THAT'S SOME BUNNY!

I wonder what size eggs this Easter bunny would bring?

WHAT HATH GRACIE WROUGHT?

GRACIE WITH DAN.

LOOK AT THAT DOG, ACTING LIKE BUTTER WOULDN'T MELT IN HER MOUTH.

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THINGS GRACE HAS BROKEN/TRIED TO BREAK; EATEN/TRIED TO EAT;

CHEWED/TRIED TO CHEW; DESTROYED

1. Pens

2. Books

3. Toilet Paper

4. Paper Towels

5. Napkins

6. Letters

7. Packages received in the mail

8. DVDs

9. The strap on my purse

10. Three wine glasses

11. Glass candle holder

12. My glasses

13. My comforter

14. An afghan my mother-in-law made for my daughter 25 years ago

15. The remote control

16. A five-foot-long branch she tried to drag in from the yard

17. Plants

18. A bowl of soup

19. A platter of raw hamburgers

20. Plastic juice bottles

21. Towels (I let her chew on corners of towels - it seems to pacify her.)

22. My pillow

23. My pillowcase

24. My medication

25. Christmas ornaments

26. The couch cushions

27. Cardboard boxes

28. My scarf

29. Chenille Easter chicks (fortunately not vintage)

30. Ribbons

31. Silverware

32. The phone cord

33. My new black flats

34. My best Thom McAn walking shoes

35. Newspapers/magazines

36. Packs of cigarettes

37. Lighters

38. A necklace

39. The dustpan

40. The dogs' water dish

41. Penny's ball (she loves to steal it)

42. Lamp cord

43. Rug

44. Two new sets of rubber stamps

45. Styrofoam peanuts

46. My jacket

47. A little garden statue of a fairy (which she dragged in the house)

48. Penny's collar (while on Penny)

49. Scissors and other tools

50. Kitchen utensils

51. A roll of aluminum foil

52. Underwear

53. Socks

54. Our earlobes (She has drawn blood from both of us)

55. Coat hangers

56. Silk flowers

57. All her chew toys, right away

58. A candle

59. Milk carton

60. Pop cans

61. Soap

62. Plastic flower pot (also dragged in from the garden)

63. Belt from Dan's robe

64. Tube of toothpaste

65. Dan's toothbrush

66. Broken glass

67. Plastic garbage bag

68. Penny's tail, legs, snout and ears

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I bet I could go on and on. I will keep adding to this list, and it could probably get to 100 without much of an effort. When I'm home and realize she's stolen something, I have to chase her around and around the dining room table or around and around the couch. She never does figure out, though, that when she runs into the kitchen she has trapped herself. So why do we keep this scallywag? Just look at that face!

USING HER BIG SISTER PENNY AS A CUSHION.

(SHE USES ME AS A CUSHION TOO.)

BOTH DOGS WERE SLEEPING JUST BEFORE THIS PHOTO WAS SNAPPED

THE LEGEND OF THE FIRST ROBIN

After seeing my post about the Legend of the Dogwood, Lila from "Indigo Pears"
(http://www.indigopears.blogspot.com/) sent me this:

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The LEGEND OF THE FIRST ROBIN

One day long ago, a little bird in Jerusalem saw a large crowd gathered around a man carrying a heavy wooden cross. On the man's head was a crown made from a thorn branch. The thorns were long and sharp. The little bird saw that the thorns were hurting the man. It wanted to help him, so it flew down and took the longest, sharpest thorn in its tiny beak.

The bird tugged and pulled until the thorn snapped from the branch. Then a strange thing happened. A drop of blood fell onto the bird's breast, staining it bright red.

The stain never went away, and so today the robin proudly wears a red breast, because it helped a man named Jesus.

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I isn't it strange how once you notice something, you notice it everywhere? I didn't know about the Anasazi Indian tribe until I was an adult, but once I learned about them I saw the word everywhere. It's been the same for me this year with the dogwood. First there was "The Legend of the Dogwood". Then I found a perfect dogwood blossom to go with my Anais Nin poem. Then came "The Legend of the First Robin."

Job hunting, which I've been doing for a week, is hard. You have write resumes and cover letters, drive here and there, humble yourself and beg for work, and put your best foot forward, all the time. It is exhausting. So to reward myself, I have decided to purchase myself a small present, no more than $5.00, for every week I am out of work. It may be a used book from amazon.com, or a lunch at a fast food place, or something like the nest pictured below. I didn't notice until yesterday that it has - lo and behold, dogwood blooms! (They look a bit smashed from being placed face down on the scanner.) So for the last time this season, here are some dogwoods!

PIQUANT IS THE WORD

"A TAVOLA NON

S'INVECCHIA BUON VIVO"

I saw this phrase while waiting for my takeout pizza in a local pizza/Italian restaurant. It means, "We do not age at the dinner table." I'm all for embracing that philosophy! How lovely to live longer just by spending long evenings over a wonderful meal and wine.

My husband and I don't dine out much anymore. I think we've eaten out only three or four evenings in the last year, and two of those were at a local truck stop! (But they do have a great prime rib/broasted chicken buffet, and Dan can order liver, which I will not cook at home.)
However, it doesn't really matter to me that I am not able to go out and have fabulous gourmet meals, because my husband is a fabulous gourmet cook. Last night he made "Pork Chops With Soy-Orange Sauce" from Martha Stewart's Quick Cook Menus book.

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1/4 cup fresh orange juice

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 teaspoon sugar

1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed

1/4 teaspoon freshly-ground black pepper

8 sprigs fresh thme (we use dried thyme, to taste)

2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter

2 tablespoons safflower oil

8 lean (1/2-inch) thick loin pork chops

(we use four thick-cut butterfly or boned chops

1. Combine orange juice with the soy sauce, sugar, garlic, pepper, and thyme sprigs. Set aside.

2. With a very sharp knife, score the pork chops 1/8 inch deep in a crisscross pattern on each side. Place in a glass stainless steel dish in a single layer. Pour the marinade over chops. Drain and reserve the marinade.

3. Heat the butter and oil in a large, heavy skillet until hot. Add the chops in a single layer and saute over high heat for three minutes on each side, browning them well.

4. Reduce heat to low and pour reserved marinade over chops. Cook until done, about 8 to 10 minutes longer. Remove chops to a heated platter.

5. Reduce the marinade in the skillet to 1/3 cup. Pour over the cooked chops and serve immediately.

Serves 4.


NOTE: These pork chops are also excellent grilled over hot coals. Reduce the marinade separately in a saucepan and pour over the chops after removing from grill.

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You can tell this is a great recipe, because that page in Martha's cookbook is covered with spatters and spills. That always means a recipe is good, because it's used so much.
The photo above, which I took from Easy Home Cooking Magazine, features a similar orange juice and herbs chops recipe that uses oil instead of soy sauce for a marinade. Because of the soy sauce, our marinade gets even darker than the sauce pictured, and there's no green onion in it. This sauce is piquant. I didn't think I'd ever use the term piquant but it best describes the flavor. Dan made this dish last evening. We cheated and had boxed garlic potatoes with it, but usually I make my French Bistro Potatoes, for which I gave the recipe in a January post. We like those potatoes with the chops because the meat sauce mingles so well with the cream from the potatoes.

However, there's an unspoken rule in our household. If only one person is preparing the meal, there will be only one gourmet dish. If two people are preparing the meal, then we can have two gourmet dishes. Therefore, tonight I have already made my bistro potatoes, and Dan will make spicy Southwestern chicken. These potatoes go well with this dish too, but for a different reason. The cream and the cheese help put out the fire!

This dish isn't for the faint-hearted. If you're in the kitchen when it's cooking, the fumes can give you coughing fits. In addition to your wine you need to have big glasses of water nearby. But we love it. It's made by a friend of ours who has talked to people about marketing it. It's that good. He never lets us pay for it, just mixes up a new batch for us. And the newer the batch, the hotter and spicier it is! These days we tend to only make this dish for the two of us. We used to serve it to guests, until a friend told me the spices had burned her lips - literally. She didn't tell me until years after the fact, but I was still mortified. That has never happened to us, but to be on the safe side we've taken it off our guest menus.

Second Photo from the Tuscan Italian Cafe, Las Vegas

JOURNEY TO THE CROSS

This painting of Jesus at Gethsemane is

displayed on a table in my home at Lent.

Thursday I read an interesting story in the Bismarck Tribune, describing a program called "Journey to the Cross," an interactive Stations of the Cross for Protestants. I was reluctant to abandon my regular Good Friday evening church service, but I am so glad I drove all the way out to Good Shepherd Lutheran Church's North Campus to attend. It was a profoundly moving experience for me. I cried at a number of stations, and other people were dabbling their eyes and sniffling.
The lights were dimmed in the large room. Twelve stations were each enclosed by three-sided screens of dark cloth. At each station, a small lamp threw just enough light for one to view the objects and read the signs containing the Passion Story and directions on what to do. We were asked to respect other people's contemplation time and not enter a station until someone was ready to leave it. Music of an almost Celtic nature played in the background.
At Station One, we were greeted by three televisions, all with blank screens blaring static. We were asked to turn off one of the TVs and acknowledge the static and noise in our minds and hearts, and the fact that in the hustle and bustle of our lives we often tune out God. On the floor at Station 2 was a pair of men's sandals centered on a trio of palm fronds. There, we were to focus on what it meant for the eternal God to become man.
A table at Station 3, "Mary Annoints Jesus," held cotton balls and vials of fragrant oil. I put a couple of drops of oil on a cotton ball and placed it in my pocket so that the fragrance accompanied me through the rest of the journey. At Station 4, we picked up a bunch of coins, feeling their weight in our hands. Are we, like Judas, tempted to betray Jesus over material things?
Station 5 featured the first step of communion, breaking bread, dipping it in oil and eating it. Station 7 was the second step of communion, where we drank wine and remembered that Jesus drank the cup of suffering to save us. At Station 8, we held "the rope" that bound Jesus' hands after his arrest. Station 9 featured a very realistic whip and crown of thorns, with drops of "blood" dripping from the thorns. That was a pretty powerful image, but there was more to come.
Station 9 affected me the most deeply. Each participant wrote one of his/her sins on a piece of paper and nailed it to a cross. The subject of Station 10 was Jesus' death. We snuffed candles and thought about the darkness "that the whole world - and heaven itself - must have felt that day."
Station 11 had a large slab of stone - the stone that sealed Jesus' tomb. Station 12, of course, was The Resurrection. As at some of the other stations, we were invited to write in prayer journals.
At the end of the journey, we dipped our fingers into a baptismal font and made the sign of the cross on our foreheads. I don't believe I have had the sign of the cross made directly on my forehead since I was baptized.
It was a most uplifting time, and at the same time very grounding. By the time I had taken all the twists and turns on my journey around that room, I had found peace with a situation that has troubled me greatly of late. I think that the use of interactive materials and the engaging of all five senses greatly amplified the experience for me and I am sure for others.

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Good Shepherd's Journey to the Cross was adapted from "Journey to the Cross" by Faith Bosland, copyright 2006, http://www.youthspecialties.com/

This picture of Jesus Knocking At The Door

is also on display in my home at Lent.

TIME TO BLOSSOM

DOGWOOD BLOSSOM

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And the day came

when the risk

it took to remain

tight inside the bud

was more painful

than the risk it took

to blossom.

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- Anais Nin

(See previous post for "The Legend of the Dogwood.)

THE LEGEND OF THE DOGWOOD

THE LEGEND OF THE DOGWOOD

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There is a legend, that at the time of the Crucifixion, the dogwood had been the size of the oak and other forest trees. So firm and strong was the tree that it was chosen as the timber of the cross. To be used thus for such a cruel purpose greatly distressed the tree, and Jesus, nailed upon it, sensed this, and in his gentle pity for all sorrow and suffering said to it: "Because of your regret and pity for my suffering, never again shall the dogwood tree grow large enough to be used as a cross. Henceforth it shall be slender and bent in the form of a cross--two long and two short petals. And in the center of the outer edge of each there will be nail prints, brown with rust and stained with red, and in the center of the flower will be a crown with thorns, and all who see it will remember."

PROUD MEMBER OF THE CLAN MUNRO

My great grandmother, Hughina Munro, and two of my great

uncles, Archibald Munro and John Alexander Munro

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Last Friday I received some terribly bad news that was personally devastating to me, but it was tempered by some fabulous news I received the same day. I got an email that said "Looking for relatives who emigrated to Crosby, ND." I guess it isn't so amazing in this time of the world wide web, but I was still astounded. My cousin (not sure which degree of cousin she would be) from Golspie, Sutherland, Scotland, tracked me down. Her grandmother and my grandfather were brother and sister.

Thanks to my cousin Kevin, I had learned a lot about my Norwegian heritage on my maternal grandmother's side, and thanks to a relative on my father's side, I learned about the Norwegian-Irish heritage of the Rockney-Cody families.

But the Scottish side of the family has remained mainly a mystery. My grandfather, Duncan Macdonald Munro, died two years before I was born. Aside from a newspaper article, an obituary, and a few stories from my aunts and uncles, I knew little about him other than that he had immigrated to Canada and met my grandmother there, and they later hopped over the border from Saskatchewan to North Dakota and moved to Crosby.

Now I have tons of information, thanks to my cousin and the Sutherland-Golspie entries on the Ancestry.com website. I learned that my Great Grandfather William Munro died at an early age, leaving my Great Grandmother Hughina Macdonald Munro a widow with 10 children ranging in age from 1 to 21. Hughina lived to be 99 years old. I adore the photo of her, such a sweet granny in her shawl.

I learned about my great uncles who fought in The Great War. I can view my family tree, and delight in the fact that I had a great, great, great grandmother named Fairly Falconer. Such a wonderful name! I am still visiting the website daily to see the photos and learn the interesting details of the Munro clan. My great aunt Teenie (Christina), used to take tinkers into her house so she could speak Gaelic to them. How I wish I could have heard her speak Gaelic!

And most astonishing to me, I learned that my great uncle William A. Munro was a journalist, just like me. He worked for "The Northern Times" in Golspie and the "John O'Groat Journal". A story in the latter newspaper related that William's "letters from the front (France) were for some time an outstanding feature of the paper. Sgt. Munro had undoubted gifts as a journalist and was most enthusiastic in his work for this journal." Yes, I knew I had printer's ink running in my veins!

There are the terribly sad stories about William's and John Alexander's deaths, which I will share on Memorial Day, and funny stories too. This one is called "Off to Canada":

"Down to the lane to Mrs. Munro and her scrosh (my comment: ???). Johnnie Morrison was in before us. The old lady was talking about her son, Donnie, the oldest son, how he never came back since he went away on a small coal boat that was in the pier. He had been helping his father who was shepherd in Kirkton - Willie Go Slow, they called him. Donnie had charge of some sheep on the links and he went away in the coal boat without letting his folks know, and left his two dogs on the pier - I remember one of his sisters coming to take the dogs home." (Excerpt from letter re: "The Hog in Golspie 1910-1920", written in 1947.)

For some reason, I find that to be funny, yet it is sad too. They never saw Donnie again, and the family lost track of him after he went to Canada.

And I wonder why my grandfather William was called Willie Go Slow. But now I DO know where the names of my relatives William Alexander, Donald, Mary and Ina came from.

Shirl and I have emailed back and forth dozens of times since her first email. I have sent her pictures of Duncan, his wife Julia and their children for her to add to the site. I've also sent pictures of myself, my husband, daughter, sister and her kids. In turn, Shirl has sent me photos of herself, her husband and children, and of Golspie. I knew that Duncan came from Golspie in Sutherland County, and that it is located at the far northern tip of Scotland, but it was great to see photos of it.

I am incredibly proud of my Scottish heritage. Even my email address contains the words Scottish Lass. My blog celebrates my Celtic Heritage. The impact of the bad news I received last Friday will fade soon; it's fading already. I scarcely shed a tear over my misfortune. But I bawled and bawled over my great uncles who died so gallantly.

The impact of the good news I received will stay with me forever. I look forward to learning more about my Scottish family, past and present, and perhaps even visiting with them someday. I feel like a link in a great long glorious chain stretching back hundreds and hundreds of years, and forward hundreds of years through our children in Scotland and America, and I hope we find the lost ones in Canada too.

HOLY WEEK

BLESSED HOLY WEEK TO ALL OF YOU

Isn't this a beautiful picture? I found it in an antique shop here in Bismarck. You can't see it here, but it is outlined in metallic gold. The picture did have a frame, but it is so old it fell apart. I think it must be Catholic, because of the age and dress of the child taking communion. That makes sense, because Bismarck and the surrounding areas are strongly Catholic. Bismarck and central and southwestern North Dakota are heavily peopled by Germans From Russia, all Catholics. These were German people who immigrated to Russia at the invitation of Catherine the Great, with promises of land. They lived in isolated groups near the Black Sea. When the great American immigration began, in the late 1800s, many came to North Dakota, again with the promise of land. They continued to live in isolated groups, many refusing to learn English or adopt American ways. Today, the area southeast of Bismarck is called the German Triangle, with the three points being Linton, Strasburg and Napoleon. But I digress.

I think I have promised this picture to my niece, Lisa, who is Catholic. However, I have been hanging onto it myself for a few years because it is so beautiful. Aforementioned niece drapes her house in purple for Lent, then stays up all night before Easter Sunday putting up her Easter decorations. I usually have my Easter stuff up weeks before Easter, but not this year. The only Easter item I have are two Easter lilies. No matter how broke I may be at Easter time, I must buy Easter lilies because I love their scent. (Kahlil Gibran, I believe, said one must feed one's soul as well as one's body: To paraphrase: If you have money for two loaves of bread, buy one loaf of bread and spend the rest of the money on hyacinths. Or Easter lilies!)

Easter doesn't seem real to me this year. It's early, and the weather isn't right. Even when Easter is the latest date it can be, North Dakota weather is not conducive to Easter bonnets, new frocks and patent leather shoes. My sister, a nurse, has to work this weekend, so it'll be just Dan and me. We may not even make a turkey or ham.

I'm sure Easter will begin to seem real, however, when I attend church services at Zion Lutheran Church this Friday evening. Even though I grew up as a Missouri Synod Lutheran (by accident), I don't really care for the M.S. Lutheran Church because it is too conservative. However, I do love the Zion Good Friday services, especially the part where we pound nails (our sins) into a huge wooden cross that is dragged up the aisle.

When I do decorate for Easter, one table in my home is reserved for the Good Shepherd. But I also love the secular aspects of Easter, and I especially love vintage Easter items. I have old Easter postcards, papier mache eggs and bunnies, and best of all, my vintage German rabbits wearing clothing. In lieu of decorating for Easter this year, I will find pictures of these items and post them throughout the week.

MARCH BOOKS

This month's books were a varied lot. Some I hated, some I loved. I bought one because it was the much-anticipated sequel to the book "Dandelion Wine," that has been on my top five list of books for 35 years. And I re-read two books I had read years ago, because I was packing up my daughter's books to ship to her in Washington, DC, and decided to keep two for myself (one she didn't like anyway.)

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I despised Ray Bradbury's "Farewell to Summer." It has none of the magic and innocence of "Dandelion Wine", the story of 10-year old Doug Spaulding, growing up in Green Town, IL in the 1920s. I loved the chapter about dandelion wine, that magical elixir that, when brought up from the basement and dusted off in the dead of winter, brings a breath of golden summer to people fighting colds, flu and winter blahs. The chapter on the mysterious killer, a re-telling of the "100 Steps" legend, was heart-wrenchingly suspenseful. And who could forget the story of how Doug's relatives, thinking they could make Grandma's ambrosial cooking even better by re-arranging and straightening up her kitchen, turned her instead into a cook who made dull, tasteless meals. It took Doug going into the kitchen in the middle of the night, tossing pots, pans and cutlery everywhere and dusting the silverware drawer with flour, to transform Grandma back into a heavenly cook. There were stories of the human time machine and the mechanical Gypsy fortune teller and the old lady who was never a little girl, all told through Doug's perceptive eyes. "Farewell to Summer" was more than disappointing, it was disgusting. It doesn't deserve any other description than that. I don't know why Bradbury waited all these years to publish it.

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I re-read "The Bell Jar," Sylvia Plath's semi-autobiographical novel based on her suicide attempt and subsequent hospitalization and shock treatments while she was a college student. I think most everyone knows about Sylvia Plath. She was a brilliant poet who married British poet Ted Hughes, had children, and later committed suicide by sticking her head in an oven. I read "The Bell Jar" in college, when in some circles it was considered cool to be crazy. I think the book has held up very well after all these years. Having gone through depression myself (though I was never suicidal), I can appreciate the accuracy and even the humor in this book. Too bad modern pharmaceuticals weren't available to her then, because she may have lived to write hundreds more brilliant poems.

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"The Secret Supper" by Javier Sierra was awful. It had an intriguing premise - find the secrets Leonardo painted into his "The Last Supper." But if you want to read a good book about solving clues and puzzles, and the Catholic Church, read "The Da Vinci Code" or "Angels and Demons" by Dan Brown instead.

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I had read "In the Lake of the Woods" by Tim O'Brien years ago, but was amazed how much I had forgotten. The entire book is based around two questions: "What happened to him?" and "What happened to her?" on the Lake of the Woods. I went to my book club session with my mind fully made up about both their fates, but when I left that night I had changed my mind about what happened to him. It was the persuasive arguments in a lively discussion with my fellow club members that changed my mind. And I think I changed some minds about what happened to her. I love the intelligent and insightful members of my book club.

**********

I purchased "Water For Elephants," by Sara Gruen, before it went on the bestseller lists. I love this book. Not evening liking circuses, I didn't know if I could love the story of a young veterinarian who joins a circus in the 1920s. In the process, he falls in love with an equestrienne/elephant rider, and is half in love with "Rosie", the dear elephant, as well. I am love with them all, especially Rosie, the intelligent and loving creature who delighted in stealing tankfuls of the circus' lemonade supply. Fortunately for our protagonists, Rosie was an elephant who never forgot. Fortunately, because she is the real heroine of this story. I loved the tales of the big top, the roustabouts, the circus train and the freaks ('cause deep down we are all freaks).

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I re-read "The Collector", by John Fowles, about a young Englishman who collects butterflies and ends up collecting young women against their will. I was fascinated by this character when I first read the book and I must confess I am still fascinated by him. I now call him by what he is, a serial killer, even though I did not know the term back then. Fowles' portrayal of this seemingly mild-mannered young man is still creepy, even with all those other books about serial killers proliferating the market.

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"Cage of Stars", by Jacqueline Mitchard, resounded so profoundly with me. For some reason, my book club gravitates toward books about Mormons, but unlike some of the other books we've read, this book tells the good side of Mormonism. Like Rosie, the circus elephant, I never forget. And I never forgive either, like the protagonist in "Cage of Stars." It is about the Mormon concept of reconciliation, and how even though her family does, the heroine cannot reconcile with or forgive someone who has committed a heinous crime against her family. There is someone I need to forgive right now, someone who hurt me terribly, but that concept is utterly foreign to me - absolutely incomprehensible. Especially since this person would never think she needs to ask forgiveness of me. I must re-examine myself and see what is lacking in me that I cannot forget and cannot forgive.

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Comment added at 6:50 PM. Oh. My. Lord. I decided to have Chinese takeout for supper tonight. The first fortune cookie had this message: "To understand is to pardon." Is that an example of serendipity or what? Can a message from God truly come in a fortune cookie? The second fortune cookie's message was: "A surprise announcement will free you." Yes, I think I already got that message on Friday. It was a total surprise, and yes, It has totally freed me.