To Grandmothers house we go.

Posted on by Thor

Christmas with the Schwartz family always involves a car ride to Grandma Martha Schwartz‘s home. Dirt snow encrusted roads turned into asphalt roads that then turned into snowy side roads.  The small farm house has been in the family for generations.  The white paint is worn and chipped and the place lists a bit from the pull of gravity over the years.  The front port is at such an angle that it feels like being on the Titanic.  Years ago a family member had a ticket to go on the Titanic, but he decided to make the crossing on another ship two months later.  Had he made the Titanic trip he would have been in steerage and would have most certainly died.  That would have meant that Pam, her dad and all the siblings would have never been born.

In the living room, the TV was on, showing a program where a bow hunter was tracking a goat with a huge lion’s mane. The men were seated and stories told were of the latest dear hunts. Ron had to shoot at a deer from a huge distance between one foot gaps in the tree branches.  The end of his barrel literally covered half of the deer.  Regardless, the shot dropped the animal to the ground.  The venison is packed and ready for the winter in the outside barn cooler.

The temperature outside had dropped to negative nine so cold drinks could be stored out on the porch.   A refrigerator would be overkill.  Grandma Schwartz is a traditionalist.   She insisted that the men line up for food in the kitchen before the women could eat.  That left the living room available for the children to open presents.  I kind of would have liked to sketch the kids ripping open presents, but instead, I had to do my manly duty and eat.  I learned quite a bit about the narrow profit margin in farming corn and the challenges of moving huge hay bails.  I listened intently wondering how I would fare in this harsh winter landscape.  Outside the snow blew horizontally past the window insulated by sheets of plastic.  I spotted black cows marching against the stark white landscape. 

The children played in the front room with a small Christmas tree.  There is a tiny little half step staircase that spirals up to the top floor of the rickety farmhouse. The tiniest toddler couldn’t resist trying to climb her way up. Parents kept having to interrupt her progress. Pam’s dad Ron Schwartz told the story of how he climbed that staircase as a child and his sister pounded him with a pillow at the top of the stairs causing him to topple down the steep steps head over backwards.  He had his revenge when he slipped a whole bunch of pins inside his sister’s seat cushion at the dinner table.  She squealed loudly and never again tried to knock him down the steps.

Family history covered every wall.  A wedding photo on the wall showed Ron and his wife, both slim and beautiful in their youth. Pam keeps 5 by 7 inch note cards that have notes about what she has done each year.  Her notes for Christmas day were always the same, “Christmas at Grandma’s and then at home.” Family traditions remain strong on this Iowa farm thanks to a matriarch that is approaching her hundredth year. 

Board Games over the Christmas Holdiay.

Posted on by Thor

The Schwartz family has a beautiful farmhouse and land in Maquoketa, Iowa. Overnight, the entire landscape was dusted with an inch or so of snow.  Breakfast, lunch, and dinner were all delicious home cooked meals.  The temperatures outside dropped to negative nine degrees by the end of the week.  With temperatures so low, we all stayed in all day either relaxing under a quilt on the couch or playing games on the dining room table.  Board and card games were played as the little ones ran around playing their own imaginary games.  The youngest had gotten an electronic ice cream cart that had a recorded track that taught numbers by requesting certain numbers of scoops and syrups.  The little sisters fought over that cart relentlessly until they discovered that the large cardboard box that the present came in was a much more interesting toy to crawl in and out of.  It could be a car, tunnel or time machine, the possibilities were endless.

By the end of the day, I had my fill of board games, and I settled in on the living room couch to sketch the Schwartz family playing a game called “Watch Ya Mouth” which was hilarious to watch. The game involves putting a plastic guard in your moth which spreads your lips wide making it impossible to pronounce Ps, Bs, and Ms.  The goal is for one player to say a phrase on a card and for their teammate to guess what is being said.  If you have a small mouth you are at a disadvantage.  Pam and I had played before and we were pretty good at understanding each other.  What happens for most players is that they laugh so much that they never even get the phrase out.

Another board game that we played was “Quelf.”  It involved answering hilarious trivia, performing ridiculous stunts, or obeying silly rules. Players had to use creativity, wit, and sense of humor to progress around the board. One stunt I had to perform involved recreating as many yoga poses as I could in 30 seconds.  Since I had done yoga in the past, I had an advantage.  Another stunt involved me becoming a boomerang and saying, “wha, wha” as I walked around the home and back to the board.  Players could request that I perform the stunt again, and wouldn’t you know, every player insisted I perform that stunt again and again.  I was exhausted from laughing so had.  I should have taken the penalty points.  The most popular game was a card game called “Euchre.” It uses a regular deck of playing cards with only the cards from nine and up used.  Jacks are the most powerful cards and could change suite.  The rules are pretty complex, but I started to catch on over the course of the holiday.   Games began shortly after breakfast and went on all day, sometimes until 3 AM.  Needless to say, Christmas at the Schwartz homestead is an adventure. 

Board Games in Iowa.

Posted on by Thor

After the Thanksgiving Turkey Dinnr, the Schwartz family plays board games for the rest of the day into the night This game called “Quelf” was rather strange. The board has characters that move around a rainbow brick road using a die to set the number of moves. Different spots would have players pick up cards much like in a game of Monopoly. Some cards in the deck insist that a player perform an action throughout the length of the game, “Roolz Cards.” For instance, Pam Schwartz had to say “Wacka Wacka” any time another player laughed. Of course when she said “Wacka Wacka” we would all laugh again. Another card had Pam shout out commands like a drill Sargent, which she did with some gusto.

I pulled a card that said I must pinch the flesh around my belly button to manipulate it like a mouth to say something like, “Well this is awkward.” I thought long and hard before performing that task, but ended up doing so to avoid paying a penalty. Another card insisted that I must stand in slow motion and point at the player to my left and say, “You have sabotaged my plans for the last time, en guard!” The simple goal of the game was to get to the end of the rainbow paved rainbow first. I didn’t win.

Another board game called “Baker Street,” based on the Sherlock Holmes books, had four players trying to solve a murder on the streets of London. Once again, a die set the pace of game play. I thought I was being clever by bypassing many possible clues to get to the scene of the crime first. The clue at the scene was no better than any other spot on the board so I had to backtrack to learn what the other players already knew. I knew that the crime had to do with the value of a bible. So I had my suspicions about the murderer and his motive, but I wasn’t able to find the weapon used in time. Each player was on their own private quest and didn’t have any reason to interact. After the  boisterous insanity of Quelf, this seemed far too tame a prospect.