Tag Archives: Christmas

Musings

Posted on December 17, 2012 | Leave a comment

I would like to thank my extended family (especially AL and J) for giving me a great childhood and letting me explore. Also my husband’s extended family for providing love and support for our marriage for the past ten years.

Thanks to all the dear friends I have and had. For one who’s moved so many times it is always wonderful to still have friends from grade school, high school and college days.

As to cooking, I’d like to thank Betty Crocker for the Boys and Girls cookbook I got for my 8th birthday, because it led to cooking and Mom getting Gourmet magazine and I loved it, still do, well not Gourmet anymore because it went bust.

To the people who’ve hired me throughout my life, from gymnastic instructor at age 16 to consultant much later. To my teachers, from everywhere. My mentors started in 2nd grade with Mrs. Johnson and continued through Mr. B in algebra and Breezy, topped off by two dear friars. My music teachers were always inspirational, from Mrs. Smith to Mrs. P and Mrs. H and even now. They made me want to reach for the stars.

Thanks also to my dogs and cats for providing love and comfort. To the remarkable fellow volunteers who worked with me on many issues and made things happen.

Finally to my dear husband, who I was lucky to find, and him me.  But we came together by chance (I think it’s fate) and we’re best friends and love each other forever as soul mates.

Dear Santa:

What I want for Christmas is that you pass by our home and know that we don’t do presents so don’t want anything but a happy life together, with our dog Zoe.

If you do pass by a store, no, I can’t think of anything. My husband is even getting toilet paper through Amazon. Thank you, Santa, for all the gifts you’ve given since the day I was born. A family, friends, mentors… oh please let my father get through this latest cancer thing. Thanks so much. I hope I’ve been good this year. Holiday Cheers! Dee

Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged , , ,

Dear Dad,

Posted on December 11, 2012 | 5 comments

Everything has a meaning. You and Mom gave us each an ornament a year. I finally got all those back but have not even tapped through the last twenty years.

You’ll see items from Kids for Kids, Texas and western memorabilia, and cooking things for me. Also a handmade mitten for Zoe, to benefit an ecological cause. Yes, I have a jingle bell wreath (2) inside, one with a recycled glass star.

Is it a Texas star? I don’t know. I love you, Dad. Merry Christmas. Dee

2012 Wreath

2012 Wreath

5 Comments

Posted in Cooking Utensils, Editorial, Education

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Stay!

Posted on December 11, 2012 | 2 comments

My husband says he’s allergic to Christmas trees, so for the past 11 years I’ve hung a wreath on the front door. Yesterday I purchased this year’s wreath, which looks quite like last year’s, fir branches with a bow and three pine cones.

We are currently living in a high-rise and share this floor with six neighbors, five since one pro athlete left after not making the Series.

I hung the wreath on one of those newfangled “doesn’t hurt the wall” hangers and picked out a few ornaments, some of which I hadn’t seen in 20 years, and got ready to hang them.

Our dog Zoe, who’ll be nine next month, was at my feet as always. She loves to go in the car when the weather cooperates but I often walk to the grocery store and she doesn’t come along because leaving her outside, she loves people and other dogs so much she could run off or go home with anyone, tail a-wagging.

Instead of going in and out, I propped open the door with old, dead UPS battery, placed the ornaments on the kitchen counter and decorated with holiday glee. There were the rocky mountains ornaments, a bear on a sled (mine), moose on a rainbow trout (hubby’s) and teeny handmade mitten (Zoe’s). Two hand-painted tag board ornaments from an event I created to help children 20 years ago. A reindeer in an apron with a tray of cookies, and a copper pan (mine, of course). And let’s not forget the Texas snowman with a lasso and cowboy hat.

I figured Zoe would be out in the hall sniffing around and greeting people. She didn’t leave the house. I didn’t even say “stay.” She just sat there and watched me like “what’s this crazy woman up to now?”

Reminds me of my dear old dog who died 11 years ago. I adopted her at age two after she’d been abused by a deputy sheriff and left at a shelter I volunteered at, for an entire year until even they threatened to euthanize her as a danger to herself, men and children. She had a home that day, for ten years. For a month, even though I had visited her weekly for a year, she thought I would kick her when I walked toward her. A few weeks of challenging her and I could run at her and jump over her without a cringe or even a blink. Just a look that said “what’s this crazy woman up to now?”

We were inseparable until the day she died, and I carry with me a teddy bear with her ashes under a felt heart and lace and tiny beads a dear milliner friend made for me, also a collage she made. They are both given a special place wherever we live. Zoe got hold of the bear one day. A friend who was helping us move asked if it was OK to let her tear up a stuffed animal. I said that they were old and I’d done multiple “surgeries” on all of them, if it eased her moving tensions, fine.

Then I asked her “which one?” She said, it’s this huge brown teddy bear with a red felt heart. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

So stay, little one, and know you’ll be close to my heart forever as well. I may be able to take you to the grocery store now because you are forever by my side, unless someone says “squirrel.” Cheers and enjoy the holiday season. Dee

p.s. to Zoe, your ashes will probably be in a black, indestructable Kong! Yes, many years from now, little one.

2 Comments

Posted in Editorial, Pet

Tagged , , , , ,

Fragility

Posted on December 11, 2011 | Leave a comment

Life is fragile. We “lose” people. they’re not lost, they’re gone from us forever. We lose some and they’re still living, but still lost in a way.

When we’re young we think we’re invincible, in our 30’s and 40’s we go along and get along, doing all we can for our families. In our fifties we could be on top of the world but still faces and bodies begin to sag.

Then, I guess we’re to choose between Botox and plastic surgery or just getting old, hopefully together with someone we love. I prefer the latter.

Just as we become comfortable, parents begin to age and there are flights here and there in these times. We also begin to think of our own aging.

A good thing comes with this if one is lucky, and that is wisdom. It’s even better if someone else benefits from that wisdom that we can share. Luckily we are at an age where we can still obtain wisdom from our elders and impart it to a younger generation.

Many of our friends and family are gone but others remain and we hope to remain close to them for the rest of our lives while remembering those who went before us.

I will try my best to be closer to the family and friends I have. I will not make Christmas cookies, because they’d be overcooked or burned and I don’t make cookies. I may try a pannetone bread pudding this year but only if I buy the cake.

OK, I may make a trifle for Jim’s office, and dinner for any office and neighborhood “strays” or adult “orphans” from the neighborhood for Christmas dinner. It’s the least I can do. Hear than Andrew? And J, you can bring the girlfriend!  We’ll initiate her to the inevitable parent situation.

No, I’m not a matchmaker, just want your roads to be less bumpy than ours. Cheers and happy holidays to you and yours. Dee

 

Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged , , ,

The Christmas Spirit

Posted on December 2, 2011 | Leave a comment

Perhaps over the weekend, recuperating from Thanksgiving, we’ll get it. I don’t think my husband ever gets it. I have to hear the right song at the right time on the car radio, shed a tear and then I’m in the holiday spirit.

We’ve seen my husband’s family for Thanksgiving and my family will be absent this year, Patagonia I think. So we’re on our own and tend to take in strays.

Christmas is a holiday in which I can use my imagination. We started with turkey, moved to prime rib, yorkshire pudding and the entire English feast. I’ve done pork roasts with hard cider gravy and corn-stuffed apples.

There’s something about that song of Maria with the Nightengale that brings me to tears every year. It was always on the car radio when I drove home from Thanksgiving with my husband sound asleep in the passenger seat and our dog at his feet.

Do I need to buy Michael Buble’s Christmas to get in the mood to see how many we’ll be feeding this year? Menu, everything, depends on this year’s muse. I have to cry, first. It’s tradition. With love and two new ornaments for a wreath we’ll get this weekend, I remain your trusted scribe and omnivore, Dee

Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged , , ,

Holiday Traditions

Posted on December 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

I think now that my family always fought with them. We never knew when to get the tree. Lights went up by our mother and father. We each got our own ornament each year so got to hang them, and I was the oldest so always got two more than my younger sister. tee hee.

Dinner used to be turkey with all the trimmings, which changed I don’t know when, as Mom went to a traditional British dinner with prime rib, potatoes, Yorkshire pudding and sides. I did the “sides,” changing them every year.

Everyone discussed presents and the routine was changed every year, even though everyone said it was “routine.” Opening Christmas morning vs. Christmas Eve. After we were adults, we each picked a stocking and stuffed it for less than $20. I think our parents got each of us four a gift or two, and we got them and each other something. Hopefully my siblings don’t read this blog (unless it mentions mincemeat) otherwise the debate will start anew.

One thing we did agree on was that breakfast started early morning with Hungarian pull-apart coffee cake made by my sisters from brioche with cinnamon, sugar and nuts. We had that with coffee or tea. Early afternoon was the dinner. Then, desserts were mainly predictable, added over the years.

There were always mincemeat tarts, Scandinavians, Snickerdoodles, date squares, gingerbreads and lebkuchen. This year we are flying to my Dad’s for Christmas eve and day. Mom is gone now. My husband and I have been together for ten years and we don’t get each other Christmas gifts. But I was born in November and he in December and we don’t give gifts for those occasions either. That may be why we flew to see his family for Thanksgiving and mine for Christmas. Happy holidays! Cheers, Dee

Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial, Recipe Ideas

Tagged , , ,

Quiet Country Morning

Posted on December 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

Sleeping nearly soundly because the dog had begun her early morning waking pattern, which ends with a paw on my leg or arm to GET UP! It was still dark, even though it was seven o’clock. Beep beep beep beep.

The snow came quietly overnight, a few inches that mostly melted during the day. Yeah, the ski resorts don’t like that melting stuff! I pulled up the shades as it’s always warmer when the snow falls, and it looked like Christmas. Then I heard what Jim calls the “articulated tractor,” a huge piece of machinery that can plow an entire neighborhood street in one fell swoop. If you’re on the street when that thing comes around, stay clear. It’s huge and seems to be going a good 30 m.p.h.

We went out before the driveway/walkway was plowed and it was slippery. Shortly afterwards, the skid loaders did the driveways with scraping snow and BEEP BEEP BEEP on back-up. Then the ski resorts started setting off mortars for avalanche control in the back country.

Interestingly, a number of ducks have decided to winter here, at least before it gets too cold for them. They may be stragglers, who knows. All I know is looking out at 14′ piles of snow placed by huge machines, my husband came home from work at eleven this morning with what I thought would be a cold, so I’m cooking a gorgeous stew, but now turns out to be a stomach bug. Guess I’ll be eating alone. Here’s to those quiet country moments, which we do actually get a lot of out here in nowheresville. Cheers, Dee

Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial, Utah

Tagged , , , ,

Buffalo Gals

Posted on November 30, 2010 | 3 comments

I remember this song from being a kid, then watching Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed “dance by the light of the moon.” Now Wylie and the Wild West has given new life to this pre-Civil War song with a honkey-tonk flair.

But I remember my Buffalo Gals, the gaggle of gals I hung out with in high school while Buffalo wings were making a splash across the USA. We hope my best bud and her husband will visit us and ski this winter, we met after many years but I’ve still not met her better half.

We remember OJ when he was merely a star football player. We lived for the Bills and the Sabres. What else is there for a Buffalo gal to do? The gang lives all over the country now and I’d love to get together with my Buffalo gals. Cheers and happy holidays to all, Dee

3 Comments

Posted in Editorial

Tagged ,

Christmas?

Posted on December 24, 2009 | Leave a comment

The house is so quiet
The reindeers’ asleep
And Jimmy and Zoe’s
Company they keep

And Christmas time is here
The most wonderful time of the year

A Volvo for Jimmy, a songbook for Dee
Zoe has boots and some treats from Margie

And Christmas time is here
The most wonderful time of the year

We’re liking the winter, our first such to see
The cold and the snow just for you and for me

It’s Christmas time, it’s clear
The most wonderful time of the year

We’re missing our families and wish they were here
It’s not really Christmas without them to cheer

It’s Christmas time, we know
Wish we could all go and play in the snow.

Cheers, Dee

ps Thanks, Burl Ives.

Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged , ,

Happy Holidays

Posted on December 17, 2009 | 4 comments

Thanks for reading and writing in. I hope my first full year of posts was informative and, at times, even inspirational. As a child I was too shy to speak my mind and unsure of how to express myself through words. In my thirties I started speaking out, and there was a lot to say aloud and through negotiating and opining upon issues about many things I believe in. After a few letters to the editor were published in our local paper and others in the NYTimes, I was floored! I tried bad poetry but the best I could do was an ode to my husband-to-be shortly after we met. Of course I didn’t show it to him!

My husband and I don’t buy each other birthday or Christmas gifts. This blog was his gift to me 1 1/2 years ago and it has inspired me to do the best I can to reach out and learn from others, talk to people, find out how our soldiers’ parents are doing, what people are cooking or even knitting (that’s for you, girl) or playing on the guitar. For someone who cringed at the thought of a class called “creative writing” I still don’t know if I can do that. I tell stories. Like some people, some of my stories have morals.

We’re alone this Christmas, not such a bad thing. I’ve ordered a rack of lamb and will make scalloped potatoes, spinach with garlic and olive oil (spinaci aglio e olio), and braised carrots. That’s what I think now, anyway, that I’ll marinate the lamb in olive oil, thyme, rosemary and garlic then roast it on high heat.

We moved halfway across the country from all our family for a job. We will spend time with them, and several have already ventured out here to visit so we don’t feel so bad about not flying to see two families this Christmas. In the meantime, I wish you and your family every happiness and hope you enjoy your time together. It’s not about gifts, it’s about family. Cheers, Dee

I wish you warmth and comfort and family memories not only during the holidays, but all of the year.

4 Comments

Posted in Editorial

Tagged , ,