noodle. Picking him up and trying to get him to stay standing was very difficult. I did get help from another para when this happened. I do not think he was picking on me. Obviously he had done this in the past but I felt very helpless.

After lunch the class had recess and they played on the playground, kicked balls and played chase with all of the other classes. I thought that they would not interact with the other students as they are in the contained classroom and don’t interact with other students during the day. But it was just like a 2nd grade classroom. They play with their classmates but it extends out to other classes.

The day ended and I looked at the paras and said that they must be exhausted by the end of the day. I would not say that I was exhausted mentally or physically but it was one day for me. They do this five days a week and I have to imagine that it can be trying.

My thoughts went to the families of these children. The challenges that are faced in the classroom are faced exponentially at home. The teachers are there for the students 100%. Parents and siblings have other things going on at home. There is house cleaning, cooking, paying bills, coming home from full-time jobs, spending time with a spouse and other children, homework or outside activities. I wonder how it can all get done. And for these families, it is 7 days a week.

I may have stress but I am sure that it seems nothing to the families with children that have different abilities. My children are independent. They are teenagers and really don’t need me anymore. They cook, do their own laundry, drive. I still guide them and do for them, but they are able to do almost everything themselves. That may never be the case for some families. I am sure that there are many blessings in these families. These children are blessings and have many lessons to teach the world. I learned a lot in that classroom. These students taught me a lot.

We all have stress. Mine may not seem as important as yours but I know after subbing in this contained Special Needs classroom that, right now, my stress is insignificant. I am truly blessed. Are you?

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Never have a city girl feed the goats.

Never, and I mean never, send a city girl to feed the goats. That is the lesson I learned this weekend. Now it all worked out okay. We all got a good laugh but it was a lesson in life and a good topic to share.

I am a city girl. While I do not live in a town, my housing development probably has 1000 people living here. I would not even call myself rural. I live in between a city, Omaha, NE and a smaller city, Blair, NE. I have never lived on a farm. I grew up in the Omaha area. I am not necessarily fond of farm animals. I will walk through the livestock barns at the state fair but that is more for the family than myself. I would rather be in the quilting building or the building that has all of the canning items or the retail building.

The Girl Scouts in my county had an overnight to celebrate the birthday of the founder of Girl Scouting, Juliette Gordon Low. I organized it so it was held at Camp Fontanelle, the church camp where our family volunteers and our children attend. We are very devoted to this camp.

This camp offers a lot in the fall. There is a corn maze, a pumpkin patch, tree climbing, hiking, outdoor evening movies, overnights and there is even a petting barn that houses numerous types of animals. Our troops were taking advantage of these opportunities. As we are Girl Scouts, we wanted to perform some type of service for the camp. Some of the things that were suggested were a little too difficult for the younger Girl Scouts so I suggested we go to the petting barn and take care of the animals. The director and asst. director of the camp thought that was good and said that we could feed the goats. They said I need to feed them two leaves and I would find them under the tarp, that they were square. I heard what they said, but not really. I went on my merry way to get help from the girls.

I, with another adult, looked under the tarp and could not find any small squares of hay. All I could see were bales. My thought was, “Oh, they must mean 2 bales and they just used ‘country’ language.” Now mind you, there are four goats and one sheep. No way could they eat 2 bales. But I was doing what I was told. I told my friend that we should just put one bale in and then check to see about the second bale.

This is when the girls could help. I got my camera out and snapped away while my friend and the girls dropped the hay bale into the pen. We were so proud! I snapped away photos of the goats eating the hay (above), of the girls posing outside the pen. This city girl can do country work; so I thought.

I found the director and asst director working with the girls and their tree climbing (BTW, not the way that I climbed a tree. This is more like rock climbing without the rock, just the ropes hanging from sturdy limbs. photo  below) I told them what I did and asked if that is what they meant. They both laughed and said that I gave them enough food for about 5 days! I immediately headed back over the barn to correct my error.

Those goats never looked so happy. They were gnawing away at the bale and if they could have talked, I think they would have told me they were delirious with joy. Such a table we had spread for them. We needed to get that bale out so I took 2 leaves (which, by the way, is a section of the bale that is naturally made in the baler when it is being formed. You just have to grab from the end and it will naturally break) and threw them in the pen to get the animals away from the bale. My friend jumped in the pen and lifted the bale to me and I put it back under the tarp. Crisis averted! I couldn’t imagine how miserable those animals would have been. And to think I thought two of the bales was what was needed!

So what is the lesson. There are many. The obvious is, don’t assume that you can figure out what is meant. If you don’t understand, ask questions.

Secondly, you don’t always know what is best. Those goats and that sheep were excited to have so much food. They went to town and were being very gluttonous. I think they would have eaten on that bale until it was gone. That would have been very bad for them and made them very ill.

Thirdly, it is okay to not know everything. There are many things in which I excel: cooking, baking, singing, organizing/managing. I know my limits at home. I choose not to use the riding lawnmower. It scares the livin’ daylights out of me.

And lastly, don’t send a city girl to feed the goats. Except now I know what a leaf is so I actually could feed the goats now! Let’s hope that this lesson is remembered when I run into the next time when I think, “I can figure it out when I get there.”

After the Girl Scout event was over, I, with 3 of the women that were at the campout, went shopping for fabric to make a quilt for the annual fundraising auction for Camp Fontanelle. Hours later, my friend was still laughing so hard about the escapades that tears were streaming down her face. We definitely had our fill of laughing for the weekend.

Life is good!

My latte’ for the day was chocolate, almond.

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Mad Libs – A Lesson for Life

In honor of Mad Libs and in the memory of its founder, Leonard B. Stern, who died this week at the age of 88 years, I write this in the true Mad Libs form. I will fill in the blanks with my words. You may choose your own words to fill in the blanks.

Mad Libs (noun) is like life (noun). The skeleton is (verb) there and it is up to you (pronoun) to add color (noun), action (noun) and variety (noun).

You (pronoun) can decide whether you will have a beautiful (adjective) day (noun) or a yucky (adjective) day (noun). Will you (pronoun) gracefully (adverb) meet (verb) your struggles (plural noun) or will you fall (verb) short? While many (adjective) people (plural noun) feel (verb) that they do not have control (noun) of their own life (noun). They feel (verb) powerless (adjective) in their attempts. Over (preposition) time, they lose (verb) confidence and day (noun) after day (noun) their self-esteem (noun) is lost (adjective).

What can be done (adjective) to ensure (transitive verb) you (pronoun) control (verb) your life (noun)? Feel (verb) good (adjective) about (preposition) yourself. You should exercise (noun) at least five (number) times a week and get enough rest (noun); seven (number) hours (plural noun) a night. Eat (verb) a proper (adjective) diet (noun). Try to laugh (verb) every (adjective) day and find (verb) love (noun). With those steps (plural noun), you can be on the road (prepositional phrase) to a great (adjective) life.

Composing that Mad Lib was not easy, and neither is life. Some struggle with major issues; how do I protect my children from bullies, where will I come up with the money to pay those medical bills, how come I can’t find a job? Some have minor problems; how do I get my child from Point A to Point B this week when I am so busy? And sometimes we just have annoyances; I need more time in my day to get things complete.

No matter where we fit in, whether we have struggles, problems or annoyances, all of these things, or any combination of the three, we must remember that what you have, the person next to us has. Their problems may be multiplied exponentially. So when we think about how disconnected that person is, or maybe rude, or moody, it may be that they feel at a loss. Kindness begets kindness, Maybe if we show kindness and caring, it will make the person feel better if they are having a bad day or it may make you feel better.

In the end, try to do something nice for yourself every day. It may be reading a book, snuggling with your child (ren), spouse or loved one, taking a long bath, laughing, or crying. Every morning, I make a nice BIG latte and it helps start my day on a good note. Today my latte was Toasted Marshmallow Pumpkin. It was very nice on this blustery, rainy day.

Remember that you have more control than you think. You have the chance to choose the adjectives and adverbs for your life. Try to make them positive and uplifting, not words or thoughts that are downgrading and negative to you and those that you effect.

Take control. Remember those days when you played Mad Libs and laughed and laughed and laughed because of the words you chose.