Gramps Remembers - cookie making time

 Yesterday, I delivered some Xmas cookie boxes for a friend. The driving around Burlington to deliver the Xmas cookie packages brought back memories of Xmas at our house when I was growing up.
 

From Thanksgiving to Christmas was a very special time in our home. My sister and I would hope for the 1st major snowstorm of the season that would sweep in from the west, with big white fluffy flakes as big as boxcars that would pile quickly, all so that we could hear – “No School for Peshtigo Schools” announced on the local radio station. 

It was also a time when the temperature would plummet to 30 below if not more, for more than a fortnight and the river ice just outside the kitchen window would crack and echo off the limestone outcropping a mile way, much like a rifle shot in the middle of the night. 

The 3 tall Basswood trees in the yard stood as sentinels in the light of the full moon as we glimpsed neighbors’ lights off in the distance thru frosted windowpanes.

One of the memories of the season as an early teen happened in our home every night after supper as the table was cleared and we started making, shaping, and baking Christmas cookies and making fudge. Baking each night for 12 nights we created different cookies and fudge; 12 dozen to be stored in the containers – each with an apple to keep them moist. Russian Teacups, Spritz, Almond Snow Cookies, Bourbon Balls, Brown Sugar Cookies, Oatmeal Cookies, Sour Crème Cookies, Chocolate Fudge with walnuts, and many more.

 
Each night as the cookies were baked; some would be deemed worthy of bakers only and used as special treats with a large glass of ice cold milk. By the end of the twelfth night, we had accumulated a mountain of cookies and then the boxing started. In each box would be loaded with a sampler of 6 cookies of each flavor with an apple wedge added and wrapped in the festive paper of the holiday. 

 

With the wrapping and labeling now completed - the next step was to plan the route by mom. We would awake bright early the Saturday just before Christmas Eve; eat heartily to add fuel to our inner furnace, bundle up to stay warm and head out to deliver cookies with my mother at the wheel. Extra blankets were placed in the car, and the boxes of cookies placed in the back seat as well as the trunk. 

Dad chose to stay home to keep the fires burning as we would not return until well after dark. As each package was delivered; old friendships were rekindled, stories told, coffee or tea offered shared along with conversation about how blessed we all were to have friends like each other.

Gramps Remembers, Being a helper

Being a helper

November 20th, 1964, the day before deer hunting season opener, my friend, Lee received a phone call while in wrestling practice that his sister would be picking us up soon because his father was in a car accident on Hwy 64, not far from the cedar swamps. A deer had darted across the road and Lee’s father had swerved to miss it but was hit head on by a west bound car.

We arrived at the scene of the accident and found out that dad had been taken to a chiropractor by his request for some adjustments. So, we headed there and picked up Lee’s father, took me home, and then they went home. Later that evening Lee’s father started coughing up blood so they took him to the hospital for an evaluation. The impact had moved his internal organs and he was bleeding internally.

He was there for a few weeks, when I received a call from Lee just before Christmas 1964, asking for a favor. He said that his dad was being transported to a Madison Hospital as his internal injuries were life threatening. So, could I and my father take care of the farm and milking the cows while they were gone.  I said yes. Lee said to meet me at the barn, and he would show me what to do. That night, we did chores together and he left for Madison the following morning.

Later that night, my dad said he could help me, and I replied that I could do this and thanks for the offer. Just give me a ride over in the morning at 5AM so I could get the feeding the cows and milking done by the time the school bus came to pick me up. Then pick me up in the evening when I was finished with the evening chores. Included in this was taking care of 2 cocker spaniels which included feeding and letting them out morning and night.

Dad would drop me off in my work clothes at 5AM and we would head to the barn. Feeding the cows was 1st in the list and that meant climbing up the silo to pitch silage down for loading up the feed bunks and added mash to it, then \then we moved onto setting up the milking machines. Prior to milking each cow, I would clean the udder and teats to attach the milker and bucket. While the cows were being milked, I would clean the gutters and aisle and empty the milking buckets into a large milk can. The system was run by a vacuum pump that sucked the milk out of the cow’s udder into the milk bucket.

As each cow was milked, the milk can would fill up and when filled it was moved to the milk house and a new milk can brought into the barn. After the all the cows milked, cows fed, and barn cleaned I headed up the house to feed and let the dogs out. While the dogs were out, I cleaned up and changed into my school clothes. Then I let the dogs back in and ran to catch the bus to school and dad would go home.

That evening, I was dropped off by the bus and the cycle continued for the next 4 weeks. I was becoming quite familiar with doing the milking chores on the farm.

Then Lee called me and told me they would be home the following day. Lee’s dad passed away Friday, January 13, 1965 in Madison Wisconsin. I did the last round of chores the next morning and Lee resumed doing them Saturday evening.

Lee stopped going to wrestling practice and other sports as he was busy keeping the farm together.

Later that spring, Lee stopped by on a Saturday and dropped off a package of beef, a cocker spaniel puppy,and his varsity letter jacket as a thank you gift. The pup took to dad immediately as they became inseparable.

Lee graduated from high school, sold the cattle, enlisted in the Navy Seabees as a heavy equipment operator.  He did two tours of duty in Vietnam before returning home.

After his last tour of duty,  he went to work at Badger paper mill and worked the farm planting crops. By this time I was a senior and had just graduated from high school, and I had a summer job at Jitterbug Sander Company in Menominee Michigan. I was also enrolled at the University of Minnesota. That summer, I would help Lee on the farm and we often double dated going to movies on weekends.

40 years later, we are still in contact with each other and friends. While I like building bird houses

and feeding birds, one of Lee's hobbies is collecting tractors.