It’s two days before Thanksgiving, which means preparations started in earnest today for making all of our favorite dishes. Even though most our serious baking will not happen until tomorrow, today was a day for boiling eggs, pitting cherries, washing cranberries, and mixing up several batches of pie dough.
When I was a very little girl, probably the age of my Lady Eleanor, my grandmother would lift me up on a chair, caution me not to dance off the edge, hand me a tiny rolling pin, a miniature pie pan, and my own ball of dough, would sprinkle some flour on the counters, and then she’d set me loose. Sometimes I’d actually create something semi-edible, but most of the time she’d just let me play, for what must have been hours, until the dough was crumbling to pieces in my tiny hands.
I don’t know if she knows that I remember those times, but I’m just now able to appreciate how much patience she must have had to allow a small person run of her kitchen. How it must have been difficult not to hover over me correcting mistakes and sweeping up the flour that I’m sure I spilled all over the floor. I know things would have gone so much faster if she’d just done it herself, but I never felt rushed, and I never felt scolded. I don’t remember a time I was denied when I ran up with a sweet “Grandmama, can I please help?”, and I never caught her going back and fixing any of the mistakes that I’m sure I made.
Today Daddy took the boys and Miss. Mabel so that Eleanor could help me with pie prep, and as we measured flour, rolled dough, and danced around to Christmas music (because listening to Christmas music while you bake makes everything taste better), I was taken back 30+ years to a bright, warm, purple kitchen and a little girl just discovering her love for baking with her favorite person.
I don’t know if she knows that I remember those times, but I’m just now able to appreciate how much patience she must have had to allow a small person run of her kitchen. How it must have been difficult not to hover over me correcting mistakes and sweeping up the flour that I’m sure I spilled all over the floor. I know things would have gone so much faster if she’d just done it herself, but I never felt rushed, and I never felt scolded. I don’t remember a time I was denied when I ran up with a sweet “Grandmama, can I please help?”, and I never caught her going back and fixing any of the mistakes that I’m sure I made.
Today Daddy took the boys and Miss. Mabel so that Eleanor could help me with pie prep, and as we measured flour, rolled dough, and danced around to Christmas music (because listening to Christmas music while you bake makes everything taste better), I was taken back 30+ years to a bright, warm, purple kitchen and a little girl just discovering her love for baking with her favorite person.
After we cleaned up from all this we set up the tree in my room so that Daddy and the others would have something exciting to see as they drove up to the house, and then we snuggled together in bed and watched The Nightmare Before Christmas for the 1,000th time this year. I sense a new tradition in the making.
Tomorrow I will have a very full kitchen. Three sets of hands will eagerly offer to help peel eggs, add ingredients, and stir bowls. It would go faster if I sent them all out and did it myself, but I will welcome the crowd. There can never be too many cooks in my kitchen.
Happy Thanksgiving, Friends!
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