“Winter invites white; white invites silence; silence invites peace. You see, there is so much peace in walking on the snow!”
The rain started last night and continued into this morning. The day is dark, the sky a pale grey. It’s a stay at home day. I’m thinking I’ll do my Christmas cards and maybe bring up a few decorations from the cellar. Last night I was able to get all the outside lights to work with the timers. One comes on just a few minutes later than the other, but I can live with that. My street looks beautiful as so many houses are decorated with lights. One house has a lighted train car on its lawn which looks as if it’s moving as the lights flash around the wheel.
When I was a kid, I didn’t care about the weather except for snow. I remember getting excited watching the first few flakes. They were usually small and took their time falling to the ground. Every kid wanted those small flakes to get bigger and multiply to cover the ground with inches of snow. It wasn’t just for a snow day but for the fun the snow would bring. We could make caves, have snowball fights and go sledding down our street, a giant hill. The TV didn’t list closed school announcements in those days. The fire department blew their no school signal around seven, and it could be heard all over town. I swear the shouts of joy right after could also be heard all over town. If the snow was still heavily falling, we waited inside until my mother would let us out. I remember when the snow finally stopped and the sun came out. The world was at its most beautiful. The snow was untouched, no footprints, no car tracks. The sun glistened off the snow and lights twinkled and shined from the tops of drifts as if diamonds had been strewn about.
It didn’t take long before the snow had footprints and the marks of sled rails. The first few sled marks were rusty but the snow quickly cleaned them. We all had wooden sleds with metal steering in the front you could turn left and right. You took off running and jumped stomach down on the sled, legs from the knees down in the air and you hoped for the ride of your life.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: Christmas lights, lighted train car, no school announcements, rain, Sledding, Snow, snow day, snow fun, snowball fights, the sun, twinkling drifts
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December 6, 2014 at 12:42 pm
Carrot Ginger Soup Recipe
• Prep time: 15 minutes
• Cook time: 25 minutes
• Yield: Serves 4-5.
I think this soup works best when it is puréed until perfectly smooth. This is best achieved using an upright blender. If you use an immersion blender, just keep working at it until the soup is as smooth as you can make it.
We use chicken stock in this recipe, but you can easily use vegetable stock for a vegetarian option.
Ingredients
• 3 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 1 1/2 pounds carrots (6-7 large carrots), peeled and sliced thin
• 2 cups chopped white or yellow onion
• Salt
• 1 teaspoon minced ginger
• 2 cups chicken stock or vegetable stock
• 2 cups water
• 3 large strips of zest from an orange
• Chopped chives, parsley, dill or fennel for garnish
Method
1 Melt the butter in a soup pot over medium heat and cook the onions and carrot, stirring occasionally, until the onions soften, about 5 to 8 minutes. Do not let the onions or carrots brown. Sprinkle a teaspoon of salt over the carrots and onions as they cook.
2 Add the stock and water and the ginger the strips of orange zest. Bring to a simmer, cover, and cook until the carrots soften, about 20 minutes.
3 Remove the strips of orange zest and discard. Working in small batches, pour the soup into a blender and purée until completely smooth. Only fill the blender bowl a third full with the hot liquid and keep one hand pressing down on the cap of the blender to keep it from popping off. Add more salt to taste. (You will need more salt if you are using homemade unsalted stock or unsalted butter.)
Garnish with chopped chives, parsley, or fennel fronds
December 6, 2014 at 1:14 pm
Morpfy,
I also saved this. I love anything with ginger, and this sounds delicious. The orange zest must add the perfect hint of flavor.
The fennel fronds sound interesting.
December 6, 2014 at 12:43 pm
Bourbon Mashed Sweet Potatoes
• Prep time: 10 minutes
• Cook time: 30 minutes
• Yield: Serves 6-8 as a side dish.
Ingredients
• 3 pounds garnet sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 inch chunks
• Salt
• 3 to 4 Tbsp of bourbon whisky
• 4 Tbsp butter (more or less to taste)
• 4 Tbsp brown sugar (more or less to taste)
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Method
1 Place the sweet potato chunks in a large (5 quart) pot, cover with water. Add a tablespoon of salt to the water. Bring to a boil. Cook until tender, about 15 to 20 minutes.
2 Drain the cooked sweet potatoes and return them to the pot on the stove. Lower the heat to low. Add the bourbon and the butter to the pot and stir. Add the brown sugar and vanilla extract and stir. Mash with a potato masher until smooth. Add more salt, bourbon, butter, and brown sugar to taste.
December 6, 2014 at 1:08 pm
Thanks, Morpfy
This one is added to my files. I love sweet potatoes and haven’t any other recipe with bourbon.
December 6, 2014 at 1:12 pm
Even though we had a cold front come through last night the sun is out and it’s in the 60s. We didn’t get any rain so the drought continues.
Every December we would drive the kids around the neighborhoods to admire people’s Christmas light displays. Some folks and even entire neighborhoods go all out decorating and some even charge admission fees to drive through after dark. I think If you can see a person’s Christmas lights from orbit on the international space station, then they are probably too gaudy and ostentatious 🙂
I still don’t get the significance of decorated evergreen trees since Jesus was born in Israel which doesn’t have too many trees of any kind. Maybe we should be decorating palm trees instead. Of course today most of the Christmas celebration doesn’t have anything to do with his birth. Until the Romans messed around with the Christian Bible Jesus was probably born around the Passover in April but integrating the pagan winter solstice holidays with Christmas probably seemed more fun.
Snow in Dallas is so rare that my kids couldn’t wait to go outside and play when they were little. Today I think they would rather stay inside and play on their iPads. A couple of years ago we even had a White Christmas which is an extremely rare event. Usually we get frozen precipitation in the form of ice or sleet storms in January or February.
December 6, 2014 at 1:32 pm
Bob,
It is raining again after it had stopped for a while. This has been a wet fall.
I don’t care if they are gaudy. I appreciate the time and effort to put up the lights. They brighten otherwise dark, winter nights. For a while the night is a blaze of color.
The tree is a tradition which has never been connected with the birth of Jesus except for it being called a Christmas tree. It dates to the 1500’s in Riga then it spread to Germany where they were decorated for Christmas markets. Prince Albert, being German, brought the tradition to England. Pennsylvanian German settlements had community trees as early as 1747. Then it spread from there.
My Ghanaian students could not even visualize snow and how cold it got. They wore layers when it got down to the 70’s during the harmattan which was actually close to Christmas. I remember my first Christmas there when my friends and I were sitting outside under the most starlit sky I had ever seen. We mentioned that the first Christmas was much like the one were celebrating in the heat of the dry season.
December 6, 2014 at 1:24 pm
We’ve had much the same weather here but the sky was dark grey and it felt like late evening all day. So far there’s one spruce with lights on in the village and I think there are three bushes covered with light nets 🙂 The weather was so bad that I didn’t want to go outside to see if my lights would shine, well I have tomorrow too to fix it.
I really didn’t like snow, mostly it was wet and melted away directly. If it stayed it was so cold that it was impossible to stay outdoors for any longer period of time anyway. But those days we at least came in whithout being soaking wet 🙂
Have a great day!
Christer.
December 6, 2014 at 1:45 pm
Hi Christer,
I’m staying right here, warm and cozy. I’m not even going to get dressed. I chose to be comfortable.
Snow can stay for days here. The more snow we get the longer it stays especially the piles on the corners where the plows put snow from the streets.
Kids still love to play in snow.
Have a great evening!
December 6, 2014 at 4:22 pm
yesterday we got a tree from Blue Seal Feeds. In the garage Peg held it straight while I turned the screws with a screwdriver (sound familiar?). She is decorating it now. I always put things on the wrong branch.
Rain, snow, freezing drizzle, all day. At least the power is still on. Our lighted yard deer were buried in snow on Thanksgiving eve, but they came out of it o.k.
This past week I did some work for a couple in Dublin, NH (not Ireland). She is 78 and he is 80 and has had Alzheimer’s for 2 years. Among other things I installed deadbolts so he couldn’t leave the house. One day when I got there he had his hat and coat on, and told me he was going to coach soccer at the stadium. There is no stadium nearby. He also told me he had a twin brother who was in the German army, but they didn’t get along so he killed him. I meet some velly interesting people.
December 6, 2014 at 5:05 pm
Bill,
Of course you put things on the wrong branch-I can hear Peg telling you that. Amazing that you have the same type tree stand. I had to chuckle.
It has been raining all day. The front lights came on but not the deck lights, and I’m not going to check them. It is too rainy.
Don’t turn your back on that guy. He may think you’re his brother returned.
I had a college roommate whose grandmother was senile as they called it in those days. The woman spoke only Polish. She would grab the newspaper, put it under her arm and leave the house totally naked and walk down the street. They locked the doors, but she’d find a way out.
December 6, 2014 at 5:57 pm
Hi Kat,
We had the No School fire whistle too. It was so exciting waking up to snow and waiting to hear the whistle. I don’t remember when they stopped doing that. We had to listen to radio instead. But that was exciting in its way. The list was alphabetical and my town starts with a W. It was excruciating waiting for the W’s.
Same weather up here. It was warmer this morning and I didn’t really mind taking the dogs for their first walk. By the second walk at 2pm the temperature had dropped 10 degrees and it was raining. That was a quick walk as will the next one be. If there is a next one. Might just put them out the door on the line. 🙂
Enjoy the evening.
December 6, 2014 at 6:02 pm
Hi Caryn,
I don’t remember the switch to radio. Maybe my town kept the fire whistle. Long time later, when TV was the no school announcer, my school started with a D so it wasn’t too long a wait.
It is raining still. Ugly night. No real Christmas tree until they dry. Let’s hope for a couple of warm days. Gracie has been out only once.
Have a great evening!