Okay, okay….my husband just said he can’t figure out how to get to meanderings.  So, look up to the top of this page, under the header.  See the tabs that say home, about, subsistence, etc.  There is a new one called Meanderings.  If you click on it, it will take you to a new page where I will put all my meandering thoughts.  It will list any articles posted, and you can click on them and read them.

Or you can just look over to your right and they are listed under pages.

That good, Caleb??

Getting used to the real Kendama. Quite a bit smaller.

While I could sometimes do the tricks on the big homemade Kendama, I sure couldn’t even get close with the small aspects and shorter string of the real one.  Not so with SP.  As soon as it was handed to him by the sales clerk, he was extremely good.

Now he just has to keep practicing….I hear that Dutch Harbor Asia is going to have a Kendama contest during Spring Break!

I returned home from a noon meeting to find that his grandpa, Caleb, had done it again.  He is famous for making SP toys out of cardboard, wood, plastic, 500 mile an hour tape…whatever he can get his hands on.  SP’s cousins, at one time, were mighty jealous of a grumman goose made out of cardboard that SP could get in.  It was complete with wings, floats, and a propeller.  It actually graced our house for about 2 1/2 years before we relegated it to the landfill.  Today he made a kendama so that SP could practice before getting the real thing.

Total concentration.

In the air!

Action.

I hope he remembers to clean the kitty litter every day, so that this can be replaced!

I have rheumatoid arthritis.   I was diagnosed about a year and a half ago.  It took me about 4 months to get an appointment with a specialist.  I gave the prescribed drug a try….over one year’s worth, mind you.  I felt worse on it than I remembered when I wasn’t taking it.  So my solution, at this point, has been to discontinue the program and find something more holistic for myself.  Which is what I am all about anyway, and I can’t believe I let myself be talked into a prescription medication.

My solution:  cleansing my body of toxins.  I feel so much better.  And it has only been about 2 1/2 weeks.  My pain level has decreased.  My activity level has increased.  Oh, and I have lost a few pounds, too, which is a bonus!

I live in a very small house.  I did not do a very good job at  weeding out possessions when moving from large to small to smaller.  And every time I get resolute about making more room for us humans in the house, I come across things like this: 

Really, how can I not have my favorite picture of my first grandson and I.  And the Russian Orthodox triptych…given to me by my godsons.  The shell tree – made by my youngest daughter.  The whalebone ptarmigan and the ivory sea otter.  Good grief, those, perhaps unlike the others, will never go….made by my mother Gert Svarny.

I believe I will try some small, unobtrusive storage boxes.  You know, either baskets, or linen covered boxes with lids.  And put stuff away, put the boxes in the closet, and recycle things once in a while.  Hmmmm….I’ll let you know if it works!

Stunning firewords compliments of the City of Unalaska!

Good grief, time flies.  I really need to get past living from holiday to holiday, event to event, and meeting to meeting.  It blurs all those good days in between!

We had a wonderful New Year’s Eve, celebrating not only the new year, but, of course, the birthdays of my mother, Gert Svarny, who welcomed her 81st year with perfect grace, and my husband, Caleb, who grumpily acknowledges his birthday each year.  Of course, if a big deal was not made of it, I am sure he would be totally disappointed!!

So every year, I debate the great cake question….what kind of cakes this year?  I settled on a cheesecake with a nut crust, enrobed in chocoate and served over a strawberry coulis, plus an incredibly dense chocolate cake with chocolate ganache.  To tie them together, each had orange in them and were sprinkled with orange zest.

Cheesecake

Crazy, dense chocolate cake.

The chocolate cake was so heavy, (literally, I could not carry it with one hand) I was really afraid to cut into it and serve it.  But, thank god, it was absolutely delicious.  I believe I have found the perfect cake for the Chocolate Extravaganza!

Pirates invaded the party at about 11:45.

As we get older, we joke about being able to stay awake until midnight!  We have devised a schedule to help us out….a late dinner at 8 PM, socializing and drinking(!), then, started for the kids several years ago, we play our “traditional” New Year’s Bingo games with great prizes of things mom wants to get rid of!!  At 11:45 things start to ball up….getting the champagne ready, watching the ball drop, toasting the new year in, running outside to watch the fireworks, coming back inside for a hearty rendition of Happy Birthday, eating cake and opening presents!  By the time this is all done, it is usually about 1:30AM.

And so, with a great start for 2011, here’s hoping your year will be filled with happiness and prosperity.  If not that, at least have some fun!

The book, by the way, Fifty Miles from Tomorrow, by Willie Hensley, actually was a gift from them last year.  It is an excellent read and I am on my second time through.  That’s why it was laying about!

Christmas Eve 2010 was worth the effort put in.  Mom and I planned, then parceled out some cooking duties:  Cookies – Greg Hawthorne, Gingerbread cookies, Alena Syverson, Scallop ceviche, Wendy Svarny-Hawthorne, who promptly parceled that one out to  her son, Nicky Hawthorne.   Brie with cranberries in puff pastry, Wendy, as well as hot crab dip.  Laresa was designated the official setter-upper, which includes setting up the table, the buffet, and the dreaded wrapping of the silverware.

Of course Mom cleaned house for almost 2 weeks before hand.  Holiday cleaning…why didn’t I inherit that gene?  On the 22nd and 23rd we started cooking in earnest.

Nicky Hawthorne's scallop ceviche....delish!

Alena's gingerbread cookies and Zoya's million layer Russian cake.

Cookies made by Greg and Mom; truffles by me.

Silver salmon lox, octopus, and pickled salmon.

Yum...Perushkies, brie, layered shrimp & potato salads, ham, curried rice, etc.

Gert Svarny, without whom the party would be nothing!

SP digging in!

Catching Sam just at the right moment!

Greg Hawthorne and son, Jacob, enjoying themselves.

Yekatrina, Michelle, and Zoya, hanging out in the kitchen!

The tree!

Enjoying family, friends, and food.  What could be better?

Potato Crop 2010

After more research, I talked him into actually letting the plants flower and die back – like they are supposed to do!  Keeping him from digging them before it was time was tricky.  He can be pretty sneaky.  So far, with about 1/3 of the crop left to harvest, we have gotten about 28 pounds of some of the most delicious potatoes I have ever tasted! 

They come in all sizes from enormous to cute, petite bites.

Several of them have been split – I guess growing too fast.  None of them have been rotten.  Yay!  They slice like butter, even with a dull knife.  And no matter how we cook them, we marvel at how good they taste. 

Olive oil, kosher salt, and thyme - then roast.

I think there is a possibility that next year we might try them outside the “greenhouse”.  

   Otherwise we will never be able to grow enough to suit our needs.

My mamma picking berries surrounded by the changing colors of the tundra.

Now, mind you, I am not complaining about the weather!  That is against the values of the Unangax^.  I am just disconcerted with the unpredictability of our weather over the last several years.  I guess I have become complacent over the last 30 years, or so, in knowing what to expect and when to expect it.  I am all for a good storm.  I never sleep better than when the wind is blowing at least 50 miles per hour.  I just was taken unawares by the termination dust in September and the north wind sneaking into my berry patches.