What are the requirements before a tradition becomes legally binding? I certainly didn’t start mumbling to myself, “I’ll be doing this for the next 45-50 years.” I swear one day I was young and dumb, eager to try something new and the next nanosecond, 5 decades have zipped by and I can’t reason why I’m doing the same thing over and over. Yet I’m a creature of habit and detest change in my life. Guess I should have seen this coming in many aspects of my life.

Mom gave me a cookbook when she got over the initial shock her youngest had eloped and nothing she could say/bribe/cajole was gonna change that fact of life. Determined, she kept trying, but only for the rest of her life. Anyway, the cookbook was a good idea because mom had failed to teach me how to cook. She was a good cook but never wanted me in the kitchen with her, even when I was little.

The cookbook was from a rival school of Rock Valley Community where I attended. Many kids from our small town hopped on a bus every morning and rode 9 miles to another small Dutch town called Hull to attend Western Christian School when they should/could have been our classmates. But mom had been using this cookbook for several years and thought maybe it was time for me to learn something. The cookbook was a hoot. The first chapter was dedicated to authentic Dutch recipes, some even listed ingredients in Dutch. (Well that was something I’d never attempt without an interpreter).

Ha! After a few years of mistakes and blunders I would see the advantage of trying some new things, and many recipes were found in this book. Next to Betty Crocker, Family Favorites has always been my most used cookbook. And I did try (and succeed) with a couple recipes in the Dutch chapter too. Ollie Bollen, St. Nickolaas Koekjes, Balken Brei (not to my liking but the Hubs loves it) and my favorite, Saucijzbroodjes (pigs in the blanket).

I still like trying new recipes. After 50 years of cooking I get tired of making the same suppers sometimes. Not all new meals I attempt prove worthy of a recipe card (which definitely means I’m making it again-maybe with a bit of Neese-tweaking), but several in recent years have found a home in my meal rotation.

When perusing a cookbook or recipes in the newspaper there are a couple of ‘tells’ when my eyes glaze over and I’m thinking, oh, hell no. Number one on my instant, ‘umm, this looks good and doable,’ or ‘are they out of their ever loving minds,’ is a very long list of ingredients, many of which are not in my house right now. I’m a cook. I make supper 6 or 7 nights a week. I have a lot of meat, red, white, the other white, seafood, fresh, frozen and ready to go. Plus all kinds of canned goods, tomatoes, diced or sauce, cream soups, red and white potatoes, wild rice and not-so-crazy-white, every shaped noodle there is, barley and spices up the wazoo. So if I see 6 things I need to buy before I make this dish, it’s probably not gonna happen.

Another Neese drawback are recipes with enough steps to make it to the promised land. While I enjoy walking and try to get in 9,000 steps a day, if a recipe has more than 3 or 4 ‘steps’ my mind is wandering back to ok, I just realize how hungry I am for meatloaf tonight.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate the labor intensive work that comes with certain entrees/desserts. While I love how appealing a lattice topped pie looks, there’s no way I’m gonna fart around trying to weave pastry strips when I’m making a dozen apple pies. I’m just not. Those braided loaves of frosted, fruit filled delicacies look amazing but not on my list of ‘must learn to do this.’ One of my favorite cookies are frosted cutouts for most holidays. It’s important to me that they taste good and look appealing. Appealing to me is a half inch layer of tinted buttercream frosting. I’m not spending an afternoon adding ‘decorations’ to my tree shaped cookies. Too much kanooey. Guess I’m really not into a lot of kanooey.

Webster’s definition. Kanooey: kah-new-eeeeeee. Fart around on a project (food or craft) endlessly/needlessly to make end product more visually appealing. Usually a complete waste of time. Don’t you have better things to do? Try studying me for a change and up your vocabulary a word or 2 for your readers. And stop saying very. Really. Just stop. (Does this explanation appear rather snotty and directed only at me)? And you say actually way too often. Stop that.

Except for Pecan Tassies. There’s no way I would have ever attempted to make these little buggars. They are so much work just the thought makes me wanna scream, yet I’ve been making them for 45 years. Why? Why? (Well, because they are the best, richest most delicious little morsel of a dessert ever, so there’s that). Blame Mag, my mother-in-law.

Ever since I was 15 and started spending Christmas Eve at my future in-law’s house, Tassies were part of the package. A big part. Mag went all out for Christmas. I think she liked to kanooey while baking. She made frozen fruit slush, chocolate covered cherries, divinity, fudge, peanut brittle and several varieties of cookies and bars every year. She was a terrific baker.

A Pecan Tassie tastes a lot like a miniature piece of pecan pie (2 or 3 bites). Only better. Best served with a fresh cup of coffee. I wanna say it’s the pastry part because it’s quite different from traditional pie crust dough. Tassie dough is made with cream cheese, flour and butter or margarine. That’s it. It’s very yellow, flaky and browns nicely. And while pecan pie filling consists of eggs, corn syrup, butter, salt, vanilla and white sugar, Tassie filling is made without syrup and calls for light brown sugar instead of white.

You with me so far? Well here’s the zinger. There’s a lot of kanooey work involved in making these tiny tidbits. I’m sure you’ve seen the specialty pans in kitchen stores. Looks like a cupcake pan except the cupcake openings are half the size. Each is about the size of a large unshelled walnut. Oh for Pete’s sake, how did I ever get snookered into making them the first time? Yup, I was young and dumb.

Well Mag took me on as a cooking student once her youngest and I eloped. She already knew we both liked to eat so someone had to step up and start learning to make meals. I was eager to please and she was patient, and I desperately wanted to learn how to make Tassies. The recipe is actually in my Family Favorites Cookbook but the very first time I read it, I feinted from the number of steps. (Good ole Webster is taking a tough love approach with me on this one).

So Mag gave me an in-person, visual lesson in the art of Tassie making. She made it look easy. The following is how much kanooey work this really entails.

1. Using chilled dough, pinch off small amount, roll around in the palm of your hand and toss in bottom of Tassie pan. Do this 2,000 times.

2. Trim fingernails. Using index finger of dominate hand, gently press dough all the way up the sides so goopy filling does not spill over, making it impossible to remove. Repeat 2,000 times.

3. Add 3 or 4 pieces of pecans to each bottom. 2,000 times.

4. Make filling. Beat eggs, add cool, melted margarine, brown sugar, dash salt, vanilla, and enough expensive chopped pecans to equal one house payment.

5. Spend 20 minutes trying to find the appropriate tool (no, not him). Add filling without spilling (hey I rhymed) a drop. There is no spoon, baster or scoop that works. This item does not exist. You’re gonna spill and make a terrible mess. Face it Sista. Own it.

6. Add filling. Carefully, between 1/2 and 2/3 full. Otherwise you will be scrubbing these pans till hell freezes over. (Not anymore, I bought non stick pans a few years ago. The Lord saw my struggle).

7. Bake 17 minutes @ 350.

8. Turn oven down to 250 and bake 20 minutes longer.

9. Remove from pans. 2,000 times. Burn every finger. On both hands. Coarse language allowed.

10. Let pans soak until next November when needed.

11. Hide Tassies.

12. Hire 24/7 guards just through the holidays.

13. Make fresh pot of coffee.

14. Raid Tassie stash.

See nothing to it. And here you thought I was adverse to kanooey work…

We were cruising into our third year of marriage and about to move for the fourth time. Ugh. Luckily for us (or unfortunately), we had squat to move from place to place. If you wanna get technical it actually was move number 5. The first move was about 2 weeks after we eloped. Hubs was staying in my small apartment. It wasn’t a conducive environment for a healthy/romantic way to start wedded bliss. Only females rented in this big old house AND EVERYONE SHARED A BATHROOM. I stood guard by the door when John was in there or getting ready for work. I found the situation hilarious-he did not.

So we rented a small house on Douglas Street in Sioux City. Cute house on a steep hill. It was late fall and we soon discovered just how cold a house could get when it was slapped on a slab of cement. Not only frigid inside but the heating bill was 3 times what the rent cost us every month.

Next up was a new duplex in Leeds (a burb of Sioux City). Nice place with great neighbors, Lee and Carolyn, who were in the same boat as we were (well, their boat had a small horsepower motor, which sputtered from time to time. Our boat had one oar. Which was broke. Needless to say, we didn’t get the paddle end). Newlyweds, both of us pregnant and our spouses worked nights, giving us hours to nurture a timeless friendship. Carolyn would have a baby girl in June and our baby girl was due in December (we didn’t know about the ‘girl’ part until the obstetrician proclaimed the news). But since I was no longer working, we couldn’t afford the outrageous rent, thus another move to cheaper digs just a few miles north.

An itty-bitty three room house in Hinton (a tiny town) where we would bring Shannon Marie home. The house was on highway 75, approximately 200 hundred feet from the railroad tracks. The house twitched/lurched/heaved and Shannon’s 5 dollar crib inched it’s way across the room each time a train rumbled by. A built in soother. Shannon’s domain shared equal billing with the dining/living room. Not ideal, but doable with a newborn.

A few months later, our landlord stopped by to offer us a bigger house for the same rent a couple blocks away. FIVE ROOMS. What would we do with all that space? However, there were a couple of glitches. The house was another slab home which had a fuel oil heater in the dining room, (taking up valuable space, connected to a chimney in the corner) as our only source of heat. Which was insatiable. And discriminatory. Our dining room was a toasty 92, the bathroom and our bedroom (far away from the heater) struggled to stay above 55. But we were crowded and Shannon was mobile, so we moved. Again. I could no longer count on the train to lull Shannon into dreamland. Shoot, we were 2 blocks from the tracks now and nothing in this house moved when a train zipped through town.

Shannon was a precocious toddler who now had her first bestie. Another toddler who happened to have fur and four legs. A Maltese named Tina. They were inseparable. It honestly couldn’t have been more work if I’d had twins. What one couldn’t think up/plan/devise, the other one could trump that-times 10.

Neither Shannon nor Tina had behavior issues-by themselves-but in cahoots together, they were a force to be reckoned with. Although the puny gang consisted of only 2, they were formidable. Much as I hate to admit, Shannon was the instigator about 95% of the time. Tina was the follower who would go to great lengths to complete their mission at hand (paw) any day.

One day Shannon (the CEO) got my purse down from the top of the dresser (the bedroom furniture was so close together, it wasn’t much of a stretch) and found an open pack of Juicy Fruit gum. With the stealth of a ninja warrior she quietly unwrapped a stick for herself and happily chomped for a couple minutes. But instead of offering Tina (the VP) her own stick, the best friends forever took turns chewing the same piece. All was well until Shannon thought it was her turn but Tina wasn’t ready to comply. (Tina knew the flavor in Juicy Fruit lasts 5 minutes-top-and didn’t want to give it up until every fleck of juiciness had been absorbed-by her). There was a bit of a power struggle, (a coup perhaps) when Tina lost some of her chomping power. Shannon might have been trying to physically remove the gum with her chubby toddler fingers. Neither would get the chance for the last 30 seconds of flavor as the wad of gum had come to a complete stop in the fur on the right side of Tina’s mouth. Almost made her head tilt from the weight combined with their slobber.

Shannon swore she had nothing to do with this fiasco. Tina had somehow managed to get the gum out of my purse, removed the wrapper and never once offered to share it with top management. Shannon completely threw Tina under the bus. At this point, Tina really didn’t give a shit whose fault it was. This wad was driving her beyond the brink. Her little mouth and tongue were feverishly trying to work the gum out of her fur-to no avail. She looked like Flo, the ‘kiss my grits,’ gum cracking, smart ass waitress on Alice.

By the time the lowly guard of the castle (me) discovered the 2 trouble prone toddlers, Tina was exhausted from chewing and getting nowhere and Shannon was no closer to admitting one iota of fault. The gum was as hard as a rock and the only solution I could think of was just cutting the hunk out with attached fur. Not her most attractive look the next 3 months, but the two made up and all was right with the world.

The next pickle the ‘girls’ would find themselves in could have turned out much more serious. Shannon was sick. She was running a temp, runny nose, ear ache, upper respiratory gunk. We brought her into our pediatrician, Dr. Stauch who checked her over and ordered an antibiotic for ten days. Several days later Shannon was feeling much better. After her nap, a diaper change and a snack Shannon was raring to go and so was Tina. I was enthralled with the lives of Lahoma and Sam Lucas on the new soap opera, Somerset when my scalp started to tingle. Except for our large screen TV (13 inch RCA) the house was eerily silent. What was going on? I could literally see Shannon, sitting on the floor in the kitchen near Tina’s water and food bowls. She didn’t turn her head or respond when I called her name. Something much more interesting was happening and I hadn’t been informed or invited.

Shannon (although she claimed it was Tina’s idea from the get-go. Poor Tina, she couldn’t argue with Shannon, who had already zipped through 3 years of law school) had opened the fridge, retrieved her antibiotic, (which tasted like bubblegum) removed the non-safety cap and slugged down a healthy portion. Not wanting Tina to feel left out, (awww) she poured the remainder of the bottle (which we COULD NOT AFFORD) in Tina’s water dish, which she was noisily lapping up. Now Tina’s fur around her mouth (which had finally grown back to a pristine white) was sticky pink, dripping all over the floor. To her credit, she was doing her best to keep her mouth clean.

I completely freaked out! (No 911 service yet) Called Dr. Stauch’s office and by the sound of my panicked voice, the receptionist got me through immediately to Stauch. After sobbing my way through the story and missing amount of medicine, he calmly said, “Denise, it’s going to be ok. This was not a critical amount for either of them. How much does Tina weigh?” “About 7 pounds,” I stammered. “Well I suggest you get a box of Pampers (still pretty new and I used cloth diapers) for Shannon and be ready to put Tina out at a moment’s notice-frequently. They’re both gonna have diarrhea for a couple days, but that’s about the worst that’s going to happen. And Shannon probably doesn’t need a refill on the script. She might not get another bug all winter.” “Thanks Doc, appreciate your help.”

These two. Reminds me of a Travis Tritt song (ha, you didn’t think I listened to any country tunes did ya)?

Well hello T-R-O-U-B-L-E, tell me what in the world are you doin A-L-O-N-E?

Yeah, say hey good l-double O-K-I-N-G, well I smell T-R-O-U-B-L-E…

I wasn’t raised around antiques, at least not in the way of old furniture. Mom was extremely proud when she bought something new (of value) like her dining room set. Sprague & Carlton. Early American style, hard rock maple table, 4 chairs, nice buffet, then adding a grandmother’s clock a few years later. She and Dad worked hard for their money but it was up to Mom to pick out new furniture. Dad really didn’t care and left the household furnishings up to her tastes.

My grandpa Lakey passed away when I was 10 and Mom acquired a few older things at his auction. One item she bought was a hand gun which I thought was odd. The trigger was inoperable so it posed no threat. Mom plopped it in a paper mache bowl (his), on top of a plant stand (also his) in the spare bedroom. Most of the glassware from Lakey and Coba’s short 2 year marriage, Mom and her brother Floyd had already divided up. (Coba died 10 days after Mom and Floyd were born). I remember Grandpa had a beautiful antique oak telephone hanging on the wall in his living room. Lakey might have owned the first tiny house in Sioux Center, or maybe all of Iowa. The house had 3 rooms, small kitchen, living room and a combination bedroom/bathroom. No the bathroom was not partitioned off. I doubt it was more than 500 square feet which didn’t leave much room for a lot of extras. (Mom didn’t buy the phone, something I’ve regretted since I reached adulthood).

I wasn’t so much wooed into appreciating the beauty and craftsmanship of furniture built in the early 1900’s as we were simply too destitute to buy anything new after we got married. It all started with my first pregnancy. We didn’t have 2 nickels to rub together when setting up the nursery, so how were we gonna be ready for this birth? (We had no clue if we were having a boy or girl so all sleepers/nightgowns with a drawstring on the bottom. The baby always managed to stick out one skinny bare foot, rendering that limb 10 degrees cooler) were pastels, mostly mint green or pale yellow. You didn’t get gender appropriate clothes until after the baby was born. Who can live like that? A newborn’s nursery looking all helter-skelter without a real boy/girl theme. It was barbaric. Or possibly, the way nature intended.

When we started shopping Hubs and I were in for sticker shock. A small dresser at Sears, made primarily from particle board was priced about 40 bucks. No way we could afford that, plus a crib. We found a used crib, (with the side slats about a foot apart. How did our kids not die in infancy)? We painted it bright yellow and bought a new mattress. Hubs stopped at a garage sale on his way to work because he caught a fleeting glance of a dresser. It had been stripped, wasn’t very fancy, didn’t have a mirror but was oak. It had no drawer pulls and was priced 5 bucks. Now we’re in business folks! (Neatest part-the handles were in one of the drawers, hahaha). We were fast discovering a love for antique furniture that would last our entire marriage.

Two people were instrumental in nurturing my antique obsession during the early years. The first one was John’s sister, Elly. We moved to the same town they lived in 1977, after 8 years of marriage and 2 kids. Elly had been hooked on antiques for ages (she was 18 years older than her baby brother, the Hubs). She was knowledgeable about wood types, different furniture styles but her real field of expertise was glassware. Although our funds for antiques was still very limited, we went antiquing with Elly and Dewey often, learning what our preferences were along the way. Usually day trips within a 100 miles. We had more fun meandering through Iowa, South Dakota and Minnesota with them. Elly was usually on the hunt for glassware, some to keep, other pieces to resell. We were looking for the next affordable furniture project for the house for us to work on.

One weekend Elly and Dewey went to an auction, then stopped by our house on their way home. She handed me a shoe box filled with miscellaneous glassware, explaining she got the box for a buck and kept the piece she needed for her collection. Sneaky Elly, very sneaky. Carefully laying the groundwork to lure me in. The box contained a rectangular shaped, green glass, one pound butter dish. It was perfect, no chips (which wouldn’t last long with 2 kids under 8). Also in the box was a small green cup and saucer. Elly explained this pattern was depression glass called Cameo. An all over pattern of tiny ballerinas. Well shoot, I was hooked. The other noteworthy piece John found intriguing. A small black, hard as a brick tire (about the size of an Apple fritter (can you tell I’ve not eaten yet) with a yellow/gold depression glass insert, advertising a tire company. He scrubbed away 40 years of cigarette ash and his tire ashtray collection was born. Ha! Elly got us both with a one dollar box she had since discarded. She was a pro.

The other lady was a farmer’s wife named Bertha. She lived west of Canton, South Dakota which is about 30 miles from our hometown of Rock Valley, Iowa. Bertha ran a used furniture business (mostly antique) in her farmhouse, down her basement. Other larger, more primitive pieces were in an outside building. For a period of about 5 years, the majority of our antique pieces were acquired from Bertha. A duck planter, a lamp for the TV that looked like a train was moving on the railway when lit. She knew her furniture, was friendly, yet quite stubborn/set in her ways of pricing. Dicker and dealing on pieces was tricky. Hubs found this out the hard way.

I spotted an oak, curved glass china closet in Bertha’s basement in 1979 when I was pregnant with our youngest kid, Adam. Petite, claw footed (china closet, not Adam) with 3 beautiful shelves, it was exquisite. I HAD TO HAVE IT. SERIOUSLY. HAD TO HAVE IT. It did have one issue. One of the panes of curved glass was broke, leaving a chunk of glass missing from the bottom. I believe she was asking about $290. Hubs offered her $200. She actually sputtered for a minute. She was too ticked to answer. This was an outrageous insult. She priced pieces fairly and was not about to be bullied by a young punk. We left Bertha’s farm without the china closet so guess who was sputtering in the car. “How could you offer such a shitty low price? You blew this deal for me. I WANT THAT CHINA CLOSET.” I might have zhanicked and been aggawase (Dutch slang for being a pain in the ass) all the way back to Spencer.

I fumed/cooled off, waited a couple days before calling and groveling my way back into Bertha’s good graces. Offered her close to her asking price (might have fudged the numbers to Hubs on this one 41 years ago). She accepted. I mailed her some money and we picked up the china closet before Adam’s delivery date in mid September. Shannon was almost 10, Joshua was 4-1/2 so I wasn’t worried about one of them getting hurt on the broken glass, but we had to order a new glass panel ($69.00) when Adam started crawling in the summer of 1980.

Looking back, much of the furniture I bought from Bertha were like stepping stones. Pieces we could afford at the time, with John doing any and all repair work, then we refinished them. We had a great time, sometimes working for weeks on a piece together. But years later I’d spot a nicer, fancier piece, some already refinished or not needing a lick of work and wanted to upgrade my furniture. Oftentimes I didn’t get rid of the piece my tastes had outgrown but gave it to one of the kids. Walking into their house looked like mine 20 years before. And now some of their tastes have changed too.

In 1982 we moved 350 miles east to Davenport, so our favorite shopping days antiquing at Bertha’s farm came to an abrupt halt. But through the years I’ve often thought (with fondness) about wheeling and dealing with Bertha. She was a charming character who taught me a lot about my infatuation with antique oak furniture and how to finesse a deal. And learning the art of compromise…

Over the years I’ve heard a lot of static about the appropriateness of certain Christmas/birthday /anniversary gifts. Some women are not happy if they receive a gift that’s not personal from their significant other. They might find it down right insulting if the gift is deemed practical or for the home instead of a more personal, romantic nature, jewelry, sexy loungewear, perfume.

Some 50 years ago, I was in the early years of wedded bliss when I realized my constant lament, “I don’t know how to cook,” was wearing thin. On both of us. Changes were needed if this marriage was gonna work. Shannon was a baby but Gerber’s Blueberry Buckle was no longer sufficiently meeting her dietary needs (I loved that stuff). I could make a pretty good tuna casserole and tuna salad but I needed to expand this one trick pony show and start ‘feeding’ us good, nutritious meals.

During the first 5 years of marriage and motherhood I was the recipient of 3 questionable gifts from the Hubs. None of his picks were going to score him an afternoon of hot sex or even a quickie but the dude was starving to death, so one thing at a time. John’s first ‘big gift’ was purchased at Greenberg’s jewelry store in Sioux City, so there was certainly some anticipation the gift was personal/romantic in nature. One would assume he was trying to set the mood with a lovely necklace or charm for my bracelet. Oh so very close. My gift was in a large box and way too heavy for a stinking eighth ounce charm. It was a set of red Club Aluminum pots and pans. Set him back 40 bucks when he didn’t have 4 bucks to spend frivolously. I WAS THRILLED. Bright and shiny, filling up every burner on the cold, useless stove. (Yeah, I still had to learn to cook so I could use those pots and pans for what God intended).

But it was a step in the right direction. It wasn’t long before I was tackling homemade spaghetti sauce (thanks to Wilma Duits, a fantastic cook) goulash and potato salad (Mag, my mother-in-law) scalloped potatoes and ham (mom), wild rice and pork chops (from the wild rice package Hubs brought back from upper Minnesota one fall), and a couple home made soups. Our waistlines began expanding as fast my recipe box-haha.

Hubs second ‘gift’ was in the same category as the cookware. Shannon had mastered crawling and literally lived on the floor. Babies learn at a very young age how to use their thumb and index finger like a lobster claw. This tiny claw can separate your arm hairs individually, rendering you gasping in pain and tears running down your face. All the while contentedly slugging down an 8 ounce bottle, ending with a petite burp. This highly sophisticated claw can detect microscopic sized lint/dirt/food/leaves/thread/ on any floor surface, and their range of detection is phenomenal. After Shannon fell asleep and was safely tucked in her 5 dollar brightly painted yellow crib, I’d sweep the hard surface rooms, then get on my hands and knees on the carpet, trying to eliminate what she hoped was on the menu for tomorrow. The struggle was real-time consuming and worrisome.

Once a week I’d borrow our neighbor lady’s vacuum cleaner for a thorough cleaning. Ida’s Kirby vacuum weighed more than I did and cost more than our 1972 Chevy Vega. We splurged on an area rug for the living room of our rental house where Shannon played most of the time. The carpet was approximately 1/16 of an inch thick. Ida’s big ass vacuum cleaner tried to swallow it whole every Friday.

Hubs arrives on my birthday with another wrapped box, this one slender and tall. Thank you Jesus, it was a $49.00 Eureka vacuum cleaner. I don’t think I’ve ever been more tickled with a gift since that one on my 22nd. I was ecstatic with his thoughtfulness. This wasn’t just a appliance, this was a remedy to address safety concerns and made my life (and Shannon’s) easier and better, though I did have to start supplementing her mealtimes with added snacks throughout the day since she had lost one of her main food sources.

Hubs went in kahoots on a gift with our toddler daughter one Mother’s Day. Since I had somewhat mastered mealtime they felt it necessary to encourage me to learn how to make some sweet treats, so they bought me my first Betty Crocker cookbook. Fifty years later it’s still my go-to cook book. I learned how to make chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies and baked my first loaf of bread and a pan of cinnamon rolls with Betty. My first scratch cake with Bonnie butter frosting came from Betty Crocker. Betty made me feel successful with easy to follow recipes and ingredients I usually had on hand. Not everything I tried turned out perfect on my first attempt but my batting average was higher than most ball players. I discovered I enjoyed baking far more than planning/making meals.

Over the years I’ve become a decent cook and a better than average baker. Most nights I’d rather eat my cooking than anyone else’s or any restaurant fare. Baking is still fun although I’m doing it a lot less often. We shouldn’t be eating what I like to bake very often.

Every Tuesday our granddaughter Ariana and great-granddaughter Jovi come over for supper. We love having them. They are a welcome break during our monotonous week. Jovi is almost 4 and keeps us entertained from the moment she walks through the door. One week she’s grandpa’s girl and wants to watch TV with him or play hard rock music (loud) and dance. The next week she seems to gravitate towards me and wants read as many books as we can and try and help with our meal.

Tuesday was the day before my birthday so they came bearing gifts. Jovi’s pick was a unicorn snow globe which she observed was sorely lacking in my life, plus an adorable wooden Christmas ornament from one of Ari’s friends who’s starting her own small business. On the bottom of the gift bag sat a small, rectangular piece of wood, which actually choked me up. Looks like I’ve gotten my first Yelp review. Oh my goodness, those 2 girls sure know how to tug on your heart strings. It’s always through the tummy…