The Reindeer Keeper

 I can't remember when it started but I do know he kept doing it into adulthood. It's one of those really, really funny, simple things you just don't forget. And of course, you never let the one doing it forget, even when they've stopped doing it. The one doing it was my older brother. It was what one would call a slip of the tongue and whenever he slipped, anyone around him would laugh. Rather, roar. The slip would happen when the discussion of what to have for breakfast came up. It didn't happen every time. It never happened on school mornings. We had enough problems getting ready for the school bus. A quick bowl of cereal or some toast was the usual breakfast. But when it came to weekends or holidays, that was a different story. It could have happened at our house or next door at my grandmother's house. If it was at my grandmother's house, the audience would have been larger. That could have included cousins, aunts and of course, siblings and our grandmot...

Back in 1975 the oldest of my grandmother's six daughters undertook a project that still brings smiles to those of us who have followed. This aunt was quite creative. I remember her making Christmas candles using discarded milk cartons and serving the best sloppy joes ever. But it was that project years ago of sitting down with my grandmother and collecting her most treasured recipes and then putting them in order in a handwritten cookbook that takes the cak e-pardon the pun. You have to understand. Many of my grandmother's recipes weren't written down or found in another cookbook. They certainly weren't on line. The only on line back then was a clothesline.Her recipes were in her heart-her mind. Many didn't have exact measurements. A pinch of this-a thing or two of that were used to define teaspoons and tablespoons. How long to bake something was often not told in time but how something looked or smelled in the oven. "Until it looks cooked" was a favort...