The Relatives Came For Brunch!

The morning after my nephew’s wedding was my favorite part of the VA trip. We all gathered in my sister Esther’s warm, welcoming kitchen for a late brunch! Everyone was there except the two sibs who couldn’t make it to the wedding. It was the time I had looked forward to the most, the time when we were cooking, eating, talking and breathing together. And it was just as great as I thought it would be!

Here is my brother Sam, the best egg fryer in the family, the one who believes that the only eggs worth frying are the ones coming from happy chickens! This is also the brother who almost bit my head off when he saw me gently submerging the crackers into the milk because he said I was stirring them but I wasn’t. I just don’t like it when the top crackers sit there cold and dry which goes to show that when making crackers you should actually add the milk to the crackers rather than the crackers to the milk…

Here is my sister Esther smiling fondly at those beautiful golden eggs, coming from happy chickens and fried to perfection by Sam.

These eggs were ready for the general public who don’t have strong feelings about eggs but the good thing about Sam is that he understands feelings about eggs and if you tell him what you are looking for in a fried egg he will make it for you exactly the way you want it! And he will put it piping hot on your plate at exactly the spot you want it!

Here is the hefty pot of hot milk almost ready for the crackers and the pot of butter standing at attention:

Here is Esther pushing the crackers into the milk because she doesn’t know better. And there are those crackers sitting there in all their buttery glory!

Amy appreciates a bowl of good crackers with ham gravy…

…and Aliyah begs for more of that yummy warm stuff that slides down the throat so easy and makes the tummy warm and the heart happy!!

Next we will talk about pan-haus (scrapple)!! Pan-haus is my love language. It is something to be dreamed about, talked about and eaten with great appreciation for its fine qualities. My sister Amy is the best pan-haus fryer in the family. She knows just how to slice it, exactly what tempature to have the pan, how much grease to put on the pan and how long to leave it on the pan so that it comes out crispy on the outside and creamy on the inside! It is pure delight to eat it with a soft egg placed right smack in the middle so that when you cut down through the middle the yolk runs down over the pan-haus…

There was also a large pot of levervausht and a pot of sausage gravy and a pot of ham gravy to drown the crackers in!

There was cold orange juice, icy homemade grape juice served in a tin bucket, and in the fridge there were gallons of cold, creamy milk. There was coffee with real cream or mint tea made from fresh cut tea leaves raised outside in the kitchen garden. There was fruit slush, and baked goods for those with a sweet tooth…

 

The Wedding!!

Finally the big day arrived!! The day that the first nephew out of my 43 nieces and nephews took the big step of marriage and officially declared himself to be a man! All the relatives glowed with pride as that strong young man stood fearlessly before God and man pledging a lifetime of love and commitment to the love of his life!

There was a photographer who took pictures of the ceremony but no personal cameras were allowed so the pictures I have are all from the reception.

Here is the radiant couple and their gorgeous cake:

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And here is the delicious food we inhaled:

( I was so busy eating meatballs I forgot to eat dessert!)

And here are some nieces and a nephew singing a very nice song for their marrying cousin and brother and Uncle Kore singing a tear jerking solo about the family Bible:

And then came afternoon visiting and poking around and getting ready to serve supper:

Supper was as good or better than lunch but I was way to tired to even think about taking pictures!! Dad made his signature pulled pork BBQ, someone made coleslaw and I think Ida made cooked the noodles and I had the honors of pouring the brown butter on top, ( flooding them actually! ) We had lush, creamy, little cheesecakes too but I can’t remember what else. I just know it was good. And I remember of sitting across the table from a man who thought it was the most exotic thing in the world to sit across the table from a girl who lives in Haiti!! And he couldn’t wait to tell so and so, “ Guess who I met tonight? “ !!!!!!!! And it was just me, tired little me who was all of a sudden important because I live in a hot, stinky country and spend my days changing diapers and doing laundry!! Hehe, I love my life!!:

Travels #2

The next two and a half days were happy days! full of special food and sweet babies:

I even got to go to a coffee shop with this dear friend:

Finally it was Thursday afternoon and time to start on our trip to VA!!:

After traveling for hours we stopped at a Mexican restaurant for dinner:

With full tummies the children were soon fast asleep and Rachel and I deeply engrossed in conversation, so deeply in fact that we missed an important turn and didn’t realize it for half an hour! It was very heart sinking but in the end we arrived safe and sound!

To Eat a Salt Baked Potato

First you dig out a potato from underneath the mounds of white salt it was hiding under:

Then take a knife and slash open the soft belly and lay it open wide. Cut several trenches through the mealy insides to make plenty of valleys for the good stuff.

Now reach for the baked garlic:

Take a big deep spoon and begin to spoon the butter and garlic over the mealy potato trenches. Watch as the liquid flows over the valleys and hills then soaks in. Sprinkle gently with salt.

Next snatch the full fat, sour cream and proceed to cover the entire potato- hills, valleys, butter and all with thick, rich, creamy, white goodness.

The final step is without question the most fun of all: take those cloves of roasted, caramely, garlics and arrange as many as you want over the top. One if you’re actually a to be pitied, garlic hater, four if you have an important meeting to attend the next day, and eight + if you believe a day without garlic is a day without sunshine!!

If you want to sit and admire it for awhile you can but its good to eat it while its hot and fresh. Just figure out how to get it to your mouth. To maximize the experience my advice would be to make sure there is a clove of that rich, garlic on top of each bite- like the proverbial cherry!!

Tumultuous Travels part 1

So I left for my trip home to witness the holy event of matrimony between my nephew and his darling with much trepidation in my heart. I left early on Monday morning while most of the household was still in dreamland; how my heart ached as I laid Veronika's warm little body in Alicia's arms and then walked out the door but I was excited too.

On my first flight out of Port Au Prince I had the privilege of being on the same flight as a couple from Germany who was flying home with their newly adopted son!! Tears came to my eyes as I watched tender, loving care flowing out of this mother and father to their tiny new son. I could see in his beautiful, wide, open eyes the question, "What is happening?" I watched and wondered as they boarded the tiny plane- I wondered what it would feel like to be taking your baby home and I dreamed of the day, my day! when Veronika and I will step on the airplane together for the first time! It was very special to me to witness this event. In a country where many of the little children are knocked around, sold for slavery, or abandoned on the streets it just seems so incredibly kind and good to see one rescued, loved, cared for...

Then as we sailed above huge, billows of gorgeous white clouds I looked out of my window and saw a big, brilliant, rainbow and I knew God was telling me, "Its going to be ok!!" So I relaxed!

After a brief stopover in Santo Domingo I was reboarding the tiny plane, going up the flimsy, narrow stairs when my foot caught on something and I heard a fatal ripping noise!! Looking down I was horrified to see the bottom tier of my best and prettiest skirt partially ripped off and dragging on the floor! Thankfully I was the first one and no one else saw what had happened... My mind turned several fast spins then I realized the only option really was to just go ahead and tear it off completely!! So I giggled quietly to myself as I scootched down in my seat and quickly tore it off and stuffed it in my sweater pocket where it safely stayed till I had the opportunity to stuff it into my carry-on! And I continued on my way with a much shorter and lighter skirt which was slightly uncomfortable as that is not my style at all to walk around in airports with a torn off skirt but there was no point in fretting over something that could not be helped so I just didn’t look.

My flights were booked tight, I had no time to pause for a bite to eat and since the airlines are too tight to serve pretzels I saturated myself with cold apple juice to keep my sugar levels up so I wouldn't pass out!

But, Oh joy when my flight arrived 30 min. early and then here came Amy with Cristopher, Micah and Marissa wriggling and giggling excitedly in the back seat of the car! All the way home while I munched on cheese, blessed cheese, the kinner kept me entertained with tales from school!! It was hilarious and somewhat shocking to realize again that they are growing up way too fast!

At Rachel's house there was warm supper waiting:

coconut, chicken stew with fresh fragrant cilantro,

salt baked potatoes with real sour cream, and baked garlic with real butter!

There was also cold milk, hot, spiced cider and cold cider and kamboucha to drink!!

And then of course there were the babies, rolly-polly and cute as can be:

 

 

Jax drinking his beloved kamboucha:

Marissa fell asleep on the living room floor:

And what a blessed sight this was:

And that was the evening of the first day! I looked back over it and thought that it was good!

So the first evening at my sister's house was great! so great in fact that Rachel, Amy and I just couldn't seem to get to bed! In the wee hours of the morning we were still sitting in the bedroom talking when suddenly there was the sound of something hitting the window! All three of us looked at each other and said, "What was that?" We figured it was some ice that was left over from the recent snow storm till we heard it on the other window! We all looked at each other again, Amy swallowed hard and I wished for a man in my life who would open the window and holler out to whoever was trying to scare us. It was the night of halloween so we figured it was prolly some unruly nieghbor boy trying to scare us and he was definitley succeeding. After several minutes passed and there was another bang we decided its time to watch- so we turned out the lights and stood by the windows staring out into the night trying to catch a glimpse of the naughty neighbor boy. Rachel saw there was something on the window sill but couldn't make out what it was, and then low and behold I saw a little head appear out on the porch. Thinking Micah had prolly heard the noise and was going out to investigate I decided this is it, we are the bosses of this house and I was going to find out who was doing this to us! I marched out to the front door yanked it open and there stood Christopher. He jumped when he heard the door open then came streaking in past me and dashed down the basement steps giggling and shouted back, "It was me!!" We went down and dug him out and demanded an explanation! He had gotten up to use the bathroom and saw we were still up so he decided to take advantage! He picked up some little toys, went out and threw them against the windows then came back inside and listened outside the bedroom door to see if we were paying attention! When he heard us talking about it he dashed out and did it again... the little stinker couldn't stop laughing because he had been so successful!! And he is having fun telling all his friends about it! The amazing thing about this story is that Christopher is usually the biggest scardy cat on the block and to think he would actually go out in the dark in the middle of halloween night is almost unbelievable. Oh well, I guess he's growing up!!