The Reindeer Keeper

Funny how we never know how great something is until we are looking back. On warm, summer days at supper time when growing up in the country with those four houses full of relatives all in a row, each family would bring whatever they'd prepared to eat together under my aunt's pine trees in her backyard. It became a smorgasbord of hot and cold dishes with all the trimmings. Back then it was the food that I thought about-potato salads, macaroni salads, baked beans, tossed salads, fruit salads, of course hots and hams and all the trimmings plus an assortment of chips. I don't remember many desserts-except for strawberry shortcake with real dumplings made soggy by berry juice and home-made whipped cream smothering the bowl. Of course it all tasted even better because we were eating outside. After everyone was finished, the younger ones would sometimes play baseball as the others sat around and talked and family dogs would see what they could find in the grass or get that loo

The season of squeezing lemons for lemonade is back again! Granted-these days all you have to do is go to the frozen food aisle, pick up some cans, bring them home, open them up, put the frozen concentrate in a pitcher, add water, stir, add ice if you want, and there you have it-Lemonade. You can purchase pink lemonade or limeade-even ice tea. Or-You can buy all those varieties packaged in a carton or glass container. No concentrate to bother with-it's ready to serve. Even the Paul Newman brand offers lemonade, limeade and ice tea. But my favorite brand remains Homemade Lemonade. My grandmother made it as did my mother and aunts. They each had a favorite glass pitcher for lemonade that never came from a can or container. It came from slicing real, hold-in-your-hand lemons and squeezing the juice out by using a thick glass-lemon-squeezer thing. It was odd-shaped but it worked.That's what they all used. You'd hold on to it with one hand and with the other put a lemon half