tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4036864693697592612024-03-23T06:41:26.439-04:00Home Celebration: A Blog Of Comfort and JoyChristy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.comBlogger1462125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-70990237787400526392022-06-25T15:48:00.011-04:002022-08-10T14:46:26.263-04:00With Dobbs, SCOTUS Just Made Agonizing Decisions on Fertility Care So Much Worse<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5HDFWef6f-cVOMm2XnWxJ1E0b4NmSFduxCNsnfrHLLe-swkL9alH6DDZO5Ducnk9tqDhCFi5QgBGAoascjFdZh_6t4RkYE5BJFq2gvhR1r_DPha1xrjAeIUBwixXQf4ZVpYYg7YDgwJsWJqtl7lu0Vu9cDAKj7HMO6gooneH71y-cg9_XuWYDmkpU/s800/px948708-image-kwvupgzc.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5HDFWef6f-cVOMm2XnWxJ1E0b4NmSFduxCNsnfrHLLe-swkL9alH6DDZO5Ducnk9tqDhCFi5QgBGAoascjFdZh_6t4RkYE5BJFq2gvhR1r_DPha1xrjAeIUBwixXQf4ZVpYYg7YDgwJsWJqtl7lu0Vu9cDAKj7HMO6gooneH71y-cg9_XuWYDmkpU/s320/px948708-image-kwvupgzc.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p>Under the current Texas law that SCOTUS just upheld in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf" target="_blank">Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health</a>, I could be charged with murder. So could my fertility doctor, and every nurse and medical student who held my hand, all those years ago.</p><p>Why would I write about something so agonizing? So volatile? To try to save someone else from SCOTUS and state legislatures making it even worse.</p><p>Anyone who knows me or the hubby well is aware that we went through an agonizing fertility slog early in our marriage. Years and years - six and a half years to be precise - of trying to have a baby and dealing with catastrophic losses and difficulties along the way. Because we were working with a doctor who practiced at a teaching hospital, years of medical students got to follow us along our journey as they got a very detailed education in how to help an emotionally vulnerable yet very determined patient through all of the testing, shots, scans, more scans, more testing, more shots, more testing, more scans...you get the picture.</p><p>Working in women's reproductive health as a specialty is an incredible gift when it is done well, because you have to be able to nurture hope while simultaneously injecting realism into the most emotional and gut-wrenching moments of your patients' lives. My doctor and his nurses held my hand and sometimes even cried with me and my hubby failed cycle after failed cycle, cared for me body and soul after every miscarriage, and celebrated when we finally...finally...found success in conceiving The Peanut.</p><p>One of my losses was an ectopic pregnancy. </p><a name='more'></a>
<p>When we first found out that we were pregnant, it was just prior to Thanksgiving, and we were scheduled to fly out to AZ to be with my husband's family for the holiday. We were overjoyed and made the mistake of sharing that joy way too early because it was the first time we'd finally gotten a positive result after all the years of trying (we were at the 5 year mark at this point). We learned after this - for very specific and painful reasons - to hold any fertility possibility close to the vest until we knew for sure we were in the clear. (Some advice about this below.)* </p><p>After a positive pregnancy test, our fertility doc brought me in for frequent monitoring to check to see if certain hormones and other things were doubling at the rate that signaled a healthy pregnancy. When you are high risk, that means a lot of monitoring, so I was going in every other day for bloodwork for the first couple of weeks, juggling that and hearing schedules in court. When the rate did not double as hoped for, the bloodwork became an every day thing, and by the end of monitoring, I looked like a heroin addict with palsy. What started as the most joyous week of my life ended a month and a half later in a chemical abortion -- that is the clinical term for what was the most agonizing thing we have ever had to endure.</p><p>An ectopic pregnancy is not rare in the US. There are somewhere around 200,000 cases of ectopic pregnancy each year. An ectopic pregnancy happens when a fertilized egg becomes lodged in or attached to the Fallopian tube and does not go on through and into the uterus for gestation. </p><p>An ectopic pregnancy can be deadly if not caught early, because a fallopian tube rupture in the wrong place which is unmonitored can lead to catastrophic bleeding or, even worse, sepsis if the growing tissue dies and infects the mother. If not caught early enough, and the tube ruptures, you can lose the ability to conceive on that ovary side, because repairing the tube becomes nearly impossible due to massive tissue damage. These cases are monitored really, really closely for these reasons.</p><p>Mine was a worst case scenario: the developing tissue was one of rapid growth, but was never going to be an actual pregnancy because it was chemically mutated, but my body felt it as a pregnancy because it was giving off the right hormones, just in irregular and unstable amounts. So I got all the pregnancy hormones, with no actual pregnancy. Even more concerning, it was lodged in the worst possible place in my only functioning Fallopian tube, which meant if there was a rupture, our dream of having a child would end there. </p><p>And it could kill me if the bleeding was not caught in time.</p><p>In 1/3 of ectopic pregnancy cases, the fertilized egg can sometimes go on to be a healthy pregnancy -- the zygote breaks free of the tube wall and makes its way to the uterus and attaches to form a healthy placenta. I clung to that possibility like a life raft for a couple of weeks, but the science was very clear after weeks of testing that what we had growing in my tube was not a potential child, but some sort of increasingly unstable and irregular (but not cancerous) growth.</p><p>Under the current Texas law that Dobbs addressed, what happened next in my health treatment plan could result in my doctor, the nursing and hospital staff, my husband and me being charged with murder, for a rapidly growing knot of cells that would never become an actual child.</p><p>Because my doctor felt that treatment required giving me a weak solution of methotrexate (a chemo medication) that targets rapidly growing cells, and thus allows the body to have a chemical miscarriage that safely removes the unstable tissue growing in the tube, we would have been potentially subject to criminal investigation and charges.</p><p>Let me tell you how my month and a half went before I had to go in for a procedure to terminate the only potential child I had ever been able to carry. Our trip for Thanksgiving had been cancelled because I could not risk a rupture in flight, as we worked to determine what choices we had with the pregnancy, and it was too early to tell which way it would go at that point. Every day, for weeks, I went in for bloodwork and testing to see how things were developing. Each day, I got more and more frantic about what the tests meant and how any of this might impact our ability to later conceive if I was not, as we suspected, carrying a child.</p><p>Every day, there was stress, anxiety, crying, exhaustion, begging, prayer, more crying, more begging, more prayer. My husband was doing the same. We clung to each other, and tried to have hope in the face of desperation and fear.</p><p>Every day. For a month and a half.</p><p>This child, if it had actually been something that could have turned into a child, could not have been more wanted and loved. But it was not to be.</p><p>My doctor made the best possible decision for me, for my body, for my situation. We were blessed with people around us who were brilliant and cared about us as people, as much as they paid attention to the science and the potential outcomes.</p><p>We made the best decision possible for our family. It was our choice. Ours. After talking with our doctor, after talking with each other, after prayers and making our own peace with what we were choosing. But it was OUR choice, and no one else gets to ever judge it because no one else on this planet could ever know the agony of having to make it - unless they have stood in our shoes.</p><p>The afternoon we went to the hospital for the termination procedure, it was Christmas Eve. The hospital was on a skeleton crew for the holidays, so the maternity ward was quiet and dark. Yes, I had to go to the maternity ward for this, and I remember walking past the nursery and trying not to sob in front of happy families cooing at their babies, but my doctor was on call that evening for a high risk pregnancy, so that was where his nurse was to administer our medication. That's where we needed to go.</p><p>They shuttled us into a quiet room at the end of the hallway, apologizing that the staff had not brought us into the ward the back way so that we hadn't gone past the nursery. We mumbled something out of kindness, but honestly I was already in shock, and have no idea what I said. </p><p>Bill held my hand, they popped a needle in the other arm for an IV drip, and I watched as they attached the sickly yellow-green radioactive bag of methotrexate into my arm, and the chemo poison began to enter my system to end the ectopic pregnancy. The nurse left us alone for the first few minutes, and I remember sobbing into Bill's shoulder while he tried to hug away the pain. We were gutted and hollow, and even now writing these words 20+ years later, I can still feel that ache like it was yesterday.</p><p>It was truly agony. I would not wish it on anyone. Ever.</p><p>For at least a week after the procedure, my body cramped and bled. I cried enough over the course of that Christmas week to dehydrate an elephant. </p><p>It was bleak enough that our dachshund refused to leave my side for a second without being dragged away, and Bill had to literally pick her up and force her to visit the yard when I couldn't summon the energy to take her. For days, Bill and I clung to each other and mourned losing something that was never, ever going to be a life of any sort. But it was the first time we had even gotten to the promise of any life, and that particular loss of hope was too heavy, too unbearable in the early days.</p><p>But that agonizing choice made by my doctor and by us saved my life, and it also saved the Fallopian tube on the ovary side that gave us The Peanut a year and a half later.</p><p>It was the best possible medical choice, and is still standard treatment for ectopic pregnancies of the sort that I had.</p><p>Now imagine going through that, and a couple of days later police officers show up at your house, because one of the nurses, or a cleaning lady, or a medical waste disposal technician at the hospital has reported you for having an abortion. Technically, they'd be correct, because that is the precise medical term for what I had as a procedure. Even for a clump of cells that were never, ever going to turn into a baby. Imagine then having to prove what you were carrying was not a child, after you have suffered the most gut-wrenching and excruciating loss of your lifetime: it would be a compounded agony on something already so unbearable that you can barely survive it.</p><p>The thought of that happening to someone who is already living through the shattered hell of an incomprehensible loss? The cruelty of criminal charges on top of that is just unbearable.</p><p>Are doctors going to want to practice women's health under these criminal liability risks? Are women going to trust medical staff once they start reporting them to the authorities when they come in after a miscarriage and instead of care face an accusation of criminal conduct? </p><p>These are not hypothetical questions, because women in Texas have already had to face this, since SCOTUS allowed the Texas law to stand while appeals were pending. Doctors have already had to face this, too.</p><p>And, worst case scenario, what if women stop trusting going to a medical provider for reproductive health care because they are getting reported for miscarriages and legitimate medical questions about the right way to handle a difficult medical situation like mine was? How many women have to die before we start paying attention to the cost to women who are actually and currently alive? How many women have to die or risk sterilization due to catastrophic infection before we see the lack of caring as much about the living women as we do for the potential not yet living maybe or maybe not fetus as a problem?</p><p>What do these laws mean for IVF and other fertility treatments? Because the laws now on the books in Texas and Missouri and elsewhere don't provide exceptions for fertility treatments as they are currently written. </p><p>Can you be prosecuted for not using some of your fertilized eggs once you've conceived your other two miracles and you think your family is complete? Could those fertilized eggs be discarded after you are past the age of being able to physically bear a child, or will you be required to hire a surrogate to bring those fertilized eggs to term or risk prosecution if you do not? </p><p>Are medical doctors going to want to work in fertility and reproductive care facing the insurance liability issue that have now been opened up with this decision? Will women have to drive four states over to get reproductive health care in a state that doesn't have draconian laws that slam the breaks on factual, scientific medicine being practiced for women with high risk pregnancies like mine was? </p><p>Will women have to risk being in actual sepsis -- where dead tissue from a pregnancy that has miscarried but has not been fully ejected by the body infects the womb and tissue of the woman carrying it? What will that mean for that woman's fertility going forward? How many women will die waiting to get to that point just prior to death in order to receive medical treatment? </p><p>Because make no mistake, sepsis is not something that any doctor or medical professional would ordinarily be forced to ignore until it got to the absolute worst possible point before beginning treatment. Until now.</p><p>None of these are comfortable questions, but women and their doctors are now having to ask them.</p><p>This does not even begin to touch questions of rape or incest, and how exceptions are not in some of the laws being proposed or already on the books. That's an entirely different and really difficult conversation all on its own, and any prosecutor who has worked a rape or abuse and neglect case could make you weep with the stories they know about what horrible things human beings can do to each other. If you have not grown up in a severely abusive environment or had to deal with a sexual assault in your lifetime, then count your blessings and have some true compassion for the poor souls who do.</p><p>It also doesn't touch on the disproportionate impact that all of this will have on the poor and disadvantaged. The wealthy will keep going to France for an "extended vacay" to deal with their problems (yes, I knew someone in college whose family actually took care of "her situation" that way), but how is the poor single mom who was raped, barely scraping by as it is and has no transportation or childcare going to get medical care of any kind without insurance, a babysitter or a ride? And after she has the baby she is forced to carry if the rape results in a pregnancy, will the already pared down social services in our country be enough to give the child more than a subsistence living? Or do we still not even care once it is out of the womb? </p><p>Are insurers going to be required to report women for medical care they receive, regardless of HIPAA requirements? None of these are easy questions either, but they definitely need to have people in power and demanding this change thinking about how they are going to answer them - if women are forced to have a child after being raped, doesn't the society who forced her to do so owe her a little care and compassion for having required this? I mean, honestly?</p><p>Worse still, this is absolutely going to impact how doctors receive training in medical schools all across the country. I guarantee you that lawyers for hospitals and liability insurers are reviewing and revamping what they recommend can and can NOT be taught, just because of shifting liability purposes for medical schools and hospitals after this decision. </p><p>How is that going to impact the quality of care for women in a nation where our maternal death rate was already on the rise before this case was even decided?</p><p>Or can we just be bluntly honest and say that we don't care about the ramifications on women's health care?</p><p>Are doctors going to receive training in medical schools on how to deal with emergency medical issues like mine? Or will the medical school risk being sued or held criminally liable for doing so? Remember, my situation happened at a teaching hospital -- all the medical students that worked alongside my doctor got real world training in a real world situation with me. Will medical schools risk that now in states that have severe restrictions? What will that mean for the level of medical care that women will now receive?</p><p>Take a moment to think about this: what if it is your wife needing lifesaving care? Your daughter? Your granddaughter? Not a hypothetical. A real world question, because who would not move heaven and earth to save their child having a pregnancy complication? But in a drive four states over to receive care because that's the closest state that provides it, how many things might go wrong in your hours in the car trying to find a doctor willing and able to practice that kind of medicine now?</p><p>There are very real consequences for a change in the law this drastic and sudden, where medicine has now been bound to a decision using rank politics and not the full extent of actual science as its guide.</p><p>Women's reproductive health care is not a "one size fits all" question. Doctors and women have to make agonizing choices based on individual facts and circumstances that have thousands of permutations and potential pitfalls and possibilities. Every woman's body and situation is different, which is why we generally leave these questions to women and their own doctor.</p><p>With the ruling in Dobbs, Justice Alito made crystal clear that the "woman" portion of the care is not his problem, and the moral ramifications of how that will adversely impact so many women going forward is not the Court's problem either.</p><p>How many women dying for this ruling will it take for the women's lives to some get consideration, too? Any consideration? </p><p>My daughter's generation is about to find out that answer in stark and real world terms. I don't think any of us are prepared for what that is truly going to look like and what those answers are going to be.</p><p>*Pro tip for folks who have family or friends going through fertility hell: don't ask when they are finally going to get pregnant or provide you with a grandchild while they are going through fertility treatment. That's incredibly painful and just the absolute worst. Just ask if things are going ok and if there is anything you can do to help, and let them lead the conversation - or not - from there, based on where they are emotionally at that moment. Let the person suffering the agony of fertility hell guide the conversation. Or have the grace to not have a conversation if that is where they are at this point. Please.</p>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-65096131462199538182021-05-21T08:09:00.001-04:002021-05-21T08:11:02.884-04:00Letter to the Class of 2021<p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LRK9hIxxAjM/S9itkvUDJRI/AAAAAAAAAI8/XZnMsVvWLU0XVtH-JJowF-218Wm0AxwFACPcBGAYYCw/s300/3881978895_00dfc0ddc8.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="214" data-original-width="300" height="285" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LRK9hIxxAjM/S9itkvUDJRI/AAAAAAAAAI8/XZnMsVvWLU0XVtH-JJowF-218Wm0AxwFACPcBGAYYCw/w400-h285/3881978895_00dfc0ddc8.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Every year I talk with my seniors about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and the lessons that I have learned on my journey in life along the way. Last year, because of the shutdown, I had to have my senior chat via letter, because trying to have this sort of discussion over one more endless Zoom seemed like a really bad idea.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Jump forward to this year's class, and we are back in school in person, but still masked, socially distanced and trying to get our seniors through their graduation without a Covid outbreak, so careful is pretty much the word of the day every day. As a result, it felt like a letter was a good idea this year as well.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">So for those parents whose seniors did not share the contents of their senior awards bag, or who didn't notice this letter tucked into the bag along with the book and award certificate, I thought I'd post the letter, too. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">This class is like a group full of my own children, mostly because The Peanut has grown up with a lot of them all the way through school, starting in kindergarten. We truly are a family at Notre Dame, and I am so proud of every student in this class. Congratulations to all the kids and their parents!</span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">________________________________________</span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Dear Notre Dame Class of 2021:<br />
</span></p><a name='more'></a><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The Class of 2021 has survived a lot of ups and down over the past year and a half. The Covid-19 pandemic upended our world, but your class has shown all of us what it means to make the best of a bad situation and still come out smiling. After the shutdown last March, you all pulled together, found ways to stay close despite the distance we all had to keep in quarantine. You found ways to support each other through FaceTime tutoring, Snapchat texts of cheer, class group chat silly memes, and calls across town just to check on someone who hadn’t shown up for Zoom classes. Back in school this year <i>(and out and back in again then out then back in)</i>, you have found ways to stay connected and savor the little things: senior lunches spaced out on the bleachers in the gym; bucket filler notes on each other’s lockers; lunchtime with Kim Possible and in the Marvel movie universe with games and snacks in Mrs. Butera’s room; picnics on the St. Mary’s playground when weather permitted, and even a Halloween drive-in movie night. Senior Week was a blast this year - so glad you got to have it!</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Each year, no seniors leave my classes without a chat about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Not just your own happiness or mine, but what your actions mean for the happiness of the world around you. Unfortunately, this year the Covid virus has gotten in the way for most of the year, so I have to impart my words of wisdom to all of you at once, and I beg your forgiveness for the impersonal nature of a mass letter instead of the usual heartfelt, individual discussions.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">It is what it is, right? Let this letter serve as cheers for your successes and prayers over your challenges that I wasn’t always able to do in person this year. </span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">These are things that have been important lessons I have learned — some the hard way — over the course of my life. That sounds very geezer in tone, but you’ll see what I mean as you go further down the pathway of life. </span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">1. At the end of the day, at the very end of your life, what you have left is your integrity and your soul. Guard them closely and choose wisely in how you act and what you do. </span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">2. No one can make you do something you know in your heart to be wrong. No one can make you do something mean or dangerous or unkind or hurtful. The only person who can make that happen is you. So when you have to choose? Choose to be wise. Choose to be kind. Choose to do the right thing. </span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">3. People will not always remember the good things that you do, but they will remember that one horrible, mean thing that made them feel afraid or sad. What people will remember about you most is how you made them feel. Choose to be kind.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">4. Be the change you wish to see in the world. Gandhi was right — when you see a problem, you may come up with a great solution to it, but it is the work that you do to fix it that solves the problem. Choose to do the work to make things better.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">5. 80% of the work is done by 20% of the people. You may see someone being lazy or not caring while you work really hard — choose to do the work anyway. Because when you are doing the work to help yourself, to help others, to take pride in a job done well, you are choosing to show that you are a high quality person that people can depend on to do things right. That has enormous value.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">6. Do your very best in everything that you do. Take pride in your work and in working hard at it. Do everything you can at 110% — go the extra mile and put in the extra effort each and every time, no matter how small the task. Very few people ever live their lives this way. They muddle through, cut corners and only do things halfway. If you strive to always do your best, it will put you way ahead. It will also give you a sense of pride in accomplishment.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">7. Be true to who you are at your core. Be proud of who you are, but also maintain some humility. No one is better than you. But you are no better than anyone else, either. Be gracious and humble, and treat everyone like your equal, because that is the right thing to do. That Tim McGraw song about staying humble and kind gets it absolutely right.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">8. You never fail until you stop trying. There will be hurdles in front of you your whole life — this virus is a big one. Most of life is picking yourself up when you stumble or fall, and finding a way to keep moving forward. Sometimes it will be in a different direction than you think, but always keep moving forward, keep working and trying, and you will find a way to make any situation — even a bad one — into a success. I believe in you. Believe in yourself.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">9. Above all, be a Golden Rule person: do unto others at all times. If you wouldn’t want someone to say it to you, then don’t say it. If you wouldn’t want someone to treat you that way, then don’t do it. Do for others as you would wish someone would do for you. It’s a very simple thing, but it has a profoundly good impact on the world around you, on your family, your friends, and your soul. Doing good makes the world a better place, so choose to follow the Golden Rule. Always.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Some of you are leaving NDHS for college or other schooling or for a trade apprenticeship, some are headed out to work after you read this letter, and some aren’t quite sure what you’ll be doing but you are working on it. I am very proud of each and every one of you — you are awesome kids with great hearts who are about to go out into the world and do fantastic things. </span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">I can’t wait to see what you do with your gifts and talents going forward. It is going to be amazing! </span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Good luck in everything you do. Know that you have family and friends — always — back at Notre Dame High School, and that we are all cheering you on as you move forward. Wishing you many blessings, and as much laughter and joy as you can hold, and sending love and prayers your way today and in all the days that follow. I love you guys like you are all my own kids, and I always will. Keep reading and keep reading history!</span></p>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-52978502980954840492020-12-31T11:00:00.002-05:002020-12-31T14:15:00.184-05:00Best Laid Plans...Ringing in the New Year<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-69foAHnVpB4/TA-cLv-PMcI/AAAAAAAAAOQ/oGFcsQj006MwX4J98KB0PA-F3yifVoEGgCPcBGAYYCw/s325/3982303430_4e271ce03c.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="215" data-original-width="325" height="265" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-69foAHnVpB4/TA-cLv-PMcI/AAAAAAAAAOQ/oGFcsQj006MwX4J98KB0PA-F3yifVoEGgCPcBGAYYCw/w400-h265/3982303430_4e271ce03c.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Yesterday, I woke up early, in the mood to write, full of vibrant promise and cooking plans. None of them got accomplished beyond the writing, because the rest of the family had other ideas on what they wanted for dinner.</p><p>It happens.</p><p>Instead of my home cooking, what everyone else wanted was tacos and delicious food from Tacqueria Lou Lou, our local favorite Mexican place. So I didn't have to cook, but got a delicious meal anyway. I'm calling it a win.</p><p>2020 has just been the pits, hasn't it? </p><p>We watched a year in retrospective about this year's losses in terms of famous and not-so-famous folks, and it had me in tears yesterday evening. I was fine until they got to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Congressman John Lewis, and then I totally lost it. Everyone we know who has been sick, everything we've had to do constantly to stay well, the stress, the exhaustion of trying to teach through all of this, worrying constantly about all of the kids that I teach and whether I'm doing enough to help them through all of this. It has just been a lot this year, and I'll be glad to see the end of it, to be honest.</p><p>The <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/02/mardi-gras-recipe-slow-cooker-red-beans.html">slow cooker red beans and rice</a> (from <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2020/12/american-melting-pot-headed-toward-new.html">yesterday's post discussion</a>) and my plans for spicy chicken thighs and collard greens are waiting for New Year's Day. For New Year's Eve tonight, we are doing family games and nibbles, and saying a big goodbye to the worst year any of us can remember. </p><p>The Peanut asked for some buffalo chicken dip, so that's a definite for today. Beyond that we have a motley assortment of things: charcuterie, cheeses, fruit, random frozen appetizers that we can pop in the oven, you name it.</p><p>This year, the name of the game for me is that it has to be easy, yummy, and something we love. We are starting off the new year with laughter and yummy nibbles, and we are kicking the crazy of 2020 to the curb with gusto.</p><p>Every year, I try to make a few resolutions about things that I'd like to improve or change for the better. This year, I'd like to just survive, find a way to laugh more, eat more vegetables and fruits, and try to write every day. Not a lot. Not a grand, sweeping agenda of awesomeness. But after 2020, it's more than enough.</p><p>Please, let 2021 have more blessings and fewer sorrows, and let us figure out a way through this virus and through our divisions to a place of health and community spirit. We could really, really use more of that in the new year. I find that it is easier to find common ground and purpose if you eat a meal together -- so maybe, when we finally can, we all try to reach out and work on building our communities a little stronger. It would at least be a start.</p><p>Happy New Year, everyone!</p><p><i>(Photo of beignets taken by me in some long, long ago trip to New Orleans at the delicious Cafe du Monde. I can almost smell the hot, fried dough and powdered sugar just looking at the photo.)</i></p><div><br /></div>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-8440235705393523632020-12-30T10:50:00.002-05:002020-12-30T10:51:51.395-05:00American Melting Pot: Headed Toward the New Year with a Little New Orleans<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ep-bLTCuFgA/TA-XD-raTAI/AAAAAAAAAOA/b0OzYJybp6Y9MzadDd_JiMdE4reXIFosQCPcBGAYYCw/s302/2953808699_98cf65bc94-1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="302" data-original-width="300" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ep-bLTCuFgA/TA-XD-raTAI/AAAAAAAAAOA/b0OzYJybp6Y9MzadDd_JiMdE4reXIFosQCPcBGAYYCw/w398-h400/2953808699_98cf65bc94-1.jpg" width="398" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>The worst part about this pandemic has been...well, you could start this sentence multiple ways and still be spot on, couldn't you? This past year, we had several trips planned to some really cool places: </p><p>Spring break in Florida, with trips to Disney World and Universal on the agenda. When I was planning the trip, which took forever, by the way, because we had to work around sports and academic schedules and work-related hiccups, and more things to name just to get away, we actually got a Fast Pass for every major ride in the parks, including the Avatar ride, the new Star Wars rides and several other impossible ones. Had to cancel the entire trip. I actually burst into tears after cancelling the perfect fast passes (the Disney people will understand - you never get everything you want, and this time I did, and had to wipe out the entire thing. SIGH) Thanks, Covid!</p><p>We were going to a Niall Horan concert in Columbus in May, where we had scored floor seats to see The Peanut's all time favorite music crush. We were right by the aisle stage that he would walk by to get to the center stage in the stadium, and Niall would be close enough to almost touch but definitely close enough to make eye contact with, except...tour cancelled -- thanks, Covid! </p><p>During the summer, The Peanut and I were going to Europe on a whirlwind grand tour of London, Paris and Rome, with a school tour group that included a special extended tour at the Vatican for Catholic schools that I was particularly excited about...until it was cancelled, due to Covid. </p><p>Mr. Smith had gotten me a particularly awesome Mother's Day gift -- tickets to see Sting in in Law Vegas at Caesar's Palace, with a backstage pass to actually meet Sting in person. (OMG!! I Know! I nearly exploded with joy on the spot. Sting! Holy cow!) </p><p>Did that happen? Nope. Cancelled due to Covid.</p><p>You see where this is going, don't you?</p><p>The funny thing is that we haven't been big on planning travel the last few years, because The Peanut's sports practice schedule tends to be year round and our planning for any trip has thus tended to be spur of the moment. We've also been saving for college and retirement and not particularly huge spenders on luxury travel and events. Not last year. Last year we were going big. It was our last shot at big travel with The Peanut before college takes over her schedule next year, and we thought we'd add in a lot of fun things. Last year, we decided you can't take it with you and let's have a great summer before her senior year in high school. </p><p>Covid had other ideas.</p><p>After months of trying to be super careful, gallons of hand sanitizer, always wearing my mask, and staying home whenever possible, I am jonesing for some travel. For some reason, as we edge toward ringing in the new year, New Orleans is calling my name. </p><p>Couldn't we all use a little more laissez le bon temps rouler in our day to day weary trudge at this point in the pandemic? </p><p>More than anything, I'd like to be strolling in the humid heat down by the delta of the Mississippi River, brushing off some powdered sugar from a fresh plate of beignets and a large cup of chicory-laced cafe au lait at Cafe du Monde. Or planning a meal at Arnaud's, in the heart of the French Quarter, with a stop at their fabulous French 75 bar for a cocktail or three before dinner. </p><a name='more'></a><br /><p>Instead, I'm going to have to settle for cooking up a bit of New Orleans at our house today. Food is a religion of sorts in the Big Easy, a fusion of French, African, Italian, and later Vietnamese cuisines, with a sprinkling of every immigrant that came to the city looking for work or refuge. The spice is high, and the taste is amazing for every great meal that I've eaten there. Certain spices bring me right back to the French Quarter: paprika, oregano, cayenne, tabasco, and the holy trinity of celery, onion and green bell pepper.</p><p>Just thinking about New Orleans food makes my mouth start to water.</p><p>Right now, I've got chicken thighs marinating in a spice rub from <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0688121659/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0688121659&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=c35a90809c26bde69f597d77e1d80f81" target="_blank">Chef Paul Prudhomme's Fork in the Road</a> cookbook -- those will get roasted this evening for dinner. Chef Prudhomme passed away in 2015, but his seasoning blends are still being sold, and I'm here to tell you that his <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000CDBRA/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0000CDBRA&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=31bade4d63a0d39a5ecb279f6842e1bc" target="_blank">Poultry Magic</a> will change your life. Spicy, but not so spicy that it peels the hide off your tongue, fabulous on chicken, and just enough spice that it rubs off on the drippings and onto the potatoes that you roast along with it in the oven. You can find it at the grocery store in the spice aisle here in WV, so I know you can find it where you are, too. </p><p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0688121659/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0688121659&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=c35a90809c26bde69f597d77e1d80f81" target="_blank">Chef Paul Prudhomme's Fork in the Road</a> cookbook was one of the first cookbooks that I ever purchased in college. He used spice blends for his recipes that brought them to life, and there were no recipes that called for a can of cream of chicken soup, so I knew that I'd crossed the Rubicon into big girl cooking when I made his delicious potato soup for friends on a ski trip in graduate school, and everyone was standing around trying to snag the last few drippings from the stock pot with bread in hand.</p><p>I'll be making <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/02/mardi-gras-recipe-slow-cooker-red-beans.html">a big pot of easy red beans</a>, too, along with some collard greens and rice. The red beans recipe is a big favorite that started with a recipe clipped from the New Orleans newspaper, the Times Picayune. It's easy and delicious, and the best possible comfort food on a rainy day when you come home from a long day at work and realize dinner has been cooking for you in the slow cooker all along.</p><p>Seriously, if you take only one recipe from this blog, take <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/02/mardi-gras-recipe-slow-cooker-red-beans.html">the red beans recipe</a>. </p><p>By the time dinner rolls around at our house, it will smell like New Orleans food, even if we don't get to travel there in person.</p><p>If you want some reading about New Orleans, may I suggest a couple of great books that will give you a little flavor of the area? After Hurricane Katrina, the restaurant industry in New Orleans was devastated, first by the storm, and then later by the lack of tourism in the wake of the storm. I would imagine we are seeing a similar issue today, as every restaurant we know here in WV is dealing with a serious slow down in dining traffic and struggling to stay afloat. New Orleans lives and breathes tourism and conventions, and neither is going gangbusters at the moment due to the virus. The Times-Picayune put together a cookbook with contributions of recipes from some of the favorite places around the area, as a way to raise funds for restaurants and workers who were out of work, and also to help local residents who had lost their cookbooks and newspaper clipping recipes in the deluge that Katrina had brought with her. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1452144001/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1452144001&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=d4f326d91cadd23ac61563e92d9f2fc2" target="_blank">Cooking Up A Storm: Recipes Lost and found from the Times-Picayune of New Orleans</a> was an effort to knit the community back together through the medium that New Orleans uses most: food. The recipes are fantastic, but the stories that come with them really make the book extraordinary.</p><p>The other is a book called <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0393335372/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0393335372&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=2f4239fb878ebbbae9855787664cbd92" target="_blank">Gumbo Tales: Finding My Place at the New Orleans Table</a>, which does an amazing job of taking you to the heart of food's place in New Orleans and letting you into the kitchens of some of its most intriguing citizens. You feel like you have just pulled up to the table and got handed a bottle of Tabasco. </p><p>All this to say, Covid has been horrible for all of us. We may have to stay in for safety reasons, but that doesn't mean that we can't read and cook our way through this together.</p>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-87440220967715108212020-11-21T16:36:00.002-05:002020-11-21T16:36:22.617-05:00Thanksgiving: A Little Planning Help<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-HUPkL1HOHFE/VlHyFlft2XI/AAAAAAAADZg/LFlhFPHKXUA/s1600/6425497833_b739334d24_z.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-HUPkL1HOHFE/VlHyFlft2XI/AAAAAAAADZg/LFlhFPHKXUA/s1600/6425497833_b739334d24_z.jpg" /></a></div>
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It occurred to me this morning that planning for a Thanksgiving dinner can be overwhelming when you haven't had to plan things out before. Especially when it is the first major holiday meal you've ever had to make for your family.<br />
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I remember that overwhelmed feeling very well the first year I cooked the bulk of the meal.<br />
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What I've learned through the years is that there is no substitute for planning. And that dishes you can make in advance are your very best friends.<br />
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To that end, I thought I'd throw together some links and some information for folks, as well as an idea of how I line out my week on a day by day basis:<br />
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-- Here's my cooking schedule for the rest of the week:<br />
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<u><b>Monday</b></u>: The Peanut and I will finish decorating and cleaning the house. I've started cooking 3 days ahead, but that's really too early. So use this day to get last minute groceries, get the rest of the house fairly clean for guests, and make certain you have plenty of extra napkins and such. If you are going to the store this week, do it as early in the morning as possible, or as late at night as you can - fewer crowds means a saner shopping experience.<br />
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<u><b>Tuesday</b></u>: This is where things start cooking this week. I'll start by making <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/great-turkey-stock-recipe.html">my turkey stock</a> as early as possible today, that way it can simmer in the crockpot for most of the day and all that glorious flavor develops. It really and truly is <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">the best turkey stock ever from your crockpot</a>, and your stuffing recipe and gravy-making will thank you for the boost in amazing flavor. <br />
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I'll also make <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">Granny's cranberry orange salad</a>, so it has time for the flavors to really meld together (and so I can sneak bites of it for the next two days -- woot!).<br />
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I also make an herb butter that gets placed between the skin and the breast of the turkey to baste the meat as the turkey bakes. To start, place a stick of butter into a ziploc freezer baggie, seal it completely and leave it out on the counter for a while to soften, usually this takes an hour or two. Then, when the butter is softened, I finely chop the following: some fresh parsley, thyme, chives, sage and a little but of rosemary. I add some minced garlic and a little <a href="http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeyspoultryseas.html">Penzey's poultry seasoning</a> as well. Open the baggie, pour in the herbs and garlic, then reseal completely; mush it altogether to combine well, then pop the butter baggie into the fridge. As it cools a bit, try to get all the butter into a "log" so it's pretty much altogether in an easy-to-slice cylinder. <br />
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<u><b>Wednesday</b></u>: Early in the morning, I chop the fresh herbs, onions, celery and carrots in the food processor until they are mostly minced. Then they get sauteed in some extra virgin olive oil and butter until they soften, and <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/stuffing-for-holidays.html">the sage and herb stuffing</a> gets assembled up to the point where it goes in the oven. I cover it tightly with foil, and it gets to sit in the fridge until tomorrow when it bakes along with the turkey for a bit. I have found that by assembling the stuffing the day before, I not only save myself a lot of time on Thursday, but the flavor of all the herbs and veggies infuses the entire stuffing so much better. I also cook up the potatoes for the make-ahead mashed potatoes and the sweet potatoes for the praline-topped sweet potato casserole. Then, I'm mostly ready to go for Thursday.<br />
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Remember that herb butter? All you have to do is slice into thin slices, work the skin of the turkey away from the meat (but very gently so that you don't rip the skin away from the turkey), and then slip those slices down between the skin and meat. Be careful and very gentle as you do this so you don't rip the skin -- you'll be rewarded with some seriously juicy turkey breast meat. I pop the turkey into the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00091PN3O?ie=UTF8&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00091PN3O">roasting pan,</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B00091PN3O" style="border: medium none; margin: 0px;" width="1" /> and wrap the top up in foil for the morning -- or pop the lid on the roaster, but it depends on which shelf I have available in the fridge for the height of the roaster or foil.<br />
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I sit down at this point and try to come up with a "to do" list for Thursday that times when things need to go in the oven or crockpots, so that each food is warm and ready to serve around the same time, taking into account the 20 minutes the turkey has to rest, etc. -- having this list with times figured out makes the difference between chaos and sanity for me, I have found. Try it and see.<br />
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Then, I try to get to bed relatively early, because a tired and cranky mom makes for a tired and cranky Thanksgiving.<br />
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<u><b>Thursday (Thanksgiving)</b></u>: This used to start with the ham getting popped into the crockpot for a Honey-Baked ham clone recipe. For convenience sake last year, I bought a honey-baked ham from the store and it was easy and delicious (if not ridiculously overpriced!), so we will likely go with that again this year just because I'm crunched for time due to girls basketball practices and other commitments. Survival has to come first during the holidays -- if we learned nothing else from the last few years of cancer surgeries and treatment, it is that. If I am making sweet potato casserole, it will also get popped into a second crockpot at some point this morning.<br />
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The turkey gets oiled, herbed up and baked. I like to stuff my turkey with a quartered onion, a quartered lemon and some fresh herbs -- usually parsley, sage and thyme -- and sometimes a few cloves of garlic. Then I bake it in a roaster with a lid, with a little water around it -- it comes out nice and moist. Sometimes I use sticky chicken spices, sometimes I just use poultry seasoning spices (which is this year's plan).<br />
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Later, the stuffing gets baked as well. And, eventually, the mashed potatoes get reheated. At some point, relatives arrive with pies, green beans and assorted other dishes.<br />
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Then? We eat.<br />
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The things on my plate that I can't quite control? There are lots:<br />
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-- I used to purchase my turkey frozen, several days in advance, giving it <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/thaw#one">1 day of thawing time per every 4 pounds of turkey</a> in accordance with the guidelines they publish every year on <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/turkey-experts/overview">the Butterball hotline page</a>.<br />
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The problem is that they never really thaw well in there, and I always end up having to pop the turkey into sink with a water bath the night before in a panic that it won't fully thaw. Somehow, the miracle always happens that it is fine the next day -- but it nonetheless drives me nuts up to and including the moment I stick it in the oven to begin baking, because I just know there is some frozen part in there that won't fully cook and someone will go home with food poisoning...but no one ever does, because I always test with a meat thermometer to make sure we've reached the critical temperature on the meatiest point of the thigh: <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/know-when-your-turkey-is-done">180 degrees F</a>.<br />
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A couple of years ago, I ordered a fresh turkey to be picked up on Wednesday, so that my fridge could stay relatively clear of giant turkey until the day before the meal. It was a revelation: life is much easier when you keep your turkey in the store fridge, and you don't have to panic about will it or won't it thaw. We've done this every year since then, and it is truly worth some consideration if you have similar issues. You pay a little more for it, but I get a fresh, organic, delicious turkey that cooks evenly due to no frozen spots in the center, and that makes me a much happier cook.<br />
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-- I try very hard to get all of my ham and glaze ingredients, stuffing ingredients, sweet potatoes, regular potatoes, and cranberry salad ingredients well in advance. I pick up my turkey the day before and use that trip to the store to snag any extra items that I've forgotten along the way - otherwise, I avoid the grocery store like the plague. The store is insane this time of year -- if you don't have your groceries yet, do not panic. But try to shop early in the morning or really, really late at night to avoid having your foot run over by someone else's cart. (which has happened to me, and the person didn't even apologize...sigh...that person is so getting coal in her stocking).<br />
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But I just know I've forgotten something important. And it is nagging at me, because that means I'll be running out in a panic into shopping hell this week to get it if and when I finally remember whatever in the heck it is. <br />
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One of these years? I'm going to make a master list. (But, alas, I'll probably just promptly lose it. lol)<br />
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Some helpful posts from prior years:<br />
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-- <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2013/11/thanksgiving-basics-turkey-stock.html">Thanksgiving tidbits and recipes</a><br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/cooking-yummy-thanksgiving-turkey.html">Here are some tips on turkey prep and baking</a>. One thing that I tried last year and loved was <a href="http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/dry-brine/?pkey=cthanksgiving-food&cm_src=thanksgiving-food||NoFacet-_-NoFacet-_--_-">a dry brine from Williams-Sonoma</a>: I put it on my turkey the night before, rinsed it off a bit the next morning, placed sliced compound butter under the skin of the breast really gently and then stuffed it with cut-up lemons and onions and herbs just like I always do. I use a covered roaster and I swear last year's turkey was the best one I have ever tasted.<br />
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I'll be repeating that again this year. Yummy.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/countdown-to-turkey-day-make-ahead.html">Make-ahead recipes are also a life saver</a>. I do my stuffing ahead, so all I have to do is pop it in the over to bake along with the turkey. <br />
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An essential part of that stuffing? <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">Rich turkey stock: I make mine in my crockpot a day ahead, and it is delicious and perfect for stuffing and gravy.</a> Make enough for both and you'll be hooked, too.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">My Granny's cranberry salad recipe</a>? An absolute must. No holiday meal is complete without it.<br />
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Also, if you need an easy idea for breakfast on Turkey Day, look no further than <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/12/awesome-christmas-morning-cinnamon.html">these easy overnight cinnamon rolls</a>. We usually make them for Christmas morning, too, because they can rise overnight and then get popped in the oven while we open our presents. But they work equally well for Thanksgiving morning, when the last thing the cook wants to do is to have to make a full meal before she has to make a full meal. Enjoy!<br />
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<i>(Photo <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/aidanmorgan/6425497833/in/photolist-aMNmDp-7k8xvP-t5Trg-Az6F7e-pwG9jf-q6SD9Y-qdXKpX-pVYEBL-pgv6uP-hFuUE7-dx4VrD-dvgCjj-drQxD7-5EJA2R-sTFK5-gaK3n-pVYLho-pVYLh3-pVYLeh-hUYAH8-7zpbnv-7izyWw-7hpJ9k-5EEKsk-AsAbKF-qcK6BV-qfW75h-qb9yBw-pVDXgU-hViJep-hTHQ2G-dvarGb-48pXDX-99dMd-uzGzat-pMazgk-qiv7Fe-hVKW8J-hLsh9W-gECBfJ-dvdH5M-ayX2S7-qaBhHH-q77WT4-qfMVek-aug6ac-4aEL8V-49C1Yg-qdjru9-hTpNy7">via John Morgan</a>. Gorgeous color!)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-9148481664419114422020-05-18T15:43:00.004-04:002020-05-18T15:43:40.478-04:00American Melting Pot: Pasta e Fagioli<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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<i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0026SVYDG/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0026SVYDG&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=381d8c005b7d7149589e4b4f80ed4d58" target="_blank">Big Night</a>, starring Stanley Tucci and Tony Shaloub</i><br />
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One of the things that this pandemic quarantine has taught me is how much food waste we had become accustomed to and not noticed in our day to day rush to get from one sports practice and school event to another. Being forced to slow down our perpetual motion lifestyle at the same time we are trying to minimize our trips out to the store has resulted in some creative recipe overhauls.<br />
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During the school year, our slow cooker gets a lot of use. For ease, you can't beat being able to toss ingredients in the slow cooker first thing in the morning, rush out the door to work, run to a sports practice, and walk in the door to a fully cooked, delicious meal. It's a lifesaver for me, and something I've been using with a lot of success for years -- all the way back to my hectic legal trial practice days, when we likely would not have eaten anything other than drive-thru crapola otherwise.<br />
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Last night, after doing a short inventory of what we had in the produce drawers in our fridge, I realized we had several bits and pieces that needed to be used up before we lost them. Let's play pandemic fridge remnant bingo, shall we?<br />
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Since we've been shopping as infrequently as possible to minimize contacts, I find that once every couple of weeks we have to do an inventory to round up the assorted random bits and pieces, and then I play a game called "what in the world can I make with this?" Sometimes, I just type in ingredients in the New York Times cooking website and see if I find something that sounds yummy, but more often than not I'm rummaging around my cookbook collection or trying to get creative in a less scary version of Pandemic Chopped.<br />
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Usually, it means I'm tossing together some sort of soup or stew, where I can get my vegetable hating family to eat their veggies and love every minute of it. My people will eat anything that includes either Tex-Mex spices or Italian flavors, and you'd be amazed how many veggies you can cram in a single soup or stew with the right amount of crushed tomatoes poured in to hide them.<br />
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Seriously. Not kidding.<br />
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Today's entry in the America's Melting Pot recipes is a hybrid of two wonderful recipes in one of my favorite all-time cookbooks: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/039458404X/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=039458404X&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=1a35baf5b0d9bdd27c0b3383270e381c" target="_blank">Marcella Hazan's Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking</a>.<br />
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This cookbook changed my life. No lie. <br />
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It's one of the first cookbooks I ever purchased. The recipe for Roast Chicken with Lemons (p. 327), lemons which perfume the meat lightly with the light and delicious scent of fresh lemon, all the while basting the meat and keeping it moist as the oil and seasoning rubbed skin crisps and turns golden in the heat of the oven. Divine.<br />
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The soup recipes in this book are what have been life changing in terms of cooking technique learned for me. The way she layers flavors by strategically adding in vegetables to caramelize and brown in extra virgin olive oil, alternating with meat sautéed for very particular purposes in terms of depth of flavor and smoky deliciousness. <br />
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Her recipes for Pasta e Fagioli (p. 102) and Minestrone alla Romagnola (p. 84) are the basis for today's throw together soup in my slow cooker. <br />
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If I want the exact taste of Marcella Hazan's soups, I follow the recipe exactly, and it is always delicious. Always. However, during a pandemic, sometimes you have to make do a bit more with what you happen to have in your fridge and not being able to run out to the store at the drop of a hat. So it is with Marcella Hazan's recipes in the back of my mind, and a random assortment of applicable ingredients in my pantry, that this is what is bubbling away happily in my crockpot at the moment. Some variation of this soup is a regular entry on our family table, because it is delicious, veggie packed, and even with the addition of spicy Italian sausage and a bit of hamburger, still very healthy given the fiber and antioxidants that pack the broth.<br />
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Hopefully, it will become a favorite in your house, too. If you have a slow cooker, it can become a seriously easy favorite that gives you a day free from cooking once you get things started. What's not to love about that?<br />
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Here's what I used today, but know that an endless variation on veggies, beans, meat or no meat -- it's like a make your own story every time you make the soup, depending on what you have on hand.<br />
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<b><u>Slow Cooker Pasta e Fagioli</u></b><br />
1 lg. sweet onion, diced fine<br />
4 stalks celery, diced fine<br />
1 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil<br />
1 lb. lean grass-fed hamburger<br />
3 hot Italian sausage links<br />
1 pkg. angel hair shredded cabbage (finely shredded)<br />
1/2 pkg. shredded carrots<br />
2 medium zucchini, diced small<br />
1 lg. can petite diced tomatoes<br />
1 can light red kidney beans, drained<br />
1 can cannellini beans, drained<br />
1 sm. can tomato paste<br />
32 oz. container beef stock<br />
1 Tbsp. dried Italian seasoning (I use Penzey's Tuscan Sunset seasoning)<br />
1 tsp. dried oregano<br />
3 bay leaves<br />
1 tsp. granulated onion powder<br />
1/4 tsp. granulated garlic powder<br />
salt and pepper, to taste<br />
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Start with onion and celery in the bottom of your slow cooker, along with the olive oil. Let this cook on HIGH for several minutes until the vegetables begin to soften. Add hamburger and allow it to brown with the veggies for about a half hour, breaking up the meat into smaller pieces as it browns. (During the school year, I'll put all of this in the crockpot first thing when I get up, and then go take my shower. When I get ready, I come downstairs, break up the meat and then add the rest of the ingredients and head out to work.)<br />
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Once the hamburger has browned, I add all the rest of the ingredients listed -- just pour everything into the slow cooker and give it a good stir. I leave the sausage links in one piece and let them cook in the soup all day. I cook this on LOW for 8 hours or so, until the meat is thoroughly cooked through and the veggies are tender. Your house will smell like heaven the entire time this is cooking, and your family will ask you frequently, "Is that ready to eat yet?"<br />
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At some point in the next hour or so, I may wander out to our little kitchen garden and harvest a few leaves of dinosaur kale to chop up and add to the mix, and there may be a few leftover green beans from last night's meat loaf that may get chopped and added in as well. It's a seriously easy and flexible recipe.<br />
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When we get closer to serving time, I pull the sausages out, let them cool a bit so I don't burn my fingers, and then cut into bite-sized pieces. While the sausages are cooling, I generally taste the broth and adjust seasonings if needed -- salt, pepper, maybe a beef boullion cube or two if it needs more depth of flavor, whatever is needed gets added at this point. Then, I usually slice the cooled sausages in rounds, and then quarter those slices so we get sausage tidbits in every bite. Once the sausage is chopped, it goes back in the soup, and it gets a good stir to blend the sausage back in before cooking another half hour or so to fully blend flavors. At this point, I check the amount of liquid and add a little more water if it is needed so that there s plenty of broth.<br />
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If you have the rind from some fresh parmesan cheese, that is fantastic to toss in the soup to flavor it. I learned from Marcella Hazan that she saves these hard rinds in a bag in her freezer to use in her soups, and I've been doing that ever since. The smoky, umami awesomeness that parmesan adds is wonderful.<br />
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One thing that I do differently is to cook my pasta separately. I'll use ditalini or macaroni -- whatever we have in the pantry that is tubular to soak up the soup broth, even sometimes cheese tortellini if we're in the mood for more cheesy goodness. We just cook it according to package directions to al dente, and then combine the soup and pasta together with a hefty sprinkle of parmesan cheese on top in our individual serving bowls. By cooking the pasta separate from the soup, I can control that it only goes to al dente and doesn't become an overcooked mush in the soup pot, which also allows us to store them separately in the fridge and maintain the pasta's integrity through a couple of days of leftover goodness.<br />
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This is the kind of soup that always tastes better the second day. <br />
<br />Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-63590847997287639392020-05-17T10:13:00.000-04:002020-05-17T23:33:27.871-04:00Dipping In to the Great American Melting Pot<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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It's funny how so many of our family memories, our ways of coping with stress, heartbreak and tragedy, and every single moment of celebration all revolve around food. At least at our house, whenever things go well or very, very awry, my response begins and ends in the kitchen, making something special for my family to bring us all back together again. I feel like that is true for a lot of us.<br />
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Jonathan Gold got that fundamental truth: food is what knits the family together.<br />
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If you haven't watched the brilliant documentary -- <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01L63WWKU/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B01L63WWKU&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=0dc9710f19b60e349266f9c92272aa7d" target="_blank">City of Gold</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=am2&o=1&a=B01L63WWKU" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> -- about Gold's work as a food critic at the LA Weekly and the LA Times, you should make the time to fix that right now. Seriously, I'm not kidding, make time to watch it today. His quirky, unapologetic love of good food is far away from the Anton Ego critic in <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0094KTCUQ/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0094KTCUQ&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=e058476fe145afab2bd39fb87e9ea04f" target="_blank">Ratatouille</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=am2&o=1&a=B0094KTCUQ" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />, because he genuinely cares about the well-being of the people whose craft of food genius draws him into the restaurants he loves.<br />
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I've been thinking a lot about Jonathan Gold's work as I've made meal after meal for my family at home during this pandemic shut down, because I've been seriously contemplating how our food choices knit us together in a giant, patchwork tapestry here in America. <br />
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For example: Why is there such a disconnect between people who love to eat out at a Mexican restaurant and those same people discriminating against hispanic folks in their neighborhood? How much of our food tastes are cultural remnants, woven into the fibers of our DNA like some ancestral calling card, the nature outside of whatever food nurture you have built up from years of family meals? How can our love of pure, ethnic goodness in our food choices not translate to a "love thy neighbor" feeling about people who are different from us -- if by "different" you mean skin tone or language, which we celebrate if it is our own or denigrate if it is not far too often these days.<br />
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One of the things that I love most about living in small town West Virginia is that because we are small in population but big in heart, we all begin to feel like family. We care for one another, we reach out, and we check on those who are a little older and frail -- that's an important thing to do in a pandemic, and a lot easier when you already know and like your neighbors.<br />
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I feel like Covid-19's one thin silver lining has been that it reminds us that we are stronger when we work together for the greater good.<br />
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But one of the downsides to living in WV, is that ethnic restaurants can be scarce on the ground. Where I live, great Italian food is around every corner -- back in the 1800s, my area had wave after wave of Italian immigrants from the sunny, southern coast coming here to work in the glass factories and the coal mines, and we have the Italian restaurants, <a href="https://vitospizzawv.com/" target="_blank">pizza places</a> and <a href="https://www.wvnews.com/theet/news/business_finance/tomaro-s-bakery-celebrates-100th-anniversary/article_c664cc9e-de05-11e3-b272-0019bb2963f4.html" target="_blank">pepperoni roll bakeries</a> to prove it. We also have a decent Mexican/Guatamalan restaurant and a tasty place for the occasional shwarma, but that's about it.<br />
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If I want good Indian cuisine or a big bowl of Vietnamese pho with delicately spiced broth and fresh noodles? I have to find a way to make it myself or we're hopping in the car to go to Pittsburgh -- which has not been a possibility during this pandemic shutdown. Maybe that's why I have been thinking about food so much more lately -- because I've been cooking it 24/7 for my family, and what I'm really craving is the food that I crave when we travel a little further afield.<br />
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The Peanut and I were scheduled to take our dream trip to Europe this summer -- London, Paris, Rome, with long train trips and lots of sight seeing between each stop. Thanks to the virus, that's off. Ugh. Just like our spring break trip to Florida was also off the table, Europe right now -- especially the long plane ride across the Atlantic -- is just an impossible dream for the moment, because my cruddy lupus and cancer challenged immune system makes it not worth the risk for our family. <br />
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But...but...we're still healthy and safe and together, and that is worth a lot, right? It absolutely is worth everything in the world to me.<br />
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I've been thinking that maybe this summer we'll do a lot of safer armchair travel instead. Now that school is winding down, I have a little more space in my day and my mind to devote to planning a more exotic meal instead of lesson planning and hectic Zoom teaching. For me, cooking is relaxing, meditative, and a way to put love on our table at every meal, which means a lot to me and my family. My cookbook collection is large, and the internet brings in even more possibilities for recipes that take me far, far away from our 3 little acres in WV.<br />
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A few years ago, I read a book that has been nagging in the back of my mind all through this pandemic -- <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0718095588/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0718095588&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=cf951b272ab2d1c862e8bde5740ee554" target="_blank">The Turquoise Table: Finding Community and Connection in Your Own Front Yard</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=am2&o=1&a=0718095588" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />. The author cooked her way around the world, and in the process found like-minded people in her own backyard who longed for that same sense of connection, one to another, that sitting down to a meal around the table can bring you. It was a profound message of hope and love, and one that I'd hoped someday to start as a regular thing in my own backyard.<br />
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This pandemic makes having a lot of people over for a potluck a little more of a challenge, through, doesn't it?<br />
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I've been missing those connections. The ones that you make in public spaces, where you break bread and share in the little joys of life together. We have restaurants in town where the waitstaff has watched The Peanut grown up through the years, where the guy behind the bar knows us by name, where we think of them as family because they truly are. I've been missing that a lot, and even though we've been doing curbside take-out because we fervently believe in supporting all of these wonderful places in town that feel like home, it isn't quite the same. <br />
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So yesterday, we watched <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01L63WWKU/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B01L63WWKU&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=2d231ddba85320154ae93580553af98f" target="_blank">City of Gold</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=am2&o=1&a=B01L63WWKU" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> for the umpteenth time, because I needed to vicariously walk in Jonathan Gold's shoes to all the adventurous meals he would have. I needed comfort viewing, I suppose, but it just made me hungry for more.<br />
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It occurred to me yesterday as I was falling asleep that I have a virtual backyard, and lots of friends who might like to share in a meal. Even if it is just all of us cooking in our own separate kitchens and bonding over a pot of something delicious -- separately but still together. So I'm going to start a series this summer on the recipes I cook for my own family that allow us to travel with our senses, even if we can't fully travel with our feet just yet.<br />
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In the process, I want to learn more about our own American melting pot, and I want our daughter to learn more about it, too. Unless you are eating three sisters stew with some fry bread, you are eating something that comes from an immigrant cooking pot -- a lesson my history classes learned this year when we did a project on family immigration roots around Thanksgiving. All of these different threads from different countries who chose to come here (not everyone chose, I know, but that's a whole other longer and bleaker conversation for another day) weave together to form our American tapestry, and it makes us stronger. Our diversity makes our culture richer and more vibrant.<br />
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If I'm going to use some of this quarantine time to teach The Peanut how to cook, why not teach her with recipes that reflect the wider world around us as well as old family favorites and comfort classics?<br />
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All this to say, I'm going to post some recipes this summer as I cook them. Feel free to try the ones that sound good to you, too. Let's take a little time to savor our great American melting pot together. Pull up a chair...Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-48728093855267123952020-05-13T14:12:00.000-04:002020-05-13T14:12:40.823-04:00A Letter to This Year's Senior Class<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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The virus has taken a lot of things this year: lives, breath, incomes, time with family and friends, you name it. One of the things that I have seen very sharply is what it has done to the end of my students' senior year. It's been rough, I'm not going to lie, and my heart breaks for this year's seniors.<br />
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It s just the ones I have in class, either, it is all of them. This year, seniors all around the country will not fully get all of their lasts: last time I walk the halls with my friends, last math class, last time I slam my locker shut, last prom. They will get some closure and some form of graduation, even in the hardest hit areas of the nation, I'm sure, but it just won't be the same.<br />
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Our daughter is a junior this year, and her class is also dealing with not getting any of their firsts: first day as the seniors in the days just after graduation; first time the seniors and juniors come together to hand that over in a beautiful ceremony we do each year called Rose and Candle; first college visits. They won't get to do any of that any time soon, either.<br />
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It's just been really rough for everyone involved.<br />
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But, to put this in perspective, we are all still living and breathing. We are safe and secure with our families. We can see moving forward, and that is an enormous blessing.<br />
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I've been thinking about all of this a lot lately, because this particular senior class is one that I have been around since they were babies at St. Mary's Elementary, where The Peanut went to school from kindergarten all the way through, just across the breezeway from the high school where I currently teach. We truly are a family at St. Mary's and Notre Dame, and these kids all feel like they are my own. I have watched these students grow from little kids to young adults, seen them wear their heart on their sleeve, laugh about the little things, cry over the big things, and lift each other up year after year as we have faced some really tough issues or happy times at school.<br />
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They are amazing kids, each and every one of them.<br />
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Today, I sent them all a letter. But because it went out to school e-mail addresses, and I'm honestly not certain how many of them are still checking their school e-mail because...teenagers...I decided to post it here as well. Just in case.<br />
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Here is my letter to this year's senior class, but it essentially contains what I discuss every year with my seniors in class just before they leave me for graduation. Love these kids!<br />
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_____________________________<br />
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Dear Notre Dame Class of 2020:<br />
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Each year, no seniors leave my classes without a chat about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Not just your own happiness or mine, but what your actions mean for the happiness of the world around you. Unfortunately, this year the virus has gotten in the way, so I have to impart my words of wisdom to all of you at once, and I beg your forgiveness for the impersonal nature of a mass e-mail instead of the usual heartfelt, individual discussions.<br />
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It is what it is, right?<br />
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I miss seeing your faces and smiles, hearing your stories, crying with you over the things that hurt, and celebrating your little victories along the way. So let this letter serve as cheers for your successes and prayers over your challenges. <br />
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These are things that have been important lessons I have learned — some the hard way — over the course of my life. That sounds very geezer in tone, but you’ll see what I mean as you go further down the pathway of life. <br />
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1. At the end of the day, at the very end of your life, what you have left is your integrity and your soul. Guard them closely and choose wisely in how you act and what you do. <br />
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2. No one can make you do something you know in your heart to be wrong. No one can make you do something mean or dangerous or unkind or hurtful. The only person who can make that happen is you. So when you have to choose, choose to be wise. Choose to be kind. Choose to do the right thing. <br />
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3. People will not always remember the good things that you do, but they will remember that one horrible, mean thing that made them feel afraid or sad. What people will remember about you most is how you made them feel. Choose to be kind.<br />
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4. Be the change you wish to see in the world. Gandhi was right — when you see a problem, you can come up with a great solution to it, but it is the work that you do to fix it that solves the problem. Choose to do the work.<br />
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5. 80% of the work is done by 20% of the people. You may see someone being lazy or not caring while you work really hard — choose to do the work anyway. Because when you are doing the work to help yourself, to help others, to take pride in a job done well, you are choosing to show that you are a high quality person that people can depend on to do things right. That has enormous value.<br />
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6. Do your very best in everything that you do. Take pride in your work and in working hard at it. Do everything you can at 110% — go the extra mile and put in the extra effort each and every time. Very few people ever live their lives this way. They muddle through, cut corners and only do things halfway. If you strive to always do your best, it will put you way ahead. It will also give you a sense of pride in what you have accomplished.<br />
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7. Be true to who you are at your core. Be proud of who you are, but also maintain some humility. No one is better than you. But you are no better than anyone else, either. Be gracious and humble, and treat everyone like your equal, because that is the right thing to do. That Tim McGraw song about staying humble and kind gets it absolutely right.<br />
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8. You never fail until you stop trying. There will be hurdles in front of you your whole life — this virus is a big one. Most of life is picking yourself up when you stumble or fall, and finding a way to keep moving forward. Sometimes it will be in a different direction than you think, but always keep moving forward, keep working and trying, and you will find a way to make any situation — even a bad one — into a success.<br />
<br />
9. Above all, be a Golden Rule person: do unto others at all times. If you wouldn’t want someone to say it to you, then don’t say it. If you wouldn’t want someone to treat you that way, then don’t do it. Do for others as you would wish someone would do for you. It’s a very simple thing, but it has a profoundly good impact on the world around you, on your family, your friends, and your soul. Doing good makes the world a better place, so choose to follow the Golden Rule.<br />
<br />
Some of you are leaving for college or other schooling, some are headed out to work after you read this letter, and some aren’t quite sure what you’ll be doing but you are working on it. I am very proud of each and every one of you — you are awesome kids with great hearts who are about to go out into the world and do fantastic things. I can’t wait to see what you do with your gifts and talents going forward — it is going to be amazing! <br />
<br />
Good luck in everything you do. Know that you have family and friends — always — back at Notre Dame High School, and that we are all cheering you on as you move forward. Wishing you many blessings, and as much laughter and joy as you can hold, and sending love and prayers your way today and in all the days that follow. Keep reading and keep reading history!<br />
<br />
All my very best,<br />
Mrs. Christy Smith
Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-38396749780308987882020-04-28T15:45:00.003-04:002020-05-07T08:03:06.369-04:00Giant College Prep Recommended Reading List to End All Lists<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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<br />
Earlier this year, one of my students asked me what they should be reading to prepare for college. I was telling my kids that one of my high school teachers (Hi, Miss Goldsworthy!) had given me a list of classic literature mixed with modern classics that were designed to make you think and ask the right kinds of questions about who we are and what we can do better.<br />
<br />
My kids were amused that I had carried my book list back and forth to college, graduate school, law school and 3 apartment and house moves, before it got destroyed when our garage flooded when I pipe burst a few years ago. I had been making my way through the entire list of books, a lot of which were ones I read again in college lit classes -- so I was really, really grateful to have read a number of them before I went to college.<br />
<br />
A couple of the students in that class asked me if I could remember a list of several of those books and share them. So I spent some time writing down the ones that I remembered, and then did a little google magic to find some additional lists for some more modern classics that are being recommended today. <br />
<br />
Below find my current proposed list, although I'm open to argument on why something else ought to be included or why you think a particular book has no business being on a classics reading list at all, thank you very much. In other words, this list is a work in progress -- I'm contemplating whether I need revisions before sharing it with my kids next year, and I'd love some opinions from the readers in my audience.<br />
<br />
So, what glorious book that you treasure did I inadvertently forget? What must be there to help shape young minds and make them ask the difficult or important questions? What do you think I should add or subtract from the list? Do tell.<br />
<br />
____________________________________________<br />
<br />
Classic Books to Read Before College
<br />
<br />
1. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee<br />
2. 1984 by George Orwell<br />
3. Animal Farm by George Orwell<br />
4. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald<br />
5. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury<br />
6. Lord of the Flies by William Golding<br />
7. The Giver by Lois Lowry<br />
8. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien<br />
9. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak<br />
10. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D.Salinger<br />
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11. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley<br />
12. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte<br />
13. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain<br />
14. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen<br />
15. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck<br />
16. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood<br />
17. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green<br />
18. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte<br />
19. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky<br />
20. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.<br />
21. And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie<br />
22. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath<br />
23. The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde<br />
24. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo<br />
25. The Old Man and the Sea by Earnest Hemingway<br />
26. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky<br />
27. The Odyssey by Homer<br />
28. The Stranger by Albert Camus<br />
29. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck<br />
30. Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain<br />
31. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins<br />
32. The Call of the Wild by Jack London<br />
33. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy<br />
34. Our Town by Thornton Wilder<br />
35. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey<br />
36. The Color Purple by Alice Walker<br />
37. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne<br />
38. Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden<br />
39. Life of Pi by Yann Martel<br />
40. Candide by Voltaire<br />
41. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller<br />
42. All Quiet on the Western Front
by Erich Maria Remarque<br />
43. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Houseini<br />
44. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott<br />
45. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens<br />
46. The Lord of the Rings series by J.R.R. Tolkien<br />
47. Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling<br />
48. Emma by Jane Austen<br />
49. The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe<br />
50. Divergent by Veronica Roth<br />
51. Beloved by Toni Morrison<br />
52. Atonement by Ian McEwan<br />
53. The Iliad by Homer<br />
54. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis<br />
55. The Republic by Plato<br />
56. The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch<br />
57. A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry<br />
58. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame<br />
59. The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli<br />
60. Beowulf<br />
61. The Tell-Tale Heart & Other Writings
by Edgar Allen Poe<br />
62. Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley<br />
63. Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare<br />
64. Middlemarch by George Eliot<br />
65. The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick<br />
66. The Sun Also Rises by Earnest Hemingway<br />
67. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho<br />
68. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte<br />
69. The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan<br />
70. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse<br />
71. I, Claudius by Robert Graves<br />
72. The Pearl by John Steinbeck<br />
73. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen<br />
74. Moby Dick, or The Whale by Herman Melville<br />
75. East of Eden by John Steinbeck<br />
76. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle<br />
77. The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett<br />
78. Silas Marner by George Eliot<br />
79. A Death in the Family by James Agee<br />
80. Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin<br />
81. Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett<br />
82. Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather<br />
82. The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer<br />
83. The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekov<br />
84. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad<br />
85. Last of the Mohicans by James Fennimore Cooper<br />
86. The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane<br />
87. The Inferno by Dante<br />
88. Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes<br />
89. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe<br />
90. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens<br />
91. Crime and Punishment by Feodor Dostoevsky<br />
92. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass<br />
93. An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser<br />
94. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas<br />
95. The Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison<br />
96. Selected Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson<br />
97. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner<br />
98. Faust by Goethe<br />
99. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston<br />
100. The Crucible by Arthur Miller<br />
101. Beloved by Toni Morrison<br />
102. Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare<br />
103. The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo<br />
104. One Hundred Years of Solitude
by Gabriel Garcia Marquez<br />
105. Long Day’s Journey Into Night by Eugene O’Neill<br />
106. Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak<br />
107. Macbeth by William Shakespeare<br />
108. Hamlet by William Shakespeare<br />
109. Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw<br />
110. Antigone by Sophocles<br />
111. Oedipus Rex by Sophocles<br />
112. Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe<br />
113. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson<br />
114. Walden by Henry David Thoreau<br />
115. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy<br />
116. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman<br />
117. The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams<br />
118. The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton<br />
119. Collected Stories of Eudora Welty<br />
120. To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf<br />
121. The Awakening by Kate Chopin<br />
122. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens<br />
123. The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot<br />
124. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner<br />
125. Tom Jones by Henry Fielding<br />
126. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert<br />
127. Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy<br />
128. A Farewell to Arms by Earnest Hemingway<br />
129. A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen<br />
130. The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James<br />
131. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis<br />
132. The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston<br />
133. Bartleby the Scrivener by Herman Melville<br />
134. Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand<br />
135. Call It Sleep by Henry Roth<br />
136. A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare<br />
137. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift<br />
138. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray<br />
139. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
by Alexander Solzhenitsyn<br />
140. Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko<br />
141. Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev<br />
142. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins<br />
143. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde<br />
144. Native Son by Richard Wright<br />
145. A Separate Peace by John Knowles<br />
146. Metamorphoses by Ovid<br />
147. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier<br />
148. Dune by Frank Herbert<br />
149. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy<br />
150. This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald<br />
151. The Secret History by Donna Tartt<br />
152. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe<br />
153. A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking<br />
154. House of the Spirits by Isabelle Allende<br />
155. A Passage to India by E. M. Forster<br />
156. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle<br />
157. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll<br />
158. A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams<br />
159. The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown<br />
160. And Still I Rise by Maya Angelou<br />
161. Complete Poems by Carl Sandburg<br />
162. Complete Poems by John Keats<br />
163. Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton<br />
164. Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville<br />
165. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
by Hunter S. Thompson<br />
166. Complete Poems by e.e. cummings<br />
167. Fences by August Wilson<br />
168. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou<br />
169. Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott<br />
170. Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel<br />
171. Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela<br />
172. Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe<br />
173. My Antonia by Willa Cather<br />
174. Mythology by Edith Hamilton<br />
175. Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman<br />
176. Night by Elie Wiesel<br />
177. Othello by William Shakespeare<br />
178. Poems by William Wordsworth<br />
179. Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy<br />
180. Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi<br />
181. Roots by Alex Haley<br />
182. Seize the Day by Saul Bellow<br />
183. Selected Poems by Langston Hughes<br />
184. Silent Spring by Rachel Carson<br />
185. Small Wonder by Barbara Kingsolver<br />
186. Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli<br />
187. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
by Stephen R. Covey<br />
188. Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin<br />
189. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison<br />
190. Get a Financial Life by Beth Kobliner<br />
191. The Chosen by Chaim Potok<br />
192. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith<br />
193. Complete Poems of Emily Dickenson<br />
194. Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank<br />
195. Elements of Style by Strunk and White<br />
196. The Godfather by Mario Puzo<br />
197. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt<br />
198. The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford<br />
199. The Help by Kathryn Stockett<br />
200. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams<br />
201. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
by Rebecca Skloot<br />
202. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair<br />
203. The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann<br />
204. The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco<br />
205. The Poems of William Butler Yeats<br />
206. The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell<br />
207. The Poems of Robert Frost<br />
208. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells<br />
209. Dr Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson<br />
210. The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass<br />
211. The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin<br />
212. The Once and Future King by T.H. White<br />
213. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson<br />
214. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess<br />
215. Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller<br />
216. Dracula by Bram Stoker<br />
217. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card<br />
218. The Kite Runner by Khalid Housseini<br />
219. Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving<br />
220. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
by Phillip K. Dick<br />
221. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes<br />
222. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell<br />
223. Maus by Art Spiegelman<br />
224. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf<br />
225. Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens<br />
226. The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
by William Kamkwamba<br />
227. The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury<br />
228. The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton<br />
229. The Princess Bride by William Goldman<br />
230. Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow<br />
231. John Adams by David McCullough<br />
232. 1776 by David McCullough<br />
<br />
Some of the lists I used to compile this one:<br />
<br />
-- <a href="https://www.bookadvice.co/harvard-top-100.html" target="_blank">Harvard University Recommended Reading List</a><br />
-- <a href="https://hvh.ccboe.org/UserFiles/Servers/Server_1195137/File/Reading%20Challenge/Recommended%20Reads%20Before%20College.pdf" target="_blank">College Board Suggested Reading List</a><br />
-- <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/478.Required_Reading_in_High_School" target="_blank">GoodReads Suggested Reading List</a><br />
<br />
I also used one from Oxford University, but I've lost the link that I used. If anyone knows of other good lists, please share in the comments. <br />
<br />
Am hoping to work my way through several of these over the next few months, and even re-read a few that I haven't read in years. You know...quarantine, you gotta do something. Why not make it worth my while and read something awesome?Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-35115910015620976382020-03-28T10:59:00.000-04:002020-03-28T10:59:03.360-04:00Pandemic Book Club: Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="//ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=US&source=ac&ref=tf_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=hoceablofcoan-20&marketplace=amazon&region=US&placement=B0067AC118&asins=B0067AC118&linkId=0bdd778827191eaf87bcf1866102b3ae&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true&price_color=333333&title_color=0066c0&bg_color=ffffff" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;">
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<br />
Hello readers!<br />
<br />
The Pandemic Book Club discussion on <i><u>The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society</u></i> will begin at 4:00 pm EST today -- Saturday, March 28th. In order to provide a little background and set the table for discussion I offer the following and will see you back here this afternoon at 4 pm EST.<br />
<br />
_________________________________<br />
<br />
Mary Ann Shaffer was born in Martinsburg, West Virginia, in 1934. Having grown up from the very beginning facing the threats of the Great Depression, growing fascism in Europe and eventually the difficulties and devastations of World War II, you would think that this is what shaped her decision to write about the island of Guernsey and the German occupation of it during the war. But it was <a href="https://www.kpl.gov/uploadedFiles/Books/Book_Club_in_a_Bag/guide-potato-peel-pie-society.pdf" target="_blank">a whim that brought her to the subject of her novel</a>:<br />
<br />
<i>She became interested in Guernsey while visiting London in 1976. On a whim, she decided to fly to Guernsey but became stranded there when a thick fog descended and all boats and planes were forbidden to leave the island. As she waited for the fog to lift, warming herself by the heat of the hand-dryer in the men’s restroom, she read all the books in the Guernsey airport bookstore, including Jersey under the Jack-Boot. Thus began her fascination with the German Occupation of the Channel Islands.</i><br />
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Over the course of her lifetime, Mary Ann worked as a book store clerk, a librarian and even as an editor for a small press publisher. She was an avid participant in a book club of local friends, who met regularly to discuss favorite books they had been reading and to debate which book of the moment they should read next. She folded her own experiences and her deep love of a good book into <i><u>The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society</u></i>, which you can see throughout the book, <a href="https://www.kpl.gov/uploadedFiles/Books/Book_Club_in_a_Bag/guide-potato-peel-pie-society.pdf" target="_blank">which her book club was instrumental in getting her to write</a>:<br />
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<i>Many years later, when goaded by her book club to write a novel, Mary Ann naturally thought of Guernsey. She chose to write in the epistolary form because, “for some bizarre reason, I thought it would be easier.” Several years of work yielded The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which was greeted with avid enthusiasm, first by her family, then by her writing group, and finally by publishers around the world.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Sadly, Mary Ann’s health began to decline shortly thereafter, and she asked her niece, Annie Barrows (author of the Ivy and Bean series for children, as well as The Magic Half ), to help her finish the book. Mary Ann died in February 2008, knowing that her novel was to be published in English and in translation in many languages throughout the world.
</i><br />
<br />
Mary Ann was diagnosed with cancer as she neared completion of her book, and her niece was asked to help her bring the book to its finish. Sadly, she did not live to see its publication, or how much it has been loved around the world since it hit the bookshelves. <a href="https://www.gradesaver.com/the-guernsey-literary-and-potato-peel-pie-society" target="_blank">It was Mary Ann's first novel</a>.<br />
<br />
<i><u>The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society</u></i> is a love letter of sorts, written by an avid reader to the books she has enjoyed through the years. It is a testament to how good literature can help us escape life's difficulties for a little while, and how talking about it with others can help the whole group to step outside their everyday lives and into something extraordinary and above the craziness that life tends to throw at us. (Which is exactly why I thought this book would be perfect to start things off for the Pandemic Book Club!)<br />
<br />
Early in the book, in Juliet's January 15th, 1946, letter to Dawsey, she says:<br />
<br />
"<i>Perhaps there is some secret sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers. How delightful if that were true....That's what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit will lead you onto a third book. It's geometrically progressive -- all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.</i>"<br />
<br />
That perfectly describes the relationship with books that I have had since I learned to read. Hopefully, it describes how you feel about books as well. It is a sort of alchemy that brings together a book with just the right mix of intriguing story, well-drawn characters with depth and mystery, and a dash of whatever it is that hits us right in our souls. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is just that sort of book, showing us all how that bond we form with a good book and with each other as we talk about it can lift us out of our weary day to day and into a world where we share a bond that lights our way even in the darkest times. I love that.<br />
<br />
Some questions to think about:<br />
<br />
1. What did you think about the epistolatory style of the book -- written as a series of letters instead of in a more traditional narrative format? Do you think it served the book better and was a good conscious choice of the authors, or did you find it difficult?<br />
<br />
2. We discover early on that Juliet has lost her own family, and has formed a second family of sorts in Sidney and Sophie. How does that shape her, do you think, and how closely can we bond to friends who become our family? Is that sometimes a tighter bond because we choose it? Or do you think that warps Juliet's perspective a bit along the way?<br />
<br />
3. What did you think about the island of Guernsey as we see it in the novel? Is that some place you would like to visit, having read this book? <br />
<br />
4. In what ways do books bond people in this novel? <br />
<br />
5. What did you think of Dawsey? How was he different from the other men in Juliet's life?<br />
<br />
6. Do you think reading about the horrors of the German occupation and the experiences that the inhabitants of Guernsey had during the war was enhanced by reading it in letter format? Did that make the information seem more personal and help it come to life more, as if it were in a letter written to you by an old friend?<br />
<br />
7. In what ways were Elizabeth and Juliet kindred spirits? Do you think their similarities helped the islanders bond more closely with Juliet?<br />
<br />
8. Juliet occasionally receives mean-spirited notes from island residents about herself and others on the island. What motivated these? What lessons do the authors want us to learn from this?<br />
<br />
9. Juliet is dealing with attentions from several men in the book, which are placed throughout the narrative as potential suitors or friends. What traditionally makes a man a "great catch?" What do Juliet's choices in this novel tell you about her priorities for her own life? <br />
<br />
10. Do you agree with Isola that "reading good books ruins you for reading bad ones?"<br />
<br />
Random House has <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/rhpg/guernsey/" target="_blank">a lovely web page devoted to the book</a> that is worth perusing. There is quite a bit of background on the authors and the novel, and even <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/rhpg/guernsey//potato-peel-pie-recipe/" target="_blank">a recipe for Potato Peel Pie</a> which, quite honestly, does not sound particularly delicious.<br />
<br />
I'll see everyone at 4:00 pm EST for our book discussion right here and on facebook. Can't wait!Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-14418873379819835452020-03-21T10:54:00.000-04:002020-03-21T10:54:17.822-04:00Pandemic Book Club -- 3/28 at 4:00 pm EST<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="//ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=US&source=ac&ref=tf_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=hoceablofcoan-20&marketplace=amazon&region=US&placement=B0067AC118&asins=B0067AC118&linkId=0bdd778827191eaf87bcf1866102b3ae&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true&price_color=333333&title_color=0066c0&bg_color=ffffff" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;">
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<br />
Hello readers!<br />
<br />
To make this Pandemic Book Club most accessible to as many of you as possible, I did a bit of time zone calculation and tried to find a day and time that might work for the most broad range of readers. What I am proposing is this: <br />
<br />
March 28th -- next Saturday -- at 4:00 pm EST<br />
<br />
My friend Tracy -- <i>waves to Tracy!</i> -- is in Italy, so her time zone was the paramount one that I was trying to work with for this. Some of you are as far West as California, so that's a time difference going backward a few hours. Afternoon on the East Coast seemed the most reasonable way to go, and a weekend maximizes the potential to participate for any of the folks who may be working in essential industries at the moment. <br />
<br />
Sorry to any of you who are medical folks -- I doubt there will be much down time for the foreseeable future, but know that you are in my prayers and that we are all sending you lots of love and thanks, and we'll hopefully have a lively chat thread for you to read when you have the time to get there.<br />
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We can chat in the comments on this blog, we can chat on Facebook and we can also chat with sound and video on Zoom. It feels like we could all use a little contact and laughter with each other, so those of you who have downloaded the Zoom app, I'm happy to set up a chat room so we can gab in person about the book and life in general. <br />
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As the week moves forward, I'm going to share a few recipes that I think work well with the book, and that also might be ingredients you are likely to have in a pandemic pantry of shelf stable foodstuffs, and we can perhaps set the mood with something yummy to snack on together while we discuss the book.<br />
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Does that sound good for everyone? Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-41861403548753757902020-03-17T09:33:00.001-04:002020-03-17T09:33:30.952-04:00Happy St. Patrick's Day!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Happy St. Patrick's Day, friends! One of my favorite holidays all year, because it gives me yet another excuse to make some Irish soda bread -- best thing ever warm from the oven and covered in apple butter. <br />
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Thought I'd share the recipe that we make for our family with everyone else. It's healthy, whole grain, and easily convertible -- you can use steel-cut oats, or rolled oats, either one. You can use buttermilk, or just regular milk with some plain yogurt mixed into it to sour the milk (it has to be plain yogurt, not the sugary kind with fruit in it).<br />
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While we're all stuck at home, this is an easy quick bread to make -- it's a quick stir and bake kind of bread, but totally delicious on a cold and rainy day like we are having where I am this morning.<br />
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Enjoy!<br />
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<a href="https://www.cookinglight.com/recipes/whole-grain-irish-soda-bread" target="_blank">Whole Grain Irish Soda Bread (Cooking Light)</a>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-38489568248853087352020-03-14T19:23:00.000-04:002020-03-14T19:25:56.008-04:00Introducing the Pandemic Book Club<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="//ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=US&source=ac&ref=tf_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=hoceablofcoan-20&marketplace=amazon&region=US&placement=B0067AC118&asins=B0067AC118&linkId=0bdd778827191eaf87bcf1866102b3ae&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true&price_color=333333&title_color=0066c0&bg_color=ffffff" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;">
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Hello Dear Readers,<br />
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In response to my friend Tracy, who is under strict quarantine rules in Italy at the moment (waves to Tracy!), and the need for a lot of my friends and family for a fun escape from the chaos of toilet paper foraging, this Pandemic Book Club was born. <br />
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After batting around several book ideas, a friend pointed out that we were talking about it on Pi day, and so <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0067AC118/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0067AC118&linkCode=as2&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkId=02b1b527b648b6d7c84b0578e4b318b6" target="_blank">The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=am2&o=1&a=B0067AC118" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> was selected as our first book club read. <br />
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We need to pick a date and time for the book club discussion, which we'll do through the comments and also maybe on Facebook? Could everyone be done reading the book by March 24th? That would be next Tuesday -- it's a great read, and one that goes quickly because you don't want to put it down.<br />
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Thoughts? Share in the comments below.<br />
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<i>(The link above - and at the side of the blog - goes to my blog's Amazon Associates account. If you purchase though that link, then I get a small percentage of the sale. I use any proceeds for classroom purchases for my high school history classes. Thank you!)</i><br />
<br />Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-18661296737017035872020-03-14T12:49:00.005-04:002020-03-14T19:24:21.006-04:00Avoiding Pandemic Panic? Reach Out and Lift Up<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Pull up a chair.<br />
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This past week has been a blur of "what next?!?" One thing after another in the national and international news, horrible medical statistics and news being flung around, personal stories of tragedy and isolation coming in from friends in infection clusters and cancellations everywhere I look. It's been the most difficult and emotional last few weeks for everyone I know, and it won't be getting any better on that front any time soon if the medical numbers we have all been seeing continue to grow.<br />
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So what are we to do?<br />
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As I told my students yesterday as we were packing up textbooks and school work to most likely complete the school year from home, we keep moving forward. We show up for work. We make good choices. Most of all, we find ways to reach out, to lift up, and to be the light -- for our family, for our friends, for someone in need that we meet along the way.<br />
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Because that is what decent people do. <br />
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We are desperately in need of decency in this time of chaos and crisis. When I started this blog, it was on the back end of my work in politics what feels like eons ago at this point. I wanted a respite from the constant chaos and anger of our nation's political fray, and a place to continue to celebrate the little things in life that I think are truly the big things we most need for each other and with each other at the end of the day.<br />
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As my teaching schedule has gotten broader and more jam packed, this little blog has gotten a little lost int he weeds of my day to day. But it feels like the right thing to do to revive it, as a way for me to share how we are coping and thriving in spite of the pandemic and to help in some small way with how all my friends and family to get through this mess together.<br />
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Two things have sprung to mind that I plan to begin this week:<br />
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1) <b><u>A pandemic book club. </u></b> Not reading books about pandemics and infectious diseases -- no thanks, I can get that in the news every day. What I mean is reading some good books as a diversionary escape from the pandemic, and then discussing them as we go in the comments once a week. <br />
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This idea came to me while reading my friend Tracy's facebook post from Florence, Italy, where their very strict quarantine has been dragging onward for multiple weeks and being shut in and isolated has begun to get to everyone. It seemed like a fun way to connect, albeit electronically, that was allowable under their very strict rules. (Waves to Tracy: love you!)<br />
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2) <b><u>A recipe share. </u></b> If we can't all travel to exotic places, we can at least try out some new recipes that allow us to travel a bit while we are penned in for the foreseeable future. Given my medical history -- lupus, and a 3-time cancer survivor, so I'm a walking target for this bug -- we're trying to limit how often I'm out and about where we can. But I love to cook, and it occurred to me that some folks might not have a skillset taught to them by their Granny and Mama that can make a packet of dried beans and some assorted veggies into a divine feast.<br />
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So what I'm going to try to do is share some of the recipes I'm making with our shelf-stable, frozen or occasionally fresh items that I happen to have in my pantry, and which you now probably have in your pantry, unless you are stuck in some interminable line at Sam's Club just trying to jam your way in the door.<br />
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We can share recipes with each other in the comments of any given post, and if you have some ingredients and are stumped on what to do with them to make them into a meal, feel free to throw the problem out to me and anyone else who is here, and I'm sure we can come up with something yummy.<br />
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Kind of a community pot luck, just over the internet. What's not to love?<br />
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As an aside, please choose to be kind and reach out to elderly shoppers or folks with disabilities. The panic that has ensued in this health emergency is downright embarrassing. Please choose kindness where you can -- be the light, not the problem. We all need to be more conscious of that. <br />
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I helped a poor little old man with horribly arthritic hands get a case of water into his shopping cart the other day, and I thought he was going to cry on the spot. When I went to check out, he was two carts behind me, and I asked the bag boy to please help him out to the car when he came through because I knew he wasn't going to be able to get the water out of the cart and into the car on his own. It took me no more than 2 minutes of my time to help him out. Please choose kindness -- we all desperately need it right now.<br />
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PS -- Thought a link to <a href="https://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2014/01/fighting-off-cabin-fever-snow-day-ideas.html" target="_blank">this older post on dealing with an extended snow day period </a>might also be helpful for folks with little ones who are shut-in for a while. The "I'm Bored" jar and our craft closet have saved the day more times than I can count, when The Peanut was little. <br />
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<i>(Photo by Christy Hardin Smith, taken several years ago at the bulb show in the greenhouse at Smith College. Thought we could all use a little spring today.)</i><br />
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<br />Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-71306220559958642422019-11-25T13:50:00.000-05:002019-11-25T13:50:36.973-05:00Thanksgiving Recipes to Share<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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It occurred to me this morning that planning for a Thanksgiving dinner can be overwhelming when you haven't had to plan things out before. Especially when it is the first major holiday meal you've ever had to make for your family.<br />
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I remember that overwhelmed feeling very well the first year I cooked the bulk of the meal.<br />
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What I've learned through the years is that there is no substitute for planning. And that dishes you can make in advance are your very best friends.<br />
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To that end, I thought I'd throw together some links and some information for folks, as well as an idea of how I line out my week on a day by day basis:<br />
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-- Here's my cooking schedule for the rest of the week:<br />
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<u><b>Monday</b></u>: The Peanut and I will finish decorating and cleaning the house. I've started cooking 3 days ahead, but that's really too early. So use this day to get last minute groceries, get the rest of the house fairly clean for guests, and make certain you have plenty of extra napkins and such. If you are going to the store this week, do it as early in the morning as possible, or as late at night as you can - fewer crowds means a saner shopping experience.<br />
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<u><b>Tuesday</b></u>: This is where things start cooking this week. I'll start by making <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/great-turkey-stock-recipe.html">my turkey stock</a> as early as possible today, that way it can simmer in the crockpot for most of the day and all that glorious flavor develops. It really and truly is <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">the best turkey stock ever from your crockpot</a>, and your stuffing recipe and gravy-making will thank you for the boost in amazing flavor. <br />
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I'll also make <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">Granny's cranberry orange salad</a>, so it has time for the flavors to really meld together (and so I can sneak bites of it for the next two days -- woot!).<br />
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I also make an herb butter that gets placed between the skin and the breast of the turkey to baste the meat as the turkey bakes. To start, place a stick of butter into a ziploc freezer baggie, seal it completely and leave it out on the counter for a while to soften, usually this takes an hour or two. Then, when the butter is softened, I finely chop the following: some fresh parsley, thyme, chives, sage and a little but of rosemary. I add some minced garlic and a little <a href="http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeyspoultryseas.html">Penzey's poultry seasoning</a> as well. Open the baggie, pour in the herbs and garlic, then reseal completely; mush it altogether to combine well, then pop the butter baggie into the fridge. As it cools a bit, try to get all the butter into a "log" so it's pretty much altogether in an easy-to-slice cylinder. <br />
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<u><b>Wednesday</b></u>: Early in the morning, I chop the fresh herbs, onions, celery and carrots in the food processor until they are mostly minced. Then they get sauteed in some extra virgin olive oil and butter until they soften, and <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/stuffing-for-holidays.html">the sage and herb stuffing</a> gets assembled up to the point where it goes in the oven. I cover it tightly with foil, and it gets to sit in the fridge until tomorrow when it bakes along with the turkey for a bit. I have found that by assembling the stuffing the day before, I not only save myself a lot of time on Thursday, but the flavor of all the herbs and veggies infuses the entire stuffing so much better. I also cook up the potatoes for the make-ahead mashed potatoes and the sweet potatoes for the praline-topped sweet potato casserole. Then, I'm mostly ready to go for Thursday.<br />
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Remember that herb butter? All you have to do is slice into thin slices, work the skin of the turkey away from the meat (but very gently so that you don't rip the skin away from the turkey), and then slip those slices down between the skin and meat. Be careful and very gentle as you do this so you don't rip the skin -- you'll be rewarded with some seriously juicy turkey breast meat. I pop the turkey into the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00091PN3O?ie=UTF8&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00091PN3O">roasting pan,</a><img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B00091PN3O" height="1" style="border: medium none ! important; margin: 0px ! important;" width="1" /> and wrap the top up in foil for the morning -- or pop the lid on the roaster, but it depends on which shelf I have available in the fridge for the height of the roaster or foil.<br />
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I sit down at this point and try to come up with a "to do" list for Thursday that times when things need to go in the oven or crockpots, so that each food is warm and ready to serve around the same time, taking into account the 20 minutes the turkey has to rest, etc. -- having this list with times figured out makes the difference between chaos and sanity for me, I have found. Try it and see.<br />
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Then, I try to get to bed relatively early, because a tired and cranky mom makes for a tired and cranky Thanksgiving.<br />
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<u><b>Thursday (Thanksgiving)</b></u>: This used to start with the ham getting popped into the crockpot for a Honey-Baked ham clone recipe. For convenience sake last year, I bought a honey-baked ham from the store and it was easy and delicious (if not ridiculously overpriced!), so we will likely go with that again this year just because I'm crunched for time due to girls basketball practices and other commitments. Survival has to come first during the holidays -- if we learned nothing else from the last few years of cancer surgeries and treatment, it is that. If I am making sweet potato casserole, it will also get popped into a second crockpot at some point this morning.<br />
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The turkey gets oiled, herbed up and baked. I like to stuff my turkey with a quartered onion, a quartered lemon and some fresh herbs -- usually parsley, sage and thyme -- and sometimes a few cloves of garlic. Then I bake it in a roaster with a lid, with a little water around it -- it comes out nice and moist. Sometimes I use sticky chicken spices, sometimes I just use poultry seasoning spices (which is this year's plan).<br />
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Later, the stuffing gets baked as well. And, eventually, the mashed potatoes get reheated. At some point, relatives arrive with pies, green beans and assorted other dishes.<br />
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Then? We eat.<br />
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The things on my plate that I can't quite control? There are lots:<br />
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-- I used to purchase my turkey frozen, several days in advance, giving it <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/thaw#one">1 day of thawing time per every 4 pounds of turkey</a> in accordance with the guidelines they publish every year on <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/turkey-experts/overview">the Butterball hotline page</a>.<br />
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The problem is that they never really thaw well in there, and I always end up having to pop the turkey into sink with a water bath the night before in a panic that it won't fully thaw. Somehow, the miracle always happens that it is fine the next day -- but it nonetheless drives me nuts up to and including the moment I stick it in the oven to begin baking, because I just know there is some frozen part in there that won't fully cook and someone will go home with food poisoning...but no one ever does, because I always test with a meat thermometer to make sure we've reached the critical temperature on the meatiest point of the thigh: <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/know-when-your-turkey-is-done">180 degrees F</a>.<br />
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A couple of years ago, I ordered a fresh turkey to be picked up on Wednesday, so that my fridge could stay relatively clear of giant turkey until the day before the meal. It was a revelation: life is much easier when you keep your turkey in the store fridge, and you don't have to panic about will it or won't it thaw. We've done this every year since then, and it is truly worth some consideration if you have similar issues. You pay a little more for it, but I get a fresh, organic, delicious turkey that cooks evenly due to no frozen spots in the center, and that makes me a much happier cook.<br />
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-- I try very hard to get all of my ham and glaze ingredients, stuffing ingredients, sweet potatoes, regular potatoes, and cranberry salad ingredients well in advance. I pick up my turkey the day before and use that trip to the store to snag any extra items that I've forgotten along the way - otherwise, I avoid the grocery store like the plague. The store is insane this time of year -- if you don't have your groceries yet, do not panic. But try to shop early in the morning or really, really late at night to avoid having your foot run over by someone else's cart. (which has happened to me, and the person didn't even apologize...sigh...that person is so getting coal in her stocking).<br />
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But I just know I've forgotten something important. And it is nagging at me, because that means I'll be running out in a panic into shopping hell this week to get it if and when I finally remember whatever in the heck it is. <br />
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One of these years? I'm going to make a master list. (But, alas, I'll probably just promptly lose it. lol)<br />
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Some helpful posts from prior years:<br />
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-- <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2013/11/thanksgiving-basics-turkey-stock.html">Thanksgiving tidbits and recipes</a><br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/cooking-yummy-thanksgiving-turkey.html">Here are some tips on turkey prep and baking</a>. One thing that I tried last year and loved was <a href="http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/dry-brine/?pkey=cthanksgiving-food&cm_src=thanksgiving-food||NoFacet-_-NoFacet-_--_-">a dry brine from Williams-Sonoma</a>: I put it on my turkey the night before, rinsed it off a bit the next morning, placed sliced compound butter under the skin of the breast really gently and then stuffed it with cut-up lemons and onions and herbs just like I always do. I use a covered roaster and I swear last year's turkey was the best one I have ever tasted.<br />
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I'll be repeating that again this year. Yummy.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/countdown-to-turkey-day-make-ahead.html">Make-ahead recipes are also a life saver</a>. I do my stuffing ahead, so all I have to do is pop it in the over to bake along with the turkey. <br />
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An essential part of that stuffing? <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">Rich turkey stock: I make mine in my crockpot a day ahead, and it is delicious and perfect for stuffing and gravy.</a> Make enough for both and you'll be hooked, too.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">My Granny's cranberry salad recipe</a>? An absolute must. No holiday meal is complete without it.<br />
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Also, if you need an easy idea for breakfast on Turkey Day, look no further than <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/12/awesome-christmas-morning-cinnamon.html">these easy overnight cinnamon rolls</a>. We usually make them for Christmas morning, too, because they can rise overnight and then get popped in the oven while we open our presents. But they work equally well for Thanksgiving morning, when the last thing the cook wants to do is to have to make a full meal before she has to make a full meal. Enjoy!<br />
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<i>(Photo <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/aidanmorgan/6425497833/in/photolist-aMNmDp-7k8xvP-t5Trg-Az6F7e-pwG9jf-q6SD9Y-qdXKpX-pVYEBL-pgv6uP-hFuUE7-dx4VrD-dvgCjj-drQxD7-5EJA2R-sTFK5-gaK3n-pVYLho-pVYLh3-pVYLeh-hUYAH8-7zpbnv-7izyWw-7hpJ9k-5EEKsk-AsAbKF-qcK6BV-qfW75h-qb9yBw-pVDXgU-hViJep-hTHQ2G-dvarGb-48pXDX-99dMd-uzGzat-pMazgk-qiv7Fe-hVKW8J-hLsh9W-gECBfJ-dvdH5M-ayX2S7-qaBhHH-q77WT4-qfMVek-aug6ac-4aEL8V-49C1Yg-qdjru9-hTpNy7">via John Morgan</a>. Gorgeous color!)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-16426220004734567222018-07-05T10:33:00.003-04:002018-07-05T10:33:38.030-04:00History in the Writing?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Dear friends:</div>
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This coming year, I've been asked to teach a couple of AP US history and government classes, along with my regular load of US history, world history and civics. In assessing my supplemental books in the classroom, I've realized that we need more biographies and history treatments on a number of topics. But due to the cost of buying new editions being so high, and coming out of my pocket, stocking an AP history library is a little cost prohibitive.<div>
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As we've moved from the old house to the new one, I've combed through our personal library and set aside a number of our books to take in for my class. But our personal library only gets me so far.<br /><div>
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So I am asking for a little help. </div>
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If you have books on American history, US presidents, early civilizations, Native Americans, world history, ancient empires...pretty much anything history related that is in decent shape that you would also be willing to mail to me, I will take it off your hands.</div>
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Christy Smith</div>
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P.O. Box 187</div>
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Clarksburg, WV 26302</div>
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Authors and titles that I would love:</div>
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-- David McCollough</div>
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-- Gordon Wood</div>
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-- Doris Kearns Goodwin</div>
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-- Ron Chernow</div>
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-- Stephen Ambrose</div>
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-- Nathan Philbrick</div>
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-- Jon Meacham</div>
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-- Joseph Ellis</div>
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-- Any of the Library of America books would be awesome.</div>
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-- Any biographies about American presidents, famous Americans, particular periods of American history like the Civil War, the Civil Rights movement, either World War, etc.</div>
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-- Any histories of Ancient empires -- Greece, Rome, Egypt, etc. -- would be very welcome, too. Including books about ancient mythologies, as my kids love those.</div>
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If you have books that you were thinking about donating to a local library, please consider donating them to a classroom full of eager learners instead. I promise to put them to good use this year and for years to come. Thank you so much!</div>
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Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-54577459049629290392017-11-20T14:36:00.001-05:002017-11-20T14:36:14.447-05:00Thanksgiving Planning and Recipe Links<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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It occurred to me this morning that planning for a Thanksgiving dinner can be overwhelming when you haven't had to plan things out before. Especially when it is the first major holiday meal you've ever had to make for your family.<br />
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I remember that overwhelmed feeling very well the first year I cooked the bulk of the meal.<br />
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What I've learned through the years is that there is no substitute for planning. And that dishes you can make in advance are your very best friends.<br />
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To that end, I thought I'd throw together some links and some information for folks, as well as an idea of how I line out my week on a day by day basis:<br />
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-- Here's my cooking schedule for the rest of the week:<br />
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<u><b>Monday</b></u>: The Peanut and I will finish decorating and cleaning the house. I've started cooking 3 days ahead, but that's really too early. So use this day to get last minute groceries, get the rest of the house fairly clean for guests, and make certain you have plenty of extra napkins and such. If you are going to the store this week, do it as early in the morning as possible, or as late at night as you can - fewer crowds means a saner shopping experience.<br />
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<u><b>Tuesday</b></u>: This is where things start cooking this week. I'll start by making <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/great-turkey-stock-recipe.html">my turkey stock</a> as early as possible today, that way it can simmer in the crockpot for most of the day and all that glorious flavor develops. It really and truly is <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">the best turkey stock ever from your crockpot</a>, and your stuffing recipe and gravy-making will thank you for the boost in amazing flavor. <br />
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I'll also make <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">Granny's cranberry orange salad</a>, so it has time for the flavors to really meld together (and so I can sneak bites of it for the next two days -- woot!).<br />
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I also make an herb butter that gets placed between the skin and the breast of the turkey to baste the meat as the turkey bakes. To start, place a stick of butter into a ziploc freezer baggie, seal it completely and leave it out on the counter for a while to soften, usually this takes an hour or two. Then, when the butter is softened, I finely chop the following: some fresh parsley, thyme, chives, sage and a little but of rosemary. I add some minced garlic and a little <a href="http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeyspoultryseas.html">Penzey's poultry seasoning</a> as well. Open the baggie, pour in the herbs and garlic, then reseal completely; mush it altogether to combine well, then pop the butter baggie into the fridge. As it cools a bit, try to get all the butter into a "log" so it's pretty much altogether in an easy-to-slice cylinder. <br />
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<u><b>Wednesday</b></u>: Early in the morning, I chop the fresh herbs, onions, celery and carrots in the food processor until they are mostly minced. Then they get sauteed in some extra virgin olive oil and butter until they soften, and <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/stuffing-for-holidays.html">the sage and herb stuffing</a> gets assembled up to the point where it goes in the oven. I cover it tightly with foil, and it gets to sit in the fridge until tomorrow when it bakes along with the turkey for a bit. I have found that by assembling the stuffing the day before, I not only save myself a lot of time on Thursday, but the flavor of all the herbs and veggies infuses the entire stuffing so much better. I also cook up the potatoes for the make-ahead mashed potatoes and the sweet potatoes for the praline-topped sweet potato casserole. Then, I'm mostly ready to go for Thursday.<br />
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Remember that herb butter? All you have to do is slice into thin slices, work the skin of the turkey away from the meat (but very gently so that you don't rip the skin away from the turkey), and then slip those slices down between the skin and meat. Be careful and very gentle as you do this so you don't rip the skin -- you'll be rewarded with some seriously juicy turkey breast meat. I pop the turkey into the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00091PN3O?ie=UTF8&tag=hoceablofcoan-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00091PN3O">roasting pan,</a><img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=hoceablofcoan-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B00091PN3O" height="1" style="border: medium none ! important; margin: 0px ! important;" width="1" /> and wrap the top up in foil for the morning -- or pop the lid on the roaster, but it depends on which shelf I have available in the fridge for the height of the roaster or foil.<br />
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I sit down at this point and try to come up with a "to do" list for Thursday that times when things need to go in the oven or crockpots, so that each food is warm and ready to serve around the same time, taking into account the 20 minutes the turkey has to rest, etc. -- having this list with times figured out makes the difference between chaos and sanity for me, I have found. Try it and see.<br />
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Then, I try to get to bed relatively early, because a tired and cranky mom makes for a tired and cranky Thanksgiving.<br />
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<u><b>Thursday (Thanksgiving)</b></u>: This used to start with the ham getting popped into the crockpot for a Honey-Baked ham clone recipe. For convenience sake last year, I bought a honey-baked ham from the store and it was easy and delicious (if not ridiculously overpriced!), so we will likely go with that again this year just because I'm crunched for time due to girls basketball practices and other commitments. Survival has to come first during the holidays -- if we learned nothing else from the last few years of cancer surgeries and treatment, it is that. If I am making sweet potato casserole, it will also get popped into a second crockpot at some point this morning.<br />
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The turkey gets oiled, herbed up and baked. I like to stuff my turkey with a quartered onion, a quartered lemon and some fresh herbs -- usually parsley, sage and thyme -- and sometimes a few cloves of garlic. Then I bake it in a roaster with a lid, with a little water around it -- it comes out nice and moist. Sometimes I use sticky chicken spices, sometimes I just use poultry seasoning spices (which is this year's plan).<br />
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Later, the stuffing gets baked as well. And, eventually, the mashed potatoes get reheated. At some point, relatives arrive with pies, green beans and assorted other dishes.<br />
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Then? We eat.<br />
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The things on my plate that I can't quite control? There are lots:<br />
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-- I used to purchase my turkey frozen, several days in advance, giving it <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/thaw#one">1 day of thawing time per every 4 pounds of turkey</a> in accordance with the guidelines they publish every year on <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/turkey-experts/overview">the Butterball hotline page</a>.<br />
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The problem is that they never really thaw well in there, and I always end up having to pop the turkey into sink with a water bath the night before in a panic that it won't fully thaw. Somehow, the miracle always happens that it is fine the next day -- but it nonetheless drives me nuts up to and including the moment I stick it in the oven to begin baking, because I just know there is some frozen part in there that won't fully cook and someone will go home with food poisoning...but no one ever does, because I always test with a meat thermometer to make sure we've reached the critical temperature on the meatiest point of the thigh: <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/know-when-your-turkey-is-done">180 degrees F</a>.<br />
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A couple of years ago, I ordered a fresh turkey to be picked up on Wednesday, so that my fridge could stay relatively clear of giant turkey until the day before the meal. It was a revelation: life is much easier when you keep your turkey in the store fridge, and you don't have to panic about will it or won't it thaw. We've done this every year since then, and it is truly worth some consideration if you have similar issues. You pay a little more for it, but I get a fresh, organic, delicious turkey that cooks evenly due to no frozen spots in the center, and that makes me a much happier cook.<br />
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-- I try very hard to get all of my ham and glaze ingredients, stuffing ingredients, sweet potatoes, regular potatoes, and cranberry salad ingredients well in advance. I pick up my turkey the day before and use that trip to the store to snag any extra items that I've forgotten along the way - otherwise, I avoid the grocery store like the plague. The store is insane this time of year -- if you don't have your groceries yet, do not panic. But try to shop early in the morning or really, really late at night to avoid having your foot run over by someone else's cart. (which has happened to me, and the person didn't even apologize...sigh...that person is so getting coal in her stocking).<br />
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But I just know I've forgotten something important. And it is nagging at me, because that means I'll be running out in a panic into shopping hell this week to get it if and when I finally remember whatever in the heck it is. <br />
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One of these years? I'm going to make a master list. (But, alas, I'll probably just promptly lose it. lol)<br />
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Some helpful posts from prior years:<br />
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-- <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2013/11/thanksgiving-basics-turkey-stock.html">Thanksgiving tidbits and recipes</a><br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/cooking-yummy-thanksgiving-turkey.html">Here are some tips on turkey prep and baking</a>. One thing that I tried last year and loved was <a href="http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/dry-brine/?pkey=cthanksgiving-food&cm_src=thanksgiving-food||NoFacet-_-NoFacet-_--_-">a dry brine from Williams-Sonoma</a>: I put it on my turkey the night before, rinsed it off a bit the next morning, placed sliced compound butter under the skin of the breast really gently and then stuffed it with cut-up lemons and onions and herbs just like I always do. I use a covered roaster and I swear last year's turkey was the best one I have ever tasted.<br />
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I'll be repeating that again this year. Yummy.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/countdown-to-turkey-day-make-ahead.html">Make-ahead recipes are also a life saver</a>. I do my stuffing ahead, so all I have to do is pop it in the over to bake along with the turkey. <br />
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An essential part of that stuffing? <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">Rich turkey stock: I make mine in my crockpot a day ahead, and it is delicious and perfect for stuffing and gravy.</a> Make enough for both and you'll be hooked, too.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">My Granny's cranberry salad recipe</a>? An absolute must. No holiday meal is complete without it.<br />
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Also, if you need an easy idea for breakfast on Turkey Day, look no further than <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/12/awesome-christmas-morning-cinnamon.html">these easy overnight cinnamon rolls</a>. We usually make them for Christmas morning, too, because they can rise overnight and then get popped in the oven while we open our presents. But they work equally well for Thanksgiving morning, when the last thing the cook wants to do is to have to make a full meal before she has to make a full meal. Enjoy!<br />
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<i>(Photo <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/aidanmorgan/6425497833/in/photolist-aMNmDp-7k8xvP-t5Trg-Az6F7e-pwG9jf-q6SD9Y-qdXKpX-pVYEBL-pgv6uP-hFuUE7-dx4VrD-dvgCjj-drQxD7-5EJA2R-sTFK5-gaK3n-pVYLho-pVYLh3-pVYLeh-hUYAH8-7zpbnv-7izyWw-7hpJ9k-5EEKsk-AsAbKF-qcK6BV-qfW75h-qb9yBw-pVDXgU-hViJep-hTHQ2G-dvarGb-48pXDX-99dMd-uzGzat-pMazgk-qiv7Fe-hVKW8J-hLsh9W-gECBfJ-dvdH5M-ayX2S7-qaBhHH-q77WT4-qfMVek-aug6ac-4aEL8V-49C1Yg-qdjru9-hTpNy7">via John Morgan</a>. Gorgeous color!)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-79504742216545687272017-07-01T12:14:00.003-04:002017-07-01T12:14:55.145-04:00Parenting In An Age Of Incivility<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Lately, the news has been filled with story after story of nasty, payback, online rant-y ick. So much so that even thinking about watching the news gives me a sick feeling in my stomach, and I've been a news junkie all my life. We're being bombarded by hateful, screaming rhetoric on all sides, and there is no respite online or off.<br />
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Worse, this is the environment in which my child is coming of age. At 14, she's not only capable of seeing this level of crazy with clear eyes, but she's also cognizant of how wrong some of this behavior is, that it would not be tolerated in our family, and that "leaders" in this nation of ours are getting away with behavior that we would never allow in our own home.<br />
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I've been stewing on this for quite a while, not just for my own child, but for all of the kids that I teach and spend time around day in and day out. <br />
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How do we raise decent, caring, thoughtful kids in an age where that is the polar opposite of what we see in our elected officials, our media environment, our online back and forth and even our day to day interactions? How do we parent effectively about ethics and manners and character, when so much of what makes us a "civil" society is degraded and frayed around the edges?<br />
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Last year, we were discussing this issue in my civics class, in relation to a news item on a political operative who created a whole string of fake information about one of the political candidates which ended up going viral and becoming a factor in the election. The operative in question had no remorse on creating a series of lies, or that those lies impacted the presidential race, and was even quite proud of his lies and boasted about their effectiveness to the reporter who was fact-checking them. Whereas I was seeing this through the lens of "lying is wrong, and this guy has horrible ethics," a number of my kids were seeing this as "he was really successful at this and anything goes in politics."<br />
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Needless to say, it was a lively discussion. In the end, it was a troubling one for me, because these kids genuinely see politics as an "ends justifies the means" sport in which you do anything to be the winner, and not as a higher calling for the service of the greater community good for us all. It still haunts me that it took a lengthy discussion to get to any level of grudging acceptance that ethics might also be important, even necessary, in American politics.<br />
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You can see where this is going for me in terms of a renewed focus on government service and ethics in my history and government discussions, but also in my parenting of my own child.<br />
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We need discussions with our kids about decency, ethics and government service for the greater good of all of us. We need to start thinking about our nation as a connected whole, a "WE, the people" and not an "us vs. them."<br />
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But how?<br />
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<i>(Photo by Christy Hardin Smith.)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-57742445566604859222017-04-02T14:56:00.000-04:002017-04-02T14:56:02.183-04:00The Quest for Comfort and Joy Amidst the Day to Day Chaos<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The news headlines lately have been chaotic, troubling and outright craze balls most days. Regardless of the political party of your choice, the day to day grind is wearing all of us down in one way or another. At least based on my unscientific survey of friends and family, we're all getting a little sick of the crazy all at the same time.<br />
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How to fix it? No idea. <br />
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Wish I had some good, constructive advice on making our nation's political sickness better, but the honest truth is that I'm as stumped as everyone else. It's beyond frustrating and exhausting, and it feels like we're all Alice, falling down the crazy rabbit hole together most days, doesn't it?<br />
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In the meantime, though, our day to day life moves forward. However much our worst days may feel like a crazy xerox copy of crazy on a hamster wheel going nowhere, there has to be some way to find some joy and comfort amidst the chaos. <br />
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Yesterday, I spent the entire day coaching a middle school track team in 40 degree weather that consisted of gray skies, constant misty rain, and an endless mud-covered football field in between runs. It was miserable, I'm not going to lie, and my body is getting even with me today for overdoing it yesterday in ways I can't begin to explain.<br />
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So finding a little comfort and joy in my day is an essential survival skill.<br />
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Right now, I'm savoring a cup of delicious hot tea with a little honey, drinking in not just the beverage, but also the smell of comfort that wafts up from my cuppa. Taking the time to notice the little details grounds me in the now, and allows the crazy of yesterday to fade into the background. It relaxes me to be present instead of always looking behind, and it makes looking ahead a little more clear in terms of ascertaining what I want - and what I do not want - going forward.<br />
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My plan is to spend a little time today decluttering and reorganizing a couple of areas in our house. Less clutter means less visual chaos, which makes me a much happier person not seeing the constant reminder of my to do list right in my face. Less really is more at our house.<br />
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There may be a nap or a hot soak in the tub in my future. A little pampering can do some serious repair work on my frazzled brain, even if it is just a few stolen minutes in some warm, bubbly water before the next crisis drags me back out into the crazy again.<br />
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The key for me is to find something, every single day if at all possible, but some small thing that allows me to re-center and re-focus on the now instead of the laundry list of things I can't get done to my satisfaction. To be present in what I am doing in the moment, rather than ticking of the list of things "to do" next. Because that list never ends, it never goes away, and it will never, ever be done.<br />
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Staying in the "what am I working on at the moment" mindset allows the rest of the list to recede a little bit. At least for a while, anyway, and sometimes that is enough to give my brain a break.<br />
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It isn't a perfect system, but it is something to try to find the joy in the little, day to day things, every single day. Because every day, there needs to be some opportunity for comfort and joy, don't you think?<br />
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What are you doing for yourself these days to find a little comfort and joy? Do tell.<br />
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<i>(Photo by Christy Hardin Smith.)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-2177994065680524982017-01-29T11:36:00.001-05:002017-01-31T11:20:22.341-05:00My America<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Imagine waking up this morning as an American of Islamic background. Wondering if your family would be rounded up, no matter how long they have lived in this nation, no matter how long they have had citizenship here. Not even Islamic background, either, but simply national background -- if you are a Lebanese Christian, you are now suspect until you can prove your faith. <br />
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Pause for a moment and consider: prove your faith. We now have a test based on religious faith in this country. A nation whose very founding was predicated on the notion that there would never be a "state" religion, but that there would be a freedom to choose one's faith because so many of the early settlers here had come to escape persecution due to a state religion in England and other nations in Europe. <br />
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Think about this for a second: because of their nation of origin or their faith, their loyalty and place in our communities is now being called into question by someone who has never met the doctor in rural America who came to this country for medical school on a promise that he would practice in an underserved, rural community that desperately needed a doctor. Or a woman who came here for sanctuary to escape an arranged marriage to a brutal man who would not allow her to continue her education. Or a child, desperately trying to escape a war-torn region, who has already lost most of his family to bombs and disease and starvation. We are shutting the door on all of these people simply because of the color of their skin, the place they were born and the tenor of their faith.<br />
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That infuriates me. <br />
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You apply the law individually based on facts and conduct and suspicion, and not to a giant, generalized swath of people that you round up in a herd and hold without charges because they have done nothing to earn them other than be born in a certain place that you happen to suspect. Individual actors who are suspect absolutely deserve very careful and strict scrutiny for our national security. No question. That has always been the case and should continue to be so. But the arbitrary, generalized application of a policy against an entire people based on their country of origin or their faith rather than rooting out the individual bad actors who deserve this kind of scrutiny is so antithetical to who we are supposed to be as a nation that I've been having trouble wrapping my brain around the depth of this betrayal to our core values.<br />
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Worse, I am at a loss to explain this to my child, let alone myself. <br />
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What I tell her is a story about someone I knew in college, who was from one of those countries now on the suspect list, and who was also a dear, dear friend and still is. Someone that I would help, would give sanctuary to in a heartbeat, at risk to my own safety if need be. Because it is the right thing to do. I believe very strongly that you choose the light over the darkness, you reach out rather than smack down, you lift up where and when you get the opportunity not for the recognition or the accolades but because it is the right thing to do. <br />
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My friend is not the enemy because of the faith in which s/he was raised. Neither are doctors in our communities, scholars at our universities, or the hundreds of other Muslims that I know or have known over my lifetime, and the hundreds of thousands more that I will never meet. In this country, freedom of religion was so important at our founding that it was enshrined, deliberately and in very precise language:<br />
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<i>First Amendment: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.</i><br />
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We forget this at our peril. We, the people, have allowed terrible injustices in our name over the centuries of our experiment in republican democracy and working toward a more perfect union. Citizenship is hard -- it requires work and patience, it requires constant participation and vigilance and pushing from the outside on the powerful who have seized hold of power within. <br />
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But it also requires us to look inward, at the ugliness that always lurks just beneath the surface, and every so often bubbles up to the top. The prejudices that our Founders wrote in checks and balances to control and subdue over time.<br />
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We are reverting back to the worst of who we were in our isolationist, divisive past, and will have to re-learn lessons that were already hard won through shameful government actions: Japanese internment, "Irish and Italians need not apply," separate but equal...the list goes on and on and, in our ignorance or, even worse, our malice, we fail to heed the echo and warnings of our past transgressions.<br />
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Worse, we are now using one religion as a justification for discrimination against others on religious grounds. I'll allow Jesus Christ the floor on what he thinks of this as a justification, in Matthew 25:31-46. Here is the pertinent excerpt:<br />
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<i>“...Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, and feed you; or thirsty, and give you a drink? When did we see you as a stranger, and take you in; or naked, and clothe you? When did we see you sick, or in prison, and come to you?’ </i><br />
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<i> “The King will answer them, ‘Most certainly I tell you, because you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ Then he will say also to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you didn’t give me food to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink; I was a stranger, and you didn’t take me in; naked, and you didn’t clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you didn’t visit me.’ </i><br />
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<i> “Then they will also answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and didn’t help you?’ </i><br />
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<i> “Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Most certainly I tell you, because you didn’t do it to one of the least of these, you didn’t do it to me.’ These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”</i><br />
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Pretty clear where Christ stood on the whole question of helping those that need help, isn't it? Don't exactly see a signpost in there that says "Christians only need apply," do you? No religious purity test or nationality test written in there.<br />
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What do you think he would feel about people using his name as a justification to discriminate? The Golden Rule and the "least of these, my brethren" have been guideposts for me my entire life, because my grandfather - who was a Methodist minister for 50 years - instilled these values in me from the time that I was young. Not as a duty or a burden to bear, but because they were a gift that you could give to others, and thereby to yourself and to the further glory of God. <br />
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To use Christ as justification for discrimination or as a test of who can or cannot receive mercy and sanctuary is so wrong. Shameful and wrong.<br />
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What some of you may not know is that I have switched teaching hats in the last few months, and am no longer at the elementary school library that I still love so much. A new opportunity to teach subjects that I dearly love opened up, and the switch seemed like the right thing to do to help out our school community.<br />
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Currently, I'm teaching high school students in the 9th through 12th grades about the following: <br />
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-- early US history: from our founding to 1900<br />
-- 20th/21st century US history<br />
-- world history<br />
-- civics<br />
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Anyone who has known me for a while understands how giddy it makes me just to type the subjects, let alone dip my toe into teaching the subject matter. This has been my life's work of study and thought, what I have argued, debated, contemplated, written about and worked in and around for most of my thinking life. <br />
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Lately, I've been praying that everything that I have been taught and think and believe about checks and balances and our nation's core beliefs will hold fast. But this morning, I have doubts.<br />
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Since I began in this post in mid-October, we've done a lot of work on early US history, the reasons behind freedom of religion and speech being so important to our founders, and the language and meaning of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. In modern US history, we've spent a lot of time on immigrants, the back and forth between business and labor, and competing views of Social Darwinism and Progressivism. In civics, we've covered a fairly broad range on our own government and the checks and balances that are supposed to be built into the system.<br />
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My prayer today is that my America, the one that shines out as an example of the best of what we could be, my more perfect union, will re-assert itself. It will take all of us working together, standing up to say "this goes too far."<br />
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Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., said one of my favorite quotes during the Civil Rights era, a maxim which has guided my life's work: "A time comes when silence is betrayal."<br />
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My fellow Americans, that time is now.<br />
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<i>(Photo by Christy Hardin Smith, of the flag given to my husband at his father's funeral with military honors a few years ago. We do patriotism in our family, but we do it with our eyes wide open.)</i><br />
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<br />Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-39021870551566592382017-01-02T10:45:00.001-05:002017-01-02T10:45:21.209-05:00Resolutions?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Every new year, I come up with these lofty goals that get lost in the day to day shuffle and the working grind as the year whizzes by me at the speed of light. Then at the end of the year, I begin to look back and realize how little was accomplished of my goals from the beginning of the year's resolutions.<br />
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Very frustrating way to keep spinning on the hamster wheel, I must say, and not exactly confidence inspiring for this year's goals, either.<br />
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2016 was especially challenging for a variety of reasons. We were incredibly busy, for one thing, because The Peanut's activity and extra lessons schedule has become crazy busy all on its own. When you throw in work-related challenges and changes, including me beginning to teach multiple US history, world history and civics classes at the high school this year...and it makes for a LOT of work and very little time around the edges for healthy cooking or even for contemplation.<br />
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2017 doesn't look like it will slow down any time soon, either. <br />
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Which leads us to this fork in the road: either I spend some time over the next couple of days planning and paring down my strategy to something workable on a daily basis, prioritizing healthy foods in the house and making contingency plans for days when cooking is impossible or I resign myself to being unhealthy, overweight, and increasingly miserable in my own body.<br />
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Yep, planning smarter it is.<br />
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This year, I have small, daily goals: get some exercise every single day, make good food choices with every bite that I put into my mouth -- especially more veggies and fruit and as few processed bits as I can make happen - and carve out some time for contemplation, self-care and general de-stressing of some sort. <br />
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If at the end of any given week, I can look back and say I managed this 5 days or more out of 7? Then I'll consider that a win.<br />
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The next couple of hours, at least, will be devoted to some food planning for this week. Whole and healthy foods, here we come...<br />
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<i>(Photo of sunrise over the Grand Canyon's south rim by Christy Hardin Smith.)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-31680021999187416372016-11-22T09:27:00.003-05:002016-11-22T09:28:59.798-05:00Thanksgiving Planning and Recipes<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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NOTE: I have had more than one person say to me in recent days that they are dreading Thanksgiving dinner because they fear the political in-fighting among various relatives, and that the residual bad-feelings from our collective election hangover will rear their ugly head around the dinner table. While I can't relieve the stress of family angst, I can help alleviate the panic mode of food preparation just a wee bit. What follows is my schedule for pretty much all holiday dining -- just substitute a ham or a prime rib or some other main dish for other holidays, and this schedule still works out well.<br />
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Have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family and friends. One way that I alleviate stress at the holidays is to manage things through planning. Another good way is to put out a lovely bowl and some slips of paper, and have your guests write things that they are thankful for on the slips and place them in the bowl. After the main meal, but before dessert, read these out loud. If you are still experiencing election hangover, put up a sign that says "please leave your politics at the door -- all sides, this means you!" and at least get a giggle out of it. Focus on your gratitude. It really does help. That and a whole lot of wine...<br />
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It occurred to me this morning that planning for a Thanksgiving dinner can be overwhelming when you haven't had to plan things out before. Especially when it is the first major holiday meal you've ever had to make for your family.<br />
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I remember that overwhelmed feeling very well the first year I cooked the bulk of the meal.<br />
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What I've learned through the years is that there is no substitute for planning. And that dishes you can make in advance are your very best friends.<br />
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To that end, I thought I'd throw together some links and some information for folks, as well as an idea of how I line out my week on a day by day basis:<br />
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-- Here's my cooking schedule for the rest of the week:<br />
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<u><b>Monday</b></u>: The Peanut and I will finish decorating and cleaning the house. I've started cooking 3 days ahead, but that's really too early. So use this day to get last minute groceries, get the rest of the house fairly clean for guests, and make certain you have plenty of extra napkins and such. If you are going to the store this week, do it as early in the morning as possible, or as late at night as you can - fewer crowds means a saner shopping experience.<br />
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<u><b>Tuesday</b></u>: This is where things start cooking this week. I'll start by making <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/great-turkey-stock-recipe.html">my turkey stock</a> as early as possible today, that way it can simmer in the crockpot for most of the day and all that glorious flavor develops. It really and truly is <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">the best turkey stock ever from your crockpot</a>, and your stuffing recipe and gravy-making will thank you for the boost in amazing flavor. <br />
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I'll also make <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">Granny's cranberry orange salad</a>, so it has time for the flavors to really meld together (and so I can sneak bites of it for the next two days -- woot!).<br />
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I also make an herb butter that gets placed between the skin and the breast of the turkey to baste the meat as the turkey bakes. To start, place a stick of butter into a ziploc freezer baggie, seal it completely and leave it out on the counter for a while to soften, usually this takes an hour or two. Then, when the butter is softened, I finely chop the following: some fresh parsley, thyme, chives, sage and a little but of rosemary. I add some minced garlic and a little <a href="http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeyspoultryseas.html">Penzey's poultry seasoning</a> as well. Open the baggie, pour in the herbs and garlic, then reseal completely; mush it altogether to combine well, then pop the butter baggie into the fridge. As it cools a bit, try to get all the butter into a "log" so it's pretty much altogether in an easy-to-slice cylinder. <br />
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<u><b>Wednesday</b></u>: Early in the morning, I chop the fresh herbs, onions, celery and carrots in the food processor until they are mostly minced. Then they get sauteed in some extra virgin olive oil and butter until they soften, and <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/stuffing-for-holidays.html">the sage and herb stuffing</a> gets assembled up to the point where it goes in the oven. I cover it tightly with foil, and it gets to sit in the fridge until tomorrow when it bakes along with the turkey for a bit. I have found that by assembling the stuffing the day before, I not only save myself a lot of time on Thursday, but the flavor of all the herbs and veggies infuses the entire stuffing so much better. I also cook up the potatoes for the make-ahead mashed potatoes and the sweet potatoes for the praline-topped sweet potato casserole. Then, I'm mostly ready to go for Thursday.<br />
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Remember that herb butter? All you have to do is slice into thin slices, work the skin of the turkey away from the meat (but very gently so that you don't rip the skin away from the turkey), and then slip those slices down between the skin and meat. Be careful and very gentle as you do this so you don't rip the skin -- you'll be rewarded with some seriously juicy turkey breast meat. I pop the turkey into the roasting pan,and wrap the top up in foil for the morning -- or pop the lid on the roaster, but it depends on which shelf I have available in the fridge for the height of the roaster or foil.<br />
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I sit down at this point and try to come up with a "to do" list for Thursday that times when things need to go in the oven or crockpots, so that each food is warm and ready to serve around the same time, taking into account the 20 minutes the turkey has to rest, etc. -- having this list with times figured out makes the difference between chaos and sanity for me, I have found. Try it and see.<br />
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Then, I try to get to bed relatively early, because a tired and cranky mom makes for a tired and cranky Thanksgiving.<br />
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<u><b>Thursday (Thanksgiving)</b></u>: This used to start with the ham getting popped into the crockpot for a Honey-Baked ham clone recipe. For convenience sake last year, I bought a honey-baked ham from the store and it was easy and delicious (if not ridiculously overpriced!), so we will likely go with that again this year just because I'm crunched for time due to girls basketball practices and other commitments. Survival has to come first during the holidays -- if we learned nothing else from the last few years of cancer surgeries and treatment, it is that. If I am making sweet potato casserole, it will also get popped into a second crockpot at some point this morning.<br />
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The turkey gets oiled, herbed up and baked. I like to stuff my turkey with a quartered onion, a quartered lemon and some fresh herbs -- usually parsley, sage and thyme -- and sometimes a few cloves of garlic. Then I bake it in a roaster with a lid, with a little water around it -- it comes out nice and moist. Sometimes I use sticky chicken spices, sometimes I just use poultry seasoning spices (which is this year's plan).<br />
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Later, the stuffing gets baked as well. And, eventually, the mashed potatoes get reheated. At some point, relatives arrive with pies, green beans and assorted other dishes.<br />
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Then? We eat.<br />
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The things on my plate that I can't quite control? There are lots:<br />
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-- I used to purchase my turkey frozen, several days in advance, giving it <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/thaw#one">1 day of thawing time per every 4 pounds of turkey</a> in accordance with the guidelines they publish every year on <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/turkey-experts/overview">the Butterball hotline page</a>.<br />
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The problem is that they never really thaw well in there, and I always end up having to pop the turkey into sink with a water bath the night before in a panic that it won't fully thaw. Somehow, the miracle always happens that it is fine the next day -- but it nonetheless drives me nuts up to and including the moment I stick it in the oven to begin baking, because I just know there is some frozen part in there that won't fully cook and someone will go home with food poisoning...but no one ever does, because I always test with a meat thermometer to make sure we've reached the critical temperature on the meatiest point of the thigh: <a href="http://www.butterball.com/tips-how-tos/how-tos/know-when-your-turkey-is-done">180 degrees F</a>.<br />
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A couple of years ago, I ordered a fresh turkey to be picked up on Wednesday, so that my fridge could stay relatively clear of giant turkey until the day before the meal. It was a revelation: life is much easier when you keep your turkey in the store fridge, and you don't have to panic about will it or won't it thaw. We've done this every year since then, and it is truly worth some consideration if you have similar issues. You pay a little more for it, but I get a fresh, organic, delicious turkey that cooks evenly due to no frozen spots in the center, and that makes me a much happier cook.<br />
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-- I try very hard to get all of my ham and glaze ingredients, stuffing ingredients, sweet potatoes, regular potatoes, and cranberry salad ingredients well in advance. I pick up my turkey the day before and use that trip to the store to snag any extra items that I've forgotten along the way - otherwise, I avoid the grocery store like the plague. The store is insane this time of year -- if you don't have your groceries yet, do not panic. But try to shop early in the morning or really, really late at night to avoid having your foot run over by someone else's cart. (which has happened to me, and the person didn't even apologize...sigh...that person is so getting coal in her stocking).<br />
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But I just know I've forgotten something important. And it is nagging at me, because that means I'll be running out in a panic into shopping hell this week to get it if and when I finally remember whatever in the heck it is. <br />
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One of these years? I'm going to make a master list. (But, alas, I'll probably just promptly lose it. lol)<br />
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Some helpful posts from prior years:<br />
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-- <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2013/11/thanksgiving-basics-turkey-stock.html">Thanksgiving tidbits and recipes</a><br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/cooking-yummy-thanksgiving-turkey.html">Here are some tips on turkey prep and baking</a>. One thing that I tried last year and loved was <a href="http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/dry-brine/?pkey=cthanksgiving-food&cm_src=thanksgiving-food||NoFacet-_-NoFacet-_--_-">a dry brine from Williams-Sonoma</a>: I put it on my turkey the night before, rinsed it off a bit the next morning, placed sliced compound butter under the skin of the breast really gently and then stuffed it with cut-up lemons and onions and herbs just like I always do. I use a covered roaster and I swear last year's turkey was the best one I have ever tasted.<br />
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I'll be repeating that again this year. Yummy.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2012/11/countdown-to-turkey-day-make-ahead.html">Make-ahead recipes are also a life saver</a>. I do my stuffing ahead, so all I have to do is pop it in the over to bake along with the turkey. <br />
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An essential part of that stuffing? <a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/11/best-turkey-stock-everfrom-your.html">Rich turkey stock: I make mine in my crockpot a day ahead, and it is delicious and perfect for stuffing and gravy.</a> Make enough for both and you'll be hooked, too.<br />
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<a href="http://homecelebration.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-and-holiday-recipes.html">My Granny's cranberry salad recipe</a>? An absolute must. No holiday meal is complete without it.<br />
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Also, if you need an easy idea for breakfast on Turkey Day, look no further than <a href="http://www.homecelebration.blogspot.com/2011/12/awesome-christmas-morning-cinnamon.html">these easy overnight cinnamon rolls</a>. We usually make them for Christmas morning, too, because they can rise overnight and then get popped in the oven while we open our presents. But they work equally well for Thanksgiving morning, when the last thing the cook wants to do is to have to make a full meal before she has to make a full meal. Enjoy!<br />
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<i>(Photo <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/aidanmorgan/6425497833/in/photolist-aMNmDp-7k8xvP-t5Trg-Az6F7e-pwG9jf-q6SD9Y-qdXKpX-pVYEBL-pgv6uP-hFuUE7-dx4VrD-dvgCjj-drQxD7-5EJA2R-sTFK5-gaK3n-pVYLho-pVYLh3-pVYLeh-hUYAH8-7zpbnv-7izyWw-7hpJ9k-5EEKsk-AsAbKF-qcK6BV-qfW75h-qb9yBw-pVDXgU-hViJep-hTHQ2G-dvarGb-48pXDX-99dMd-uzGzat-pMazgk-qiv7Fe-hVKW8J-hLsh9W-gECBfJ-dvdH5M-ayX2S7-qaBhHH-q77WT4-qfMVek-aug6ac-4aEL8V-49C1Yg-qdjru9-hTpNy7">via John Morgan</a>. Gorgeous color!)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-34069190350991779902016-09-11T09:30:00.001-04:002016-11-02T17:00:16.359-04:00In Memory, 9/11: How Fragile We Are<iframe width="425" height="239" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ubWucJtio0M" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe><br />
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May the memory of all those lost and injured, of the civilians going about their everyday lives and all of the heroes who stepped up and stepped into the breach to save them...may their memories all stay dear in our hearts and often in our prayers. <br />
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Life is fleeting. Live yours to the fullest and use it wisely. Be a good friend, reach out to someone in need, give hope to someone feeling lost. Find a way to give back a little in memory of all of those we have lost on 9/11, and all those lost in the wake of that fateful day. Honor their memory by bringing something good into the world.<br />
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Never forget how fragile we truly are.Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-17827341043816803432016-07-14T12:40:00.000-04:002016-07-14T12:40:06.792-04:00Loving This<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="239" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/33g-ZHBQdNU" width="425"></iframe><br />
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This is the latest trailer for "Loving," which opens late in the year just in time for Oscar consideration season. If this was all we ever saw of the movie, it would be a powerful statement of how far we have come, and how we constantly have to fight not to go backwards again, because we still...still in 2016...have a long way to go.<br />
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Fifty years ago in this country, it would have been illegal for a white American to marry a black American in far too many places in this country.<br />
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The Loving case was initially filed in their home state of Virginia, but it could have been filed in any number of places all over the nation, mostly places below the Mason-Dixon line, but not all of the states who had anti-miscigenation laws were in the deep South. In some states, in the backwoods bayous and farmlands far away from the looseness of the city folks, this is still looked at sideways and with disrespect.<br />
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Fifty years ago: think about how many friends and neighbors would have been potentially subject to arrest and persecution under cover of state law for daring to love someone of a different color. For a lot of us, that seems sad and ridiculous and completely illogical from our perch in 2016, knowing so many loving couples who fit that description and have done for years. <br />
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But for far too many in this country, they still feel that this is wrong. And in this nasty brew of a political season, these festering folks are starting to crawl out of the woodwork and point the finger of shame from their small-minded corners. For some people, the 1950s were a golden era of "values."<br />
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But they certainly weren't "Loving" values for all Americans, now were they?<br />
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This movie is being released in a political season that is desperate for real, honest, compassionate, factual conversation, at a time when listening to someone else's point of view or standing in the shoes of someone different from one's own is a lost art in public discourse. In my opinion, this movie could not have come along at a better time.<br />
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You love who you love - it is the soul within that calls to your own, and the outside package is just the window dressing. That's always been my thought on this, and it is what we teach our daughter. But that isn't the case for everyone, now is it? Some of us mouth the words in public, but think something else entirely in the silence of our hearts, even if we aren't flying a confederate flag in our truck beds to announce those thoughts to the entire world like some of the redneck yahoos do in my town.<br />
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To say that I can't wait to see this movie would take it too far, for I know there will be difficult scenes aplenty. But we should all go to see this, to think about who we are as individuals and as a nation, and where we ought to be going, to hold a mirror up to our own reflections and find what work needs to be done.<br />
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We need to give our nation a long, hard look a lot more often. From the looks of this trailer for "Loving," this could certainly be a conversation starter on an issue that needs a lot more thoughtful discussion. Bravo.<br />
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<br />Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-403686469369759261.post-81203869849352171402016-07-11T12:12:00.002-04:002016-07-11T12:12:32.608-04:00Being An Adult Is The Worst Sometimes<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DDUrcuOGwxA/UslvfoeoeSI/AAAAAAAACu8/8t0HasVkr-cojHj8AHGi0kvmWdc7Zv2vwCKgB/s1600/giraffetongue.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DDUrcuOGwxA/UslvfoeoeSI/AAAAAAAACu8/8t0HasVkr-cojHj8AHGi0kvmWdc7Zv2vwCKgB/s1600/giraffetongue.JPG" /></a></div>
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My to do list is a bazillion miles long today, but all I can think about is playing hooky. Being an adult can be so hard sometimes, can't it?<br />
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What do I want most to do at the moment? Color and take a nap.<br />
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It's summertime, and I may be reverting to my childhood pastimes. Is that so wrong?<br />
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Come and play, everything's a-okay: the Sesame Street lifestyle is calling my name.<br />
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Maybe after I get the fridge cleaned out...<br />
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<i>(Photo by Christy Hardin Smith.)</i>Christy Hardin Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12533664308954913961noreply@blogger.com0