Can You Hear Me Now?

"He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!" (Matthew11:15).

The image: Our ears. We use our ears to hear, to listen and to perceive and understand our surroundings. The Savior frequently suggests we use our ears to hear not only the temporal but also the spiritual. Developing our spiritual hearing is critical because frequently the Lord speaks using parables or symbols in order to protect sacred things from the unworthy.

The food: “Elephant ears” are delicate, flaky cookies also called palmiers, or palm leaves, by the French. (Do not confuse these cookies with the carnival fare, also called elephant ears, which are fried pastry, a lot like a Utah scone, which should not be confused with English scones.) These cookies are incredibly addictive and very easy to make.

The recipe:

2 sheets puff pastry, thawed

1 ¾ cups sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon, if desired

Thaw the puff pastry thoroughly, about thirty minutes. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Mix sugar with salt. Spread ¾ cup sugar on a clean, flat surface. Unfold the pastry over the sugar. Mix remaining the sugar with cinnamon, if desired. Spread ½ cup sugar over dough. With a rolling pin, roll the dough into a 10 X 13-inch rectangle while pressing the sugar into the dough on both sides. (There will be a lot of sugar remaining on the flat surface.)

Starting at the long ends of the rectangle, tightly each side until they meet in the middle. (For larger cookies, roll from the short end.) Place the rolled dough in freezer until stiff, about 15 minutes. Repeat the process with the second sheet.

Remove the chilled dough and with sharp knife cut slices ¼-½-inch thick. Place the slices cut side down, about two inches apart on parchment-lined cookie sheets.

Bake about 10-12 minutes or until golden brown and puffy. The cookies burn easily, so watch carefully during the final minutes.

Store in an airtight container. Cookies can be crisped a day later by heating for a few minutes in a 350 degree oven.

Activities:

• Marco Polo: Choose a player to be “it.” With his or her eyes closed or covered with a blindfold, the “It” tries to “tag” someone by using his hearing. This player shouts “Marco” and the other players respond with “Polo.”  This continues until the “It” tags another player, who then becomes the new “It.”

• Parable Go Fish

Preparations: Make a deck of cards using either the names of the different parables or the elements of a specific parable you will be teaching. Label each card, and if you like, find a corresponding picture. Print the card on card stock and make four copies of each card.

For example, for the “Parable of the Sower,” I made up five different cards titled, The Parable of the Sower, Seeds on the Wayside Eaten by Birds, The Seeds in a Stony Place that Have No Root, Seeds Choked by Thorns, and Seeds in Good Soil that Bring Forth Good Fruit.

To play the game:

·      Deal each player 5 cards. (More if your deck is large or there are only a few players.) Place the remaining deck or “pool” in the center of the players.

·      Take turns asking for particular cards to match those in their hands. For example, “John, do you have any “The Parable of the Sower” cards?” John must turn over all of his Parable of the Sower cards, or if he has none, he tells the requester to “Go Fish.”

·      Play continues until one player has no more cards. The player with the most matches wins.

What Are the Odds?

"Daniel, it's seven o'clock. We need to leave in ten minutes." I yell up the stairs. Daniel is a good boy. Responsible. He has a bit of his sister Chrissy in him. He can go from 0 to 60 in three seconds and get out the door in five. When he wants to.

I finish dressing. Khakis. I just can't bring myself to be a schoolteacher in jeans on casual Friday. Blue sweater. Blue socks. Brown shoes. Should I wear my clogs, casual and comfortable, or my loafers.

I brush my teeth.

"Five minutes." No grunt. "Do you hear me?" I ask. Finally, a grumbled acknowledgment.

My hair looks funny. I fiddle with it. What are the odds? I thought it was impossible to have a bad hair day on Friday.

"I really don't want to be late to work." More grumblings.

I brush my teeth.

"I mean it." Tone a bit aggravated. It is already 7:15. What is the probability I will be on time? The odds are even if we leave in five minutes.

I grab my computer. Throw a sandwich in a bag with a banana and juice. Grab my jacket, get my keys, quickly slide my feet into my shoes. I decide against the total comfort of the clogs.

I will be late.

I start the car. I wait. In a whirlwind, Daniel finally scrambles in.

“I’m going to drop you off at Suvio’s.”

Grumble.

“If I can bypass the high school traffic, I might yet make it to the middle school on time.”

Grumbled acceptance and slammed door.

I make it to the middle school parking lot with one minute to spare. Grab my computer and my purse. Begin a hurried walk to the door. But something’s not right. My gait is off. There is a looseness on my left side.

I look down at my shoes. Two different shoes. Not a right and a left shoe, but a right and a left shoe from two different pairs of shoes. The left is suede and has a tassel. My loose, go-to comfy loafer. The right is smooth leather and a slightly darker brown than the suede. It is plain, no tassel, and the opening rides up much higher on my foot. My tight, supportive shoe. There is no loaf in this shoe.

No time to run home. Maybe no one will notice, I think.  I hope.

And as I rush through the door to sign in, I remember my mother. She must have been about my age. One morning she too was running late. She overslept. She dressed quickly to get out the door in order to meet her carpool. Only in the car as she relaxed did she realized she had forgotten to don a bra. And this in an era when only defiant love children went without.

She suffered the entire day. Uncomfortable in a day of meetings in a world surrounded by women she felt were far more sophisticated and well-dressed than she. (Alas, she loved her fellow sisters of the General Board of the Relief Society, but she always felt she never quite measured up.) But she survived. She made it home without anyone ever being the wiser. That is, until she told me and I summarily told everyone I knew about it.

“I am Mrs. Stornetta. I will be your substitute teacher today.” And I wonder. What is the probability that at least one of my forty-nine students that morning will notice? I am a little uncomfortable. Seventh-graders can scrutinize. Why am I threatened by the seventh-grade fashion police? Were I a betting woman, I would bet against myself.

As students begin to consider how many combinations of sneakers and loafers and red and black and plaid caps Johnny could wear, I think of a new problem. Mrs. Stornetta oversleeps. Her three pairs of brown shoes are lined up in a row. What is the probability that she will choose a pair that matches?

Yet no one notices. Except the office secretary to whom I confess my fashion faux pas. I hope she is a bit more tight-lipped than I was about my mother's confession. I quickly leave the school as soon as the bell rings. Like Cinderella I want to make it home before my good fortune wears off. And as I kick off my mismatched pair and slide into a comfy chair, I think of my mother again. I am my mother.

What are the odds?

Burning Brightly

So today I am pretty tired and pretty busy. I was up at 5am. Must make it through work. Then I must prepare a dinner for Sister Suarez. A broken ankle.

I come home at lunch (because I was at TJ--Thomas Jefferson Elementary School). Chop onions, garlic, carrots, and celery. Hope the scent of the onions and garlic on my hands will not repulse the third graders I am working with. Saute in olive oil and leave it. Go back to TJ.

Come home after school. Reheat sauted vegetables, add tomatoes, herbs and simmer my marinara sauce. At the same time proof yeast, then make Italian bread dough. As it kneads in my KitchenAid, I sit down for a few minutes to check bread recipe.

Then when sauce has simmered, begin with the pasta. Cook box of pasta while rolling out bread dough. Make three long loafs. Cover and let them rest on my pizza peel.

Drain pasta. Begin second box of pasta. (Yes, I should have boiled it all together in one pot, but I just wasn't committed to making that much pasta when I started.) Combine sauce, pasta, and mozzarella, Parmesan, Asiago, and Romano. Put Ziti in oven.

Slash bread loaves with my lovely new lame. Brush with egg white. Spray with water. Take Ziti out. Put bread in on pizza stone. Spray oven with water to create steam. Set timer for three minutes.

Remove second pot of pasta. Drain it. Spray loaves a second time. Set alarm again.

Then the smoke alarm goes off. A frequent occurrence since we have replaced the smoke alarm. It is very sensitive. Daniel, in the family room, turns off alarm.

Begin combining pasta, sauce and cheese for two smaller pans of Ziti to freeze. Spray bread the third and final time.

"Mom," Daniel says, "There's a fire."

"I know. I know. Some crumbs must be burning in the bottom of the oven," I reply.

"No, Mom." Daniel is insistent. "There's a fire."

I look. I have learned to trust my seventeen-year-old. He is frequently more perceptive than I.

Daniel is right. Yes. There is a fire. A real fire. It is flaming high. It is flaming bright. There is a beauty in the bright orange flame lapping at my towel on my cooktop. I had forgotten to turn off the burner.

A greasy dishtowel--I had used it to cover my orange rolls last night, all four dozen made the night before for Relief Society anniversary dinner--was next to the burner. The dishtowel, which, of course, I should have washed by now, must have fallen onto the burner.

We maneuver the dish towel outside. We pour water on it, hoping to get the flames out before the deck is damaged. The dishtowel is black. It is really burned. But the flames go out. Wet black char and white crumpled towel sit outside the patio doors.

I will miss that dish towel. One of those flour sack dish towels. One that is perfect for covering rising rolls and bread. One that has come to me from my mother's kitchen. One that someone (not me) has taken the time (in the days of Relief Society bazaars) to embroider a pretty lady with a full red skirt. I will miss that dish towel the next time I need to cover my orange rolls.

But what I will really miss is Daniel. How can I let my baby go to college. Who will tell me that my kitchen is on fire when he is gone?

I will miss him.