Zooming With the Aces #23: Holiday Traditions

Zoomers, November 16, 2023

Fred Elder welcomed 16 classmates from across the country to talk about favorite holiday traditions and memories of Thanksgiving and Christmas with family and friends. Thanksgiving turned out to be the favorite holiday for many of us.

Row 1: Marilyn Tompkins Bellert, Sycamore IL; Fred Elder, Madison WI; Glenna Stearman Park, Montgomery Park MD; Barbara Hammond, Wichita KS.

Row 2: Skip Granger, Sun Lakes AZ; Charles Howard, La  Canada CA; Lee Ayres, Fresno CA; David Robinson, Wichita KS.

Row 3: Linda Soderberg McKay, St. Louis MO; Mary Lancaster Curtis, St. John County KS; Tom Tatlock, Appleton WI.

Row 4:  Diane Zinn, Lawrence KS; Rod Pierce,  CO; Jane Thompson Olson, Park Ridge IL; Kay Ellen Consolver, Fairfield CT

Editors’ Note: The summary below is not a trasncript. If we need to correct the comments attributed to you, please let us know.

Holiday Traditions

Today’s theme was holiday traditions. The Zoomers branched out, as they tend to do, and talked about traditions and memories of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years – past, present, and future. 

Diane Rusch Zinn  I’ve been thinking about Thanksgivings in the past. My most memorable Thanksgiving was our first one – 1962 at Stanford. Our guests included East High alums Bob Holgerson and Lin Lamme and their wives. No one knew how to cook, but we all tried. I made my first pie and first hot rolls ever. They turned out fine. I also remember my daughter Lauri’s first Thanksgiving away from home when she was at St. Lawrence University in upstate New York. The trip was too long and too expensive for her to come home, so she went to a friend’s house for dinner. They did not make gravy. Lauri was incredulous. How could you eat turkey and mashed potatoes without gravy? Another year, Dick’s brother Steve joined us for Thanksgiving. Steve liked to cook. He made a pumpkin pie that didn’t taste quite right.Turned out he forgot the sugar. 

Our most recent problem at Thanksgiving has been our Lab, Duchess.  For making stuffing, I cut bread into cubes and set it out to dry on a table on the porch. Duchess found it and ate it all. The next year, I put the cut bread cubes on the dining room table, where Duchess is not allowed. That didn’t stop her. She ate all the bread, again, plus half a pie that I left on the table.

Dick and I haven’t spent Thanksgiving with our kids, who all live on the East Coast and have Thanksgiving with their in-laws. We used to go to Wichita for a big Zinn Family Thanksgiving, but that changed and we’ve had a few Thanksgivings here for the Wichita family.

Rodney Pierce    During the majority of  Thanksgivings since high school, I was in the service, out at sea, eating Thanksgiving dinner on board ship, either the Kitty Hawk, the Coral Sea, the Constellation, or Ticonderoga.The Navy puts on a very good spread. At home, we usually have about 22 people enjoying Grandma’s cooking. We are planning on it for this year at our house. Yes, we will have gravy. You can’t have turkey without gravy!

Jane Thompson Olson  We have had some excitement in our family this fall.  Our daughter-in-law had surgery on Monday to fix her sinuses. This morning, a 16 year-old granddaughter had an emergency appendectomy. She’s fine, but it was grizzly for awhile. We usually go to Colorado for Thanksgiving with our kids. This year, we are unable to go, since my husband Paul is in the middle of radiation treatment for prostate cancer. So, we are staying home in Chicago for Thanksgiving with our kids  from Madison. We will be breaking tradition by going to a Brazilian steak house on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. Christmas will also be in the Chicago area. We will be leaving on Dec. 27 in our RV and going to Gulf Shores, Alabama for the winter.

 

Kay Ellen Consolver I relate very much to gravy.  I think every Thanksgiving I called my mother and pleaded,”How do you make gravy?”  In fact, it was so bad when I was in New Hampshire visiting children from a previous marriage and they started laughing about my gravy. I also had Thanksgiving in Washington DC with the family of another man I married, again not for very long. Then, I met John, and we were married for 30 years. We moved to London and for many years we had an American Thanksgiving with our friends there. We always had dinner on Sundays because our friends were all in the theater, and that’s when the theater was ” black.” One of them always brought pies, and that was a good thing because my mother was great with pie crusts and I wasn’t.  One of our friends still observes this tradition.  So that was a series of traditions – the gravy, the pies, the English friend who carried it all on.  At Christmas, I’m going to San Diego to be with my sister, who has helped me so much during my recent heart surgery and recovery.

 

Linda Soderberg McKay   When I was growing up, we alternated between my two grandmothers, one at a Kansas ranch and the other in Lakin. One of them made her own butter. They grew their own vegetables, so everything was very fresh.  I got my love of cooking and eating too much from my grandmothers. My mom did not cook. I prepare traditional menus and usually host Thanksgiving for my family. I have two funny Thanksgiving stories. My eldest daughter, Kim, went to college in California. We couldn’t afford for her to come home for Thanksgiving. She went to the grocery to get her turkey on the day before Thanksgiving, not knowing that by then all the fresh turkeys were gone and hers would be frozen solid. The main challenge was defrosting it.  She’s now gone to cooking school, so she’s far surpassed me.

Another story, bittersweet. On my husband Michael’s last Thanksgiving, we were supposed to go to our daughter’s home, but he did not feel well enough and we stayed home.  I tried to find an unfrozen turkey and finally found a service that still had turkeys. When I picked it up, I discovered it was uncooked.  What’s more, it weighed 26 pounds. For two.  Michael thought it was the best turkey we ever had.

 

Mert Lancaster Curtis Nothing at my house is ever traditional.  Prior to marrying my second husband, it was traditional with  a lot of family. But after I was divorced and remarried, we had a blended family and never knew who was going to show up or when. So I just had  an open table, and whoever showed up was welcome, and it’s been that way for 45 years. Now, for the past 3-4 years, I’ve gone to my stepdaughter’s home and she has the same setup, a menagerie of 35 -40 people. This year, I will spend Thanksgiving with them; on Friday and Saturday I will be eating with other family members and celebrating a birthday. 

 

Tom Tatlock   I will be going to Wichita this year to get together with my sisters from Atlanta and Phoenix and my brother who lives in Wichita. We have an extended family in Wichita, so we always have a crowd for Thanksgiving. There were so many people that there were always kids’ tables. We thought what we really wanted was to get to sit at the big folks’ table. That was a big mistake. It was never any fun, not like the jokes and laughing and games at the kids’ table.

Back when WSU had a football team,  I went to the game with my cousins, Ward and Chuck Lawrence and their dad. We were almost the only ones there. It turned out to be on the day of a record-breaking blizzard. Another year, my son who was then living in China managed to locate a turkey. He picked it up, but on the way home in a taxi, the turkey slid onto the floor.  Once he got the turkey home, he couldn’t find people to cook it.

At Christmas, my mother’s mother loved to make taffy. She taught us all how to make it and how to pull it. Chuck Lawrence always had the darkest taffy because he didn’t pull it much.  My grandmother taught us to pull taffy and twirl it as we worked. One year, she twirled and twirled her taffy and accidentally threw it upward, where it stuck to the ceiling! We still make taffy at Christmas.  Thanksgiving is probably my favorite holiday because we have so much to be thankful for and it has escaped commercialization.

Skip Granger  I was in Hawaii and they shipped in Christmas trees. That was not my favorite Christmas.  As for Thanksgiving, we’re going to dine at our country club where they have a huge buffet. When you have a buffet, you can’t take home a doggie bag.  November 22 is my son’s birthday and we went to a sushi place last night. Mary Ann is a small, so we can’t take advantage of a buffet. We ate so much and were given a 2-hour limit, and I can’t believe how full I still am today. Once, my sister in Aspen invited us and others to Thanksgiving there. She had put all the food in the refrigerator and left for awhile, not realizing the dog could open the fridge. The dog had eaten everything. For this year, we’re going to Ventura where we’ll be on the water for a week. We  have friends from Pebble Beach who are coming to surprise us (Son Trey clued us in on the surprise.)  We’re going to Santa Barbara, having dinner at a fine restaurant there.  We’ll remain in the area.  We’ll have Christmas there and we’ll celebrate Hannukah, so we’ll have a double whammy. They love having us because we know all the words to the Christmas songs. Then we’ll come home and celebrate the New Year. Skip added that he’s scheduled for an MRI of his brain, so may be calling Tom for advice, depending on the results.

Charles Howard   I like grouping all the winter holidays together. Our daughter was born on the Winter Solstice, which fills in the blank space between Thanksgiving and New Years.  In my youth, we went to my grandparents’ farm, 100 miles away near Yates Center. I learned to set tables and make noodles from my grandmother on the farm. Men weren’t allowed in the kitchen. I still remember that you can make noodles, roll them and slice them, and not have to buy them in bags at the store. Thanksgiving opened the door to a time of year with little sunshine but lots of joy at home.  I always liked when the sun came back.

 

 

Lee Ayres  Tom’s remark about the Thanksgiving blizzard reminded me of an annual decision – where to go for Thanksgiving? With two grandmothers living in the direction of Kansas City, our family usually went that way. If the weather was clear, we went to the grandmother’s on the farm near Paola.  If the weather was dicey, we went to Johnson County. Either way, it was always a lot of fun. Thanksgiving Day at home has evolved in California. We continue to try to simplify life. We have always put up holiday lights the day after Thanksgiving. By now, we are down to white lights only on each of 12 trees. We put out seasonal decorations first for Thanksgiving and then for Christmas. Thanksgiving has always been my favorite. Nowadays, it’s a bit calmer. This is a good time to give thanks, when we have so much to be thankful for.

 

David Robinson  The scary thing is I got my first Christmas present from Amazon today.  I bought Christmas stamps at Dillon’s today, and after the Zoom, I’m going to Independent Living to buy Christmas cards from a Wichita artist. Everyone I send them to really likes them. For Thanksgiving, my maternal grandparents lived on North Grove, and that’s where we went. It was a little house they bought after moving from Dodge City after WWII, two bedrooms, one bath, no dining room. It’s amazing that our grandmother cooked up feasts in this little tiny kitchen that my grandfather had painted red. Up until the early 50’s, they still had an icebox! Usually 15-20 persons showed up for dinner. My sister and I had firm instructions to do the dishes; I washed, she dried. The kitchen sink looked through a window into the garage that was full of stuff. It was wonderful. We had such an amazing time. One thing about Christmas, we bought our tree at Farha’s on Kellogg.  My dad wouldn’t participate.  He gave us a limit of $5 for the tree. I remember walking into the house and the fragrance. That was one of the best parts of Christmas.

Marilyn Tompkins Bellert   I’ve had a string of Thanksgiving catastrophes.  My first Thanksgiving I did what probably many of you did. I failed to take the giblet sack out of the turkey. So I roasted the turkey with the giblets inside and talked every year about that goof.  Both of my daughters did the same thing.  They didn’t listen to Mom.  One year, we had twenty people coming for dinner and my oven died.  We ate turkey last, late in the afternoon.  The next year, the control panel on the new oven (part of kitchen remodeling) exploded at 2 a.m. on Thanksgiving evening during a self-cleaning cycle, throwing that safety glass stuff all over the kitchen. We cleaned it all up in the middle of the night and put the turkey in at 6 AM.  I’ve gotten better over time over time at turkey, gravy, pies, and managing crises.

This year, our kids in the area said we had the right of first refusal for Thanksgiving.  The kids wanted to make it easy, so eight of them are coming on Wednesday for two days of cooking.  Of course, that means I have to feed them – lunch and dinner on Wednesday, breakfast on Thursday.  They’re all great cooks, including the teenagers. The last time we had Thanksgiving, I ordered it from HY-VEE  because it was easy and mostly cooked.  Linda, I knew to check on that because one year we had gone to my mother’s and she had ordered from Dillon’s.  The food arrived precisely on time, but nothing was cooked. 

This year’s innovation is going to be a chocolate cake.  One of the three birthday kids is vegan, and it’s going to be a cake I’ve already tested.  It’s made with beets and is intensely chocolate and very rich topped with a fudgy frosting made from two ripe avocados, maple syrup and cocoa, all whizzed up in the blender.  It’s fabulous. We’ll make it again and again because it’s so good.  How weird is that?

Thanksgiving is a time of adventure for us.  Like Mert, we are open to one and all. Aunts, uncles, cousins, even their dogs turn up unexpectedly.  The funniest Thanksgiving we ever had was when my daughter from Virginia came with her family. Their tradition is a footrace after dinner, regardless of weather.  Everyone goes outside.  My grandson the athlete won all the races, running barefoot on the icy grass across three backyards. After two races, a four year old granddaughter was sobbing loudly, because she couldn’t run as fast as the big kids. My son, twenty years older than the athlete, tucked her under his arm and told her to hold herself straight as an arrow. She did. They came in third, which was good enough for her.

Tom told us that when someone’s numerical birthday falls on the same day of the month as his birthday, like my grandson who will be 23 on Thursday, Nov. 23, it’s called a golden birthday.

Glenna Stearman Park  In 1964 after being married three months, we lived in Dayton Ohio where Joel was a graduate student at Air Force Technical Institute.  We were living on that wonderful $350/month salary, so we were always skidding in on the last few pennies at the end of the month. I’m always an optimist, so I invited a friend, Hal Robler, for Thanksgiving dinner. The day before Thanksgiving, I had no money at all and Joel was freaked out about what to do.  I told him it would work out.  We went to the commissary and priced all the food without buying anything. That evening on the way home, Joel insisted we call Hal and cancel. I assured him that something would happen and that we would make it. As we walked down the hallway to our apartment, I saw an envelope under the door.  It was from my mother and was full of money.  I’ve always been rescued like that by my parents and have never had to ask.  It’s some kind of ESP; they know when I’m up against the wall.  We went right back to the commissary and bought all our food.  It was all kind of crazy, but I knew something would happen to bail us out.  All through graduate school, we had episodes like that.  For seven years we each had teaching assistantships and we had the three boys, so it was kind of wild and interesting. I taught my boys how to make three meals out of one chicken and periodically taught them other skills like that. Those were our early years. 

When we moved to South Korea, Joel was a visiting scientist for the Korean government and we lived on Korean income, which was close to graduate school, but a little better.  One Thanksgiving, I searched the black market for a turkey and the usual fare, but there was no such thing. We had invited students who taught English to Korean kids to have dinner with us.  I asked them to hit the black market and pick up anything that was Tex-Mex; also the German market for cheese. We had tacos, tortillas, even Pace picante sauce. Everyone showed up in the afternoon, and we all had a Mexican dinner.

Our other Thanksgivings have been in California, Texas and Boston, depending on where we were at the time.  Most of the last 20 years have been in Boston at my sister’s.  She has a dining room that seats all.  We all bring dogs, and they sit under the table waiting to eat what people spill. This year we’ll be in Rhode Island at my oldest son’s.  Were going to stretch Thanksgiving into Thursday and Friday to accommodate the schedules of his seven children. Anyway, it’s going to be nice.  Christmas is a whole other story that I’ll save for later.

Barbara Hammond  I have done Thanksgiving and Christmas in many places – from Nebraska to Vermont. When I was young, we drove to my grandmother’s in Wahoo, Nebraska for either Thanksgiving or Christmas in my dad’s ‘39 Buick which he called the Green Hornet. When I was raising my own kids, we had a traditional Thanksgiving. I’m a good gravy maker.  After my mom died, I hosted Thanksgiving “orphans dinners” with people who had no family connections at the moment. This year, I am cooking for family and friends. My sister will not be cooking, since she is in the process of moving to Eudora, Kansas. That leaves me doing all the cooking.

For Christmas, we continue one long-term tradition: the brown paper Santa. I have written about this for the website. My family were good friends with the families of Janice Johansen and Marilyn Ash.  Our families had Christmas Eve dinner together. There was a long wait after dinner until Christmas Eve Services started, so Janice’s mother created an activity. She bought 25 cent gifts for everyone. With no time to wrap, she put each gift into a lunch-size brown paper bag. My family has continued the tradition of opening one gift, wrapped in a brown bag, on Christmas Eve. This evolved into making brown paper bag Santa masks. (Barb put one of hers on to demonstrate for us.)  One year at my mother’s on Christmas Eve, we all put on paper bag Santa masks and went to the Johansen’s house to wish Mrs. Johansen a Merry Christmas. She opened the door, and there we all were.

 

 

Fred Elder  My favorite memory was when I was  mid-teen and we always went to my favorite uncle’s who lived on a farm near Eureka, KS.  What made it memorable for me was that in the semi-afternoon, the men always went quail hunting and the mid-teen boys got to go along, actually carry a gun and shoot the quail.  It was a great pleasure for me because I hadn’t done a lot of that.

In terms of Christmas, I’ve had different kinds, but the one that stands out was being in Vienna with my friend Ardith many years ago.  We stayed in one of her friend’s place (They were gone.).  We went to the local food market, bought a turkey and all those things, brought it back, cooked all day and ate it all.  Really fun to do something completely different. Vienna has really changed in the 20+ years I’ve been going there.  It was much more third world when I first started visiting. The streets were dark and vacant by 9 PM.  Now, that’s when the action starts.

Back and Forth

Kay Ellen – I’m surprised no one has mentioned  football games on Thanksgiving. My dad always had three radios and a TV on. Football was much more important than the turkey. Fred wondered why no one had mentioned football, too.

Diane – I want to share a hint on making gravy. Take out the giblets. Cut off neck and wing tips and brown them all in some butter in a pan.  Then add water and simmer for a couple of hours. Remove the giblets and use the broth for gravy or for moistening your stuffing.  Browning the giblets will make the gravy taste much richer. One year, my daughter Rebecca and I were in London at Thanksgiving and had a Mexican dinner.

Jane – We always went to our grandparents’ and uncles’  Thompson Turkey Farm on North Hillside to pick out our turkey, then return when it was ready for us. It was very quiet there on Thanksgiving day. My grandparents lived there.

Linda – I have  Christmas decorations in place already. My granddaughters come and decorate for Christmas when they are available. Last year, it was in October. They visited last week. A Christmas tradition: my mother-in-law always had a birthday cake for Jesus and everyone sang happy birthday. Our second daughter married a man of the Jewish faith. One year, Jewish in-laws came for Thanksgiving dinner and wondered what was going on. They wanted to know how many times they would have to sing to Baby Jesus.

Glenna – Our oldest son JT was excited about going to bed one Christmas Eve. Adults were making too much noise. I checked on JT, who was looking out the window. A red safety light for the apartment complex was on, so I told him Santa was there and he had to go to bed fast. The next day, he went through the neighborhood telling a big story that he had seen Santa and Rudolph. My favorite Thanksgiving day photo is a turkey stuffed with an octopus. 

Our Last Words of the Day

Marilyn – Happy Thanksgiving

Glenna – Hope you have one of those turkeys stuffed with octopus

Barb – cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, stuffing with gravy

Skip – Hold up hand if you will have noodles at Thanksgiving dinner. (Half a dozen people held up their hands.)

Charles – My grandmother would roll up the dough and cut it. I learned that you didn’t have to buy dried noodles in bags.

Lee – Happy holidays

David – KU-KState football this Saturday

Linda – Happy Thanksgiving day. Appreciate calls

Tom – Happy Thanksgiving to all, and thanks for doing this.

Diane – I loved all your stories. This was really fun.

Rod –  Happy Thanksgiving everybody.

Jane – Happy Thanksgiving and may we all count our many blessings.

Kay Ellen –  Happy Thanksgiving, and I won’t be cooking good gravy.

Fred – Thank you all very much.  Our next Zoom is scheduled for December 21, which is very close to Christmas. More on that later.  Wishing much good cheer to you all!