Sandi Chats

This past weekend we attended a couple of social events known as a "potluck dinner". They can also be called "fellowship dinners" or "carry-in dinners". One was a carry-in dinner to honor a couple of friends' recent marriage. The second was a potluck dinner at church to give the congregation a chance to visit with a visiting missionary family.  I am not really sure how wide-spread a potluck dinner is in our culture, but in our community you can probably find one to go to at least once a week. Everyone arrives bearing at least one, if not three or four, dishes to share, meat items, casseroles, salads, desserts, dinner rolls, appetizers, relish items...the list of possibilities is only limited by your imagination! Young women in our community are taught to cook. They learn from their mothers who learned from their mothers. Consequently, many of the dishes are made from recipes that have been handed down from generation to generation. For a potluck...

We've all heard the superstitions: "Step on a crack, break your mother's back". It's bad luck for a black cat to walk in front of you. It's bad luck to walk under a ladder. Breaking a mirror will bring seven years of bad luck. And I'm sure you can add many more, but you get the idea. We have our superstitions. Well today is Friday, the 13th. That is considered, in our culture, to be the ultimate day of bad luck. Supposedly we should all stay home in bed to avoid becoming victims of any unfortunate events. And since most of us can't shirk our duties and stay in bed we just have to get out and take our chances. Where did this superstition originate? I wondered that myself so I Googled the question. (How did we ever find out anything before Google?) According to Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia of knowledge, this superstition has only existed for the past 150 years or so, which in the whole scheme of time is only a short time. It was based on an...

Life has so many days that just go by and are forgotten. Usually they are just the mundane days that seem like the one before, nothing special happening.  Then there are the days that are remembered for the wrong reasons. Most of us can remember September 11, 2001 and the terrorist attacks that has forever changed our day to day world. A few less of us can remember November 22, 1963 when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. And quite a few less can remember December 7, 1941, the "day that will live in infamy", when the Japanese attacked our base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. (I wasn't around for that one but have heard accounts from those who do remember!) And then there are days that are remembered for all the right reasons, weddings, births, happy events. It's fun to recall those days and remember the happiness that came with the event. One of the happy days in my life is October 10, 2010. Do you remember what you were doing that day? This one is kind of a r...

Recently the news has been full of stories and pictures of the disasters created by the various hurricanes that have hit the United States as well as some of the islands in the Caribbean. In some cases, the levels of destruction have been devastating...and in others the inhabitants and their surroundings have fared much better. When it comes to hurricanes, I am always thankful that a hurricane is an impossibility for us in the central United States. The most we reap from a hurricane is an occasional rainy spell that was fed by the storms on the coasts...and in Nebraska a rainy day is a good day! However, even though hurricanes are unlikely, we are susceptible to other types of storms.  Following is a story from one of those times: Our little town has a great fire and rescue team. If you need an ambulance, a team of trained EMT's will show up, medical bags in hand, to be sure you get taken safely to the hospital. If your house is on fire, they are there to dampen down the flames...

Welcome back! Things got a bit crazy in my world for a few weeks, plus I lost my inspiration in all the busyness of things, but I am glad that things are settling down and to be back with my readers. Since I've been here, we had our annual McCoy Labor Day Family Reunion. It was a bit quieter this year as two families had other commitments and couldn't make it. But those of us who showed up had a good time.  This year we planned another water-park trip, this time to Watiki in Rapid City. At the last minute, several of us changed our minds and instead went shopping. So no repeat of last year's near drowning debacle! We also took a wine-tasting tour of a couple of the wineries in the area. I discovered that I'm not much of a wine drinker! And I'm pretty sure that in 4 days I consumed 20,000 calories, but I enjoyed each one of them! Then we arrived home to jump right into preparations for our Cowboy Fast Draw state and territorial shoot held September 15th through...

This past week I read a Facebook meme that says: "I spent the first 2/3 of my life acquiring stuff that doesn't matter only so that I can spend the last 1/3 getting rid of it. What a stupid game of consumerism we Americans play." I could have written this (had I been clever enough to think of it) as I have more than my fair share of clutter and accumulated possessions. I have often criticized other family members for keeping so much stuff, but it's one of those times of "the pot calling the kettle black".  In recent years there has been a trend toward "minimalist" living. It's actually kind of cool, but I'm not sure I'm ready to pare down quite that much yet. The philosophy behind minimalist living is that you only keep enough stuff to meet the current need....two plates, two sets of tableware, one week's worth of clothing, and so on. In some ways that would be very liberating. And in others it would seem rather austere. We s...

Last Saturday morning found us hurriedly packing food and clothing and other supplies into the camper for a trip to Lakeside, Nebraska. This was our postponed 4th of July trip that didn't pan out this year due to the holiday landing in the middle of the week and work schedules, etc. We always look forward to our summer trip to Lakeside where we do NOTHING.  And I mean NOTHING. We don't even go get our snacks and drinks, we ask the kids to bring them to us. Well this year didn't disappoint! We arrived to find that the pop-up tent was already "popped up" and all I needed to do was set up my own lawn chair and find a cold drink! So for the remainder of Saturday and all day Sunday we enjoyed sitting in the warm breeze, visiting and watching kids play and trying to keep the dogs from fighting. We had grilled burgers and summer salads and brownies and all sorts of good stuff to eat and drink. It was a very relaxing couple days. However, there was an undercurrent of ...