The Making of a (World-Famous) Tradition

We had an absolutely superb day yesterday celebrating Lepkuchen Day! Wow! It was awesome! DH and I decided that, in terms of Lepkuchen Day, we have finally "arrived." This was our fourth year celebrating, and we finally made everything we wanted out of it.

Here's how our Lepkuchen Day history has gone:

Year #0 - We experience Lepkuchen Day at our friends' house. We are instant converts. 

Year #1 - I couldn't get DH to take me seriously about wanting to celebrate it ourselves, so I made Lepkuchen and DH slept through it. That was it for that year.

Year #2 - We didn't get around to making any cookies because we had just bought a house, so we just went over to our friends' house and ate theirs.

Year #3 - We make a big batch of lepkuchen, but we forget to get our invitations out until something like 1-2 days in advance. We end up having a total of one visitor.

Year #4 - Yesterday!

Well, we got a super-late start. Our open house was 9a till noon, but I figured, "Ah, shucks, no one will actually come right at the beginning," with the end result that I was just serving breakfast and starting to preheat the oven when "Ding, dong!" - in walked two sets of neighbors (including the parents of the woman who used to own our house!). I valiantly tried to conceal the scrambled eggs on the table and did some scrambling of my own to hurry some lepkuchen into the oven so that they could have some to eat before they left.

We had an awesome time getting to finally know some of our neighbors. After that we had several waves of church family drop by, so we actually had three hours of steady visiting for a total of 11 guests - a 1000% increase over last year! (An improvement like that won't be possible to make twice in a row!)

We got all (or most) of our lepkuchen made by 1:00, and then we decided to skip nap time and head straight over to our friends' house for their 2:00 to 5:00 p.m. Lepkuchen Day open house. We ended up staying for three and a half hours and had a splendid time visiting with them and their visitors while baby slept in a back room and our eldest played enthusiastically with the toys they keep for their grandbabies.

It was the best Lepkuchen Day ever. Seriously, Lepkuchen Day is now one of my favorite holidays. It's a wonderful, delicious, fellowship-filled day that has all the makings of a beautiful holiday, but instead of the sadness-tinged nature of Christmas (I always know that Christmas means the end of the Christmas season) it has all the excitement and anticipation of a holiday season just beginning.

I came to thinking afterward that Lepkuchen Day may be the answer to a prayer for me as well. I have been wanting to start some sort of annual neighborhood gathering, but I haven't been able to figure out how to do it. My parents' neighborhood has always had a yearly July 4th block party, which was always a ton of fun, and I've wanted to do the same thing. However, I am a rotten hostess, being among the socially awkward of the world, and I have been very fearful that my attempts to host a July 4th party of our own would be a terrible flop. Lepkuchen Day, which I can handle much better because I'm more of a cook than a hostess, might just be a yearly gathering that we can host for our neighborhood (as well as our friends!), and perhaps it will spur someone more socially-inclined to host a proper block party of some sort or other. Just a thought.


So, in the interest of having one composite article about Lepkuchen Day, I am going to cut and paste from yesterday's article, explaining the history of the holiday, and then I'm going to add "Lepkuchen Day traditions" down at the bottom (so if you've read yesterday's writing, just scroll down to the bottom.

***

About six years ago, we met an absolutely delightful couple, Dale and Pat. Dale's mother had made a habit of making Lepkuchen in November before Thanksgiving, so when Dale married, he and his wife created their own "official" holiday - Lepkuchen Day, to be celebrated on the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and to be dedicated to the making and eating of Lepkuchen cookies.

We thought it was a splendid idea, and after enjoying a Lepkuchen Day at their house (they hold an open house on L. Day to welcome neighbors and friends), we decided that we simply had to join in the fun. We were newly married, and needing some traditions of our own that weren't just adopted from our individual families, and so Lepkuchen Day became our new holiday tradition.

Tomorrow we will celebrate our fourth Lepkuchen Day (or third active Lepkuchen Day, to be honest, since we skipped one when we had just bought our house). I am so excited! I have three batches of Lepkuchen Dough waiting in the fridge (it's made a week in advance), and we have invited our friends and neighbors to join us (last year we had a grand total of one guest, but it was something!). I am really looking forward to it. Lepkuchen Day has become a very real holiday to us, and we love it!

And so, may I be the first to wish my gentle readers...

..... A Very Happy Lepkuchen Day!

And here is the recipe! 

~ Lep Kuchen ~

There are certain things that are nice to know, especially when the world seems to go not well -- the King is coming, my family loves me, and at Christmas there are Lep Kuchen. The following recipe goes back more generations than I know, but probably came from Germany where the K's and H's (my mother’s family) have their roots. Enjoy making the batter, listen to Christmas music while baking them, and then savor the taste...and the memories. DFK

INGREDIENTS (Use high quality ingredients only)

• 2 lb. brown sugar
• 5 eggs (large)
• 2 tablespoons molasses
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1 “ nutmeg
• 1 “ cinnamon
• ½ “ ground cloves
• ½ cup whiskey (Seagram’s 7 Crown is very good.)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda (Dissolve it in the whiskey.)
• 1 cup chopped walnuts (If you buy walnuts that are already chopped, be sure to check them for any pieces of shells.)
• ½ lb. pitted dates (Use very cold scissors or knife to cut up into pieces slightly smaller than a raisin. Better to cut up your own dates than to buy already chopped ones.)
• 1½ to 1¾ quarts flour (This is about 2 lb. Use a liquid-measure container.)
• Box of powdered sugar (for the glaze) and a pastry brush

PROCEDURE

A. The Batter
1. Cut up the dates and the walnuts (check for pieces of shells).
2. Thoroughly mix brown sugar, eggs, molasses, spices, and baking soda dissolved in the whiskey.
3. Stir in nuts and dates.
4. Add flour slowly (i.e., ½ quart at a time). Dough should be sticky, but not gooey. Don’t add too much flour. 1½ to 1¾ quarts usually is just about right.
5. Mix well. Use hands to blend ingredients.
6. Allow dough to stand 1+ week in covered container in refrigerator.

B. The Baking
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Spread a thin layer of flour on the cutting surface.
3. Have moist hands and moist rolling pin (cold water) to pat down and roll out dough (about ¼” thick, more or less to personal preference).
4. Cut dough into diamond shapes using a cold, wet table knife.
5. Use a non-stick cookie sheet.
6. Bake 8-10 minutes. Test the first tray to determine if you need to bake them shorter or longer.
7. Allow the cookies to cool, then spread a thin glaze on each. Make the glaze by adding water to powdered sugar until it forms a pasty consistency (a little thinner than Elmer’s glue).

1 batch makes 85-100 of the best cookies on earth.

* My own note: Since I don't like to spend all day rolling out cookies, I do slice-and-bake. The night before L. Day, I roll the dough into logs and wrap in plastic. They're a bit too soft to do just refrigerated, so I pop them in the freezer a few hours in advance so they're semi-frozen. I'm going to experiment to see if they can be sliced when completely frozen, and if that works, I'll post here. Yesterday I discovered that the colder they are, the better (and less stickily) they slice. Also, you can dip your knife in water to keep it from sticking.

***

Lepkuchen Day Traditions

(1) Our friends D&P make Lepkuchen Day the day that they first play Christmas music. I can't pull that off, since I start playing Christmas music in something like February (and I cheat - I really start in January), but it's a great way to do it.

(2) Our friends also make it a tradition that the first song that they play on Lepkuchen Day must be their family's favorite Christmas song. We didn't find that out till yesterday evening, so it was too late, but we'll do that next year.

(3) Our friend Dale has special air-bake cookie sheets, the "sanctified cookie sheets," that are used for nothing but Lepkuchen. They are carefully wrapped and stored and are brought out for nothing but Lepkuchen Day (and are thus in terrific shape). We may get around to this!

(4) Lepkuchen Day is also a day for inviting friends and neighbors over to visit. This is the part that makes it so special! Thanks so much to everyone who joined us yesterday! (And to those who wanted to, but couldn't!) Friends can eat snacks (this year I made apple cider in a crockpot and put out chips and salsa... I am so stinking proud of myself) and help glaze lepkuchen while they visit. We send everyone away with a plate of lepkuchen (as well as all they can eat while they're here).

(5) After Lepkuchen Day, we give Lepkuchen to neighbors and friends. We have some in the freezer for everyone who requested it and our near neighbors, plus our midwife, our mail carrier, etc.

(6) In each package of cookies that we give out, we put a paper tag that reads, "Life is hard, but at least there are Lepkuchen." Our friends this year also started putting a little paper with the history of Lepkuchen Day, and I think we'll do the same next year.

(7) This one is ours! We put a sign on all the doors that said "Happy Lepkuchen Day" and gave what is, to us, the classic Lepkuchen Day quote: "There are certain things that are nice to know, especially when the world seems to go not well -- the King is coming, my family loves me, and at Christmas there are Lep Kuchen." - Dale K.

(8) As Lepkuchen Day approaches, we post manic reminders on social media sites, as in, "Only six months till Lepkuchen Day!" By the time Lepkuchen Day actually arrives, most of our friends and acquaintances are pretty well convinced that we are either unbalanced or actively insane.

(9) We uphold Lepkuchen Day traditions with a religious fervor that drives said friends and acquaintances to the same conclusions reached in point #8. Our friend Dale is the master of this, but we do our best to tread in his footsteps.

(10) We take lots of pictures! This one we completely flopped on. Completely. Not one picture (any pics taken were done post-event.) Next year when you're over, remind us to take pictures! 
 
***

And there you have it! This year across the nation there were five families (plus one to come) celebrating Lepkuchen Day, so, as Dale puts it, "The Lepkuchen Day revolution has begun!" If you're looking for a superb annual tradition, join us next year!

And as they say.... Only 364 days till Lepkuchen Day!

Break Out the Whisky..... It's Lepkuchen Day!!! (And Other Delightful News)

Actually, I've never really had whiskey... it's just an ingredient in that most delectable and tantalizing German Christmas cookie, the Lep Kuchen (or lepkuchen or lebkuchen). So bring it on!

About six years ago, we met an absolutely delightful couple, Dale and Pat. Dale's mother had made a habit of making Lepkuchen in November before Thanksgiving, so when Dale married, he and his wife created their own "official" holiday - Lepkuchen Day, to be celebrated on the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and to be dedicated to the making and eating of Lepkuchen cookies.

We thought it was a splendid idea, and after enjoying a Lepkuchen Day at their house (they hold an open house on L. Day to welcome neighbors and friends), we decided that we simply had to join in the fun. We were newly married, and needing some traditions of our own that weren't just adopted from our individual families, and so Lepkuchen Day became our new holiday tradition.

Tomorrow we will celebrate our fourth Lepkuchen Day (or third active Lepkuchen Day, to be honest, since we skipped one when we had just bought our house). I am so excited! I have three batches of Lepkuchen Dough waiting in the fridge (it's made a week in advance), and we have invited our friends and neighbors to join us (last year we had a grand total of one guest, but it was something!). I am really looking forward to it. Lepkuchen Day has become a very real holiday to us, and we love it!

And so, may I be the first to wish my gentle readers...


..... A Very Happy Lepkuchen Day!

And here is the recipe! 

~ Lep Kuchen ~

There are certain things that are nice to know, especially when the world seems to go not well -- the King is coming, my family loves me, and at Christmas there are Lep Kuchen. The following recipe goes back more generations than I know, but probably came from Germany where the K's and H's (my mother’s family) have their roots. Enjoy making the batter, listen to Christmas music while baking them, and then savor the taste...and the memories. DFK

INGREDIENTS (Use high quality ingredients only)

• 2 lb. brown sugar
• 5 eggs (large)
• 2 tablespoons molasses
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1 “ nutmeg
• 1 “ cinnamon
• ½ “ ground cloves
• ½ cup whiskey (Seagram’s 7 Crown is very good.)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda (Dissolve it in the whiskey.)
• 1 cup chopped walnuts (If you buy walnuts that are already chopped, be sure to check them for any pieces of shells.)
• ½ lb. pitted dates (Use very cold scissors or knife to cut up into pieces slightly smaller than a raisin. Better to cut up your own dates than to buy already chopped ones.)
• 1½ to 1¾ quarts flour (This is about 2 lb. Use a liquid-measure container.)
• Box of powdered sugar (for the glaze) and a pastry brush

PROCEDURE

A. The Batter
1. Cut up the dates and the walnuts (check for pieces of shells).
2. Thoroughly mix brown sugar, eggs, molasses, spices, and baking soda dissolved in the whiskey.
3. Stir in nuts and dates.
4. Add flour slowly (i.e., ½ quart at a time). Dough should be sticky, but not gooey. Don’t add too much flour. 1½ to 1¾ quarts usually is just about right.
5. Mix well. Use hands to blend ingredients.
6. Allow dough to stand 1+ week in covered container in refrigerator.

B. The Baking
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Spread a thin layer of flour on the cutting surface.
3. Have moist hands and moist rolling pin (cold water) to pat down and roll out dough (about ¼” thick, more or less to personal preference).
4. Cut dough into diamond shapes using a cold, wet table knife.
5. Use a non-stick cookie sheet.
6. Bake 8-10 minutes. Test the first tray to determine if you need to bake them shorter or longer.
7. Allow the cookies to cool, then spread a thin glaze on each. Make the glaze by adding water to powdered sugar until it forms a pasty consistency (a little thinner than Elmer’s glue).

1 batch makes 85-100 of the best cookies on earth.

*****

In other happy, happy news!

Point #1 - Our insurance has tentatively agreed to pay for the more detailed genetic testing for baby! Hurray!!! I say "tentatively" because their letter was rather confusing - they said "yes, we'll cover it, but we don't guarantee payment." Hmm. However, our geneticist's office considers it sufficient to go ahead, so we'll be getting the test done after Thanksgiving and should have results sometime in January. When we get results, we will either (1) have answers, hurray, hurray!, or (2) know that this is the end of the road, and that we will just have to treat symptoms without having a diagnosis (because there is currently nowhere else to go in terms of testing - this is it). So either way will be a conclusion!

Point #2 - We saw baby's GI doctor this past Wednesday. If you will remember, our geneticist wanted us to do a brain MRI and a reflux test to see if baby's back-arching could be due to either neurological causes (the MRI) or reflux (the reflux test). We are not keen on the reflux test because it requires fasting, barium drinking, possible intubation, and most likely restraint for X-rays. So very fun. Plus the fact that baby doesn't really show signs of reflux. But we went ahead with the pre-procedure consult, and thankfully the doctor seemed to agree with us without us even having to voice our concerns! I think her main thought was "And you are here because....?" Or rather, she was concerned about completely different issues! (Baby's low weight concerned her, but I don't think she was concerned about reflux.) Anyhow, in brief, she said, "We could test for reflux by doing test A, B, C or D, but since those are really unpleasant for baby, let's just treat him for reflux and see if it works." If it works, we'll know his back-arching was caused by reflux, and if not, that it wasn't! Hurray! So we'll be going back there in 2 months, and hopefully that will be it.

Off to take advantage of nap time! Good night, all!

A New and Wonderful HG Blog!

I am so excited to announce the presence of a new HG blog on the net!

Knocked Up, Knocked Over

The authoress is writing about her preparations for an upcoming pregnancy after having experienced disastrous HG with baby #1, and she is posting her experiences, her research, her emotions, and her plans. Good, great, wonderful stuff. Take a few moments to read through it! I especially loved her pregnancy/HG game plan (I had one too!).

I am so excited about all the new HG blogs! This promises to be among the best of them. Thanks for writing!

Another Wonderful HG Blog

I am so excited to announce the presence of a new HG blog on the web!!!

Knocked Up, Knocked Over

Doctor #Whichever - Physical Therapy

Yesterday we had baby's first physical therapy session (all the other sessions lately have been evaluations of one type or another).

It went pretty well. I have a horrible time trying to pay attention during these sessions. For one thing, I was obsessing over the fact that I had somehow brought baby to his session with grungy socks and a onesie that had a mysterious stain on it. And he had a really bad haircut (which I've tried to since rectify... only somewhat successfully). The internal agonizing of a mother sure the therapist has written her off as a bad mother. But I digress.

The other thing that I find horribly hard about therapy sessions is that we have our eldest with us as well. And as he is emphatically not the "sit in a corner and read a book" type (like I was), I have to keep an eye on him, make sure he's okay and occupied, and occasionally discipline. So trying to do that while have a conversation with the therapist and participate in the therapy is next to impossible. Or rather, I do it, but I'm distracted and a total stress case.

Moving on.

The therapy went well, nothing much new there.

However, here's something interesting. The therapist mentioned something new to us - torticollis, or persistent head turning in one direction (i.e. right or left). Baby definitely has this - he likes to turn his head to his right, and he has the tell-tale positional plagiocephaly (flat head on one side) as a result. When I searched torticollis to see if it could have anything to do with his back-arching, I came up with something called Sandifer's Syndrome. While we're only guessing at this point, baby does match up with a lot of the symptom picture. With that in mind, we're definitely going to mention it to the GI doctor when we see her this coming week (as Sandifer's Syndrome is a complication of GERD, which will be her specialty).

Interesting stuff! I would really like some answers on this thing. I can't believe how much time and money and effort we've put into a search for a diagnosis which has only resulted in head-scratching and a collective "hmm." It would be nice to be able to have a diagnosis and move on into treatment instead of staying in limbo forever.

And now, on to a very busy weekend! Tomorrow is "Batterday Saturday," the day when we make our cookie dough for next week's annual "Lepkuchen Day" - a holiday invented by our friends, which we adopted into our own holiday traditions. Yum! I can't wait.

Love to all!!!

HG Musings & Advice

My good friend Jennifer, currently pregnant with Embryo Adoption Snowflake baby Matthew (SO exciting!!!) has gone through the wringer with nausea and vomiting during her pregnancy. I wanted to share some of her writings.

First, on dealing with HG, and the discouragement that comes with it:

Week 13: "Emesis"

And also...

Week 24: "Middle of the Night Whining"

And then a great compilation of her how-to-deal-with-it tips:

My Very Limited HG Tips

I always love posting writings from HG mamas, so please feel free to send me links to link to if you have written about your experience or done any "how to survive" articles.

If Two Colds in One Week is a Bit Much....

.... Then two colds plus food poisoning in one week is definitely too much!

Enough said.

But don't think I'm complaining too loudly, because I was blessed beyond measure that this food poisoning was so minor - really, really minor - I was able to get up and function for most of the day. Praise God for that, because I have had enough food poisoning/stomach flu lately - this is the third time in about six months!

So I'm not complaining. But I would really like to knock it off with the gastroenteritis! Bad, bad germs!

This has been an odd couple of weeks. Right now I am having to learn to deal with a paradigm shift in our family, one that is common enough to most families, but which being both new to me and out of line with my personality, has been a super hard-sell. I hate to sound to mysterious - I'd love to write it all out, but I make it a point to write nothing on the internet that I wouldn't like the entire world to see. So for now, onward and upward in terms of uncomfortable and stretching personal growth!

DH is currently considering a possible new job opportunity.... It sounds absolutely wonderful, except in one (to me) essential aspect - it means that we would lose something like an hour and a half of his time every day. I realize that I've been blessed to have him home so early in the afternoons (he works an earlier shift and takes short lunches), but I find the prospect of losing that family time to be something along the lines of unthinkable. Partly because I enjoy his company, partly because I believe that "daddy time" is invaluable to the boys, and partly because the hours between "daddy's home!" and dinner have been the best part of our days for the past year. If this job change happens, we will be back to "daddy's home, let's eat dinner so the kids can jump into the bathtub and go straight to bed." For me, the schedule would be a deal-breaker (even though it's not even a bad schedule, as schedules go), but I understand why DH is excited about this possibility - it's with a great company doing something that he likes (he's been doing work not particularly well suited to him at his current post). So it's definitely a matter for prayer!!

And now off to try to clean up the mess that has happened while I've been too yucky-feeling to do anything about it! That, or to collapse on the couch. The latter looks preferable. Night, all!

Morning Sickness Articles

First, from a pregnancy site:

When Pregnancy Vomiting is Not OK

I found a couple of things in this article that seemed a bit odd; for example, I really doubt if a woman who goes to her OB/midwife vomiting blood will be told, "You probably have an oral infection!" Or rather, if a mother is told that, I think it's probably time to change providers - not just toothpaste brands. In other words, most women know the difference between "I need to brush more often" and "I'm throwing up so much that I'm actually vomiting blood." But anyway, I digress. Any publicity is helpful!


And in much more groundbreaking news, the preliminary findings from the USC HG study are in and (drum roll, please!) there does indeed appear to be a genetic causative factor for HG. Read here:

Severe Morning Sickness Runs in Families

From the article:

"Researchers found that women were more likely to experience a serious form of morning sickness if their mothers or sisters did as well.

"Looking specifically at a very severe form of nausea known as hyperemesis gravidarum (HG), the authors found that women with sisters who had HG were 17 times more likely to also develop HG." (emphasis mine)

So there you have it! Thoughts, anyone?

For myself, I don't know of any other women in my family who had HG. Unfortunately my knowledge of family history is limited, since (due to my parents having had me late in life, and their parents having had them late in life), all of my grandparents were dead before I even hit my teens (most of them before I was born). However, severe morning sickness is something that often lives on in family oral history, and I have heard nothing from either side of my family. My mother had ordinary garden-variety nausea - I'm not sure she even ever threw up. When HG hit me, she was really stumped as to what was going on (we all were, to be frank!). So for me, I don't seem to have a direct and obvious link.

However, I have heard of many other women who said that their HG/NVP ran in their families, and it's nice to know that so that siblings and daughters can be aware and prepared.

Two Colds in One Week....

.... is really too much!

Yes, two colds in one week is really pushing it. I've had enough!

Last Friday, we went to a lovely wedding. Saturday morning, we (DH, DS and myself) woke up with the beginnings of a cold - DS more advanced than DH and I, so we're assuming that he brought it home. Thankfully, it was a super-super minor cold - the kind where you just feel a wee bit under the weather and are back to normal within a few days. The kind of cold where your body laughs scornfully at said virus - "Bring it on, you weakling!"

Apparently it took us at our word.

On Wednesday, DH woke up and said, "Oh gosh, I feel horrible." Enter cold #2. DH stayed at home for two days, and then I woke up with it on Friday (it hit properly today). We're waiting to see if baby or our eldest will be hit with #2. In the meantime, DS missed an entire week of preschool and AWANA (with cold #1 - he was never really "sick" sick, but I feel bad sending a sniffling kid in), we had to cancel baby's therapy and a multitude of other events, and we're just waiting for #2 to run its course.

I wish that life could just stop when one is sick! It would be lovely to be able to retire properly to bed and just rest when sick... instead of having to draggingly continue through life and child/baby-care. But enough complaining.

I'd update properly, but I'm dead tired - and sick! So until later... enjoy your Sabbath!!