AMARYLLIS

 An Arctic Blast socks

the Southeast, wildfires

consume the "City of Angels."

On the coldest day

of winter, an amaryllis

bursts forth in my kitchen.

Divine order of the universe

is turned upside down,

Mother Nature confused.

When the frost sparkles

like gems on needle-like-grass,

a blood-red flower shoots

from a bulb reposing on gravel,

and lifts a cup of grape juice

to toast the golden light.

          --Brenda Kay Ledford

I hope my blogger friends are staying warm and safe.

I am enjoying my amaryllis blooming in my kitchen. On a cold, snowy day, I sip a cup of hot apple cider, gaze at the beautiful flower and count my blessings.

  May we remember our neighbors in California who have lost their homes due to the wildfires.  One man who was a resident of our county, lives in California.  The fire is now five miles from his home.  May we remember Greg and thousands of other people who have lost their homes.  Also, please keep the firefighters, National Guard members, and first responders in our thoughts and prayers.

Happy New Year

 

Nobody knows what the new year will hold, but I choose to face 2025 with hope and faith in my heart that according to the Holy Bible, "All things work together for good to those who love the Lord."

I was blessed in 2024. I faced some trouble, some disappointments, some sickness, but through it all; I was never alone.  The Lord brought me through.  We discussed in our Sunday school class on Sunday if anyone had made any resolutions for 2025.

Every person in our class reflected that they just wanted to be kind to people, spread a little love in this sometimes very harsh world.  This is my desire, too.  I think if everyone did his or her part spreading kindness, it would be a better place to live.

So what are my plans for New Year's Day?  First of all, a little country church in my community holds a watch service.  This is an old time mountain tradition where people gather on New Year's Eve at the church.  They hold a singing, prayer meeting, until midnight.  They herald the new year praying and giving thanks for another year.  Then we gather in the fellowship hall for refreshments.  This is a joyful celebration and faith that God will be with us and take care of us no matter what we may face in 2025.

On New Year's Day I plan to have the traditional meal:  collard greens, corn bread, and black-eyed peas.  Some folks include hog jaw with their celebration.  The old saying goes black-eyed peas represent round coins, collard greens bring paper money, and cornbread brings gold.  Most folks wouldn't take a chance messing up any dreams of good fortune for the new year.  As for myself, I could just take the cornbread and a glass of ice cold buttermilk.

However you choose to observe New Year's Day, I wish all my blogger friends a:

          Joyful &

Blessed New Year

Jolly Librarian Technician

 Our wonderful computer technician at Moss Memorial Library delights the patrons with his fantastic festive costumes at Christmas.  He's original and fills our local library with jolly, holly, celebrations.  I just go to the library often during the holidays to see what wonderful costume he's wearing.  Ben is a brilliant young man who is very creative and makes the season merry and bright!

Light of the World

 The Star of Bethlehem shone

over the nativity scene,

the little Lord Jesus was

born on a cold winter's night.

The Son of God 

left the portals of heaven

to bring light and love

to the souls of weary ones.

Doubts and fears cease

at the foot of the cross,

Christ was born to die

and to redeem the lost.

He gives hope to troubled hearts.

And as the hosts of heaven

sing praises to the

King of Kings, eternal

light shines in the land

where there is no night.

Rejoice with the angelic beings,

our Savior has come to earth.

            --Brenda Kay Ledford

I wish all my blogger friends: 

A Blessed Christmas and Joyful New Year!

A Mountain Christmas

 Blanche and her siblings walked miles from the head of the Trout Cove over a dirt road to Ogden School in the 1930s.  The Blue Ridge Mountains were locked in the jaws of the Great Depression.

Mrs. Lucy Hyatt was Blanche's teacher.  She decided her students would have a happy holiday.  "Who wants to make paper chains to decorate our classroom?" she asked.  The students clapped their hands and rushed to the worktable.  They cut strips from construction paper and pasted them together.

The teacher also asked if anyone would like to help the janitor cut a cedar in the woods.  Blanche and her brother, George, volunteered.  They selected a white pine and dragged it into the classroom.  The pupils made decorations for the Christmas tree.  For several days they cut bells, stars, and ornaments.  Some children brought silver foil from chewing gum wrappers to design an angel to top the tree.  They threaded strings of popcorn and put them on the tree.

While the kids made decorations, Mrs. Hyatt made hot cocoa on the pot-bellied woodstove that stood in the middle of the room.  She poured cans of Carnation condensed milk, water, sugar, and cocoa into a pan.  The teacher baked gingerbread and served it to the students with the drink.  The children loved the treats.

A highlight of the holiday celebration was a program given by the John C. Campbell Folk School.  Danish dancers and musicians entertained the mountain children.  Blanche enjoyed the lively show that introduced her to the arts and culture.

Although times were hard during the Great Depression, one dedicated teacher brought a lot of joy into the lives of her students.  She was a God Send during the time when many kids wouldn't have much for Christmas.  This is a true story about my mother, Blanche.

by:  Brenda Kay Ledford

I wish all my blogger friends:

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

Turkey Hunting

 Way back in the Trout Cove during the 1930s, my mama and her siblings decided to go turkey hunting.  Blanche, brother George, and sister, Oma headed up the mountain trail the day before Thanksgiving.

They decided to stop at Hazel Henson's house and invite her to go turkey hunting with them.  Blanche and Oma wore feed sack dresses.  Patches dotted George's overalls.  

Night fell and they still hadn't spied a turkey.  A Full Harvest Moon ricocheted through the pine trees and an owl screeched in the holler.  Blanche grabbed Oma's arm and they screamed at the same time.

George laughed and slapped his knee.  "What's wrong with you chickens?  I was just mocking a hoot owl."

Blanche and Oma tried to hit George, but he took off like a racehorse through the woods.  He reached Hazel's house before they could catch him.  Hazel joined them on the turkey hunt.

Since they didn't have any weapon, Oma suggested that they stop at Jim Power's log cabin.  They stepped on the rickety porch and knocked on the door.

"What brings you younguns out on this fine night?  Ought you be home getting ready for Thanksgiving?"

"We wanted you to bring your shotgun and join us turkey hunting," said George.

"All right.  I'll be glad to go.  Just let me finish my supper."  The old gentleman crumbled cornbread into a glass of buttermilk and wolfed it down.

He grabbed his shotgun, put on his cap and got a lantern.  He whistled for the hound dogs and they headed up the mountain.  Oma, Hazel, and Blanche followed the guys.  Old Blue, Spot, and Buck spied a squirrel and chased him through Greasky Creek.  Their howls resounded across Brasstown.

They came to Pauline Payne's house and stopped to ask the family if she was still in the hospital.  Her daughter invited them into the house.  She said Pauline was feeling better, but still in the hospital at Murphy, North Carolina.

Oma asked Mr. Payne if he still owned a fiddle.  He got the instrument and asked Jim Powers to play it.  Jim started making music and they danced all night long.  They never got around to turkey hunting.

by:  Brenda Kay Ledford

I hope all my blogger friends will have a

Happy Thanksgiving!

NATIONAL APPLE MONTH

 October 1-31 is NATIONAL APPLE MONTH

Great-Grandpa Dallas Matheson owned 300 acres in the Matheson Cove in the early 1900s.  He grew an apple orchard above the frost line on Shewbird Mountain.

He and the boys would take a sled up the mountain in the fall and haul apples down to the log cabin and store them in the cellar.  They were some of the most delicious apples you could ever eat.

One was the black beauty.  It was such a deep red that it was almost black.  There was the "Ben Davis" that was a light color with small streaks and white inside.  

Many other apples came from the seeds of other trees and this gave a mixed flavor and all were very delicious.  Those included the horse apples, the hog sweet, red June, striped May, pumpkin apple, queen pippin, pound apple, and others with no names.

Grandpa made long trays with light weight lumber for drying the apples.  The family peeled and sliced the apples and spread them on the trays to dry in the sun.  At night they brought the trays in on the porch, then out on the racks the next day.  

Dried apples are delicious, especially when made into fried apple pies or a stack cake.  The stack cake is made with five or six thin layers made from a cookie recipe.  The fruit is cooked with a little sugar and cinnamon  then spread between the layers.  It is best if left to soak for a few days.

Finally, this month is National Apple Month.  Maybe the saying, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away," is true.  Enjoy October with the mountains putting on a colorful show as the leaves deck out in colorful garments and the little trick -or -treaters fill their bags with goodies on Halloween.

                                                                  

APPALACHIAN MUSIC

 Music was an important part of the Appalachian Mountains.  This range of mountains reaches from Canada to Alabama along the eastern coast of the United States.  I live in the Blue Ridge Mountains which is a section of Southern Appalachia.

The mountain dulcimer (beside the gentleman's photo) was played often by mountain people.  Gordan Parris of Hayesville made Appalachian musical instruments.  These instruments included the guitar, banjo, and the dulcimer.  Gordan was regionally recognized for crafting fine musical instruments.  I was fortunate to interview he and his wife at their mountain home off Cold Branch Road in Hayesville.  He had several piles of wood drying in the yard that he had collected to craft his instruments.

The banjo was brought to Appalachia by the blacks.  Although only 10% of the Blue Ridge was populated by African Americans, they also contributed to the rich musical heritage of this area.

Interestingly, the fiddle was frowned on by some religious leaders in the community.  It was often played at barn dances.  Some mountain preachers were opposed to dancing and thought the fiddle was associated with the "sin of dancing." Clogging and buck dancing were favorites of the Appalachians.

Ballads were brought from Ireland and Scotland to Appalachia.  They were stories in songs.  Most had a sad theme such as the traditional Scots-Irish ballad, "Barbara Allen."  This is a sad love story where Barbara Allen rejected her fellow and he died of being lovesick for Barbara who refused to visit him on his deathbed when he called for her.

The ballads were passed down from one generation to another by word of mouth.  Many of the Irish in the homeland, were not able to read, so they preserved the songs by singing them.

The churches contributed also to the musical heritage of the Blue Ridge.  Christian Harmony music was sung without any music.  John Wesley, Fannie Cosby and other great songwriters penned powerful songs that are still sung today in many congregations.

Many of the mountain people sang to help them overcome hardships.  The black people often lifted songs of lament for the day they would be free as they picked cotton. Blue Ridge people gathered for singing at churches during the Great Depression in the 1920s to give them strength to make it through very trying times and poverty.

Music continues to lift the spirit of downtrodden people not only in Appalachia, but around the world.  It's a universal language that binds people together in fellowship and worship of  God.

by:  Brenda Kay Ledford   

Foam Party

 

The youth at our church held a Foam Party to celebrate the beginning of the school year.  Everyone had a great time including the adults.  I joined the fun and walked into the foam. 

"You can do anything with children if you only play with them," said Prince Otto vo Bismarck (1815-1898).

End of the summer, the youth holding a Foam Party.

After plunging into the foam, I bend to brush off the suds.

It was a mountain of foam and like floating on clouds when you entered the foam.

Here's a photo of me coming out of the foam and laughing with the kids.

Carefree, getting in touch with the kid inside me, I've never had such fun!

What a wonderful way to start a new school year with the kids.

THE FRONT PORCH

 Memories flood my mind as I sit on the front porch.  Perhaps it is the taste of buttermilk, the smell of cornbread baking in Grandma Minnie's Dutch oven over the fireplace, or the sorghum syrup Granddaddy Bob made each fall from cane.

The family rose before the rooster crowed to tackle the hot, hard, job of stripping blades from cane.  After cutting them down, you put the cane into piles and cut off the seed heads.  Then Granddaddy and the boys loaded the cane on a wagon and hauled it to the mill.  A mule pulled the pole that turned the mill.  Cane was fed into the vertical rollers like a washing machine.  Juice squeezed from the cane and flowed down a spout to the boiler where it was boiled from one vat to another.  You skimmed foam off the top until it came out a nice clear brownish-red color.  Dozens of yellow jackets swarmed and you had to keep them out of the syrup.  Our family made 90 gallons of sorghum syrup.  The labor paid off when you savored the rich, thick, sorghum on hot, buttered biscuits.

Besides making sorghum syrup, Great-Grandpa Dallas Matheson owned 300 acres of land on Shewbird Mountain.  He was a farmer and grew an apple orchard above the frost line.  He raised the black beauty that was so red it looked black.  The Ben Davis was light with small streaks and white inside.  Other apples included the horse apple, hog sweet, red June, striped May, pumpkin apple, queen pippin, pound apple, and others with no names.  Each fall our family took a sled and mule to Shewbird Mountain and hauled apples to the house to store them in the cellar.  Grandma and the girls dried apples on trays outside in the sun.

I ponder the good old days on the front porch. We had no air-conditioners and it was a taste of heaven resting on the porch each evening as a breeze wafted over the valley.  Neighbors would stop for a visit and we enjoyed swapping a few stories as lightning bugs flashed.  Brother Harold and I caught them in Blair canning jars and pretended they were our lanterns. 

Many homes have no front porches now.  Families are missing a wonderful slice of the bygone days.

by:  Brenda Kay Ledford

Reprinted from:  GOOD OLD DAYS, A Poetry and Prose Anthology

                           Published by: Old Mountain Press:  www.OldMountainPress.com

                                  

Book Review: "Christmas in Matheson Cove"

 CHRISTMAS IN MATHESON COVE

by:  Brenda Kay Ledford

Book Review by:  Carroll S. Taylor-poet, author, and playwright

It's Christmas in Matheson Cove, North Carolina, and snow on Shewbird Mountain adds to the excitement of the season.  For Bob and Minnie Ledford's eight children, joyful holiday expectations are running high, but uncertain, in this charming picture book written by author and poet, Brenda Kay Ledford.

The story unfolds on Christmas Eve in 1931 during the Great Depression, when kids hung their stockings and were grateful to receive candy, fruit, and nuts on Christmas morning if they were lucky.  Times were hard, and families celebrated the best way they could.

Bob is disheartened.  His hunting trip in the snow with his dog Old Rover on Shewbird Mountain yields no wild game.  He returns home, hangs his coat on a nail, and tells Minnie that he can't afford presents, not even a stick of peppermint candy.  "I ain't got no money..."

He believes that hanging the children's stockings is a waste of time.  Minnie reminds him, "Money don't matter.  It's our love that makes Christmas."  And she encourages him by saying, "God will provide."

Bob and Minnie hang the children's stockings anyway, hoping for a miracle.  Leave it up to the older Ledford boys to make that surprise miracle happen.

Ledford's book is beautifully illustrated by the artistic design of North Carolina native Doreyl Ammons Cain.  All illustrations in the First Edition are original with vivid colors that Cain created with pastels.  The book's front cover, with snow and evergreen trees, creates a festive scene inviting readers to enter the story.

Ledford includes seemingly small details--like kernels of corn accidentally dropped by the boys along a snowy path--for a reason.  Young cornstalks in the spring will remind Minnie and readers later in the story of how Christmas blessings happen all throughout the year.  The effects of the boys' miracle don't happen just once but continue in unexpected ways.

Ledford is a seventh generation native of Clay County, North Carolina.  Christmas in Matheson Cove describes one holiday her family spent during the Great Depression.  "The parents had no money for presents, but the children figured out a plan to provide gifts for the family."

Ledford reminds readers that acts of love are miracles that show the true meaning of Christmas, and her historical story is one that is certainly worth passing down to future generations.

Christmas in Matheson Cove was published by Catch the Spirit of Appalachia, an imprint of Ammons Communications.  The book is available online at:  sharingspokenstories.com/shop/ols/products/christmas-in-matheson-cove.

INDEPENDENCE DAY (United States)

 

When I grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains, we didn't have watermelons all year.  It was a real treat to dive into a plump, juicy, watermelon on the Fourth of July.  Daddy bought one each year at the little country store and put it into the freezer to get nice and cold.

On the Fourth of July, Mama packed a picnic basket with delicious goodies:  a chocolate cake made from scratch, oatmeal cookies, celery (Daddy loved celery), corn-on-the-cob ( we called them roast nears in the mountains), white-runner beans, and of course; hotdogs and buns.

Daddy loaded the giant-sized watermelon in the back of our old black Ford and we headed to the Matheson Cove to Granddaddy and Ma Minnie's house for a cookout under the maple tree.  Daddy sliced the watermelon with a butcher knife and asked Ma Minnie to fetch the salt shaker.  Doctors would have a fit today if they caught folks shaking, shaking, shaking, salt on every piece of watermelon.  Mama declared, "This is the best watermelon we've ever eaten."  We all agreed and wolfed down the other goodies.

We cousins held a seed spitting contest.  Harold (my brother) and I filled our mouths with seeds, lent back and spat as far as we could.  Cousin Bobby had the contest down pat and always spat the seeds clear across the yard.  Grandma Minnie gave the winner of the watermelon spitting contest an extra slice of Mama's rich chocolate cake.

Then we cousins headed down to Hyatt Mill Creek to swim.  The boys swung on a grape vine across the deepest part of the creek and splashed into the ice cold waters.  Harold brought his fishing pole and headed far from the crowd to catch catfish for our supper.  He usually got a bunch and Uncle Ralph fried the fish and hushpuppies over and open fire for our supper.

When the sun set like a ruby over Shewbird Mountain, we called it a day and headed home.  Back then we didn't have fireworks in the mountains, but enjoyed the lightning bugs putting on a night show as we drove home over the winding, dirt road.

I will always remember the Fourth of July celebration our family held deep in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  A simple celebration filled with the love of family and grateful for our freedom.

by:  Brenda Kay Ledford

Happy Fourth of July!

BLACKBERRY JELLY

                                            My beautiful mother sitting on the front porch.

 BLACKBERRY JELLY

I look in the mirror

and Mother is reflected in me.

I'm more like her every day.

Each morning she rose

as the rooster crowed

and the sun peeked over

Shewbird Mountain like a ruby.

Honeysuckle perfumed the pine grove

as she grabbed a bucket

and headed to the berry patch.

She stretched her body through briars

to pluck the plump fruit,

ran like a racehorse when

a black snake chased her home.

I watched Mother as she stood

over the woodstove making jelly,

sweat ran down her face.

I helped her wash the Ball jars

to preserve the flavors of our farm.

Although she's been gone

for three years from earth,

I feel close to her 

as I flip through her recipes

that she wrote on napkins,

paper bags, and notebook paper.

I can hear her voice telling

me to Clean up the kitchen,

as I use the bowls and utensils,

Don't waste the ingredients,

money doesn't grow on trees.

I'm proud when I look

in the mirror and see

the spitting image of Mother.

                  --Brenda Kay Ledford