• Mama’s teacakes…

    June 18, 2014 / 5 Comments

    Sharing a nostalgic post today from My Southern Heart.  Originally published October 12, 2009.

    When I was growing up, there was only one car which my Dad took to work.  This meant, of course, I walked to school.  Granted, we didn’t live on a farm after my toddler years and it wasn’t a five mile walk through blizzards, but there were some cold, rainy, snowy days on my .31 tenths of a mile to and from school.

    One of my sweetest memories is coming home from school to find my Mama there and the wonderful smell of something baking.  Sometimes, there were sweet potatoes baking in the oven as part of our supper or Mama’s special meatloaf that I’ve never been able to quite duplicate.  Often there were cupcakes…warm and ready to be iced.  My favorite, however, were Mama’s vanilla teacakes…a bit like a sugar cookie but fatter and softer like a cake.  Often they were iced with Mama’s special chocolate icing.

    One day this past week, we were watching an old episode of The Waltons (I love the Waltons!).  Grandma Walton had made her special sugar cookies or teacakes.  Right that moment, I wanted one of Mama’s teacakes more than anything in the world.  After the show, I searched through Mama’s cookbook which I had compiled until I found it…the recipe for her teacakes.  I baked them on a Pampered Chef baking stone instead of Mama’s old cookie sheet which is long gone.  I also “dropped” them on the cookie sheet instead of rolling them out.  I dipped a slightly moistened juice glass in sugar then “flattened” each one out.  Next time, I won’t flatten them so they’ll be fatter and softer, but they were still delicious.

    Just one bite of that teacake, and I was a teenager coming home from school again to find warm teacakes in the oven…

    Mama’s Tea Cakes

    1/2 cup butter (1 stick)

    1 & 1/4 cup sugar

    1 egg, beaten well

    1 teaspoon vanilla

    1/4 cup milk

    2 teaspoons baking powder

    2 & 1/2 cups flour

    Cream the butter.  Add sugar gradually.  Add egg, milk and vanilla.  Sift dry ingredients and add to first mixture.  Roll out mixture to about 1/4? thickness.  Cut with round cutter and bake on a greased baking sheet at about 375-400 degrees.  Delicious iced, especially with chocolate, or sprinkle with sugar.

    Enjoy….

    Read here to find out when and how I discovered that I had actually NEVER lived on a farm!  

    That was an identity crisis!

  • Days gone by…

    June 15, 2014 / 2 Comments

    Yesterday, I traveled with my daughter and three of  her children to see a parcel of land (almost six acres) for sale.  It was the perfect afternoon to be in the country with clear blue skies overhead and a strong breeze blowing through all the trees on the property.  And there were plenty of trees:  an apple orchard, a long stand of black walnut trees, mulberry, oak, maple, large hackberry trees and an assortment of beautiful evergreens.  My daughter has been “homesteading” to some degree at their home in a suburb of Des Moines for quite some time.  She longs for land and a place to have a very large garden, chickens and maybe even dairy goats.  I come from a long line of Scottish farmers.  Maybe she inherited some of that love for the land.

    The farmhouse on the land was built in 1920 and has seen better days.  It has no central heat or air conditioning.  There is a substantial wood stove in the family room which would heat part of the house.  The hope was to be able to move the house to another part of the land and build their new home where the old house stood.  I think each of us had pictured decorating an old farmhouse!

    The beautiful setting reminded me of traveling with my parents as a child to visit aunts and uncles living in the country.  Sadly, my parents sold their farm before I was born.  I would have loved growing up in the country!  I remember visiting my Aunt Lillian and her family on a farm in Mississippi.  I loved it!  My cousins and I would pick blackberries by the train trestle.  We might have returned with a few chiggers but we also returned with big, juicy blackberries!  Aunt Lillian would make a delicious blackberry cobbler on the old wood stove.  She would also make tender huge biscuits just like Mama’s.  Perhaps they inherited their gift for cooking from my grandmother.

    The wood stove always fascinated me.  Even as a child, I wondered how she knew when the temperature was right for baking those delicious cakes, pies and biscuits.  Somehow, it seemed like magic but, even as a child, I knew it couldn’t be that simple.  I knew even then there was work involved.

    I’m a little too “old” to start homesteading now but I do admire those who are investing in their future by learning from days gone by…

    By the way, if you’re interested in enjoying food actually prepared on a wood burning stove, visit here to learn about a visit to the Living History Farms in Des Moines, Iowa, where you can do just that!  Also, here is a good article about how the cooks of yesteryear determined the temperature of their wood stove!  The wood burning stove at top was featured in Country Living.

  • Autumn days…

    October 24, 2013 / 10 Comments

    The weather has turned cool here at last.  The trees are finally wearing their Autumn shades of gold, crimson, deep ruby and russet orange. It is time to drag out the sweaters and place a warmer blanket on the bed.  My favorite time of year, Autumn makes me happy.  It brings back memories of harvest festivals of years gone by…apple picking…apple dumplings…homemade apple pies.

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    My daughter purchased two bushels of apples, and tomorrow I will help her turn those apples into delicious apple butter!  Years ago, when we lived in Indiana, my sisters and my niece Sharon came for a visit.  We traveled to Nashville, Brown County, Indiana.  It’s a wonderful little town with quaint shops, resident artists and wonderful food.  There, at the Nashville House Dining Room in the historic Brown County Inn, I had some of the best oven baked apple butter I have ever tasted.  I came home and tried to duplicate it and actually came close.  Now, years later, they actually share the recipe here!

    Tonight, I will go with my daughter and her family to “The Great Pumpkin Party” at church…just as we did last year.  The large church is equipped all over (indoors) with all sorts of fun events for children – including different “jumping” houses and games.  There are also pony rides outside.  They love it and it is so much fun!

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    My thanks to those of you who’ve stuck with me through this “postless” last month.  Excuses?  I’ve been traveling and spending time with precious grandchildren – both near and far.  These days, I am also traveling back in time as I spend hours working, once again, on my family history.  Yesterday, I found myself missing Dot, my late oldest sister and the one who dreamed of being able to trace our ancestors as far back as possible.  We were actually “stuck” on Mama’s maternal grandmother, Mary Frances Cooper.  I wrote for her death certicate.  Fifteen years ago – that was how you had to do it.  There were a few clues but also the wrong first initial of her father.  The information about her was being given over the telephones of yesteryear.  Her father’s first name was Vincent.  My Dad was listed as the informant and gave the individual asking for the information the letter “V”.  Over the phone, “V” can sound like “B” and that’s what they wrote down!  In the old days, they used a lot of initials for first names and that can throw a curve.

    Yesterday, I finally traced Mary Frances Cooper’s family all the way back to her immigrant ancestor and my 6th great-grandfather, William Cooper, who was born in 1669 in Warwickshire, England!  He immigrated to America and arrived in Virginia with his wife Elizabeth Lawrence in 1718!  The find was so bittersweet…for I wanted to share it with Dot.  I hope she knows.  There are more branches of this family tree to complete now.

    I’m rather surprised to say that THIS is my one-hundredth post!  I’m looking forward to sharing more of my Sweet Journey Home and I thank you for following along with me…

     autumnleaves

  • Pure joy…

    August 17, 2013 / 11 Comments

    Yesterday was a day of pure joy and thanksgiving as my newest grandchild made her way into this world…with mom and daughter doing fine.  She was born at 10:34 a.m. weighing a healthy 7 pounds, 14 ounces and with enough hair to know there may be some strawberry blonde for this sweet baby too…just like her big sister and her Dad.   

    My son called me on “Facetime” from the hospital in order for me to “meet” her in “real-time”.  I talked softly to my beautiful brand new granddaughter and watched closely as she peacefully slept and moved her little hands.  Sweetness personified. 

    I will fly to Dallas on September 5 to meet her in person and hold her in my arms.  I will be there to celebrate her big sister’s second birthday!  What fun that will be!

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     I couldn’t help but reminisce a bit and remember when my son was born…just a little over 33 years ago.  Here he is in the hospital with his dad not long after he was born.  Notice the strawberry blonde hair even then.  Sweet memories.  I love this circle of life and the incredible joy of being a grandmother!

     

     

  • The sixth day of August…

    August 6, 2013 / 3 Comments

    There are some days in life that are just bittersweet…today is one of those days.

    On a sweet note, today is Cindy’s birthday.  She is my sister Gerry’s firstborn.  Cindy is beautiful with a heart of gold…just like her late Mom.  She has an ever ready smile and a wonderful sense of humor.  We are always laughing when we’re all together.  An amazing pianist and wonderful teacher, she must bless the hearts of the students at the college where she teaches.  No doubt, she blesses the hearts of our entire family…just as she blesses mine.  Happy Birthday, Cindy!  I love you.  Wish I could be there to celebrate with all of you!

    Love this photo from about 1957.  Cindy was almost 5 and I was 12.  (Guessing at the year and ages here.)

    Apparently, I’d propped her up in the car window!  I was a really good baby sitter!

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    Sadly, today also marks the ninth anniversary of my beautiful sister Dot’s death.  She fought a courageous battle against AML (Acute Myloid Leukemia) but Heaven needed her.  She had such strength and optimism.  She believed in FAMILY more than anyone I have ever known.  Dot remembered special days with a card, a note or a call.  She organized family reunions and made sure that we all got together.  She had a gift for staying in touch.  Dot had the burden/privilege of being the oldest…maybe that comes with the territory.  As I shared in the previous post, searching for our family roots was Dot’s inspiration and I will honor her by finishing it.  She would like that.  

    How I would love to answer the phone and hear her quip one more time, “Hello!  What’s going on besides the rent?” with that smile in her voice.  I miss her every single day…but I will see her in Heaven.

     I love this picture of my sister when she was about 21 years old. 

  • A mystery in Scotland…

    August 4, 2013 / 25 Comments

    I wonder if the same thing that makes me wish I’d been an FBI agent is the same deep thing that makes me love a mystery?  Finding clues, sorting them out and solving a mystery is more than just a challenge – it’s actually intriguing.  This time, I’m talking about searching out clues in my family history.  Years ago, my late sister Dot had the dream of finding our ancestors.  I joined her in the exciting search.  It didn’t take a whole lot of imagination to know that with the last name of McGregor, our ancestors had come from Scotland.

    We began the journey back through the years and enlisted the help of our other two sisters.  The four of us traveled to the archives of Mississippi and various other libraries.  We wrote many letters requesting information from archives in several states.  Amidst the laughter on each trip we’d take, we discovered answers – in birth records, death records, marriage records, old newspaper clippings and family Bibles.  You would have thought we’d won the lottery when we “proved” a date or name.  There are three large rubbermaid containers stacked next to my chest in my bedroom…filled with several years worth of hard work.  I purposely did not put them in the storeroom for a good reason:  they’re there to remind me that I must finish this family history.  When the snow starts to fall in a few months, I will rejoin Ancestry.com and begin the journey back through time once again.

    Several years ago, my husband and I were traveling through North Carolina where my immigrant ancestor, Rev. William McGregor, had lived almost 300 years ago now.  There at the foot of Fall Mountain, he built a homestead – complete with a sturdy log house and outbuildings.  He established a large apple orchard.  He “preached in the meeting houses of America”…which had been his reason for coming to America in the first place.   He sold his home and land to Dr. Kron, the first physician of North Carolina.  The house has been rebuilt as an exact replica and is in Morrow Mountain State Park in Stanly County, North Carolina. 

    It was somehow humbling, yet awe-inspiring, to stand on the land of my ancestor, a Baptist preacher from Scotland (there weren’t a lot of Baptists in Scotland at that time).   I stood on the porch of his home and wondered where the answers lie.  So many of the actual records burned in fires over the years according to the archives there in Stanly County.  There are hundreds of his descendants who are searching – as I am.  Supposedly, Rev. William McGregor was born in Ossian’s Glen, Scotland.  Other records indicate he came from the Isle of Skye. 

    The mystery lies in Scotland but there is much to prove here first.  This is just part of the mystery that I will be working on this Winter, when the snow begins to fall…

     

    Below:  The front of Rev. William McGregor’s house in Morrow Mountain State Park, Stanly County, NC…

     

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    Below:  The  back of Rev. William McGregor’s log house in Stanly County, NC 

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     Below:  The back door of Rev. William McGregor’s house…wmmcgregor3