Cute Nephews (Plural)

Our newest nephew, Davis, continues to be cute (no surprise). Here are some samples of his seven-month-old cuteness:

This is from his cuteness-on-a-couch series.

Here, Davis demonstrates that he can be cute on the floor, too.

Davis has a keen interest in literature.

He also enjoys the outdoors.

Because Davis is a baby, he seems to get all the cute-nephew-attention around this-here blog. But we've got three other nephews who, despite being years away from babyhood, have maintained their own cuteness (come on, gentlemen, don't blush--own it!) into adulthood.

My sister Sandy's stepson Aaron, who just turned 22 this month.

My sister Sandy's stepson Ryan, turning 21 next month.

Susan's brother Jerrett's stepson Arron, who just turned 18 this month and will graduate from high school in the spring.

Fine-lookin' group, huh?

Norske Stew

It was a pretty quiet house for most of the day. Susan and the girls went to Badlands Ministries south of Medora for its Fall Family Day . . . and left me behind! Some family event, huh? No, really, that was at my request so that I could catch up on some work. While they were painting pumpkins and roasting hot dogs and singing songs and having a worship service, I was at the computer and then at the grocery store and then at the stove. Yes, it was time for another Scandinavian Saturday, and today I was on my own in the kitchen.

It has been cold and windy and rainy the last several days, and today was chilly and overcast. I decided it was a good day for lapskaus ["stew"]. We had lapskaus at Norwegian camp this past summer (remember?), so I recalled generally what should go into it. I also found several recipes online and in a Scandinavian cookbook that I have. I took the best from each and made up my own recipe! When the ladies returned home, they reported that the smell in the house was heavenly--and I must admit: it did smell good. Here's what I served for supper:


It's always a Scandinavian touch to serve fish, so here in the bowl is shrimp-'n'-crab salad sprinkled with Danish bleu cheese. We ate it as an appetizer on celery sticks and rye knekkebrød ["crispbread" or hardtack]. And those are my mom's dill pickles in the bowl on the plate.


The lapskaus was an enormous hit. I fried pepper-bacon and onions to which I added chicken, pork, more onions, leeks, garlic, celery, carrots, rutabaga, and potatoes. I added seasonings and fresh thyme and bay leaves and turkey stock and then let it sit on the burner for a long time to stew. It's safe to say that I made enough to have plenty for leftovers; I filled a 1.5-gallon container with what remained after we gobbled up our supper portions! But it's so good that I'm already looking forward to having it again for dinner tomorrow.


For dessert I sliced some fresh strawberries and macerated them in sugar and kirschwasser (a German cherry brandy). I whipped some cream with sugar and vanilla extract and served slices of angel food cake covered in the fluffy whipped cream over which we spooned the strawberries. It was my version of bløtkake ["cream cake"], which really should have several layers with whipped cream and fruit between them . . . and then over the whole thing. But this was a delicious substitute nevertheless.

A Week of Fun Events

Monday
I was invited to a taste-testing at noon. The university president's wife is hosting an event tomorrow before the Homecoming football game, and she invited me to taste all the food that she's considering serving and provide feedback so that she can finalize her menu. Well, not only me, of course; she invited about a dozen of us, some faculty and some staff. What a great idea for establishing goodwill and enouraging interaction . . . and treating us with some great food! Dining Services prepared all the food using the first lady's recipes, and she provided us with folders containing all the recipes featured on the menu. We ate, wrote down our feedback, and left with plastic-wrap-covered plates of leftovers!

Thursday
I attended a banquet honoring this year's Alumni Fellows, distinguished alumni chosen from each department to return to campus during Homecoming and be honored for their accomplishments after graduating from our university. Our department's alumna spoke to one of my classes yesterday morning, and she gave an eloquent acceptance speech at last night's banquet. The alumna from the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science happens to be a woman who used to teach at the high school that I attended! Her husband (himself a DSU grad) got a job at our school and taught me geometry and computer programming. After they got married, she got hired at our school, too. In the years since, they have moved on to another district where he has become the superintendent, and she has distinguished herself in educational technology. It was a fun blast from the past to see them again and visit briefly. (And the food was delicious: salad with a teriyaki/mandarin orange dressing, marinated roast pork tenderloin, new potatoes, green beans almondine, and pineapple cake for dessert.)

Tonight
Our family attended an absolutely phenomenal concert. We have tickets to the Dickinson Area Concert Association's series again this year (it has been a wonderful annual investment that's worth far more than what the tickets cost--incredible!), and tonight's concert was a performance by Stringfever, a "genetically modified" quartet of players of "violectric" instruments. They're genetically modified in that they are three brothers and a cousin. And the instruments are electric violins and cellos--much like electric guitars--made by Violectra. I had never seen or heard of such a thing: instead of solid bodies, the instruments consisted of strings over the plastic?/metal? outline of a tradition violin/cello shape! And they achieved sounds both traditional and funkadelic, making some songs sound like rock concerts and others like classical concerts.

They were talented and technically adept with their instruments, and they were also funny and fun to watch. And the highlight of the night was when they asked for volunteers from the audience who would be willing to come up on stage and help them with a certain song. Abigail turned to me immediately to ask permission to raise her hand, and both she and Hillary had their arms raised so quickly that I think I heard them slicing through the air!

And guess what. The two of them were selected to join Stringfever on stage! The song was a demonstration of how all four musicians could play one song using the same instrument: the cello. They gave Abigail and Hillary each one of the violins, showed them how to hold them, and instructed them to pluck a particular string on cue. Then the men played the song beautifully but comedically, making much ado of intertwining their arms, trading bows, taking over one another's parts, etc.

Hillary and Abigail waited patiently throughout the song, their violins in position and their fingers on the correct string, tapping their feet and keeping an eye out for the cue to play. A few measures before the song's end, the two men who had shown the girls what to do leapt away from the cello, crouched in front of the girls, and finally give them the go-ahead. Their simultaneous string plucks produced the note that ended the song! That in itself (i.e., all that waiting for just one note) added to the humor of the song, but it was thrilling for the girls to be on stage; and they hugged me so hard when they sat back down that I knew they were absolutely delighted. They got many compliments by other patrons after the concert; and in addition to autographing the girls' programs, the musicians gave them key chains and a magnet with "Stringfever" on them. Even Suzanna--as sister of the volunteers--received that treat afterwards!

I highly advise you to give yourself a treat and watch some of Stringfever's videos from their Web site. Those excerpts will give you a sense of what we enjoyed tonight. It was a great end to a busy, stressful week.