Category Archives: holidays

2022, Family, holidays, Music, Uncategorized

December Music

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We have sung some hymns in church set to Welsh melodies lately, and Husband says he gets the shivers whenever he hears them. He attributes this to having some Welsh ancestors, and thinks the melodies tap at some deep primordial aspect of his collective makeup.

I tend to be more opinionated rather than shivery over church music. I like Advent music in church. One isn’t supposed to have Christmas music in church until Christmas. Advent music tends to be quiet and contemplative, which is fine with me. I find my teeth on edge when our church music gets too boisterous or when we sing hymns that have a lot of lyrics in the first person. How Great Thou Art is an example. Our Worship and Music director really dislikes Blessed Assurance, but was gracious enough to sing it the other day at the funeral of a 103 year old parishioner. Our recently retired choir director couldn’t stand Amazing Grace and refused to perform it or sing along when the congregation sang it. We have one song coming up on our December choir schedule that sounds like it should be in an old time western movie. The left hand piano accompaniment rhythm sounds like a horse ambling slowly on the trail. The congregation has loved it when we have sung it other years. I try to think of funny lyrics to it while we practice it, which reduces my irritation.

I really do like to sing in our church choir, and we have some fun performances coming up this month. Husband will play a duet on his cello on Christmas Eve with a flute player. We will do A Festval of Lessons and Carols like they do at King’s College on December 18. We won’t sing How Great Thou Art.

What gives you the shivers? What December music do you like? What December music do you loathe?

2022, animals, Farming Update, Food, holidays, Music

Random Thoughts

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Today’s Farm report comes from Ben.

It’s December. Not too much farm stuff this week, and I have some random thoughts.

I saw SEVEN ducks fly over to their breakfast! Everybody but the poufy and the two big black ones. Rosie and Guildy, the regular mallards, and the two that I always assumed were too fat to fly. (Is it OK to call a duck fat?) But they all flew from the pond to the corn. Yay ducks!

It was down in the single digits the other night and I had to turn on the wellhouse heater again. I sure don’t remember having to do that in November or early December before.

I got the rear blade mounted on the tractor and got to use it after the 3” of snow we got on Tuesday. As usual with the first snow and the not solidly frozen ground, I ripped up some sod. Oops. Well, the chickens like the dirt. Gonna be rough mowing next summer, but that’s next summers problem.

We did get the driveway markers in and snow fence up last Saturday. That Saturday after Thanksgiving has traditionally been a nice weather day and we’ve done snow fence for several years on that day. It was a little windy, but it wasn’t too cold, and as long as we worked with the wind, the fence stayed up by itself and it went OK. It helps that the posts are still there one year to the next. Last year my shoulder had just started to hurt, leading to the surgery in February, so I wasn’t much help with the snowfence last year. We put up 400’ in about 1.5 hours this year. Next year I’m hoping to install some permanent wood posts for the ends of the sections. It’s on my list of next summer’s jobs.

Every night I give the dogs some ‘Milkbone’ dog treats. Allie has to get one first. Humphrey will not take a treat first; he’ll only take one after Allie gets hers. I don’t think it’s altruism, I’m not sure if he’s that suspicious? He won’t take pills or eat anything without sniffing it first. And Bailey. She’ll leave the treats sit all night. And when I open the garage door the next morning, she grabs a treat and heads off to bury it in the snow. She’s so weird. They’re all so weird.  

I’ve started baking Amish Friendship bread again. Just did my second batch of 6. I should be able to get one more batch in before the knee, then I’ll stall it for a bit. I’ve got a list of things that needed to be done before my knee replacement. (8 days and counting! I’m excited and scared and cautiously optimistic!) There were some big things like getting fieldwork done, and machinery put away, getting the snow fence up, and putting the rear blade

on the tractor were the last two items. But then I started adding minor things, just so I could enjoy crossing them off. I’ve added things like ‘Put up Christmas tree’ and ‘Show Kelly the well house heater’ and ‘move the piano’. We’re making progress on the list!

Music this week: I’ve been listening to the Modern Big Band channel. And on the car radio I heard Nina Simmone singing ‘Sinnerman’.

CAN THE FOODS ON YOUR PLATE TOUCH EACH OTHER? DO YOU EAT ONE THING AT A TIME OR EAT A BITE OF EVERTHING?

2022, animals, Family, Food, holidays, Nature, Uncategorized

Tasty Eats

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We celebrated an early Christmas with our son and his family over Thanksgiving. I was quite excited to get a new cookbook from them, The Nordic Cookbook by Magnus Nilsson. We have his Nordic Baking Book, which has hundreds of wonderful recipes. The book I just received has 700 recipes from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Greenland, the Faroe Islands, and Finland. Some recipes are pretty traditional ones for meatballs and stews. I am happy to report, though, that if I ever run across Pilot Whale in the store, I shall know how to cook it. It may be a while before I am brave enough to cook with seal entrails or roast a Puffin.

It is interesting to see the different versions that different Nordic countries have for the same dish. There are slight variations on seasonings and ways of cooking things like meatballs, sausages, and meatloaf, for example. I think that we will have a fun time exploring this new cookbook. There are some things I will never cook with, like, blood, for instance. There are plenty enough other recipes that will be far more tasty.

What are some of your favorite cookbooks? What are some of the oddest things you ever cooked and/or ate?

2022, Food, Gatherings, holidays, home, Seasons

Cookie Storm

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I’m sure you’ll be shocked to hear that I’ve overdone.  Again.

I have rules about things around the holidays.   All self-imposed, so my own fault.

  1. No holiday music or movies until after dinner on Thanksgiving (YA always turns on the holiday station right as we leave from our Thanksgiving feast.)
  2. No holiday baking until the Friday after Thanksgiving.
  3. Tree purchased on Black Friday and put up some time that day.
  4. My best friend and her husband (and sometimes their kids & spouses) come to help decorate the tree, almost always the Sunday after Thanksgiving.
  5. Cookies and hot chocolate are served at Tree Trimming. Normally I make 5-6 kinds of cookies over the weekend for this gathering and then do the rest of the holiday cookies in the following few days.

These rules formed a perfect storm this year as my friend from Nashville arrived last night as well to babysit the house and the dog while YA and I take a trip.  I decided that I needed to get all the cookies baked before Tree Trimming.  I also had to get the house cleaned up.  AND, the front porch was coming down the final stretch.

3 days, 15 kinds of cookies, tree, lights, tree trimming, house clean enough for company AND the front porch is done.  I feel like I’ve been through the proverbial wringer and every muscle in my body has hired a hit man.  There is even a blister where the dough scoop hits my middle finger and I woke up during the night with pain in my hand and had to take an ibuprofen!  So I’m thinking that I have overdone it.  Just a bit.

(Anna’s M & M, White Chocolate Madadamia, Lemon Snowflakes, Peanut Blossoms, Frosted Sugar, Malted Milk, Cream Cheese Spritz, Peanut Butter Bon Bons, Vanilla Crescents, Pecan Meltaways, Speculaas, Soft Ginger, 2 kinds of fudge).  Yes I know this is only 14 – the 15th debuted it’s way right into the trash.

When was the last time you over-did?

2022, Family, Food, Gatherings, holidays, home, Uncategorized

What a Deal!

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Husband’s son Mario has come to Winona for a 10-day visit, and brought the whole famdamily! It’s a complicated, blended family with 3 girls: 20 years old, 17, 13; and a 2½-year-old boy and his 3-month-old brother. Their mom is a dream.

Happily, they are staying just around the corner from us, at the home of Mario’s mom. (She bought this house in 2021, having no idea at first that her former boyfriend would be sharing the back yard fence.) What serendipity! We just walked over there this evening with our contribution of salad and fixings, played with a little kid, held a baby, ate, talked with teenagers in front of a (real) fireplace, helped clean up, made plans for tomorrow, and walked back home. I met more of their relatives, and there will be an even bigger crowd for the big Thanksgiving blowout on Friday. If needed, we can “overflow” over to our house, which holds about six.  : )

I was a little nervous about so many of them coming for so long, and of course this is just the first day.   But we’ll all be fine – there can be an easy flow back and forth. Who set this up??

When do you eat your Thanksgiving meal?

2022, Family, Food, Gatherings, holidays, Seasons, Uncategorized

Well, I’ll Be Stuffed!

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It’s time for the annual CarbFest.  We always spend Thanksgiving with close friends and I am always asked to bring the vegetarian stuffing and a dessert.   A friend asked me to send her my recipe for the stuffing and as I typed it out I realized that I have probably never followed the recipe to the letter even once.

In fact, this year, I’m thinking of adding some cornbread  to the sourdough as the base of the stuffing.  And I have to go get craisins today because I always used them instead of the dark raisins.  I’ve also never used fresh parsley – not once in 20+ years.

I’m thinking I should probably have told this to my friend.  What if she makes the recipe as written and doesn’t like it and then wonders about my sanity??

Do you have a recipe that you always alter?

2022, Art, Family, Food, holidays, Mysteries

World Kindness Day

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Yesterday was World Kindness Day.

YA and I celebrated (although I’m not sure she even know it was Kindness Day) by heading off to the Botticelli and Renaissance Florence exhibit at the Minneapolis Art Institute.  It was a nice exhibit; not as much Botticelli as I would have liked, but I suppose the Uffizi in Florence didn’t want to completely empty out their galleries for us!  YA wanted to see this one

(unfortunately it stayed behind in Florence).  She did talk me into buying a magnet of it for the refrigerator though!

Afterwards we went to Hola Arepa for brunch.  I had the Fried Egg Breakfast – the Arepa version of huevos rancheros with two great sauces and yuca fries.  It was really scrumptious but made even better when half way through, YA suggested that she pay for our meal.  I accepted so quickly that she laughed.  NEVER before has she volunteered to pay for a meal in a restaurant for us. 

I’m putting it down to World Kindness Day although I’m not sure YA was in the know!

Any kindnesses to report?

2022, Business, holidays, Travel, Uncategorized

Aldis Alone

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It’s been quite a while since I last set my alarm clock but yesterday was my annual trek to Aldis.  This is the third year that I’ve headed out in the wee hours to get to the closest Aldis that sells their wine advent calendars – in River Falls!  No wine sold in grocery stores in Minnesota!

I arrived at 6:15 a.m. and was happy to be #5 in line.  If all you want is wine/beer/seltzer calendars, you probably don’t need to be quite this early, but the other advent calendars (cheese, Legos, cat, dog, Star Wars, etc.) go like hotcakes and they don’t stock all that many.  Two women who were #1 and #2 in line took seven cheese calendars between them. 

As I was sitting and reading (and chatting, who are we kidding), I was thinking about our psychology discussion on Tuesday.  I have never even hinted to YA that I would like her to come along on this trip.  It’s hard to imagine she would be interested, but I realized this morning that I like to do this by myself.  There aren’t too many things that I really like to do on my own – the biggest is opening day at State Fair.  That is absolutely my day to be on my own.  (A couple of years ago YA talked about going on the first day and I emphatically told her that we could drive over together but at the entrance we would be going our own ways.  She decided not to go.)  I also like to do the arboretum a couple of times a year all on my own and I usually head to the zoo once a summer by myself.  These are days where I go wherever I want and completely at my own pace. 

Of course, sitting in a stadium chair for 3 hours doesn’t involved any going or pacing myself, but it is my own little adventure every year.

Do you have anything that you really prefer to do all on your own?

2022, Gatherings, holidays, Travel, Uncategorized

Happy Halloween!

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As you read this today, I am, I hope, winging my way back to North Dakota from a conference. I am slated to arrive back home in time to start handing out treats.

The organization putting on the workshop I attended always has a big party the Friday we meet. It is surprising how wild middle-aged lawyers, government appointees, and State regulators can get. This time it was described as a Halloween party, and everyone was encouraged to bring costumes. We come from all over the US and Canada for this meeting, and it was amazing how many brought costumes. I considered bringing a Venetian carnival mask, but I was worried it would be damaged during the trip, and I couldn’t really wear a mask over my glasses, so I demurred. There were lots of witches, a monk, doctors in scrubs, the Phantom of the Opera, and Brittany Spears, to name a few. I wore a skirt outfit, and told people it was my expert witness costume, as I often wear the same outfit to court.

During the days before the party, some of my female colleagues and I were amused by the antics of a younger male attendee whose demeanor and presentation left no doubt that he thought very well of himself, and who knew he was a very handsome fellow. To our delight, he came to the costume party dressed as Jesus. It was perfect!

What was your best Halloween costume? Dressing up tonight?

2022, books, holidays, home, Kids, pets, Uncategorized

Scary FlappyThings

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Last week was really windy here, with gusts up to 61 mph all day Wednesday. It looked like we were back in the Dustbowl, with the sky obscured by blowing dirt.

Kyrill, our Cesky Terrier puppy is a pretty intrepid boy with the usual terrier bravado, especially when the fiends (neighbors and pedestrians and the Postie) are outside and he is looking through the bay window. He even tolerates the vacuum and electric floor sweeper. He gets afraid, however, whenever he hears flapping noises, like those made when garbage can liners are shook out preparatory to going into the empty garbage can, or when the neighbor’s flags are flapping loudly in strong winds like we had last week. He wanted to get past the neighbor’s flag pole as fast as he could as we were buffeted by the Wednesday winds.

Our children didn’t have many fears, aside from our daughter when she was about 4 not wanting to go to a new doctor named Dr. Wolf because she was afraid he was a real wolf. My mother said I was afraid of the vacuum cleaner when I was little, and she had to wait until my father got home to hold me so she could clean the house.

There are several “Haunted” venues in our community to get good and scared at before Halloween. The mall and the old hospital building have been turned into such places. I don’t like things like that at all, but most of my coworkers have been to them and enjoyed getting terrified. I fly into Bismarck late in the afternoon from Washington DC. on October 31. That is scary enough for me!

What scared you when you were little? What is the scariest book you ever read? What are your experiences with “haunted” venues?