a sweet look back....

 New Year's Eve seems like the perfect time to take a long look back.  Having celebrated the impending new year with a friend at lunch (we're such party animals) I have had time to think back this evening and I have the visual aids to help.  My daughter and her husband were married in 2008 and beginning that Christmas, he has gifted me with a calendar every year; a wonderful personalized calendar filled with pictures of children, grandchildren, other relatives, pets and more.  It was fun to page back through and see how the grands have grown from cute little four, six, seven and eight year olds through grade school pageants, middle school band and baton, high school marching bands, graduation pictures, and so much more.  I love the progression of Halloween costumes and Christmas morning pictures.  Not quite so much fun to see how the adults have aged during the same 13 years but still interesting.  Changing careers reflected in many pictures.  But I noticed that my most recent calendar (2022) contained many grand-dog pictures, a reflection I think of the fact that my daughter and son-in-law are now empty nesters.  It's bitter sweet that children will grow up and move on, and their parents can't follow them to college campuses and job sites to take pictures.  So I wasn't too surprised that this year, instead of a calendar of pictures, I received  framed pictures of their son and daughter, each with their significant other.  Grandchildren grow, new relationships blossom, and, who knows, no rush here, but maybe one of these years I'll get a Christmas calendar full of great grandbaby pictures.  Happy New Year everyone. Enjoy the anticipation of new things to come.  

Procrastination again?

 

And speaking of putting things off, I certainly understand why much mail didn't get delivered before Christmas.  I'm happy to blame it on deep snow and subzero temperatures.  I must also admit that when letters are mailed on the 23rd the likelihood of them not being delivered before the 25th is not all the fault of the post office.  So here, for those who haven't received this year's Christmas greeting from me (or have fallen behind in opening your mail) is my holiday greeting by blog.

Still Acting Out

By Luci Foltz

 I’ve had fun playing in 2022,

first as the gender non-specific marriage counselor Leslie in “Sylvia”

(“I may be a man pretending to be a woman,

or I may be a woman pretending to be a man.  I let my patients decide.”)

and then as the over-the-hill drunken actress Gay Wellington in

“You Can’t Take It with You.” (“When I see snakes, I know it’s time to lie down.”) 

I spent half of that show ‘passed out’ on the couch,

Such an easy role.

Now I am playing a ‘church lady’ (talk about type casting)

in “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.”

When I wasn’t playing make believe,

I finally, finally got to travel, a glorious Rhine River cruise.

Beautiful scenery, cathedrals and castles, and fabulous food.

Later in the year a lovely driving trip to Michigan,

and a gathering with long-time friends in Woodburn

to celebrate our (gasp) 60^th high school reunion.

And here’s a shocker.  My much-too-young children and their spouses

are now empty nesters,

(well, except for the dogs and the cat)

while my grands experience college, careers, travel, and new loves.

Was there sadness this year? Yes.

A dear friend died, and another is living in the cloud land of dementia.

Grief indeed.

 

            May God hold you close during this busy time and always,

            comfort and console you when such support is needed,

            and cheer you on as you live your life to the fullest. 

                               

                        Happy New Year, 2023.

 

pass the pepper please...

 Here I am, stuck between Christmas and New Year's Day and wondering what I can write about.  My west coast brother hasn't been much help recently.  Between blizzards, slide offs (no injuries), family home for the holidays, and taking care of their grands, he and has wife have been kept quite busy lately.  So I was left to check out anything special about December 29 besides the fact that it puts us firmly on the slippery slope into 2023.  To my amazement I discovered that today is National Pepper Pot Day, a day that celebrates the 'soup that won the war,' the Revolutionary War that is.  Pepper Pot soup, made of tripe, beef and whatever vegetables you can find, seasoned with liberal amounts of pepper, is presumed to have come originally from the Caribbean, and was sold on the streets of Philadelphia. A side note here, we tend to think of fast food as a modern invention but, according to historical sources, lots of sandwiches, pasties, chestnuts, etc. were sold on the streets of large cities.  George Ludwig, who lived in Philadelphia, was George Washington's Baker General, charged with providing bread to the troops.  Sadly there wasn't much grain available.  The farmers were evidently selling their crops to the British, who probably paid with real money.  So George W told George L to feed the troops whatever he could to keep them alive during the cold winter of 1777-78. Pepper Pot soup is what he made.  I think it probably worked really well.  Soup is warm, can always be watered down to feed more, and plenty of pepper can disguise the taste of not quite fresh ingredients.  Maybe next year I'll have a Pepper Pot party, but I will use fresh ingredients and probably leave out the tripe.

PS If this doesn't appeal to you at all, tomorrow is Bacon Day!

simple pleasures

 Today was a day of simple pleasures.  It started with doing laundry this morning and realizing, as I took clean clothes out of the washers, that our wonderful new Maytags have lighter colored tubs than the old ones (silver instead of black), making it much easier to find the errant black socks that stick to the side.  Next, as I was getting ready to meet a friend for lunch at my favorite Mexican restaurant, I realized that I would need my sunglasses.  Hooray for sunshine!! I was so inspired that, after a delicious meal, I filled my car with gas and went grocery shopping. Alas, no fruitcake, but we must all bear up under some disappointments.  Finally I went to my appointment with my hair stylist and was able to use my daughter's very generous gift card to pay for the haircut.  Merry Christmas to me.  Now I am relaxing at home, watching a show about kindness, remembering what a good day it has been and celebrating with a yummy piece of fair trade chocolate, which allows me to feel virtuous while celebrating "National Chocolate Candy Day."  

Well I like it.

 Today is National Fruitcake Day, and, to further complicate things, December is Learn a Foreign Language Month.  Sadly, I just learned about the foreign language thing today which leaves me with three days to learn a foreign language.  I don't think that's going to happen.  About fruitcake, I know I'm in the minority but I actually like fruitcake.  I'll admit some are better than others, but in general, I like them. I usually buy a small fruitcake for myself (I try not to inflict my biases on others) but this year I didn't see any on the grocery shelves.  Perhaps on Thursday, when I plan to shop for groceries, I'll see some on sale.  Hope springs eternal.  I have, at times, considered baking my own fruit cake, but when I study the recipes they all seem to require being baked way ahead of the holidays so they can be soaked with rum (or whatever) several times.  While I'm thinking about doing this, the time runs out, unless I want to have fruitcake to serve for Easter.  (See my earlier blog on procrastination.)  Ah well, maybe next year.  

The day after...

 It's Boxing Day, celebrated in many British related areas of the world.  What you may ask is Boxing Day?  Or you may not care, but I tend to look it up every year because I've heard various explanations.  First, just to clear up any misconceptions, it has nothing to do with boxing kangaroos or the sport of boxing.  According to Google, what else, Boxing Day is the day after Christmas (we knew that).  In days of old, the servants of the wealthy aristocrats had to work on Christmas day to keep their masters happy and well fed.  Then, on the day after Christmas, when no one wants to do much of anything anyway, the servants were given boxes of gifts (like used clothes), monetary bonuses, and left over food, and allowed to go home and spend the day with their families.  It occurs to me that if those servants were thinking ahead, they made sure there would be plenty of good leftovers to take home.  Evidently, according to a BBC news cast I was just watching, these days Boxing Day is celebrated in England by shopping for all those things you wanted and didn't get the day before.  We actually have a similar tradition here in the USA.  Perhaps we should call it Return & Exchange Day.  

Merry Christmas...

 It has been a very good Christmas.

Being a family of solid German origins we celebrated with a Mexican cheese and chicken casserole and a Mexican chocolate cake for dinner, yummy, and a fun gift exchange.

I also was able to say bon voyage to my oldest granddaughter who is heading to France for her spring semester, still studying business, but in Rouen, and "good job" to her sister who finished her first college semester with straight As.  

My other grands were with their serious? significant others this Christmas, which is a different, but I think inevitable, family dynamic. What fun.  

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.