Wishing you and your family a very blessed Christmas and a warm, bright, and healthy New Year.

I am so thankful that I am here to celebrate it with family and friends. We have much to be grateful for because, as you know, things looked a lot different for us/me a year ago.

Michael and Andrea are doing well in their teaching career. Michael is still in Istanbul,  and Andrea and her family will be celebrating Christmas at their home in Winnipeg. I will blog about them soon.

I was reminiscing again...

Christmas in Buenos Aires     

Growing up in Buenos Aires, I remember the number of times that we attended a Christmas Eve program by the number of fancy dresses that my mother sewed for me. And that would be two. Both made of chiffon and gathered at the waist. 

The first one I remember was light pink with tiny white embossed dots, normal round neck line and puffy sleeves. The elastic on my left sleeve was too tight and irritated me greatly. After the program, and much to my relief, I “accidentally” managed to sever the elastic. To this day I still strongly believe: If something bothers you, "fix it.”

 The following Christmas my dress was white, with a multitude of multicolored 5 cm. square patterns scattered here, there, and everywhere,  each square decreasing in size as it cascaded down in an arch. The neckline was square, and the sleeves were straight and short--nothing to “fix” this time. I remember walking home, after the Christmas program, feeling like a princess. A very hot princess indeed!  It was December 24, and the weather was hot and humid. 

Once we got home, I was finally allowed into the darkened living room to admire the lit Christmas tree. Yes, we had real candles and each candle had been carefully attached with a clip to a strong branch. Our tree was our very own “home grown” Christmas  tree.

For a number of years we would bring our potted Christmas tree into the living room, and each year it grew a little taller, until one year it grew THIS tall! 

          

I took this photograph in 2006 when Peter and I went to visit my brother Juan, and his wife Marta, in Buenos Aires, after not having been back in thirty-one years.

Some of my catholic friends went to church every Sunday. They would get all dressed up and returned each time with a 4x6 cm. picture card. On it was a beautiful icon painting and a Bible verse for the week. I thought they were so lucky...I loved the pictures. 

One day, I asked Renate Kaethler, or she asked me, I don’t remember who asked whom, you know how unreliable the little details of our memory can be, if I could go with her to church. Renate lived three houses over, and was much older than me––all of three years. I was almost 9 years old. I wanted to go because I was curious and because it gave me something to do on Sundays. She, on the other hand, went because she wanted to grow in her faith, and as I found out from observation, because she was interested in one of minister Martin Derksen’s sons. Not sure which was the stronger reason for going to church. 

Sunday mornings, Renate and I would walk down our street, for about two kilometres, and wait at the train station for the right train to come by. We chugged along till we got to our destination. Once we got off we walked a couple of blocks to the Mennonite church. And so the service began. After the usual preliminaries an offering basket was passed around with pesos in it to which I promptly helped myself to, and to my dismay was told by some very excited children to put it back.  “You have to give, not take.” Well, that was a rotten deal! 

The singing part I really enjoyed.  We were accompanied by the piano and sang along as the blond lady upfront with the old fashioned “schups,” pumped her right hand up and down to the beat of the much beloved Christmas carols: “Stille Nacht (Silent Night); O Tanenbam (O Christmas Tree); Ihr Kinderlein kommet (Little children come); O du froehliche, o du selige (Oh, How Joyfully, Oh, How Peacefully; “Kling Gloeckchen, Klingelingeling!” (ring little bell, ringalingaling)--this one really got me going!; and Leise rieselt der Schnee, (softly falls the snow). What snow? It was 30˚outside! But still we dreamt of softly falling snow in Canada.
These are some of the carols that stand out in my mind and to this day they still put me in that Christmas spirit.
 Ihr Kinderlein, kommet (O Come Little Children) ICC

 But beside the carols comes the memory of the the flat rectangular tin box of halva that my father would buy around this time of the year, and also the chocolate marzipan bars wrapped in shiny gold paper. After all, what would life be without childhood memories.

Wishing you the best of health,

Hilda

It's Pfefferkuchen Time!

The oven timer is going, ding, ding, ding.

 One baked pan is done and the last pan just went in.

Last year I was too ill to even think about baking for Christmas, and thanks to my good friends, as you may recall, my freezer got filled up. I was going to write: "No such luck this year," but I never want to feel as ill as I felt last year around this time.

Peter and I were looking forward to baking these little delicious 

cookies, called by several names and made close to Christmas season; it's another job we like doing together.

The Low German dictionary describes them as: 

Pfeffernuesse (Gebaeck); sweet cookies with pepper content, hard, pepper-flavored pellet-like cookies, eaten as candy. 

There are many recipes, and I have tried different ones, but today I used Frieda's recipe. She also sent me two photographs taken two years ago of her 3 beautiful helpers. 

Frieda and Werner's grand-daughters from l-r: Nicole, Julia, Krista 

(Gordon & Shelly)

Frieda is Peter's paternal cousin, but through DNA work, I discovered she is also my cousin who knows how far back, and it happened probably somewhere in Molotschna many years ago. 

Pfeffernuesse

Heat and cool  to luke warm--

1 1/2 cups honey

        2 cups of white sugar

1/4 lb lard

1/4 lb butter (margarine)

-----------------

Mix 3 tsp. baking soda in 1/4 cup warm water.

Add 1 cup of whipping cream and mix into the luke warm honey mixture.

Mix well (with  mixer if you have one) other wise it's 'elbow grease'

Measure 7 cups flour into a large bowl

       Plus 1 tsp. cinnamon

                  2 pkgs "Neunerleh"  Lebkuchen spice mix (from the deli on Alexander Ave.) I have even used 3 pkgs - we like the flavour very much)

 1 tsp salt.    

 (stir the flour/spice mix until blended)

Dump the honey/whipping cream  mixture into this large bowl of flour and mix til well blended and dough feels good to handle.  If it is too soft add a little more flour until you like the feel of it.

Should feel like any cookie dough made for rolled out or molded cookies.    Let rest  in fridge overnight -  Next day take portions of the dough and make "snakes." Put them on cookie sheets lined with parchment and put into the freezer for a few hours.  Then remove one sheet at a time, cut into 1/4 inch slices on a bread board and put on cookie sheets (greased/or parchment lined) and bake at 325º until done.  They burn easily so check them after 10 minutes by turning one over. If the bottom is brown-ish then they're done - the tops are just golden not brown.  Dump them on the counter to cool. Make a cup of coffee, sit down and have a dozen or so.    Enjoy

(hope this works out for you - sounds complicated but isn't - sure are good tho. )

First you mix...

then you...I flattened the dough to cool it off faster in the fridge.
Then you...Oops!
I forgot to take a photograph of the "snakes!"
You will have to use your imagination.
Or I'll quickly...

After the "snakes" have been in the freezer for a few hours

 (or...as in my case, for a day or two because Peter and I attended a very informative all day genealogy workshop in Abbotsford) they are sliced and now are...

 ready for the oven and...

 Ready to eat!

Before Peter and I started to bake them, I was wondering,

 "What is the origin of these little peppernut cookies?" 

This is what I found on the computer when I googled my question:

(from Emily's View) 

 Where did the recipe come from? How long has this delightful Christmas cookie been handed down?

Again, I turn to the book  Mennonite Foods & Folkways from South Russia by Norma Jost Voth - Old recipes frequently called for black pepper. Used in cautious amounts - pepper blends quietly and enhances the other spices. In medieval times, ginger and pepper were used together. The basic ingredients - honey, eggs and flour - were made for centuries. When trade routes opened across Europe in the 14th century -spices from distant lands came to Germany and France and created a baking revolution. During the Middle Ages, a pound of ginger would buy a sheep. Pepper was the most coveted of all spices. In medieval France, a pound of pepper could buy a serf his freedom. Pfeffer means spices Thus came the names of Pfefferkuchen (pepper cookies) and Pfeffernusse. Papanat (pay-pah-nayt) was the low dutch word, and the word I learned as a child.

There is more history in this book, that declares that Hillsboro, is the Peppernut Capital of Kansas. 267,000 are prepared each day. Four kinds were made - raisin, nut, gumdrop and anise. As a child, Mom had the three of us roll 'snakes' of dough, cut with a knife in small pieces, and then place in a pan for baking.There are approximately 30 recipes for peppernuts from Swedish, Danish connection, Dutch, Danzig, Friedrichstadter (made for Duke Frederick), German and Russian types of Peppernuts

They are addictive!

 They just keep pop, pop, popping into your mouth!

Love,

Hilda

Walking Along...

Yes, I am so happy that I am able to walk again. I started at the end of last month (Sep.) and guess what, we walked 10 km. today. I still can't see with my right eye, but at least I can walk.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood...,

Then took the other, as just as fair.

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black

--Robert Frost

We passed the golf course. Looks awfully empty today.

Peter is reading information about paragliding. But I see a white chair, and if you have time and care to read
what we did last Sunday...:

Walking to the Ranchers Restaurant                      

On Sunday, Oct. 19, 2014, Peter and I walked to the Ranchers Restaurant for a late breakfast. I didn’t feel like being in church with a sore and inflamed eye. The distance is 3.5 km. from home which we hadn’t walked for a couple of years; by car many times before. But the feeling inside me that I could do this by walking was strong in me and so we set out. This was huge for me.

It was a lovely morning even though it looked as if the clouds could let loose at any time and out would’ve come my umbrella. In the distance we could see that we were not the only ones walking, for up ahead we could see a lone figure slowly walking, perhaps also enjoying the day.

On the way back we again passed the spot where the paragliders land in the summer time. We turned to see who had addressed us. It was a native, perhaps in his 40s, who probably had been sitting there when we walked past him earlier on our way to the restaurant. He asked if we knew when the paragliders would be come down. 

“On Sundays, between noon and five o’clock” I said, and added, for the sake of a bit more information, “We have been up there before.” We had driven there with my Land Rover after Peter had talked to one of the instructors. The way up had been steep and full of pot holes with branches slapping the sides of my poor Land Rover. What a lovely way to initiate the vehicle!

“Too cold now,” Peter commented.

The native jumped off the white plastic chair he had been sitting on, and waddling over he walked along with us.

Peter told him a bit of what we had gone through. He then shared about his brain aneurism, the time he spent in hospital recuperating and recovering from his drug addiction. Once he was home, his girlfriend had reamed him out for smoking, and so he had quit that as well. 

We came to the roundabout where we parted ways, and we realized once again that each person we meet has his own story to tell. 

*******

I haven't driven nor cycled for over a year and walking feels SO good. And we walked on and on.

My blood test was good last week. I hope it stays that way for a long, long time. My right eye...? They may have to do an eye biopsy next Tuesday to see what is going on.

Take good care,

Hilda

:

De-cluttering

     Thank you, Albert and Margarita, for the lovely orchids. They look fantastisch on my window sill.

I hate to say this, but autumn will soon be around the corner, and it’s almost time to bring out our winter clothes. This year, I have given a lot of my clothes, etc., away to MCC and to thrift stores. 

I gave away clothes that no longer worked for me.

 Clothes that I no longer liked, were way out of style, too old, or no longer fit. Sad to say, with time...

our bodies change.

 I know that there is much work left to be done in me and in my not so big clothes closet, but I would like to get to the point where I don’t have to stand in front of my clothes each day and debate on what to wear.

 I joke around with Peter, by saying, 

“I want to be just like you: Five shirts is all I need.” 

I believe there is a certain “freedom” that comes with having less in my closet, and... 

in our home in general. 

It’s time to de-clutter, fix what is broken and paint what needs painting. 

Poor Peter, I am sure he is happy to be back at work. 

I will keep working at it, and quickly, or not so quickly, walk past the window shops... 

Wish me luck...!

From my grandmother I learned,

 “You needed one dress for the week and one dress for Sunday.” 

Hard to believe that they had an estate in Russia.

Germany-1930. Each person represents the head of the household before leaving for Paraguay. She immigrated with nine children; the youngest, Erna, was 11.

                      From my mother I learned, 

“Kleider machen Leute” (clothes make the man/person).

Buenos Aires, Argentina-1944?

 Johann Janzen (my father), Katja (my mother) Juan (my brother), Erica (my sister). Five years later, I came along. 

It took a long time to bake me!

                                           From my mother-in-law I learned, 

             “The poor need it more.”

  Olga Funk Goertzen, in our back yard--circa 2002.

       I wonder... What I am passing on?

One of these days I will attack my linen closet. I see too many towels and too many unnecessary/mismatched bed sheets, etc.

Happy "de-cluttering,"

Hilda

Family Fun

This part is not fun, but here is an update:

•My fingers are tingling and my toes are a buzzing (from chemo). Very annoying. I hope eventually that feeling will disappear. 

•My dates for cataract surgery: Sep. 17 and Oct.1

•Now, if only I could get rid of this miserable cold...Yes, I did see the doctor.

 How wonderful are these?! Thank you so much for the lovely bouquet to whoever left these at our front door. 

Much appreciated!

Foxgloves come up everywhere...if you let them.

 Climbing hydrangeas

My love, prayers, thoughts (and roses) go out to you who are not doing too well--health wise. 

Don't be discouraged. 

 Michael's plant since grade 6? He is 38 years old now. 

 This summer it had 8 blooms instead of 1.

 Zachary, Caleb, Michael. 

What! Another movie!

 Time to play Hide'n Go Seek. 

Caleb counting to 50 in French. Looks like he's in pain!

Andrea, still looking...

 Amazing! The places you can find to hide on a 1/3 of an acre.

Even if it means lying flat on the ground and hiding among the spider webs!  

Zachary. Just a little rest will do...

A picnic at Harrison.

Hilda, Michael, Andrea, Tony Klassen (nephew). 

In the water: Linda Klassen with Emma, Leah, Julia,

 Zachary and Caleb.

Nasturtiums growing in our garden because my mother (Katja Janzen Janzen Janzen) grew them and so did Peter's grandma (Anna Braun Funk).

Michael. 

"Lunch time!"

Corn from the green and yellow barn. Very good!

Take good care.

Love,

Hilda

"Everything that is done in the world is done by hope." — Martin Luther 

Radiation (:

Well, I am done!...for a while...and yes, the two radiation treatments went well, and...I am feeling fine. 

You can't imagine how good that feels, and a lot of you can. 

We all have our journeys, and hopefully we can be there for

 each other.

Thanks for your friendship, love and prayers, etc.

I still have doctor's appointments, blood tests and 

CT scans coming up...

and for now, I will keep "glowing in the dark" from all the x-rays, radiations and CT scans.   

***

The rains fell very softly early this morning, and so with my camera hanging from my neck--I looked around first to see if the neighbours where still fast asleep--I started to snap a few. I think I could have made a good picture too, walking around in my light turquoise housecoat and beige baseball cap!

And these are the ones I took:

 Campanula "Bellflower Dalmation" 

We have had these Campanulas for 17 years. 

Just the right spot. They like it on the shady side.

Peter is up, dressed, and ready to go!...transplanting the basil plant into a bigger pot. 

They need room to wiggle their roots.

Basil--smile when you say the word basil--is full of fragrance, flavour, but hard to grow (for me). So, this year, I have it sitting on the railing of our deck. 

"High, dry and well watered"

The forecast is rain for the next 6 days! 

I may even take it along camping, and not just to pamper it, but to use a bit in our salad or chopped (torn up, if you like)

 and sprinkled over a tomato sandwich. It's the best!

The tomatoes are ready in the greenhouses, and I must say,

 they taste pretty good! 

The other herb is the Sorrel plant used for making Sorrel soup.

I believe, our ancestors must have had a lot of sorrel growing in their garden and for sure in the fields... 

It's a great soup, especially if someone else makes it for you (: 

and is able to take instructions (:(:

Actually, Peter likes cooking more so now then ever before.

Here is my version--for today: 

Sorrel Soup

5 cups of water

1 vegetable or chicken bouillon

1/2 a cup of sauteed onions, sauteed--optional 

but milder than raw

 1 bay leaf

3 med. sized potatoes, diced

Cook this up, and add:

3 cups of sorrel, chopped

2 cups of beet tops (if you have some)

A few sprigs of parsley, chopped

A few sprigs of dill, chopped

Salt and pepper, to taste.

If you like the soup smoother, you can use a hand blender--that's what we did. 

There is that word "we" again...! 

Have you noticed that as we age we use we more and more!

And, to continue with the soup recipe, no, I did not forget the ham with bone, or the cream in it. Each to their own. 

It's a nice rich red colour because of the beets (:

To your health!

Enjoy!

Hilda

To de dump...

Hello, again...

 I have to share some of the photos I took today:

 Wisteria

 Golden Chain Tree

 Rhododendrons, a Maple Tree that grew from seed and the Golden Chain Tree

 Rhododendrons and a log we found at the edge of Harrison Lake many years ago. We dragged the drift wood across the sand and into our car trunk. Oops! Can't do that now. 

 Sure, sure, some don't care if it's their front profile...

 ...while others make sure it's their side profile (:

Oh, yes, shoes from Payton and Buckle (: (: Very comfy.

Irises

Even the Buttercups look lovely!

 Azaleas 

   Rhododendrons. That's right. And if you still don't know how to spell Rhododendron, well...then, just copy and paste! Like I did! 

And then it was time to go to the Bailey dump with our load, Bill's load and Bill's truck. Hey, no way I want to get my truck dirty...

 We have arrived...

   Perhaps I could find a freezer here...mine is about as old as these.

 Today was a very busy day here. This guy will show us where to go...?

 Guess who is doing all the work?

If you look far, you will know where the crows go--when they are not at our place or yours.

 They give you a card like this just in case you get lost (: Actually it identifies our vehicle which is weighed on the way in and out.

Time to go home now...we are done.

 As you may know, I love old barns and... 

 ...not so old

 What a beautiful time of the year...

 Close to our place

  And, here is Rita Oosterlaar. She loves gardening even if her back hurts. She tripped on an inside carpet and fell backwards. Her doctors advice: Get rid of those carpets!

I am still working at getting my iron intake, and a whole box of spinach should do...you'd think.

Those green clops that you see in the frying pan, we call them "frogs"

Here is the recipe:

1 small box of Spinach--steamed, cooled, drained

Add:

1 egg

1/4 cup bread crumbs
1/4 tsp. onion powder

Chop the herbs. 

(I add as much as I like). 

2 T. dill 

      2 T. parsley 

    2 T. chives 

Wishing you a wonderful evening (:

Hilda