A Father's Day Flower Story

"Any man can be a father, but it takes someone special to be a dad." 

Happy Father's Day to all of you out there who are fathers or had a father. The picture is of my husband and our first child. My husband and I were both so young, but we were a family. I've always loved this picture. You can almost see the love bonding between father and son. 

But as our preacher pointed out this morning, not every child had or has that loving dad. He didn't, so he knows. Still, we want to celebrate those who are good dads. I've been blessed to know many wonderful, loving dads. My father. My father-in-law. My husband and his brothers. My sons. Many of the men in our little country church. Dads to celebrate! 

It's fun that one of the flower stories I received for my Small Town Girl Celebration Contest ties in so well with Father's Day. Thank you, Carol, for sharing your happy flower story. 

She says, "My favorite gift of flowers was a wrist corsage from my father, which he gave me when I played a piano concert when I was about 10. It was my first adult gift of flowers, and a total surprise, given to me by the man I idolized. No flowers will ever mean as much to me. Dad passed away in April 2012, and I miss him every minute."

When I e-mailed Carol for permission to share her story she sent me a photo of her handsome dad to go with her flower memory and added this information about him. "My Dad was a very special guy. He fought in WWII, then served the U.S. in the Air Force for 23 years, retiring as a colonel, then went to work for the Army as a weapons development engineer. And through it all he did special things to make us feel loved - gifts from all over the world for my Mom and all five of us kids, trips to museums, figure skating with his girls, etc. He even brought home a large glass lens that would later be used in a military camera lens, and let us each have a chance to help grind the lens! Wonderful memories!"

Precious memories. It's been great seeing all the pictures of dads on Facebook today as we do have those precious memories. I hope you have wonderful memories of your dad or if you are the dad that you are making great memories with your children.

If you haven't left a comment or sent me an e-mail, annhgabhart(at)yahoo(dot)com, to throw your name in the hat for my contest, you still have time. Deadline for entering is July 13 at midnight EST. And I'd love to hear your flower stories too. Not a requirement for entering, but fun. If you do send a flower story, let me know if I can share it forward. No last names or places, so your privacy is protected. And again, Carol, thanks for sharing about your flower corsage and your dad.

Thanks for reading! 

Fathers and Ice Cream - a Recipe for Good Times

A truly rich man is one whose children run into his arms when his hands are empty.  ~Author Unknown

When my dad was living and we all went home to celebrate Father's Day, we nearly always made ice cream. The same was true when we gathered with my husband's family in the summer time. I think they must have decided on June for Father's Day because they knew most dads love ice cream. 

My dad had a White Mountain ice cream freezer. The kind you cranked yourself. Those plug-in types like the one you see in the picture where we're making ice cream last year on Father's Day, they weren't the real thing. If you wanted to make the good ice cream, you turned the crank with muscle power and not electrical power. That was part of the fun on Dad's day. Taking turns cranking the ice cream. Even the little kids got in on the action in the early going before the ice cream started to harden.

Mom made the stock, then generally we added bananas, some cream or half and half and vanilla. Sometimes, if we had fresh strawberries or peaches, Dad would let us vary the flavor, but he liked banana best. So did my father-in-law. So does my husband. I think I experimented with a chocolate recipe once. All the guys considered it a waste of time and effort and next time went shopping for bananas. Once Mom had the canister loaded with the ice cream mix she turned it over to the guys and kids to freeze.  

Of course it was Dad who knew exactly the right mix of salt and ice to freeze it the fastest. Nothing was really going to happen until water started coming out of the overflow hole in the wooden tub. Then you were getting somewhere. Finally Dad would declare the crank too hard to turn, open the top very carefully to keep the salt on the outside and not in the ice cream, and pull out the dasher. Mom would pass out spoons to the kids to get a taste from that. Then Dad would put a cork in the top, drain off the salty ice water somewhere it didn't matter if the plants died. Always a great way to get rid of stubborn poison ivy plants. Then he would pack in more ice and salt, tie newspapers around it with baling twine, and cover it with a thick blanket. After an hour or so, the wraps would come off and it would be ice cream time.

We don't make ice cream as much as we used to while Dad and my father-in-law were living, but the memories live on. And I do have my mother's recipe for the stock if you want to give it a try. Beats the mix hands down.

She cooked it in a double boiler, but you can also probably microwave it or cook it carefully with a lot of stirring in an iron skillet. This made about a gallon. You adjusted the amount by adding the mashed fruit and additional milk.

Stir 1/2 cup all purpose flour into 2 cups sugar. Add 3 eggs, beaten. Stir in 6 cups milk. Cook over hot water (see note above) until slightly thickened. Remove from heat and beat hard. To the above mixture add sufficient milk, a pint of cream (or half-and-half), your choice of mashed fruit (for banana ice cream, mash up 6 or 7 really ripe bananas) or flavoring. Stir well, pour into your ice cream freezer and have fun making some yummy ice cream.

Do you have a favorite ice cream recipe? Share it with us. 

Thanks for reading. Hope you had a blessed and happy Father's Day.

Good Times with Dad

Happy Fathers' Day to all you dads and all of you who have a dad. I hope if your father is still living you were able to give him a hug this weekend either in person or via telephone or some electronic means. And those of you like me who don't have your father here with you anymore, I hope you thought about some fun times you had with your dad and that you're still smiling in your heart from knowing how loved you were by that first most important man in your life.

I had a good dad. He wasn't a take you fishing (thank goodness since I never wanted to go fishing) or play catch with you kind of dad. He did like making ice cream on hot summer Sundays. Banana was his flavor of choice. And once the grandkids came along they all had fun helping him churn the old White Mountain freezer.

But mostly when I was a kid, quality time with dad was time spent working in the fields in tobacco or hay. When you're a kid that's not exactly what you want to do, but I don't remember resenting it too much. That's just what we had to do since we were part of a family and all of us had to work to keep the family farm going. My kids had to work on the farm when they were growing up too, but they were into a lot more extracurricular activities at school. That's not something I did. I spent my spare time writing and reading and walking in the woods and playing with dogs. Just like now. Except I've added in playing with grandkids now.

And there are still chores to do. With July coming, I'm going to have to look some of those chores I've been putting off in the face and just do them. Window washing and painting and closet cleaning. I haven't named a favorite chore yet. What is my favorite chore? Can you have a favorite chore? If you like doing it, then it isn't a chore, is it? I suppose my least unfavorite chore is laundry. It's so easy now with the washers and dryers. Just throw the clothes in and the machines do all the work. Lots easier than that wringer washer I had when I got married and tons easier than the scrub board my mom had when she got married.

You know the Shakers were one of the first to come up with a washing machine. The Shakers were industrious and hard working, but they always wanted to figure out a quicker and more efficient way to do all their work. That's why they came up with so many innovative ideas. They wanted to get their work done as fast as possible so they could do more work. They made what they called "fancy goods" to sell to the "world." They liked making money to expand their holdings and take care of their land. They are an interesting people to learn more about, and I learned something new this week. I mistakenly thought all the Shakers had died out, but there are still a few (four?) at Sabbathday Lake Shaker Village in Maine. They are actually still recruiting but from what I read on the internet, they have a lot of curious nibbles but few serious inquiries.

Not long now until my new book, The Believer, will be out. Remember you can send me an e-mail from my website, http://www.anngabhart.com/ to be entered in the drawings in July and August. One entry gets you five chances to win an autographed copy of The Believer. Also, I'm going to be sending out a newsletter this week. If you'd like to be on my newsletter list, you can go to the website and click on the newsletter link and I'll sign you up.

Hope you have a great week. I'm sending that new book, The Seeker, in this week so I can feel good for day or two. Then I'll have to be on pins and needles until I hear my editor's reaction.