Pysanky Easter

Caribou Harvest Egg on Left, Traditional Ukranian
Windmills design on right

Friday night, I spent a few hours happily sitting at the table, and drawing in wax on raw eggs.  This traditional wax resist dye method was used for centuries in Eastern Europe, both pre and post Chrisitanity, to celebrate this time of year.  Some of the traditional designs are very Easter specific, referencing the life of Christ, and some of the designs are more universal, representing hopes for happiness, good weather, and abundant harvests.  The one on the right above is a traditional design.  The one on the left, I designed using traditional motifs.  There are two variations on sun motifs on the top and bottom of the egg.

Set up: candle, kistky, wax, dye

My caribou harvest egg

This one uses a traditional 'deer' design that I decided was actually a caribou, a crossed branches motif, and a duck's foot motif.  I made it out of deep respect for the cycles of life in this northern land where we still have feet of un-melted snow.  It is in honor of the continuity of the seasons, and my hopes for a hunt in the coming year.

Ram, sun, seed sprouting, apple tree

Rooster

This was the final egg I dyed.  It is divided into eight sections, and each holds a symbol representing my hopes for this homestead and this life we are beginning to build.  There is a red ram for vigor and fertility, a rooster for abundance, sunshine, sheaves of wheat, and an apple tree! 

Brie goes well with everything! A wine and cheese birthday.

Brie goes well with everything! A wine and cheese birthday.

"A plethora of cheeses and wine has never yet been brought together in such a lovely home with such wonderful people.  Compliments to the hostess and a monopoly of thanks to her for bringing her daughter back into this world in such a lovely form 27 years ago," wrote my Darlin'Man.  It was my birthday the other week, and to celebrate the day, my mom put together an absolutely divine wine and cheese pairing feast.  In addition to the wine and cheese, we had bread, almonds, raspberries, strawberries, artichoke hearts and a gorgeous salad my sister made.  It is recommended that if you do not have access to a great sommelier and fromagier, that you keep a notebook with comments and thoughts on pairings so that you can gain skill in pairings.  In support of such an endeavor, I asked everyone to take notes, I will share some of their thoughts below.  One of my guests, the brother of my dearest friend, who also happens to be a playwright, had insightful prose poems for many of his comments.  His words will be in italics through out this post, you can read more of his thoughts and writing at www.alexgagnehawes.wordpress.com. Everyone else will be in quotations.

For the main course, we had some 8 cheeses with 6 wines. 

Gran Maestre Manchego: matured soft cheese, aged 12 months, product of Spain: brash, endearing

Havarti – slick, The action scenes of Indiana Jone's desert.

Grand Cru Original Gruyere, aged 4 months: an award-inning alpine-style classic.  Fresh Wisconsin milk creates light, floral notes with a mellow finish – stinky full.  It was indeed a beautifully stinky cheese, and might have been my favorite, but I'm not so certain about the light floral notes!

A Dutch Masterpeice Rembrandt Extra-aged Gouda- perfect crisp on edge of crunchy.  Intelligently sharp.  Divine.

Smoked Cheddar : not cheese but memory, condensed warm rich campfire love.

Montchevre Chevre: Hating chevre is like hating yourself.  Why bother?

Le Chatelain Brie: Brie fills in the silence when I pray.

Glenmorangie: like a late summer forest meadow: exhilarating, intoxicating, I must leave too soon.  Smoky caramel love

Red Garage Merlot: fruity nose, mild taste.  After that scotch everything is mild.  Not far from the grave.  A micro-vintage from the San Francisco area. 

Chateau St. MichelleGewurtztraminer: Sweet sour full, leaving the party with and kissing someone new

Macon Villages Chardonnay: White wine like crustless sandwiches.

Sauv-Blanc – White wines like young people intoxicate, are dull.  That said, I quite liked all three of the whites, which is surprising, as I am generally a red wine gal.

J. Lohr Cabernet: Cranberry verging on currant.  Sturdy, drily sweet.  I cannot separate becomig adult from learning the meaning of "dry"

The manchego might have been the overall favorite, with Maple and Me being fans of the Havarit Meunster, and my very fave being the Gouda.

NOTES:

Jasmine: Syrah and Gruyere complexifies the stinky cheese flavors.

Brie and Syrah deepens the brie (dad says "nice clean flavors" about this one)

Gouda and Syrah, omg.

Jesse: oh my god good gouda! With Cabernet-Sauvignon,  yes, but gouda outshined a little.

Justin: j lohr cab and havarti munsteur – perfect

Mark: sauv blanc and gruyere makes stinky cheese stinkier.

Anna: Chardonnay and Chevre!

"What are we doing here?"
"I don't know."
"Do you want some more cheese and wine?"
"Yes."
-Hipsters at a wine and cheese birthday

For dessert we had three "fabulously accurate combinations" of wine with cheese.

White Stilton with sweetened dried blueberries: Blueberry Fayre/Port; what cheesecake tastes like to poor people.  Cheese creamy, tart, satisfying, port splendid. " Triple combo of blue cheese, walnuts, and port is heavenly" said my father, and it is true.  There is a magical alchemy that happens in the mouth with this combination.  It was probably my absolute favorite of the entire night, and made me forget all about the concept of a birthday cake.  Who would ever want cake with this in front of them?

Gruyere/Madiera: frost on windowpanes.  Strong. Cruel. The morning ahead.  Beautiful, old.   I thought I was going to like this a lot, because I LOVED the Gruyere, and have been fantasizing about madiera ever since I first delved into Shakespeare in 8^th grade.  Turns out though, I do not like madiera.  Fortunately my father does, so I'll be keeping this rest of this bottle behind our other liqueurs until his next visit.

Geweurtztraminer/ Yancey's Fancy: New York's Artisan Cheese:  Bergenost, a buttery triple cream havarti/muenster style cheese – safe soft parmesean.  a cheese to give strangers you want to be friends.  a cheese that reminds you of undone chores. pair with sweet white and serve sparingly.

Eating Well

The Menu

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Appetizers

Roasted bleu cheese and leek crostini with walnuts on sourdough

Proscuitto wrapped medjool dates stuffed with herbed goat cheese and fresh basil

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The Meal

Herb brined Turkey stuffed with wild rice dressing

Blackened sweet potato spears with chile cream sauce and green onion garnish

Roasted Brussel sprouts with grapes and walnuts

Garlic herb biscuits

Cranberry sauce

Mashed potatoes

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Dessert

Apple Pie

Mocha Pecan Pie

Pumpkin Pie

Cranberry Pie

Maple Syrup Pie

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Thanksgiving is kind of a big deal hereabouts.  With three women in my family who live their lives out of the kitchen, we relish the excuse to go overboard.  And while we generally prepare enough food for two to three times the number around our table, that is not precisely what I meant.  We go overboard in the planning, the preparation, the menu-conceptualizing.  This year, I contributed the pies and the bird itself (courtesy of my boss who ordered fresh turkeys for each of his employees), my mother prepared the bird and our family tradition wild rice stuffing and paired the wines, while the meal itself was the brain and love child of my sister.  This is her last year in Fairbanks, as she's going to grad school next year, and so probably the last Thanksgiving we'll get to co-cater unless one or the other of us visits in future years. 

 

Two weeks ago now was Thanksgiving.  This weekend, I made gallons of stock with the turkey carcass, and we've been eating soup all last week and this. 

Seasons of Cold

This week has seen the temperature drop to more than twenty below zero.  While some –many – areas of the country are enjoying the promise and excitement of the first snow, entering into that hovering in-between month of November and others I am sure will not see their first hard frost for a month or more, we are well into winter.  I grew up in New England, where the seasons and the months followed the kindergarten pictures fairly closely.  Spring was ushered in with grey puffy rainclouds and mud boots in March, with tulips and pasque flowers in April, with flowers galore in May.  October was a riot of gold and red and orange.  November was chilly and wet and grey.  December saw snow and decorated trees, and January was always painted in light blues and whites with crystalline snowflakes.  I'm sure you know the pictures I mean.  Living now in the subarctic, I find that living a seasonal life shakes out just a little different.  It is the first week of November and already my seasonal/mindfulness display table with its candles between the dining room and the kitchen is covered in cloths of light blue and white, with blue and white patterned origami snow cranes.  That's the "January" of the kindergarten pictures. 

Our fall this year was long and lovely.  We had a week of "September" weather, with tall grasses going to seed, sunny days and cool evenings, and the merest hint of gold in the leaves.  Then we had a week or a little more of the bright bright gold of an Interior "October" followed by two weeks of "November" with cold rain and overcast skies.  By the middle of October, the temperature hovered between five below and twenty above, and there was a coat of snow on the ground. 

Now, sitting by the warm fire with a mug of spicy mulled wine, I realize that it is no wonder that I feel the pull of the winter celebrations so strongly – I am a month into true winter dark already.  We are losing more than eight minutes of daylight each day, as we draw slowly closer to the Solstice.   The holidays are 'supposed' to start a month or a little more into wintertime.  A fellow Fairbanksan blogging friend confessed that she has been listening to Christmas music ever since Halloween.  I too, have been cueing holiday stations on Pandora or Spotify when I am alone, and poring over pictures and thoughts of holiday crafts and baking and decorating and gifting.  I have always been slightly horrified by the store displays that pull out the Fourth of July the day after Easter and Christmas even before Thanksgiving has come.  I still am, a bit.  It is blatant over-commercialization.  But in this particular instance, in this particular clime, for this particular holiday, it makes sense.  I was waiting and hoping for the holiday displays to begin even before they did.  And I feel a little impatient for the weekend after Thanksgiving to arrive so that I can pull out the box of decorations and convince the Darlin' Man to help me pick out a tree. 

I think about the psycho-social origins of winter holidays in the Northern lands.  They were based around the Solstice of course, celebrating the return of the light even before Christianity had left its birthplace in the Middle East.  Whether you celebrate the days getting longer or the birth of your savior, the last days of our calendar's December are a time of hope and renewal, even in the depths of the winter hibernation.  Many of the traditions we think of are about this renewal or rebirth.  But many of them – the mulled wine or cider, the cookies, the warming spices of ginger and cinnamon and clove, the firelight, the family, welcome wreaths, even the gifting – are also about the drawing-in and the gathering-around of the winter season.  The weather out of doors is inhospitable at best, so we create our own warmth within.  We gather with loved ones to eat and to tell stories.  Most holiday decorations have meanings associated with the religious and spiritual significance of the holidays, from the colors to the evergreens to the stars, but also by decorating the space that we live in, where we retreat to away from the winter cold, where we gather with loved ones we make that space –our home- inviting and welcoming.  We allow it to be a space of retreat and respite, a place where spirits are lifted.

Which is all a fancy and very long-winded way of saying that this year I shan't be ashamed of my intense enjoyment, and early commencement of the winter season.  

Clucking Blossom VIII

Cluck Cluck Bloom y'all!

where  the sun always shines and everything is always free: music, love, art, food, and dancin'.  There was lots of dancin'

The festival

Clucking Blossom successfully celebrated its eighth year in true Blossom fashion this year, with music, hippies, art, and dancing.  Clucking Blossom is a free community festival every year, and this year my Darlin' Man was one of the main organizers.  He's been working on this project for months, fundraising and planning, and after a last minute craziness of Borough sound ordinances and event insurance, he (they) pulled it off phenomenally!  You'll see pictures of the ArtWalk below, its something he started a few years ago, and every year he stays up most of the night the night before hanging art in the trees, and then most of the night the night after taking it down.  Oh yeah, and his band performed as one of the closing acts. 

I had a great time, but more importantly, I'm so proud of him and the fruits of all his hard work.

Art Walk entrance

These flowers actually made me do a double take.  I was like,
what kind of Georgia transplant is actually blooming already?

Books above the path.

Floppy Disks installation

Little'un being swung around by dad.

Hooping.

This is how an acoustic band performs at an outdoor music festival.
Inside a tight group of audience, who sings along, so the vocals can
be heard by all.
Local Band = Feeding Frenzy.

spring wood violets along the art walk.

Why they call it the land of the midnight sun...
Photo taken at 11:30 pm

Fire Dancing to the Phineas Gauge.
That's my darlin'man up there on stage rappin'.

juggling fire

Fire hooping

AK fire tribe ladies being amazing with hoops.

Happy Beltaine

The first of may.  Beltaine.  May Day.  A day of celebration of life renewing, the flowers of spring.
I noticed today that the birch trees and also the lilac by my mother's front door were starting to bud, beginning new leaves for the coming season.  Also?  It snowed.
Snowed.  As in cold air and light flakes and an overcast sky.  Last week, it was so warm I left doors and windows open- deciding I would rather the fresh air and scents of warming earth than the safety from the mosquitoes.
On the bright side, hopefully the late frost and snow will have killed off a generation or two mosquitoes and we'll have a bit of a reprieve at the beginning of the bug season.  On the less bright side, I left my tray of calendula starts out on the porch too long (ok, I forgot about them and they were out all night) the other day, and so now most of my very vigorously promising starts are no longer.  Fortunately, this was about a day before the echinacea seeds started sprouting, so they're okay.

Happy May Day!  May you grow into the year ahead with much creativity and joy!

Imbolc

Last fall, my darlin' man burnt down the pile of rubbish the former owners had piled up on a spot the previous owners had done so.  It had some plastics and treated wood, and metal scraps and bits of who knows what piled up.  So, definately not a spot that I would think of growing veggies on, no idea what's leached into that spot of soil.

At the bottom of the pile, once it was burnt down, he found a bunch of feildstones.  So he made a ring around the fire pit.  Then he added found - railroad ties for benches.  So now I have the large ritual fire pit I've always wanted, and he has a spot in which he can safely build the ginormous bonfires we so enjoy. 

So, for Imbloc -coincidentally, also his cousin's birthday - we ate salmon and spinach salad and german chocolate cake.  Friends drove out to the homestead, and the darlin' man built a pyre.  He layered downed birchlogs with pallets, log cabin style, and then stuck the christmas tree on the top.  The initial flames were at least 30 feet high.  The moon was out, though the rest of the sky was cloudy, framed by the two tall spruce.  As the evening moved towards morning, the stars came out.  And much wine was drunk, and stories told.

*disclaimer: these photos are actually from the solstice bonfire, which I never got around to posting.  But my camera was dead, and we were out of batteries this weekend.  So, in reality, the snow was about 2 feet higher.