Frosted Memories

Christmas has always been a very special time for me. There is something about the shining lights, the decorating, and the baking that reminds me of how faith, family, and love intertwines to bless the house with joy. 

One feature of my new house that brings family and friends together is my kitchen with its huge space. It is here that I spent much time preparing the annual cookie bundles this year. I dabbled with different flavors and types of cookies but saved some time for the traditional sugar cookie making. First, I needed to find the cookie cutters that hold years of memories. Next, icing was needed so I searched the internet to find a delicious peppermint icing,  Sprinkles were needed after several attempts to cut out the cookies. This process brought me back to memories of baking cookies with my mother. As an artist, she easily decorated her cookies with different types of nibs. No matter how hard I tried, I could not create a design like hers but I heard on TV that a cookie's decoration did not need to be perfect. All you need to do is have fun. 

When I opened the sugar cookie container on Christmas, my granddaughter, Sierra, quietly snuck up next to me, peeked into the cookie container, and softly said.

"Grandma, you make beautiful cookies." 

After that sweet statement, my heart leaped for joy. I knew that my kitchen would be the place where baking happens with the little grandgirls and new memories would be born. 

Try a cookie. 

Make your own.

Enjoy the art of baking that brings 

loved ones together in a special place.

Baking Steps

in the kitchen

gather to bake

decorate with care

taste the cookies

frosted with sweetness

remember Christmases past

smile with love

compliment your efforts

bake another batch

©CV, 2021

🎄🍪🍪🍪🎄

"Kitchen. Noun - A gathering place for friends and family. A place where memories are homemade and seasoned with love."

This is my Slice of Life forTwo Writing Teachers. I end with recollections of every bite of Christmas cookies I taste-tested this holiday.

Organizing My New Kitchen

Today is devoted to organizing my new kitchen. Actually, it is a reorganization because the first plan did not work as well as I would like. It takes time and perseverance to complete this task since I have quite a bit of space. 

-disorganization phase prior to writing this blog-

Actually, I am perplexed. I see bottles of spices for cooking, another set for baking, and lots of clutter. I unpack another box and find my old cookbooks. While I use the internet for many recipes I also want to do due diligence to my old tried and true recipes in the cookbooks. I peruse the cabinets in the perimeter around the appliances and the drawers under the eight foot of center island counter space. Each cabinet needs to be designated for a distinct purpose. So I stand back with wide open cabinets to take a good look at the whole job, sigh, and take on one cabinet at a time. 

Hours later, I am still in the organizing phase but too tired to continue. There is tomorrow to finish my grand plan of making my kitchen one that has fluidity and practicality, a place with warmth reminding me of my former kitchen that always was the hub of the home. I want my kitchen to be a place for conversation, laughter, and joy-a place for my little granddaughters to knead dough, bake cookies with me, and enjoy a licking-the-bowl good time like I did with my Nonnie, and my children did with my mother and me. Perhaps, tomorrow will be the day to sit back and say, "Ah, my kitchen is complete. I can move on to another room to organize. 

There are many more boxes awaiting me. For now, I contemplate on how to make my kitchen a place for loving gatherings with the following quote by Kitchens by Emma Reed in mind.

"Kitchen. Noun - A gathering place for friends and family. A place where memories are homemade and seasoned with love."

Day 23 of March SOLSC! #SOL21 at Two Writing Teachers.

Is your kitchen the gathering place in the home?

Around My Table

"The world begins at a kitchen table."

Joy Harjo, from Perhaps the World Ends Here

While Tropical Storm Isaias raged like a lion last week on Long Island, we spent four days huddled around our kitchen table grateful for hurdling another dark stormy event in our lives. The darkness and sweltering heat surrounding those days left my family and friends breathless, isolated, and far away from reality as we functioned without power, electricity, hot water, and the internet. Little did we know of life outside our neighborhood that was strewn with heavy branches fallen from massive trees. It was the kitchen table that brought us together with electric candles as we talked and began the cleaning-out-the-freezer process. 

I think back on all the years the table served as a hub for family life and am grateful to have found Joy Harjo's poem to ponder. It became a catalyst for me to write using her line, "The world begins at a kitchen table," as a prompt. Her poem is full of the beauty of kitchen life. At the end of October, my family will leave our Long Island home of thirty-eight years for a second chapter of family life. My table memories will fill my life with joy.

We start each day in our hub, the

kitchen, with a revolving world

of conversation. Life begins

with a daily gathering at

dawn where a  

litany of thoughts flow from the kitchen.

Evenings sing of gratitude around our sturdy table,

washed with years of joyful and sorrowful tears.

©CVarsalona, 2020, Long Island

I missed Poetry Friday last week due to the storm but am happy to backtrack and connect with my writing friends. Connections are important in this world during quarantine life because they keep spirits high. Thank you to my poet friend Laura Purdie Salas who was last week's host. She has an original poem and a wonderful, information graphic on "Why aren't you writing a poem?" Although I am late to join the roundup, I feel that this poem needed to be written and sent out.

A new kitchen waits for me here in Virginia.