w is for worn down December 22, 2008

This weather we are having has got me worn down like an elderly hip socket.  I keep moving but it’s painful and slow, and I keep imagining all the things I’d do if I could move freely.  Windchills like this are unusual.  I don’t remember it being this cold since the early days of our married life in Ottawa.  We were younger then, and on one particularly brittle night, headed out to the New Chiam for bad Chinese food just to get out of the house. This time around,  I haven’t left my house since Friday at noon.  

Friday:  took Kate for wisdom tooth extraction x 4.  Picked up milkshakes on the way home.  Tended to Kate.  Cooked food.  Watched TV.

Saturday:  Tended to Kate.  Welcomed John’s family for Christmas lunch.  Cooked food.  Cleaned up food.  Watched TV.

Sunday:  Tended to Kate. Went to church.  (Oops I lied – I have been out of the house!!)  Cooked food.  Baked cookies.  Wrapped gifts.  Watched TV.

My boring life.  But it was a warm life, and believe me, I have counted my blessings multiple times that I have a wonderful, warm house with food in the cupboards and TV hooked up to cable.  It has not been a hardship.  It’s just worn me down.  I am moving slowly, and if not for work obligations today, might grind to a screeching halt.

It’s Christmas week and the weather forecast is dismal.  We have lovely events and family time to look forward to on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of this week, followed by the eager anticipation of our BFF’s arriving on Saturday night.  So, I think I will just stop watching the weather, take each day as it comes and maybe rent a cane or something!

i is for ice December 19, 2008

Our world is encased in an icy crust this morning.  Schools are closed.  Traffic is non-existent.  Early morning Christmas lights in our neighborhood bounce off slick lawns and sidewalks.  A sugary glaze has frosted all the trees and driveways.  I am thankful to not have to be anywhere too early this morning.

T got up and got in the shower before he got the message that his school district is shut down today.  I think he will adjust happily and quickly to the news.  My office closes when the schools do, so I won’t be going in.  I had taken the day off anyway, however.  My job today is to deliver Kate to the oral surgeon’s office to get her wisdom teeth extracted and then spend the rest of the day watching over her.

The icy rain started last night.  We staying in and enjoyed a yummy dinner of chicken parmesean and pasta with homemade marinara.  After dinner we broke out some cards and played several rounds of “Catfish.”  I managed to maintain my presidency (first place) throughout the game, slipping to vice-president (or second place) for one round.  It was a different story when we switched to Trivial Pursuit.  How can someone win a game of trivia that was published before she was born?  I only know that K has a seemingly endless knowledge of both the trivial and the important.  We had a really fun evening together before J and T headed out for the weekly coffee/study date.

And now today, we have not a typical snow day, more of an ice day.  Activities today not typical of a day off.  Instead of staying home and watching movies in our jammies, we be heading out to get some teeth extracted.  Maybe some movies and jammies after that!

s is for small group December 18, 2008

We attend kind of a big church, about 950 people on any given Sunday.  It’s pretty difficult to get to know people well in that setting so we have what we call “small groups.”  These are just what the title says, smaller groups of people that get together to know each other well.  There are 12 people in our small group and last  night all but one of them came over to our house.  

We had a great time.  We all sat around the round coffee table in our little family room.  We put all the treats that everyone had brought on the table and kept the hot chocolate and the decaf flowing freely.  We munched on cheesecake that was still frozen (50 seconds at 50% power made it just perfect), Fannie May candy, homemade toffee and more delicious candies and cookies.  We told jokes and asked questions.  We discovered that one couple just learned that the impending grandchild is a boy.  Joy.  We talked about what we could study in the new year – we’re thinking financial stability and stewardship.  In ‘09?  Go figure!  We also discussed everyone’s Christmas plans and some pretty serious stuff going on in a couple of our families.  We talked about children abroad and headed that way, children facing some medical stuff, and children for whom everything is just fine, for now anyway.  We made a plan to get back together after the holidays, one couple volunteering their home for the month of January.

And at the end the most remarkable thing happened.  We prayed.  But this is not that remarkable, as we pretty much always have a closing word of prayer.  But this time was different.  Each member of the group prayed for the person on his or her left.  I was moved to tears as I heard each caring member thankful for the qualities their person brings, making the ask on behalf the special needs and requests of their person and their family, and giving thanks to God for the truth of the Christmas season.

I think Christmas at its best demonstrates our need.  Our need for each other.  Our need for a Savior.  I am thankful for this small group of friends as we discover this together.

t is for tradition December 17, 2008

Later this week my daughter and I will venture out to my mom’s new kitchen at the farm and bake some Christmas cookies.  Cookies are a big part of the holiday traditions of my childhood.  My mom made other stuff every year.  Some I liked, some I didn’t.  She’d waste a big hunk of time every year making something called Date Cake.  Although it would have been more exciting, this had nothing to do with dating.  It was not a snack you ate while playing Mystery Date with your friends.  This was a cake made from actual dates and while a lot of people got excited about it, I never really understood the attraction.  She also made something called Cherry Dessert.  This was one of the few layered confections that did not contain jello, but rather cherry pie filling.  This was one of my favorites, and I do remember that she always left half without nuts for my Uncle Rog.  I never really understood that part of it, but I do now.  I leave nut-free halves of baked goods all the time for my favorite snackers.  Cherry Dessert had graham cracker crust and sweet cream cheese and pecans (on my half) and real whipped cream (until Cool Whip was invented) and not one but two cans of cherry pie filling because one looked “skimpy.”

But  the cookies were always the main attraction:

Thumprints:  brown sugar dough rolled in ground pecans and baked until almost done.  Then you pressed your thumb in the middle and returned them to the oven to bake.  The indentations were filled with sweet frosting.  Blue was always almond flavored.  Yellow, of course, was lemon.  Pink was peppermint and green was spearmint and yes there is a difference.

Melting Moments:  small round cornstarch and powdered sugar cookies that really did melt in your mouth.  They were dotted with the same frosting as the thumbprints.  This cookie was kind of a late addition, the recipe coming from Aunt Sis whose real name was Agnes.  

Chocolate Crinkles:  these magic chocolate cookies went into the oven as balls of dough rolled in sugar and came out as disks of elegant cracks and crevices.  If they were baked a little too long they were crunchy, a little too short and they were gooey.  I always hoped for the gooey.

Pecan Dreams:  I have since learned that everyone makes these and calls them by a different name.  Mexican Wedding Cakes, Norwegian or Russian Tea Cakes.  These are filled with ground pecans and rolled while warm in powdered sugar.  This is the best time to pop one in your mouth, while they are warm, although the evidence is hard to hide as your lips are sure to be ringed with powdery white goodness.

Spritz:  These are cookie press cookies.  Sometime over the years my mom lost her cookie press, the one with the dented metal barrel, the gear shaped crank and the warn little shape disks that turn the stiff dough into trees and poinsettias and wreaths.  It’s taken her years to find an acceptable replacement, shunning the new fangled electric shooters for an old school hand operated model.  I never liked the spritz with the red hots pressed into the dough before baking – they always burned.  The green trees sprinked with sugar were perfection.

Some years, we would get to make sugar cookies.  Cut out from Grandma Parker’s thin white cookie dough recipe they were baked and then frosted with all manner of colors and sprinkled with no hint of restraint.  This made a big mess, and so was not my mom’s favorite cookie.  But I saw myself as a cookie artiste and made sure that no cookie looked like it’s neighbor.  Sometimes I think I must have been an exhausting child, but my creativity was allowed to reign holy terror over those sugar cookies at Christmas time.

My husband has a similar heritage of Christmas sweets and one of his favorite memories is of one Christmas  in college when his mom sent a package to him at the fraternity containing hundreds of assorted homemade cookies.  Not only did it make him the most popular man in the house that season, but it brought the memories and smells of Canadian Crunchies, Santa’s Whiskers and Salty Oatmeals right to his door.

A couple of weekends ago, J and I got busy and baked several hundred cookies for our college student.  We knew she was having a holiday party and lots of friends would be visiting.  We baked some of my cookies and some of his cookies and packaged them up and sent them off.  It was a fun treat for her and for her guests, but mostly it was a tasty walk down memory lane for the two of us.

I am looking forward to Friday and all the great smells and tastes of Christmas cookies, but mostly I am looking forward to a sharing this tradition with my mother and my daughter.  Hopefully the new cookie press will work just right!

h is for holiday rambling December 16, 2008

This is the time of year when weather becomes an issue.  It’s like another party in the decision making process to be considered.  It’s not that you can’t get out and go, but you really don’t want to because its either too cold, too slow due to road conditions or you just want to avoid the people who appear to be unfamiliar with winter driving!

Last night was an at home night because of some of these reasons.  And also because my husband is such an awesome shopper that our errand list is nil.  He has taken care of everything and it makes the next two weeks seem awesomely stress free.  I did laundry and watched a pretty good episode of Jon and Kate plus 8.  Some would argue there is no such thing.  But last night they put their “fame” to good use focusing the attention on St. Jude’s Children’s Hopsital in Memphis.

Tonight we will venture out no matter what because Kate is coming home!  We will be heading to Bloomington tonight to pick her up.  T and J and I have done a pretty good job of being festive on our own, but tonight the joy factor will ramp up considerably. 

On Sunday morning, I walked into the family and was punched in the stomach by the big stocking emblazoned with the letter C.  C will not be home for Christmas.  He who is often the life of the party, cracking jokes and planting hugs and kisses on everyone will be with his German family for the holidays and we will miss him muchly.  As his mom, I am happy for his adventurous year, but as his mom, I’m really gonna miss him.

Today we are a little closer to Christmas and anticipate a wonderfilled time with family and friends.

c is for camels December 15, 2008

Or lack thereof.

Last night we attended one of our favorite holiday traditions, the Live Nativity in Muncie.  This little church in a little town midway between our town and the state line does a fantastic reproduction of the Christmas scene.  Complete with actors portraying all the key roles in a kind of statue-like state.  They have live animals and cathedral bells.  It’s a drive-by experience and they have it all set up in an alley way.  To get there you drive all the way through town on streets lined with plastic milk jug lumineres.  No doubt the entire town saves their empties for just this event.  They stretch the tableau out so that when you come around the corner with your headlights dimmed and enter the alley way, first you see some shepherds watching their flocks by night, actual sheep in this case.  Then you might see some ducks and geese in straw nests, before you arrive at the manger where pre-teen Mary is struggling to keep warm and giggling the entire time with a slightly older Joseph.  A spotlight warmly bounces off the plastic face of the baby Jesus.   They have a cow and a donkey tethered on either side of the little shelter.  Up high on a platform above them is the angel Gabriel with an enormous trumpet horn.  That actor must hold the heavy instrument high the entire duration of his or her shift.  Finally the wise men come into view.  They are spledidly arrayed in various brightly colored robes and towels.  And last but not least, my personal favorite part:  a live camel.  In our driveby car we are so close that we can see the eyelashes.  If it chose to spit, we would be in the unfortunate path.  But it’s just cool to see a camel that close in that setting in our little part of the world.

We go every year.  It’s John’s favorite thing to do at Christmastime, and usually he persuades someone to join us as he makes the whole thing sound so splendid and irresistable.  

We went last night and immediately knew something was amiss when we rounded the corner and saw the wisemen first. uhoh.  And no camel.  That’s right folks; apparently the world wide recession had hit the Live Nativity and there were cut-backs.  No camels, no ducks, no sheep.  But still the same dedicated folks holding their positions for hours while we  and hundreds of other onlookers drove by.

 It was simpler than years past.  Fewer characters, fewer animals.  But still sweet.  Still a lovely way to spend a Sunday evening just before Christmas.  And although I was really looking forward to the camels, I was still inspired by my husband’s little boy enthusiasm, warmed by the company of good friends who agreed to join us, and, as always, moved by the effort of one little town to tell a big story.

r is for review December 12, 2008

I wrote my first book review for Amazon this morning.  It’s for a book I’m enjoying called “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus” by Nancy Guthrie.  Here’s what I wrote:

In this collection Nancy Guthrie has brought together classic and contemporary Christian authors. She has arranged the 23 advent sermons in order according to the Christmas story. It makes a wonderful early morning companion or family dinner devotional throughout the season of preparing for Christmas. The writings chosen range from the complex to the simple, from the modern to the ancient, but all point the way to the arrival of Jesus as God’s loving solution to man’s dilemma. Reading one selection at a time, I am discovering authors whose work I will explore further. Well done!

The thrill of being published is mine!!  So I immediately went to the website and scoffed at the other reviewers who wrote long rambling lectures.  At which time I again realized my need for God’s solution to my dilemma and resumed reading.

e is for expectations December 11, 2008

I am writing about a work issue – one that I encounter over and over again in volunteer world.  So I have a couple of questions:

What do you expect when you volunteer?  Do you do it to serve others or to be served?

I think the answer to this should be obvious but it is not.  Many volunteers seem to want to be served, have things their way, control the situation.  And who can blame them really.  It is a sacrifice of time, energy and expertise that might otherwise be compensated.  

More and more, agencies that need volunteers are being stretched to the limits.  They simply do not have the resources to dedicate a staff person to the full (or even part) time management of volunteers.  In an ideal world, each volunteer would be greeted, screened, oriented, trained, appreciated.  But today’s situation being so much less than ideal, many volunteers are given much less than that.

I suggest a different model.  A  model where the volunteer brings humility, flexibility and willingness.  And a model where the agency brings an attitude of gratitudel, professionalism, and care.

Volunteers who are humble are not concerned about what they will do, but how they can help.  

Volunteers who are flexible are not concerned about a certain task, but about the people who will benefit.  

Volunteers who are willing say yes when asked within the limits they have set for themselves.  

Agencies who are grateful, welcome volunteers and do not view them as an inconvenience.

Agencies who are professional have high expectations of their volunteers and do what they must to protect the vulnerable.

Agencies who care get to know those who serve and help them find fulfilling work that is meaningful to the mission.

Mission cannot be accomplished without the important contributions of volunteers and appropriate appreciation must be demonstrated. Each time they serve, volunteers need to check their motives for doing so.   This is a difference-making model for effective volunteerism.

d is for driving companions December 10, 2008

Yesterday in the cold pouring rain, I drove to Decatur.  With me were two volunteer coordinators from the community who I didn’t know very well.  It was a good opportunity to hear about their work and get to know them a little better.  At first I didn’t view it this way, because I don’t always enjoy being around people and would have prefered the drive in solitude.  Alone with the Carpenters and their fantastic Christmas collection from 1974.

But together we went.  I learned a lot.  I learned that it’s hard for college graduates to find jobs right now and that many recent or one year grads are still looking.  I learned that 1000 people attended the recent funeral for a beloved local elementary school teacher who died on an icy morning recently.  I learned that calls to crisis line multiply during the holidays because people are not joyful, but very, very sad.  I learned that it can take 90 minutes to get from Savoy to Parkland if you have to rely on MTD.  I learned that a trip goes faster when you have companions.  I was very thankful too, that the weather cooperated and temps stayed above freezing.

The meeting was a regional volunteer management thing lead by a state agency.  Needless to say, yesterday was quite a day for our state. It’s not everyday, although fairly common in Illinois, that your governor is arrested for the attempted sale of the president elect’s senate seat and other political atrocities.  So the leader of our meeting, who is employed by the governor’s office, seemed a little twitchy.  It was a little uncomfortable, a little too long, and a little short on useful information.  

When I returned home, I was delighted to hang out with J and T and enjoyed some leftover chicken tetrazini (Aunt Susan’s recipe – very tasty).  I then headed out to talk about volunteerism at a union sponsored community education class.  THAT was an interesting experience, as I was sandwiched between a labor activist and the leader of the local socialist movement.  Hmmm….  I did stop by Starbucks on my way to that meeting and enjoyed a tall skinny vanilla latte, and enjoyed every sip.  It was a cold, rainy, windy night and my latte was an excellent companion to get me through the class.

Headed home and joined T on the couch for an episode of a new favorite show, Eli Stone, and waited for John to return home from a marathon church leaders meeting.

d is for dreary December 9, 2008

Rain in December just doesn’t seem quite right and we are getting a lot of it this morning.  The day ahead sounds like a gray one.  And I have to go to Decatur.  Enough said.