Staying Home for the Holidays

I’m lucky enough to have multiple choice at the holidays usually.  The benefit of being single.  All the moms & kids seem to be driver.  I’m usually with family in one place or another although I sometimes also squeeze in vacation fun.  This year the decision was to stay put.  I love traveling to see my sister and her family but staying in Memphis keeps me close to another sister and her family.  Mom has been good enough to ramble with me quite a few times.  Some times I go by plane, there was at least a year or two in NY when I may have gotten a train, and almost always a series of automobiles.

This year, we’re staying in Memphis!

Today was Christmas Eve… and packages were opened by my North Carolina family members.  Nephews getting things from John Deere shirts (that’s Jake looking so tough) and 4-wheeler saddlebags to Wii games.  I had a few more errands to run so I did that and then decided to spend some time finally getting some cards done.  I had put them off cause I wanted to write a line or two at the very least.  A change from the printed labels and names.  I have been working on my cards with hand-addressing them, thinking of all the great friends & family I have.

I’ll sleep in for Christmas and then spend the day with family.  Mom decided a little while ago that she wanted to cook Christmas dinner.  That sealed staying in Memphis.  She knows exactly how to get me.  She said “I thought I’d bake a ham and make potato salad.”  I know.  Ham’s is pretty typical but the potato salad… that maybe a southern spin, but hey, it’s what I like! (photo added after lunch)

Sure, we can have ham for lunch at any deli and there are whole stores that specialize in spiral hams with a no worries glaze.  For some reason, those things just don’t cut it.  I want the old school ham cooked the way it always was.  And served with potato salad, preferably out of the “potato salad” bowl Mom always used.  (It was always the biggest mixing bowl in the house and has always been a hit.  And it does taste yummy the next day!)  And those rolls hot from the oven…. and… and….

My mom started fixing some of the food a day or two ago.  There’s the special cranberry salad with pecans that seems best after it sits a bit.  So we’ll take some time to appreciate all her hard work.  I’ll also be keenly aware of the kind of efforts it takes to produce that food.

Farmer friends on twitter like Mark McHargue and Mike Ver Steeg will be clearing the road from their houses to barns clear so routine feedings don’t get hampered by the blizzard hitting the Plains.  (Mike was nice enough to point out he’d be wearing cotton while he does chores!)  Will Gilmer, aka the singing dairy farmer, has a new coffee maker set so coffee is ready when he goes to check the dairy cows at 3 am.  (Seriously, could he really sleep before that? I’m so confused!)  One of my newer tweeps, Chass55, still has 40 acres of corn in the field…. sad to say that it’s covered in snow and will likely be there a while.  That just is skimming the top of the list!

If you are like me and a food consumer rather than producer…  you can tell these farmers and others thanks by connecting to farmers in your community or through Farm2U on twitter or Facebook, by putting a message on this site, or simply add a line to your prayer at dinner.  If you’re on twitter, we continue to use the #thankafarmer hashtag so tweet away!

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PS — Will puts out videos frequently called MooTube minutes and I’ve pointed lots of people to some of his songs.  If you want to learn a bit about Christmas at Gilmer Dairy Farm, give his latest song a listen.