Hello Young Mothers Whereever You Are.....

If you are a young mother RUN, don’t walk, to the nearest Walmart or any other store where you can buy a loose leaf notebook, diary, journal or whatever you want to call it and begin today to write in it every day for the rest of your life. Now that may seem like a formidable task or a waste of time to you right now but believe me, in years to come you will want to hug my neck for encouraging you to do so. Entries can be made in less than fifteen minutes or you can write as long as the urge remains. Your day-to-day experiences that may seem humdrum to you now will take on added significance in your senior years. You will read the comments you made and they will bring tears to your eyes or fill your heart with laughter as they bring back the precious memories of those times. Think of the things that you see your young child do as he or she is learning the lessons of life. Their first smile, sickness, laughter or cry is something that you should never forget. First steps, words or hugs - who doesn’t remember those little arms grabbing you around the neck or the leg. You are their world at the time. Enjoy it but also put it on paper for safekeeping. If you have a computer, and in this day and age who doesn’t, you are ahead of the game already. Take time away from FaceBook and email to write about your family. Photographs are wonderful but they can’t tell you what your child said at the time or what they did one moment after the camera clicks. It’s up to you. And don’t forget to include your spouse. There are so many moments that you share that should be written in stone. Remember the way he looked at you when you presented him with your first child or told him that you bent the fender of the new car he was so proud of. It doesn’t matter, its all life and should be remembered. Time passes so fast while we are trying to keep up with all the day to day living and pretty soon it has slipped away. Children have graduated, married and gone on to live lives of their own and that’s how it should be. We have nurtured, protected, advised, nagged and tried to prepare them for life. Now it is out of our hands but what parent doesn’t sit and wonder if they did all they should have, could have or would have if they had thought of it at the time. Life gives you one chance and you have to try to get it right the first time around. Few of us have no regrets. I know I have plenty and when they arise I sit back and try to remember the things that my husband and I did right. We all make mistakes but we all try not to repeat them. “I’m sorry” erases so many of those mistakes and “I love you” takes care of many more. 

Think back to when you were a child of two or three. What do you remember of those formative years? Do you wonder what kind of child you were? Who do you go to for that information? That’s right, your Mother. Be prepared like a good little Scout. In the far distant future when your child approaches you about the subject, grab your trusty notebook which should still be right at your fingertips where you are making daily entries about your grandchildren, and say, “I thought you would never ask!”

Little Bird Killers!!

I love biscuits. Unfortunately I have never mastered the art of cooking them. My daughter Cathy has and cooks little biscuits that really do melt in your mouth. They’re about the size of a silver dollar and stand approximately one to one-and-one-half inches high. They’re always delicately browned on the top and light as a feather. I know that’s a much used phrase but if the shoe fits I don’t care. I saw a recipe once named “Angel Biscuits” and thought, “that must be the one she uses”. I could visualize little angels sitting there on top of her sugar canister waiting for the pan to come out of the oven, breaking them in half, and plopping them in their tiny little mouths. Mine are quite different. They have a top and a bottom but no innards. Willis, my husband, once referred to them lovingly as “Bird Killers.” He had a point there. He loved birds and had bird feeders placed around our yard to feed them in the winter so they wouldn’t starve. When he crumbled my left over biscuits and spread them around the feeder the birds avoided them like the plague.

When I asked Cathy if she used the Angel Biscuit recipe she said, “No, Mother, you use yeast when you make Angel Biscuits. I’ll send you a copy of my recipe”. She did and I decided to try it the very next day. When I took them from the oven I thought maybe she might have given me the wrong recipe. I should have known better. I called and asked which brand of flour, milk, and shortening she used. There are only three ingredients. Surely I could master that. I dumped my bag of Red Band and bought White Lily Self Rising flour.  Since I always use Crisco I was safe there, and she said the brand of buttermilk didn’t matter so I stuck with Morning Fresh, my favorite. I was ready now. It must have been the flour that I used previously that caused the failure.

The following day I tried again. I mixed, rolled, cut, and put them in the oven to bake. I was proud of the way they looked. Pretty little suckers that I was sure would be a winner. While in the oven, there was a metamorphic transformation into something I readily recognized. Bird Killers!

Over the years I’ve grown accustomed to my biscuits but still strive to improve their quality. I like to think that I'm a reasonably intelligent person who can follow directions to the letter. I still follow Cathy’s recipe, still use the same brands and measure as carefully as one can. Once in a while the results are pretty good, not great mind you, but pretty good. We can at least eat them. They work well for Bread Pudding, Toppings for Chicken Pot Pie, or Plain Old Cheese Biscuits or Toast that I reheat in our little Black & Decker toaster oven. The birds still won’t eat them, but we do.