Month: December 2009

Before Christmas Gramma and Paw Paw came over to make the cut-out Christmas cookies they make every year. Paw Paw made the dough and cut out the shapes.

Dad wore his Christmas apron.

Mom tried to put an apron on me.

I didn’t like it.

Then we made icing! Lemon, orange and almond.

While waiting for the cookies to come out of the oven, Mom introduced me to nonpareils.

Nonpareils are very good for licking off fingers.

Turns out I’m a very good cookie decorator …

and cookie eater.

While waiting for the next batch of cookies to come out of the oven, Dad tried to humor me by playing with his icing. This worked for a little bit but …

eventually the wait just got too long. All I wanted to do was decorate cookies and there were none to decorate. Did they not know that 15 minutes to a not-even-two-year-old is a very, very, very long time? Especially when it’s past my bedtime.

Milk helped. As did my bedtime routine. While Mom was giving me my bath and putting me to bed, Dad, Paw Paw and Gramma decorated the rest. Aren’t they pretty?

“I am still convinced that a good, simple, homemade cookie is preferable to all the store-bought cookies one can find.” —James Beard

Lately I’ve been practicing drinking water without a lid.

You have to hold on tight, take very small sips (but still remember to breathe) and hold the cup so tight to your face that you leave red marks on your forehead and cheeks.

I love it. So much so that I kept asking for more and more and more.

“We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out.” —Ray Bradbury

Now that we know Tucker isn’t going to eat the formal dining room table legs and Sophie knows better than to play with the handmade pottery sitting on the handmade Arts & Crafts bookcase (we hope), we’ve taken down the baby gate that once blocked off entry into the dining room from the kitchen. Sophie was thrilled with our decision. Now she can circle the entire house—living room to kitchen to dining room to living room. It doesn’t seem so long ago when I remembered the joy of discovering circle walks in people’s homes. However, her favorite way to engage in the circle walk is by marching. “March!” she’ll say (over and over and over again). “March!” She loves to lead. But she insists on having someone follow. Tucker happily joins in, too. And with every pass of her toy bin she picks up a new toy—that you must carry. Oh, and some sort of singing is necessary, too. “March!”

“Every life is march from innocence, through temptation, to virtue or vice.” —Lyman Abbott

“This is the message of Christmas: We are never alone.” —Taylor Caldwell

Sophie loved decorating the tree this year. She’d pick up an ornament, try to hang it up, hand it to one of us, watch us hang it up and then say “another one, another one” while running back to the ornament box. Often I think, this will be my favorite stage of my child’s life (and, yes, often I think this won’t be my favorite stage of my child’s life). But people are right. It does just keep getting better and better.

“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.” —Laura Ingalls Wilder

Everyone has a dish their mom or dad makes that they absolutely love. (One of) mine is my mom’s homemade potato soup. I think it takes her hours to make. I know it involves homemade stock. And I know that I tried it once and it was nothing like my mom’s (in part because I did not take the time to make homemade stock). She recently came to visit and, with her, brought a glass jar full of soup and, subsequently, full of memories of home. I’m not the best cook. But I hope there’s something I someday make, consistently, that Sophie grows to love. And I hope to someday visit her with that something in a glass jar or in some Tupperware or on a plate covered in foil. And I hope that with each bite it will be more than something that tastes good—it will be something that tastes of home. And then, I hope she’ll smile—because of good memories in addition to good taste.

“Soup is the song of the hearth … and the home.” —Louis P. De Gouy

This is my friend Daileon. You can call him Dai Dai. He was saying “cheese!” for the camera while I was clapping. We’re good friends now. Especially because he shared all his toys with me. And was still nice to me when I cried. (I do that sometimes.) Can’t wait to see you again, Dai Dai!

“The most I can do for my friend is simply be his friend.” —Henry David Thoreau

Paw Paw came over the other day and watched me while Mom had a doctor’s appointment.

I showed him all my bracelets (including some new ones just my size that Grandma made me!) …

put them on …

and then sat on Tucker.

“It takes all the fun out of a bracelet if you have to buy it yourself.” —Peggy Joyce

“Christmas is for children. But it is for grownups too. Even if it is a headache, a chore, and nightmare, it is a period of necessary defrosting of chill and hide-bound hearts.” —Lenora Mattingly Weber

This year we went to a simple tree farm in Lewisburg, Ohio, from which you can see the farm where my dad grew up, and where my grandma still lives. There was hardly anyone there. There was no Santa or free hot cocoa or a tree shaker or wreaths for sale—just a guy and a fire and a log to sit on if you got too cold—it was perfect.

After we visited my grandma and enjoyed my aunt Ellen’s bread, coffee and hot tea.

It’s a beautiful tree.

“Never worry about the size of your Christmas tree. In the eyes of children, they are all 30-feet tall.” —Larry Wilde