Brrrrr!

Hi, everyone!

The Sunday after New Years Day, Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Steven stayed after church to undecorate the Christmas tree there.  After lunch, I helped Grandma start undecorating my Christmas tree friend at home, too! That was like decorating in reverse!  First, we took the garland off the tree.  Then, I helped Grandma take all the ornaments off!  When we open all the leaves of the dining room table, there’s space to set them all down!  Then Grandpa took the lights off the tree.  Grandma and I thought we had all the ornaments off, but Grandpa found two more hiding when he took the light strings off!

It was after dark by the time my Christmas tree friend was ready to go back outside, so Grandma and Grandpa waited until Monday to take it out.  There was enough snow Sunday night to make the apple tree lights look very pretty!   Grandma started packing up ornaments Sunday night, but we didn’t finish that either until Monday.    The town picked up my Christmas tree friend from the end of the driveway.  Maybe it will be part of the mulch the town uses under the swings at Perinton Park!

Wednesday was a warmer, melty day.  Grandma looked at the weather forecast for much colder weather and decided Wednesday was her best chance to get the lights taken off the apple trees.  That was a busy tree day, because a crew of arborists was pruning branches in our back yard to clear utility pole access!  It was raining lightly, so Grandma said I could stay inside while she finished bringing in the lights.  By Friday the wires were dry and warm enough to be flexible.  I helped Grandma rewind the strings of lights onto their storage cards.  Two strings had broken places, but Grandpa was able to fix them!  After we put the apple tree lights away, Grandma started making Ground Hog Day cookies.  I helped her wrap two batches!

Some of the dishes Grandma likes to cook call for small amounts of ground pork.  The grocery store charges over $5 a pound for that, even though the cost of the pork shoulder that’s ground is less than $2 a pound.  Grandma decided to grind her own!  She cut the pork shoulder into cubes and froze them briefly to make the edges stiff.  Then she ground the cubes a double handful at a time in the food processor.  I helped her keep track of which cubes were ready to grind, then I helped measure the ground pork into 8 ounce packages.  Those went into the freezer, too!

After we ground the pork and carefully cleaned up all the work surfaces, Grandma and I made more Ground Hog Day cookies!  The most time consuming part of making chocolate caramel crunch bars is unwrapping 48 chewy caramel candies for each batch!  Grandma did that in advance, so the rest was easy!  I helped blend the melted margarine, brown sugar, flour and quick oats to make the cookie crumb base.  After that baked in the pan, I helped sprinkle chocolate chips all over each pan.  Then Grandma microwaved the caramels until they melted and poured the caramel over the chocolate chips.  Each pan got a topping of more of the butter, sugar and oat mixture and baked some more.  We made a double batch, because these are Uncle Steven’s favorite Ground Hog Day cookies!  Two days later, Grandma made the Ground Hog Day peanut butter bars.  They get marbled peanut butter and chocolate frosting, and everybody knows my specialty is marbling!

Our freezer was getting really full, with all the pork and big boxes of Ground Hog Day cookies!  Grandma took the boxes of Ground Hog Day cookies to Uncle Steven’s house for foster care, because they had space in their freezer.  Monday night was very cold, so Grandma and Grandpa decided it was time to defrost the freezer!  When the temperature is in the single digits Farenheit outside, we can store all the freezer contents in the garage without worrying that it will thaw.  After all the food was in the garage, Grandpa put a hair dryer on a shelf in the freezer and protected it from drips by setting a bowl over it.  He closed the freezer door to keep the heat in!  We started to hear thunks as ice melted enough to drop off the freezer elements.  That’s when I helped transfer ice to the sink.  I also watched the level of melt water in the drain pan to let Grandma know when it needed to be emptied!  We started after dinner and by bedtime the freezer was clean, dry and cold enough to put all the food back in.  There’s lots more space without all the accumulated frost and ice!

Tuesday morning, it was sunny and still cold.  We had a light coating of fresh snow that Grandma said would be perfect for my annual snow bath!  Grandma helped me roll around in the snow, then she took me right inside to wrap up in a towel.  She could rub some of the dirt in my fur off with the snow, without getting my insides soggy!  I got a nice warm-up from the hair dryer, then I spent the rest of the day lying in a nice sunbeam!  Today is another melty day, but without any sun.  I’m glad I got my snow bath yesterday!

Love,

Lion-san