Hedonistic dogs and pictures of feet. Cowfeathers Christmas.

Unbelievably, Christmas has come and gone. The great rush, enjoyed as the rush and push to get "it all done" not just for the morning of Christmas but for the giving, and the sharing of time, talent and hospitality that the season of Christmas entails. We had wonderful gifts and visits from neighbors, including honey from across the street, fruit scones from the farm to the northwest, card playing on a wintry eve, and belly-warming Kentucky bourbon.

And, on the Eve of Christmas, the family gets "purty" and travels to church for what makes Christmas what it is, a celebration of the birth of Jesus. And, my favorite penultimate moment of Christmas- the candles in all hands and the singing of "Silent Night" in a darkened church.

When we get home, I get pushy and make everyone wait for a moment so I can get pictures of the family on Christmas. I feel these opportunities slipping out of my grasp, from when I could dress up Eldest in a miniature Christmas dress and prop her in a chair for a photo.

My babes.

 

 Huz with his girls.

 

 

 The boyz.

 

 

 



 When I surrender the camera- which is not frequently done, I get a picture of my little guy and myself. Kinda.

 

 And one of me with my gorgeous girls. Sorta.

 

 

 

 

 But patience, and a bit of nagging, often gets the job done.

 

 

And then comes Christmas morning, and the dogs eagerly await the descent of the children. Santa came, and filled the stockings, left each child a present and the dogs are excited, as Santa left something special for them as well.

 

 

A dog bed by the fire, mostly big enough for two hedonistic pups.

Cowfeathers Christmas Musicale!

What an odd week. Everything that was supposed to happen; shop, wrap, send, make, bake, work, clean, bathe, laundry, chat, call, help, carry, fix- happened. But in a fog. My world marched on, but I am aware that is not so for the families of Newtown. And, even though I have lots of childhood memories of Newtown (having grown up in that 'hood), I don't think they have entered too much into my grief. What I mean is, I don't think that my growing up there makes it worse. On Sunday afternoon I burst a blood vessel in my eye sclera (the white part) and since then, a bleeding eye seems appropriate.
But, Christmas will come, and the myriad things we do to show that effort of celebration will happen or won't. My kids prefer the effort. To that end, we had our Cowfeathers Musicale last weekend. An old house hosting an old fashioned get together. To sing, and play music of Christmas.
I took some photos.

 

 The candy table. A magnet for the kiddos.

 

 

 

 

 All ready for eaters, singers and musicians!

 

 

 Our first candidates, with Eldest holding some sheet music, and Huz scoping out the goodies. Where's Youngest? See picture #2 above.

 

 

 The kids and I strung up some carols in the conservatory (usually the dining room but in an old fashioned house, old fashioned party, why not use an old fashioned name for the room where we will play music?) I was cutting out the letters, Youngest was laying them out and Eldest was starting to string them. The first one up was "Silnet Night". My laughter had Eldest wondering what was wrong.

 One of our pretty guests!

 

 

 Middlest and her friend decided to move their loud instruments to the sunroom to play background music for a while. It was beautiful.

 

 

 

 Middlest helps little Ava play Carol of the Bells...?  Well, a carol on the bells.

 

 

 Eldest sat at the piano to get us caroling. 

 

 She had help.

 

 

 A few caroling hold-outs.

 

CAKE!

Un-humble sugar cookies.

Let's talk about the humble sugar cookie. I think it gets short changed. All cookies have sugar...okay, Mom always said "Always, never, all and none are fighting words" and I don't mean to start a row, but reasonably, cookies have sugar. So, cookie implies sugar. We've moved on to chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal raisin. My love of cookies was fostered under the care of a deeply committed cookie lover, my Gram. She baked. She also knit, and had great talent there, but for a kid, Gram=cookies. And she was great at chocolate chip and peanut butter, also my childhood favorite, the Snickerdoodle. But when it comes to Christmas, the queen of my cookie dreams was Mimi. I can see that Gram had a rep for baking, and while Mimi did not have the rep, she had the chops. Mimi and Grandpa travelled to New England every Christmas, and as I have said before, their big Lincoln sailing up the drive meant the good stuff could begin. Mimi was in charge of the Christmas Cookies, and this was no small honor from where I stood. Christmas was the sole time of the year when it seemed unlimited cookies were provided. They came out of the vast trunk of the Lincoln in big, well- loved tins. Mimi and Grandpa would park, and we'd dash out to greet them. Penny, or Muffin, or Hiltie (the dog of the generation) would be parked on an antique pink satin comforter folded, on the two foot wide arm rest between driver and passenger seat, impatiently bouncing. My Grandparents would get themselves out of the car, and then out came the dog, to greet ours and have a "piddle". Then, hugs, suitcases and presents were unloaded....and the tins.
I was drawn to the wedding cookies, with their sweet outside and nutty shortbread interior. Addictive. But, close second was the sugar cookies.
Sugar Cookies, cut out in shapes of trees and stars, and my favorite, the oddly shaped one that kind of looked like a submarine, but stood on end, your imagination could fill in the bits and you could see it was really a Santa Claus, with a pack of toys on his back. Mimi made her sugar cookies super thin, so they were really crisp and then sprinkled with the sweet colored sugars. Butter, sugar, flour, vanilla, baking powder, a little salt came together to speak Christmas to my tongue.
Years later, when I make Christmas cookies, the wedding cookies are the first out of the oven, and usually several batches are consumed before then birthday of Jesus. But I make cut out sugar cookies. I triple the recipe, and thanks to the hard-core KitchenAid mixer ( a years-ago Christmas present from a wise baking sister), power through a ball of dough the size of my head. And then we choose shapes.
I am drawn to big cookies, and maybe it the desire to create something memorable for my own children, I like to make not only sugar cookies covered with colored sugar, but also iced cookies. I suppose it feeds my creative need as well. So, last night, Youngest and I covered the table with a sheet and baked and decorated.

 This year's iced offerings include a favorite of mine, the Dala Horse.

 

 

 

 Behind the plate of cookies, you can see two real Dala Horses. One of them belonged to Huz' family, and I got it in the marriage. :-)

 

 

 

 

 Plus a herd of dairy bovines, wearing jingle bells.

 

 

 

And drums and trumpets for my musical family! Youngest did an exciting job of the little houses, and I will bet they go first. 

Let the cookies begin!

What is winter in Ohio coming to, when the best we can do is a frost-on-the-grass morning? In the sunshine???? I suppose I can live with it.

 And the blue, blue sky? Acceptable.

 

 

But, still a bit chilly for spending large amounts of the morning outside. So; Gingerbread Morning. Middlest and I had made the gingerbread and cut out the cookies, but now it is time to get them dressed for eating. We have ENORMOUS snowflakes 6 inches across,

 

The snowflake above was broken, so it got a band-aid..

 and pretty little cottages (one antebellum Southern plantation cottage), and

 great big 6 inch high trees.  The royal icing will get super hard, so the cookies are stack-able. And the sweetness of the royal icing is just perfect with the gingerbread. They aren't gluten-free, so they are  safe from me. But I remember how special they taste!

YUM!!!!

Cowfeathers Christmas Continues

Our living room is where we open presents on Christmas morning, and is where the family gathers in the evenings. This is where we put the tallest Canaan Fir we can find at the tree farm.

 On top of the old gun cabinet ( which holds our meagre and out-of-date electronic offering), Middlest has brought down her doll house for us all to enjoy, and has decorated it for Christmas.

And our tree. The "Family Tree". I has the traditional glass balls and such, but also features all the accumulated ornaments of our life experiences and stages. Trips to places near and far, mementos from the various states we've inhabited, and the ornaments from a box that showed up, randomly, with all my ornaments 20 years or so ago, and I hang them each year, wondering where they came from. Crocheted snowflakes made by Gram, ornaments gifted and made by friends. It has the ornaments made by the kids, each one sooooo precious to them at the time, and still holds a bit of their hearts. On the left side, towards the bottom is one made by Youngest. It looks a bit like a white question mark, with brown flames. This is "Rudolph", with hand shaped antlers. Most kindergartners had antler sized hands, but not Youngest.

 The preschool years collection also features pictures of the kids in hand-made ornaments; Eldest as an Angel in a cloud.

And Middlest in a puzzling ornament.

 About eye level is a clay rendition of "Oklahome" at Christmas. Oklahome was the first house Huz and I purchased in Oklahoma. My sister in law, Yvonne, sweetly made us an ornament of it in, maybe, 1997? and I've treasured it ever since.

 Towards the top of the tree is a little wooden sled, made of Popsicle sticks. I remember my mom, and her friend, Betsy, making hundreds of these one summer at our beach house. This was, likely, 1974? When I started decorating my own trees, I was bequeathed one, and each time I hang it I remember watching them repeat each step, over and over to create these little sleds. I think it was a good childhood lesson in persistence. I'm still not clear on why they created so many. Craft Fair? Fundraiser? Lots and lots of friends?

 Off near the fireplace is a sheep, made with the wool from one of our first ewes, a Suffolk named Fanny. She wears a collar of jingle bells, and makes so much less trouble than the real deal.

And, at the top? Our Angel. Huz and I were married on the beach in Hilton Head. A secluded area in Sea Pines, our wedding party had the beach, mostly, to ourselves. After the ceremony and reception right there near the water, the guests and participants built sand castles and flew kites on the beach. A curious resident asked me what was up. I told her we'd just been married and this was our party. She got very excited and said she had something for us, and she'd be right back. She dashed off down the beach, and came back shortly with a box, wrapped. Inside was this Angel, for our tree, she said. She made the Angel with shells, and sea oats and bits she'd found on the beach.

And there she has been each year for the past 18. Thank you kind stranger-lady! It is a wonderful memory each year.

Hoarders- 11 year old boy edition.

 The Christmas preparations continue.....and I could ignore no longer the disaster that was Youngest's room. Christmas presents should not be given unto a child with a room that horrid. This is how even he felt about the mess:

So, the trauma of yesterday was announcing to him that is was time to put our courage to the sticking place and ATTACK!!

                                                 It was easy to be alarmed by this notion.



Youngest's room is a dark place in our home. It is, well, apocalyptic. He is completely overwhelmed when it comes to reparations of the mess, and completely lackadaisical about creating it. And, this time, it had gotten well beyond even my fortitude. So, instead of trying to clean it up, I employed my stall cleaning talents and helped him shovel the mess into black plastic garbage bags- the big kind. 10 of them. Full to the top. The plan is to unpack one bag a night, making piles for Goodwill, keeping what is relevant and trashing what is left. In all this, we did manage to pull out two kitchen garbage sized bags of trash that was quite evidently- trash. I think if CPS saw his room, he'd be repo'ed.
Frankly, by 7 pm we were both driven to drink.

From preceding paragraph, you can intimate that I am not a "cleaning mother". I don't clean up their rooms. I don't even do their laundry ( that stopped when I realized that if I had another stack of folded shirts and matched socks end up in the laundry bin, I'd be in the loony bin). They have to do their own laundry and keep their own rooms. Only, it sounds more effective than the reality.
So, braced by a libation, (well, he had a tuna boat) we persevered, scrubbing the walls (how do his feet get so high on the wall so frequently?) and the floor, and sweeping out the fireplace, he now has a not-quite-bare room, and I have a laundry room stuffed with black plastic garbage bags.
Darn- looks like I moved his mess to common space. Ugh.

Chicken tree!

The "Chicken Tree".
Back before we had electrified the barn, the chickens had their own large evergreen tree, decorated with stars and balls the kids and I had made. Now, I miss the tree for the chickens, but leery about leaving the lights on a tree all day/night in the barn. So, comprimise with a tuturre covered with lights in front of the barn gate. Makes the nighttime walk to the barn warmer! Julia saw me setting up with my cell phone to snap a picture, and put herself in the shot - the dog's a natural.

Christmas mantles.

Mercury glass candlesticks, frosted grapes, white roses and soft, fragrant Canaan Fir.

Yesterday I promised to share pictures of Cowfeathers as it gets decked out for Christmas!

Middlest and I decorated mantles over the weekend. Three of the 6 in the house. The two upstairs are out of my purview. (One in each of the kid-rooms, I can barely even walk past let alone venture forth. And with the mess, who could tell anything was decorated atall?)

But we had fun with the living room, dining room and kitchen mantles. Still to be done is the study- called "the redroom" even though it hasn't been red for years.

In the kitchen, a room where I spent a lot of time putzing around, I placed a wreath of peacock feathers, because it is pretty and makes me happy. A mixed balsam and pine garland smells wonderful!

 

And in the dining room, the mantle that gets the stockings, silver reindeer-pulled sleighs are surrounded by colorful balls and striped candy sticks. Youngest hasn't eaten them yet!

 

Fall has fallen away!

Fall has fallen away, and "The Holiday Season" has begun. This is such a fun, frantic time! Halloween has come and gone, a brief Trick-or-Treat for Youngest- he's 11 and that is still a magical experience. Of course, we have to drive to a place where there are homes that anticipate trick-or-treaters!

 4-H has kicked off for 2013, closing a wonderfully successful 2012 year for our large club.

 And Thanksgiving was again a major feast for 5. Huz created a huge spread, largely with the help of Youngest. My cooking boys! Eldest and I worked most of the day on her college applications and then after the late afternoon meal, Middlest and I went for a ride. Just in our front field, as Thanksgiving in rural Ohio- for many- means shooting stuff that moves.

 My great grandmother would be pleased to know another generation is using her gold rimmed glasses for Thanksgiving fruit cocktail. I remember my grandmother sitting at the counter sectioning grapefruit and oranges in preparation for the big meal (we also had fruti cocktail on Christmas). Now, Youngest- 5 generations later, is making the fruit cocktail and enjoying it before the turkey and trimmings.

 Thanksgiving weekend, we picked out a tree. My Middlest Sister started the tradition when her kids were itty-bitty, to raise their hands to show how big the tree is (and in effect watching the kids grow). My Eldest's hands are getting pretty close to the top of the 8 foot tree!

Our perfect tree being neatly cut off by Huz, assistance by Middlest.

We hunted in the blue spruce section for tree #2. This one is a Germanic looking tree with layers of branches- perfect for lighting candles! Youngest conquered this one.

Then, the spruce went onto a cart- too prickly to pick up! And the soft, 8 foot Canaan Fir was hoisted and walked back, a long way, by Middlest. In Kendra-speak, she "beasted" the tree. Funnily enough, after the trees were put on the shaker by the teen-boy workers, one offered to carry the fir back to the truck while Huz hauled the spruce. The same tree Middlest carried about 5 times further, without putting it down once, had the worker,sweating, grunting and resting about every 20 feet. Poor kid.

So, on to Christmas, with it's trees, parties, decorations and music. Presents to make, wrap and send, cookies and treats to make and eat! I'l start posting pictures so you can all share in Christmas at Cowfeathers!