Monday, May 21, 2000 - Clove Soup and other atrocities

Last Monday night we had the funniest soup you could ever imagine.  It was supposed to be vegetable/beef soup with chili flavoring, but Hannah got a wee bit mixed up and put a healthy dose of cloves in it.  Cloves are on the order of cinnamon; good for sticking into oranges till they look like porcupines and make your house smell yummy; and maybe good in some kinds of cookies, but not in the soup, please.  

“Mama, could you come and taste this soup?” called Hannah.  “I think I put too much something-or-other into it.”

Victoria, standing on a chair beside Hannah watching her stir, turned and looked at me as I walked into the kitchen.  "It used to smell good," she informed me seriously.

It did smell rather odd.  I could almost recognize the scent…  Almost.

I dipped a spoon into it, blew on it, and tasted it.

Bleahhhhhhhhh!!!

I made the worst face I could muster, and, with eyes squinted tight shut, I said, “I do not like it, Sam I Am.”  (a la Dr. Suess’, Green Eggs and Ham)   

Why the littles--and Hannah and Dorcas, too--thought it so side-splittingly hilarious, I do not know.

Hannah recommended I drain the broth out and start over.  “Otherwise,” said she, “it’s still going to taste like cloves; I put quite a bit in.”

But not wanting to waste it all, I first tried to fix it by pouring the whole works into my largest pan and adding several cans of vegetables, a couple of onions, and one more can of tomato soup.  

It still tasted like cloves.

I drained the broth out and started over, adding as many more cans of vegetables as I could find in the cupboard, and another large onion.  Then I put in a gallon of tomato juice, and three-quarters of a box of mashed potato flakes.  

It still tasted (and smelt) of cloves.  Ooooooo, shiver me timbers.  Soup du jour, anyone??

I didn’t even bother putting the leftovers--nearly the entire pan (and the pan is huge)--into the refrigerator when supper was over, for I didn’t think anyone would want Clove soup again.

I guessed wrong.

Tuesday, when Teddy discovered there was no leftover soup for his lunch, he was enormously disappointed.  “You threw it out???” he exclaimed in disbelief.  “I really liked it!”  He stood there, looking quite like a woebegone cocker spaniel.  “And there was so much left!”

Yes, there was.  And why hadn’t he said he liked the awful stuff, if he so did??

At 8:15 Tuesday morning, as I was combing Caleb’s hair, he asked, “Where’s the cookies?”--and that’s when I remembered:  I had promised to bake cookies for Lydia’s and Caleb’s class outing to the park. 

So, as soon as the children headed off to school, I made cookies.  In fact, I got into such a panic that I had them done--all ten dozen of them--in forty-five minutes.  I made oatmeal cookies, using a recipe I once copied from a book I found at the library--Blue Ribbon Recipes.  The recipes are those that have won blue ribbons at local, county, state, and national fairs over a number of years; and, after using a good many of the recipes, it is easy to see why they took the Blue Ribbon, for they are exceptional.

Since I had no vanilla, I used some Hazelnut Syrup sent to me from a friend, along with quite a quantity of various coffees and teas.  Mmmmm, yummy!  They were better than ever.   

The children left for the park at 11:45 a.m., cookies in hand.  I kept enough home (cookies; not children) that our family could have three each, too. 

That day, Hannah went to Lincoln with Norma.  After seeing a chiropractor, they went shopping.  At a Salvation Army, Hannah found the cutest sailor dress--and guess what?  It was my size!  Soooo…I got the dress.  Wheeeee!

Helen Tucker, our fourth- through sixth-grade teacher, treated Hester and a couple of other little girls to a taco lunch Tuesday, because she got a 96% on her Heritage test.  And then we wound up having tacos for supper that night, since it was Taco Tuesday, when tacos are only $.50 each.  Hester likes tacos, so she didn’t mind having them twice.  We all went together to Taco John’s, expecting to collect our tacos and then go eat them at the park.  But bad weather was approaching, and everyone in the entire county of Platte, it seemed, had converged on Taco John’s at once, and we like to never got our tacos. 

We gave up on going to the park and just took them back home. 

Victoria finished her taco and went off to play.  A few minutes later, she came back into the kitchen holding Caleb’s binoculars to her eyes.  “Mama!” she announced, “you’re clear close to me!” 

That night after I gave her a bath, I noticed that she had a nasty hangnail on her thumb.  “Oh, dear!” I exclaimed.  “Doesn’t that hurt?” 

“Yes,” she replied solemnly. 

“Well, let’s go put a Band-aid on it,” I said, taking her hand and walking down the hall. 

“What kind of triple antibiotic will we put on it this time?” she queried.  (We have never had anything but one kind of triple antibiotic, and that’s all we’ve ever called it, silly little girl.) 

As I was putting the Band-aid on her, I said, “It’s really infected.” 

Later, she showed her bandaged thumb to Dorcas.  “It’s really inspected,” she informed her sister gravely. 

Victoria loves to sing.  Sometimes she sings songs we all know, but other times she makes up tunes as she goes along.  She invents words about anything and everything, and she never seems to run out.  The songs almost always have a main theme about Jesus; but she’s liable to switch suddenly to Mary’s Little Lamb or Pop, Goes the Weasel, too.  It’s so funny to listen to her, but we all pretend not to notice a thing, for if she sees that we are listening, and trying not to laugh, she tips her head down embarrassedly and stops singing.  We should record her, we really should.  

We have a treasured tape of Hester and Lydia playing and singing when they were ages three and one; too bad we didn’t do that with all the children.  One never realizes how quickly the times of a child’s life flies past, and how soon he grows past a certain stage and never does something again.

Church was canceled Wednesday, in order that the children could practice songs for the Spring Program.  

Bobby and Hannah arranged their furniture and put up blinds at their house that night.  They still have wallpaper to put up in the kitchen, and soon Sears will bring their stove, refrigerator, and microwave.  Only a month and three days to go.  HELLLLPPP!!!

Thursday afternoon, Victoria was well entertained--nose to the front glass--when our organist and school aide, Sandy Koch, was taking pictures of the school children outside, often standing in our driveway to get the entire group of children in the picture. 

Tornado season is upon us.  There was a tornado near Humphrey and Creston one afternoon, just 20 miles north of Columbus, and our tornado sirens went off.  Six farm places were damaged or destroyed, and a couple of people were hurt.

Hannah went to her house with Victoria to clean the floor, because Bobby had textured the ceiling the night before.  She discovered a puddle of water on the floor.  After mopping it up, she used the sink--and there was then a lake on the floor.  Hmmm…

Tad is trying to learn how to meow like a tomcat:  “MeeOOoOWwWRrRmee.” He sounds like a teenage boy whose voice is undergoing metamorphosis.

For Dorcas’ graduation present, we got her a big resin sailor bear with a pair of binoculars, and the big bear is holding a little white resin teddy bear, and the little bear is peering through a spyglass. 

Larry is starting work at 6:00 a.m., and working to 3:30 p.m. these days.  But one day, the employees were told they could go home at 2:30, because it got so cold and windy, and there were tornado watches abounding over the entire state.

Thursday night--well, Friday morning, really--I finishing sewing Dorcas’ dress.  She sewed a good deal of it, and did a good job, too, especially considering that it was the first dress she’d ever sewn, and the pattern was rather difficult.

There was no Jr. Choir Thursday night, so children could spend the time practicing for the Spring Program. 

The children were tired today, probably because they had no naps yesterday; that Wednesday afternoon nap seems to perk them up enough to get them through the rest of the week.  Caleb and Hester both took a nap today, just because they wanted to--highly unusual, for them.  A little past suppertime, Caleb came stumbling hurriedly up the stairs, eyes half open, scurrying along to get his corndog, which he especially likes.

“AAAAaaaa!” I exclaimed in mock fright.  “A mole just came out of his hole!” 

Caleb was only just slightly amused.  He said in a small voice, the vaguest bit reproachful, “I forgot I was sleeping, and I slept too long!” 

I would have been done with Dorcas’ dress by Thursday night, but some slimy peanut butter (smooth, to some people; but we don't like smooth; thus, 'slimy') caught my attention (it was lurking in the cupboard, waiting for an unsuspecting victim to smear liberally on his nice sourdough muffin), and I decided to put it in its place by making cookies with it.  Actually, I asked Lydia if she'd like to make Wyoming Whopper cookies, and then I started getting out the ingredients, just to help her out, you know, and before I knew it, I'd done the whole works.  I only had five cups of oatmeal, instead of six, so I put a cup of Farina in it.

When the batter was all mixed together, it tasted alarmingly like slimy peanut butter, so Dorcas rushed off to the store for Heath brickle, butterscotch chips, chocolate chips, and M&Ms.  I poured all four bags into the mix, and then didn't we have some scrumptious cookies.  Mmmmmm!  The best Wyoming Whoppers ever.   

Lura Kay got a female Himalayan kitten to go with her little male kitten, who was sick.  She thought he might do better with another kitten.  He’d already--in a week--forgotten his half-sibling, who is three weeks older, and he puffed up and bounced sideways at her, already feeling very territorial about his new home.  But he forgot about the slipperiness of the wood floor, misgauged the effectiveness--or lack thereof--of his brakes, and slid headlong into the newcomer and then fell flat.  This made him get all the bushier, and he hissed awfully at Kitten II.

The littles brought their belongings home from school, thrilled to pieces school is out for the summer, and, as usual, the living room was soon littered with the mess.  And guess what they did with it, just as soon as they got it all dumped out of their bags:  Of course--they played ‘school’.

Friday, the children had half a day of school--program practice all morning.  Dorcas and Teddy had instrument practice several times last week, preparing for the Spring Program.  And twice, all the children went through the entire program, from beginning to end.

That afternoon, I took Teddy to Fremont to look for a suit for him.  Victoria went along; the others stayed home.  Our destination was the Goodwill.  And there we found two suits, both of which looked brand new, and both of which fit Teddy perfectly, other than one pair of pants being a little too large.  The sign said $8.99 each.  We were so pleased, and there was enough time to spare, that we looked for a few more things.  We got four ties--$.99 each, and several shirts and dresses for the Fourth of July, too.  Several of the shirts were brand new, and one even had the original tags still attached. 

And then came the coup de grâce:   when we got to the checkout stand, we learned that all items with a blue tag were $.99 each.  Guess what:  both suits had a blue tag.  $.99 suits!  

We arrived home at 5:00 p.m.  Thinking the program started at 7:00, I hurriedly gave Victoria a bath, stuck her in bed, and then we all began rushing around like chickens with our heads cut off.  A couple of the children then began a debate:  was the program at 7:00?  Or was it at 7:30?  We called my niece Rachel…and learned it was indeed scheduled for 7:30.  We slowed down and discovered that we really could get ready for The Big Occasion without running over each other, knocking each other flat, or stepping in one another’s faces at regular intervals.  

I wore the new navy and white polka dot sailor dress with the pleated peplum and straight skirt that Hannah got me at the Salvation Army in Lincoln.  It was the sort of dress one shouldn’t wear after eating 30, 40, 50, or more cookies the day before--and that’s exactly what I had done.  So I ate nothing the entire day Friday…and then I wore the dress.

I made up for that ‘fast’ at the luncheon, and afterward, because The Ladies of the Kitchen sent a big box of cookies home with us.  Help.  Anything that has chocolate in it is magnetic, for me.  Hand over the chocolate and stay back, and nobody will get hurt!

They also gave us two big bags of sandwiches.  Trouble was, the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches wound up in the same bag as the tuna salad sandwiches and the ham and cheese sandwiches and the chicken salad sandwiches and the sturgeon/halibut salad sandwiches and the flounder/flathead salad sandwiches and the mooneye/tallywag salad sandwiches…  and I don’t care for tuna- ham- cheese- chicken- sturgeon- halibut- flounder- flathead- mooneye- tallywag-flavored peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  Otherwise, everything was cherry. 

It was a beautiful program.  I especially liked a quartet of Teddy, Aaron Tucker, and Matthew and Jonathan Wright, Bobby’s younger brothers; the whole senior class singing together (an octet)--their voices harmonized perfectly, and there were singers for each part; and the kindergartners’ songs--oh, so cute.  I must be getting old and maudlin; these things make me want to blubber and snuffle.  

The suit Teddy decided to wear--a grey with a subtle plaid--fit him perfectly.  It didn’t need to be hemmed, taken in at the waist, or even ironed.  It looked like it had come straight off the rack at Burlington Coat Factory.  Afterward, I took four rolls of pictures.  Keith, Joseph, and I shot some video footage.  Keith said nary a word, so we have no idea who anyone is, if we haven’t met them before.  

Dorcas received many nice presents.  One of her classmates gave her a stylish blue marbleized pen with her name printed in gold on the barrel.  She was given a set of three books, a crystal cake-holder with a forest green ceramic pedestal, several crystal dishes, an embroidered vest, photo albums, and barrettes, among other things.

Saturday morning dawned cloudless and sunny, a beautiful day.  When I walked across the street to the school to copy some papers, birds were singing like everything, especially a cardinal who was singing his heart out from the Douglas fir across the street.  When I went back home, I started making my bed…I pulled the covers up on one side…then I picked up a few things on my sewing chair and moved them to the bed…I looked at the machine…I looked at the bed…  

The big trouble was, you see, that the very next thing I really needed to do was to cut the train off Hannah’s wedding gown; but Hannah, of course, was still sound asleep.  Now, there was a little nightgown, all cut out and waiting to be sewn, in one of my cabinet’s compartments, and I have been planning to sew it for Hester.  I looked at it… It really isn’t all that beautiful.  I will make it look cute enough that Hester will no doubt like it; but the material is really rather ugly.  It’s brown with an orange design, and it was cut out to be a mini skirt.  But the material is soft, so it will be a fine nightgown, and I will put lace and trim on it…  But it was 7:15 a.m., and I had not had much sleep. 

All of a sudden, the unmade side of the bed reached out and snatched me ever so unexpectedly, bringing me tumbling straight into the feathers.  And there I stayed until ten o’clock. 

I got the train cut off of Hannah’s dress, and began sewing the lace back on.  This is no easy procedure, let me tell you.  There are pearls and sequins all over the lace, and the needle insists on hitting one every now and then, upon which occurrence it invariably snaps right in half.  So I sew along, squinting and blinking like a frog in a hailstorm, waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Or the next needle to break, as it were.

I have made it to the halfway point now, so there is hope I might possibly finish in the near future.  And then…  oh, woe is me.  And then.  And then, I must fix the top of the dress.  If worse comes to worse, just look for me in Guatemala, where I will flee to avoid prosecution (or persecution, as the case may be), should things not work out.

The children did the dishes Saturday afternoon…wiped off the table…cleaned the counters--and then headed outside to play.  Half an hour later, the wind blew in fierce gusts, and dark clouds came billowing in, greenish gray and threatening.  It began raining--and the kids began thronging back home again.  All but Hester, that is, who’d escaped with Jodie into Kelvin and Rachel’s house.  She called to ask if she could stay and play.  I turned her down and told her to come home immediately.  She came.  We turned on the radio and learned that there was a tornado at Humphrey again, some 20 miles north of Columbus.  But our tornado sirens never did go off; the powers that be must’ve figured they didn’t need to use them, since the tornado was heading further north, and dissipating as it went.

Saturday evening, I baked a chuck roast that I planned to use in Sunday’s potato soup.  It got done just a little after supper.  Guess what happened to it then?

That’s right.  Chuck roast no more.  Chuck roast bye-bye.  Chuck roast all gone, chuck roast down the hatches.  Can’t blame ’em; I ate my share, too.  In fact, it’s quite possible that I ate my share and my twin’s share, too. 

Saturday, Hannah made strawberry pie for dinner Sunday.  Keith and Esther, Bobby, and Lawrence and Norma came for dinner.  We had Philadelphia steak ‘pockets’ for most everyone, while three people--including me--had Reubens.  Imagine!  Me, eating--and actually liking--a sandwich that has sauerkraut in it.  We also had potato vegetable chowder, which turned out delicious, despite the lack of chuck roast, and mixed fruit.

Victoria eats small amounts at a time, then gets hungry in a not-very-long while, and comes back to finish her food.  As she leaves the table, she informs everyone, “I want to save that.”  And if people don’t take her seriously, and somebody eats it while she is gone, you can be sure, she lets them know they did the wrong thing, when she returns!

And now it is time to give Victoria a bath, tuck her into bed, and send the littles off to their respective beds.  Teddy and Joseph, still schoolboys for two more days, have taken themselves to bed a couple of hours ago; and Hannah and Dorcas are nowhere to be seen.  Perhaps they are in their room, sorting through all their things and trying to remember which belongs to whom, and what came from where, so that Hannah may take her things to her house.  It’s quite a dilemma, for they have shared things all their lives.  One way or another, it will all work out.  And, after all, she will only be four blocks away.