My life has always been full of traditions. Some of the traditions have been passed down for generations, and some, our family has created.  When my kids were very little, my husband started a tradition that really helped us to form very close bonds and really helped define who we were as a family.

Every Saturday without fail, John would get up early and cook a big breakfast for the family. Everyone knew that that was just the start of a day full of fun times. It never did matter what we did, as long as we were together. Saturdays became known as” Families Day”.  It was almost on the level of a holiday in our home. They would start the countdown on Thursday, 2 days ‘til Families Day, 1 Day ‘til Families Day. Why was “Families Day” such a big deal in our home? One reason……Dad was home.  John was such fun Dad (I’m the serious one). The giggling would begin early and continue throughout the day. I loved to watch him with the kids. He loved them so much and they adored him. I know exactly how they felt. One smile from him would set everything right again. Even In hard times we continued this tradition. It was sometimes all we had to look forward to.

Recently I started to think about “Families Day” again. We have not done “Families Day” in a year. See, I lost my husband to brain cancer a year ago June 1^st. He was the center of our world. So, Families Day lost its reason for being, or so I thought. He was the inspiration behind it and the one who always got the fun started, but we are still a family, right. So, after temporarily losing our identity, I have decided to once again start “Families Day”. Yes, it will look different than it did before, we have had to redefine who we are as family, but, we will be together, laughing, having fun and remembering the one who inspired it.

In Loving Memory of John D’Atri    1966-2007

Mothers Day Blog.

Instead of sharing something about my own experiences as a mom, I wanted to do a story about my own Mom this Mother’s Day.  Won’t Mom be surprised? ;  )

When we were very young, my sisters and I, used to be very creative. We did not have a lot of things. We had each other and we had our imaginations. For special days like my parent’s anniversary and Mother’s Day we always got together and tried to plan something special.  We were very young, between the ages of 8 and 12 I would say, maybe even younger, so we did not have much to work with and very little funds. One of our favorite things to do was to make a pinata. I have no idea which one of us came up with the idea; I don’t even remember ever seeing a real pinata back then. We always pooled together whatever money we had, which was never much, and we would go to the penny candy store and by a bunch of candy. We always made the pinata out of a lunch bag that had been decorated. We would decorate it with crayons, stickers, or ribbon, whatever we could find. It was not very elaborate believe me. We would hide it, talk about it in hushed tones and eagerly anticipate the special day. When we gave it to our Mom we were so proud. To us it was a masterpiece.  My Mom and Dad would act like it was the work of art we thought it was. I never, ever felt like what we had done was anything but perfect. She never belittled our efforts. No matter how lame they were really, I mean for goodness sake, it was a paper lunch bag.

     When I was an adult my mom gave me my baby book. It had become more than that really. It was full of cards and stories and poems and pictures that I had given her.  I can’t tell you how special it made me feel, that my efforts were important enough to her, that she kept those things for so many years. They were all stuck into a book that started out as a baby book and ended up being the story of my first 18 years. The pictures were torn at the edges and the writing is pretty faded but the memories of giving my Mom those gifts, all those years ago, are now crystal clear in my mind. Thanks Mom!  I Love You!
 

 When I sat down to write about Earth Day and our Earth’s status, I felt it might just be too big of a topic for me. I mean with the politics and the harsh rhetoric that go along with it, I was thinking maybe I better stick with something “nice”  that will put us all in our happy place. That would be so much easier wouldn’t it?  Well, after thinking about it a little longer, I decided that maybe it’s not as hard as I thought. Sometimes we look at a problem as large as the health of our planet and we subconsciously decide that because one little person cannot solve all the problems; we may as well not even try. But we can all affect the things within our sphere of influence, which will collectively impact the world. I think the best way to go about doing this is with common sense, not scare tactics. An unhealthy environment causes unhealthy people.  We all want to be healthy and we certainly want our children to be healthy as well. We can all make little choices every day that will make a big difference over time. They say that the hand that rocks the cradle, changes the world. If we teach our children while they are young to reduce, reuse, recycle, and rethink and not just to do it, but why we want to, even need to.  The next generation will instinctively be conservationists; to them it will be a no-brainer. That’s what we need: we need caring for our planet to become a no-brainer. I mean what is the alternative?

I would like to introduce you to someone very special to me. This person has had the most influence on my life of all family and friends combined. My Grammie Evelyn.

She is advanced in age now, but when I was growing up she was a formidable woman. She filled a room, when she talked, you listened and I wanted to be just like her. 

My Grammie was a homemaker extraordinaire, her house was always spotless, she was a marvelous cook and she always had something baking in the oven. When something was cooking that smelled delicious, she called it “Happy Home Smells”. Grammie kept a garden in her backyard, she worked a part time job to help make ends meet and she was always in church on Sunday.  She was sweet and strong and she had a faith that intrigued me.

Grammie was a no nonsense woman. She told me a story once that I never forgot. She said that she had asked my grandfather, to wash the windows one spring. She asked several times to no avail. One day, she set a bucket of rocks on the stoop, so that grandpa had to step over it, to get into the house. When he came home from work, of course he asked what the rocks were for; she said 2 words, “the windows”. He had all the windows clean before dinner was ready.  That was Grammie for you.

     I will never forget her teaching me to wash dishes. The water was so hot it brought tears to my eyes. Grammie said that if the water didn’t burn your hands, the dishes weren’t clean. She also said that if the dishwater is dirty when you are done, so are the dishes (Meaning rinse them thoroughly before you put them in the dish water.) Grammie may sound like a very serious woman, and she was, she was also the sweetest, most loving and nurturing woman I have ever known. Her hugs made the world a sweet place indeed.  When you had Grammies hugs and one of her delicious meals (including dessert of course), in your stomach, all was well with the world.

After we moved from Illinois to Arizona, my Grammie would visit us on occasion. This always meant Duncan Donuts and Carmel Pull-aparts.  Carmel pull-aparts fresh from the oven are still one of my favorite treats. I often make them for Holiday breakfasts or anytime I want to share that same feeling I got from Grammie , with my children, love.

Carmel Pull-aparts

½ cup butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 large package vanilla pudding mix (not instant)

½ teaspoon cinnamon

2 tablespoons milk

2 loaves frozen bread dough (like Bridgeford)(thawed)

Directions:  Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Pull 1 loaf of bread apart into small pieces.  Toss scatter-like, into a glass 9×13 casserole dish. Heat remaining ingredients in a small saucepan until bubbly and sugar has dissolved. Pour the sugar mixture evenly over the dough in casserole dish. Tear up the second loaf. Put pieces into empty spaces in casserole dish. Set aside and let rise until doubled. Bake for 20-25 minutes in a 400 degree oven. (cover  the top with foil near the end of cooking if the tops get too brown.) Cool for 5 minutes(don’t wait too long, it will stick) and turnout onto tray covered with foil. Eat while warm.

When we have our first few “warmish” days in spring, I start my spring cleaning rituals. I love this time of year, it is a time for cleaning, purging and renewing inside and out. I set aside time to do the regular cleaning, windows, walls and baseboards etc. I also like to go through my pantry and throw away the things that are past the expiration date, and empty and clean the canisters and replace with fresh bulk items, new flour and sugar etc. (Of course this is not necessary if the items are used regularly.)

One thing I like to include in my spring cleaning is going through my spice cabinet. I replace my old spices with new ones, to make sure the spices I add to meals, are fresh, so my meals will taste exactly as I want them to. The *‘How to Use Spices Cookbook,’ Put out by the American Spice Trade Organization in 1958, says to “discard all those whose aromas do not rise up to greet you,” when opening the lid.

We don’t often think about what some of our ancestors had to go through to obtain herbs and spices. Voyages lasting 2 years or more were not unusual. They would go to great lengths, to obtain the highly valued spices, once used as currency. For us they are necessary staples in our pantries and thankfully, we can replenish them as needed.

I am thinking of adding a new item to my spring rituals, planting a garden. Now that I have room, I’m looking forward to planting a little victory garden of my own, including an herb garden, of course. It’s something I have always wanted to do.

I have the privilege of belonging to a family that is passionate not only about food, but each other. After all, the reason for the food is not only to nourish the body but also to feed the soul. It gives us a great reason to get together and enjoy each other’s company, catch up on news, watch our children grow up together and learn what’s really important in life– Family.

It’s kind of hard for me to write about myself because I love being the behind the scenes kind of person. The go-to-person, the researcher, the archiver and the historian. I love to learn the who and why of something. I’m one of those people who can’t do something just to do it. I need to know why we do it, who did it first, and what was the motivation behind it.  Who are the people who have gone before us, and passed down to us the recipes and the traditions that we hold dear?

Looking at old cookbooks is a passion of mine and I look forward to sharing with you tidbits of information I find as I delve into the past and bring back to focus some of the things that our ancestors knew about food. One thing that I have learned from them is that food is not about the ingredients only; it’s about the people we prepare it for.