Gingerbread House

Today is the day my father was born in 1909. He left us in 1982,  too soon to see any of his grandsons or great granddaughters learn to love to cook as much as he did. My sons are passing me up as gourmet cooks, Lauren (22) cooks meals for the family now, Skye (13) is a great pastry cook, Maddie  (9) tried her hand at chicken curry recently, even making the curry blend herself, and Jordann (7) loves to tie on an apron and help to bake.

I am often asked where I learned to love cooking. A great deal of that became a part of me because Mother and Daddy owned a cafe most of the time I was growing up. Mother worked there and cooked more at home, but Daddy cooked for the cafe, creating the best hamburgers and lunch plates.  He got up early and went in to make scratch pies and hot rolls. So as I watched Nora and her Mom, Kristen, make a gingerbread house, I thought how much Daddy and Mother would have loved to see this project!  At 21 months, Nora was intrigued by putting the little candy dots on the house. Perhaps it is a good thing she does not eat candy yet.They did a fantastic job.  There was not much cooking in this kitchen project, but she will be standing on a stool helping me make cookies soon! You made your great granddaddy proud, Nora! It was Kristen's first gingerbread house, too!  But she bakes beautiful cakes, so she knew how to handle that frosting.

Christmas Wonder

 “For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child Himself.” 
― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

It is also good (wonderful!) to be a grandmother at Christmas. To share in the wonder of twinkle lights and cookie baking, to give even your tea table a Christmas dress and  cover tiny trees with pretty decorations. Nora brings us the delight of her joy this season, making it all new again for everyone in our family. She runs around discovering every tiny manger scene, angel, and Santa. She loves dancing to all the sweet carols.  I find myself being astonished and full of wonder in new ways and saying it just like she does:   "OOOH!   Wow!"  

Bringing the Garden Inside

Ben and Kristen gave me a small herb drying rack for my birthday.  Last week, I hung it from the center of my pot rack and added a few bundles of herbs. I love reaching up to pinch a bay leaf, some rosemary twigs, or crush a basil leaf into a pan on the stove. Christmas music is playing, the tree is up, and it smells like Christmas. Last week when Maddie and Jordann and their mom arrived to spend a few days, the first thing I heard when they came inside was "It always smells like Christmas here!" I like that.

Blessed

Thanksgiving Day has come and gone, Advent begins tomorrow. The 2 days are not always so close together, but it seems appropriate to move from the posture of marking gratitude to these next weeks of waiting and expectancy. I love so many things about these celebrations. There is the time set aside for personal reflection and recollection. There is time for family gathering and celebrating. This Thanksgiving has brought a keen awareness of how precious our times together are and how much I appreciate the occasion because it draws people home. The coming year brings great change for all of us, some already known. Jobs and homeplaces are relocating, our grandchildren are growing up. Next year gatherings may be different in numbers and place. So I need to say one more time how grateful I am that all our thirteen of our sons, their wives and our grandchildren were together for hugs and laughter, fun in the kitchen, remembering, and circling our great feast for Joe to pray a blessing and thanksgiving for our family, our food, our being together.  Not many pictures, but so many, many good memories.

Thanksgiving 2015. Blessed.

Skye is 13!

Today is our lovely granddaughter's thirteenth birthday.  From the moment of her parents' excited news of her tiny beginning, she has been so much joy and gladness for me. In the months before her birth, I wrote a journal to her in the form of a letter, given to her parents on the day she was born, a tradition I have continued with each new grandchild.  I simply wanted to tell her she was already a part of our family story and would always be.  I wrote about happily we anticipated her arrival, of all the things we looked forward to sharing with her, and how we celebrate faith and family. From rocking and lullabies to planting flowers, building fairy gardens and baking macaroons, Skye continues to add delight to our time together. Thank you, and Happy Birthday, sweet girl!

Maddie mailed me a note with a gift inside and the instructions "Here is a sticker you can add to almost anything..." I grinned as I attached it to the pumpkin on my counter. P for pumpkin, P for pie, but also P for Parker!  Our family has grown to number 13 Parkers (and alot more counting extended family.)  With a grateful heart every day, and Thanksgiving gathering coming soon, I am glad for our times together as a family.  See you soon, Maddie!

Making Music

I enjoy making music with my choir and handbell friends, but there is a different kind of pleasure in music with my grandchildren.  I have had so many good times with each of my granddaughters:  rocking and singing lullabies, swinging and singing,  playing CD's and singing along in the car as we drove somewhere, marching around the house singing and sounding out with everything from pot lids to maracas, trying out recorders and harmonicas, making drums out of boxes and cookie tins.  I remember Lauren's "Poor Mr. Spider" tape she loved playing over and over in the car and dancing with her. I played handbells with Skye's youth handbell group.  Maddie loved singing from the time she could talk and could sing Amazing Grace with perfect pitch when she was 2. Jordann loves making up songs on the piano and Nora does too.  Whether it is singing "Skip to My Lou" 20 times in a row or "A, You're Adorable" or tunes from The Sound of Music, music with these girls fills my heart!