Lost and Found

Poor Mary.  Joseph is missing.  One minute he was there- on the windowsill- next to the radiator, with the rest of my miniature Nativity set.  And the next, he was gone-leaving behind a scene of scattered sheep, a fallen shepherd, and a lonely wife.  The main suspect?  I think the dog did it.  What puzzles me though, is that Kona is a herding dog.  I’d have thought she would have gone for the sheep…

Yesterday, I started to put the house back in order.  Our visiting family members had all gone back home, and the tree was starting to lose needles at an alarming rate.  I got out my canister vacuum to see if Joseph was hiding under the radiator.  My canister vacuum is old and doesn’t have the greatest suction-and Joseph is also bigger than the end of the attachment I planned to use-so I figured if Joseph was under the radiator I could rescue him.  Out came several wads of dust, two marbles, and a small soccer ball-but no Joseph.  And then out came an envelope-the kind you find in the middle of a catalog along with the order form-from the Montgomery Ward company, with an address simply reading:

Montgomery Ward
Portland 10, Ore.

           

The post office implemented postal zones-like the “10” on the envelope- for larger cities in 1943, but didn’t  devise the zip code as we know it until 1963.   This envelope was very old and had probably been under the radiator  for a  long time.

It is little discoveries like this that make living in an old house so exciting. (On previous occasions, we’ve found a gold wedding ring and a coin from 1869.)  Though the envelope is not a valuable or earth shattering discovery, it is still a connection to the people who lived in this house long before we ever did.  I can picture a teen-aged girl, not unlike my own Amy, flipping through the newly arrived Montgomery Ward catalog, pouring over the latest styles, and having the  envelope fall out  and slip under the radiator…

Maybe, in 50 years or so, someone  will come along with a more powerful vacuum.  They might  also be searching for a missing object under the radiator-and perhaps they will find Joseph. They too-in their future time, will marvel over this connection to us, now in the past.

In the meantime though, it looks like Mary is on her own.

The Christmas Present

I love a good story, and a good Christmas story is the best, especially when it is true. I present to you, my wonderful readers, a fun story that happened several years ago when my husband and I were newly married.
It all started with a pair of boots. I saw them in the window of the local downtown shoe store—and it was love at first sight for me. They were black. They were tall, and they looked similar to combat boots. What they were not was cheap. I wanted them so desperately-- but on the salary of a grad student and a part time preschool teacher—they were not going to happen.
With a little money I’d saved, I visited the shoe store a few days before Christmas and bought my husband a pair of slippers. He needed new slippers. I tried not to look at the boots. It was hard. The sales clerk asked if I’d like the slippers gift wrapped. Sure, I said. If there’s one thing I’ll beg off on-it’s gift wrapping. While I can do some things really well, gift wrapping is not one of them, and I wasn’t sure if we even had any Christmas wrapping paper at home.
I walked home with heavy heart—but I felt good that I’d bought something nice for my husband and not something frivolous for myself. As I started to place the slippers under the tree I noticed another box-wrapped in the same paper as the slippers. I couldn’t believe it—my husband had gotten me the boots! What a sweetheart! And then I did the only thing that I could possibly do. I rewrapped his slippers. Even though I knew what I was getting, he didn’t have to know that I knew.
Of course Christmas morning I put on one heck of a show of surprise and excitement-but then I had to come clean.
For the very best stories are meant to be shared!

MERRY CHRISTMAS and a BLESSED NEW YEAR!

The Story of My Vintage Cookbooks

Each year as the Christmas season rolls around, my thoughts turn to holiday baking and cooking, and I start looking at recipes for cookies and breads and candy. I like to cook and bake now, but this was not always the case.
There was a time when I was proud to say that I didn’t like cooking, or even know how to very well… and I didn’t care to learn either. I even wore this refusal to “learn my way around a kitchen” like a badge of honor and maybe it was my feeble attempt at being “liberated.” Who knows? Ironically, I also bought a lot of vintage cookbooks. There was a wonderful used bookstore, located in an old apartment house, that I would visit quite often, and at 1 or 2 bucks a piece, I would come out with armloads of old cookbooks. I bought them because they were vintage, and cheap, and they were filled with great vintage pictures. I’d line them up on a shelf in my kitchen and look at them from time to time…but never use them. I guess I thought that to be a successful cook one had to be a “gourmet” cook and master the types of techniques taught at the Culinary Institute.
Over time, my ideas about what defines a successful woman began to change, and I started taking my inspiration from women of the past-both women in my own family, and women in society as a whole. It was the ordinary hardworking, resourceful homemaker from the Depression years and wartime years who began to seem extraordinary-- the women who would have used the cookbooks I collected. My Grandmothers and Aunts were such women. So I decided I would not only learn to cook and bake, but do it in such a way as to honor them and make them proud.
Now I’m happy to say that I can bake a beautiful loaf of bread, or roast a chicken on Sunday and come up with three or four ways to use up the leftovers during the week, or make perfect fudge the old fashioned way. (Well ok, I’m still working on that one-soaking the pan overnight really will get the hardened cement-like chocolate to come out.)
I love my old cookbooks even more now-- now that I actually use them, and I can’t help thinking about the unseen hands that touched the pages before me. I only wish these dear women were still around, because I have a question about that biscuit recipe on page 80…

Here is a recipe for my Great Aunt Olga’s Ice Box Cookies. These are very dangerous and can cause a serious case of over indulging…and they are most certainly not healthy, (but my Aunt lived well into her 80’s!)

Preheat oven to 350

1 cup softened butter
2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 to 4 cups of flour
1 teaspoon vanilla
Cream all ingredients together well except flour. Add 3 cups of the flour, and additional flour to form a soft dough. Mold dough into long rolls and wrap in waxed paper and chill in freezer until firm. Cut into 1/8” slices and bake 8-10 minutes or until golden brown on ungreased baking sheet.
Makes a lot!

That Old Holiday Feeling

First of all, thank you for visiting my blog-I am truly grateful! And second, I’ll give you a minute or two to try to identify the object in the picture………….
It may not really look like one-but it’s a turkey. I made it in school when I was 5 or 6 or so (hopefully not MUCH older than that!) I vaguely remember thinking at the time that it was the most artfully crafted turkey ever to be created by anyone, and I’m sure I was prouder than punch the day I took it home and showed my mom and dad. These handmade decorations that children make are certainly the most precious kind of decorations, and my dear Mother saved them all-the orange blob of a jack-o-lantern and the Santa’s boot complete with cotton “fur” among others.
I remember that this time of year was so magical back then. There was always much to get done, but it was fun and not something to be endured and gotten through. And I’m sure that the amount of time between Thanksgiving and Christmas was a lot longer when I was a kid, or at least it sure seemed that way. The days were a happy blur of baking all kinds of cookies, writing Christmas cards, decorating the house (I still remember gazing at the boxes containing Christmas decorations in the middle of summer-longing for the holidays to come), wrapping presents, getting a tree-and all my memories are framed in red and green and the scent of pine and sugar cookies.
I want this feeling back-I want to feel the anticipation I felt when I was a kid (though not the feeling of eating so much at Thanksgiving that I wanted to die!) I don’t want these fleeting days during “the most wonderful time of the year” to be spent grumbling over getting cards sent, or ornaments hung, or cookies baked. I don’t want to get irritated because I’m running out of shopping days, and finding it a chore to pick out everyone’s presents. It’s hard-I’m an adult and life is not as simple as being 9 and only worrying about whether I’d forget my lines in the Sunday School Christmas program. But I’m going to try really hard to be childlike this year- eat leftover pumpkin pie for breakfast, use too much glitter, put cookies and milk out for Santa, build a snowman, marvel at a tiny baby nestled in a bed of hay, maybe even make a few clay reindeer. I’ve got plenty of time too, if I start right now!

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Bitter and the Sweet

The end of summer has come and it’s quiet around the house today. My daughter Amy started back to school (8th grade!), and I miss having her around. Besides being mother and daughter, we are the best of friends too. I truly love her company and we do lots of things together. Last night there was a flurry of activity as she prepared for today-she retrieved her back pack from the closet where it had been hidden away since last June. She filled her new binder with all the usual and necessary school supplies-pencils, pens, paper. She picked out her first day of school outfit (all new clothes, of course!) And while I baked cookies for her lunch, she watched a favorite old movie-taking her mind off the inevitability of today a little longer.
But the end of summer is good too. This is the time of year that I take a few green tomatoes from the garden and make mincemeat-that classic blend of green tomatoes, apples, raisins, sugar, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg (I don’t put any meat in mine.) After hours of cooking, this mixture is reduced to a dark, sweet, spicy concoction that I put up in jars and then put away for the upcoming holidays. To me, no Thanksgiving or Christmas would seem complete without a mincemeat pie-it’s as much a tradition as roast turkey or a Christmas tree.
Amy may be back in school now, and she won’t have as much free time as she does in the summer-but one thing won’t change. When it comes time to make mincemeat, my favorite helper will be by my side.