Post #19 – Women’s Memoirs, ScrapMoir – Matilda Butler and Kendra Bonnett
By Constance Guidotti
The foundation of another McMansion is covering the land that was once the site of the little house and garden where in years past the Guidotti and Lucas families celebrated Christmas. We were descendants of Pearl Lucas who migrated to California from Oklahoma during the Great Depression. She was “Mimmy” to me and her other grandchildren.
Today all that remains of the house and garden so lovingly tended are a couple forgotten daffodils that insist on blooming, even after Mimmy’s peach, apple and orange trees have been cut down. Heavy equipment digs up the fertile land for yet another three-car garage and stucco house that makes up the city of Cupertino in 2009.
In 1955 Mimmy’s clapboard cottage on the corner of McClelland Road and San Leandro Street sat in the middle of apricot and prune orchards. A half block away, on what is now Foothill Boulevard, stands the building that was once the Steven’s Creek Market. It is now waiting to be occupied again after the unsuccessful Curves closed. Years ago Mimmy walked to the market to buy the flour and sugar she needed to make apricot and apple pies. The old market building is all that remains in this area of Cupertino where once local life revolved around the seasons.
In early spring, yellow mustard carpeted fields under a canopy of blossoming fruit trees. By July 4th apricots were ready to pick–after the cherries but before the prunes. September it was apples, October peaches, and in November pomegranates and persimmons completed the cycle.
On any day, the fruit in season would determine the kind of pie Mimmy would make. She kept two kinds of freshly made pies on hand. Company was always coming by: neighbors, people from her church and local kids on their way home from school. They all stopped by for pie and a chat. “What kind of pie would you like?” she always asked. “Would you like ice cream on that?”
Mimmy in her flower garden
Mimmy’s days followed a seasonal pattern. Summer mornings she read the Bible while rocking in her oak chair in the living room then, while it was still cool, she went out to tend her garden and pick the day’s crop of fruits and vegetables, which she cleaned and froze for the coming winter.
Summer afternoons Mimmy settled into her rocking chair in the darkened cool living room to crochet the lace edgings for the pillowcase sets she made for each woman in the family for Christmas. The men always got store-bought socks.
Mondays were washdays. The flowers of the season–the daffodils of February, iris of April and the roses of summer–contrasted with my grandmother’s dresses, freshly laundered and starched, hanging on the clothesline that ran along the path to her backdoor. Her weekday dresses were colorful cotton prints, all home sewn using the same pattern. Sunday dresses were solid maroon or deep blue to set off her white hair.
Wednesdays Mimmy gathered with women at her church to make quilts for the poor. During the rainy days of winter she also set up a quilt frame in the living room. It took her 40 hours to complete a quilt. She created her quilt blocks from the scraps left over from sewing projects and plied them into wedding gifts for her grandchildren. Each of us received a quilt, crocheted hot pads and a set of seven, hand-embroidered, flour-sack dishtowels.
Sundays Mimmy rested after attending morning church services and spent the remainder of the day at peace.
Most days included at least one activity in preparation for our family’s annual Christmas dinner. It was a testament to her dedication to the special meal that her treasured Kenmore freezer sat prominently in the kitchen. All year long she collected the seasonal ingredients and froze them at their peak of ripeness in the Kenmore. This was her gift of love to all of us.
By summer, Mimmy’s holiday preparations were in full swing. Cucumbers became the sweet pickles we enjoyed with Christmas dinner. When the figs ripened, she candied them in thick syrup. These along with the dried, stuffed prunes and apricots accompanied the fruitcakes she gave to each family.
As fall approached she started canning apples and freezing the October peaches. She prepared the fruitcakes and set them to soak in brandy. After Thanksgiving, Mimmy made and froze pounds of ravioli, one of the dinner’s highlights.
Mimmy checking the Christmas tree before heading to the kitchen to make the cranberry sauce.
Mimmy was still a farm girl at heart though she had evolved into a grandmother after years of hard work and a lifetime of struggle. My children, her great grandchildren, saw the same irrepressible spirit. They sat at the same kitchen table covered with her hand-crocheted lace tablecloth. “Do you want ice cream with your pie?” she’d ask. As we all chatted, I rubbed my finger lightly over the sharp surface of her cut-glass sugar bowl. Even now I’m drawn to the diamond cuts, as I admire it sitting on my own kitchen counter. I stare into its facets and remember…
Early Christmas morning Mimmy stuffed the turkey and put it in the oven. Then she called our house: “Tell Jim and Ted I’m ready for the picnic tables.” My husband Jim and his father loaded the tables into the truck and drove the half mile to Mimmy’s house. As she did every year, she directed them to take one table into the living room for the kids. The other table went into the kitchen next to her table. She covered the coarse wood surfaces in crisp white cloths and set the table with her Betty Crocker silverware. Mimmy collected all 12 place settings, piece by piece, from coupons on boxes of Betty Crocker products. It took her years. The kids got the every-day silverware.
The kitchen windows were foggy with steam from simmering pots of pasta sauce and gravy; the ravioli were rising to the surface of the boiling water; and the smell of roast turkey permeated the air as we set out the cut-glass relish dishes brimming with homemade pickles, peppers and pickled red crabapples. The mashed potatoes and cooked green beans from last summer’s harvest stayed warm in the oven. The turkey in all its glory sat on the platter ready to be carved.
Mimmy (back left) oversees everything for Christmas dinner.
Mimmy was like a fairy godmother in her print dress and crisp apron. Her pure white hair set off the blue eyes behind gold-rimmed glasses. Her smile made the magic of another Christmas that lives on in the memory of just a few of us now.
MIMMY’S GRATED APPLE PIE
[Note: Many of Mimmy’s recipes did not rely on exact measurements and were copied by watching her cook. Following is the way we wrote down this recipe.]
Grate coarsely 4 or 5 large green apples such as Granny Smith
Add 1 cup sugar
Two tablespoons flour
Two tablespoons lemon juice
Two egg yolks beaten
Mix and pour into uncooked pie shell
Bake at 350 for about 1/2 hour
Meanwhile beat the egg whites and two tablespoons sugar till stiff. Put meringue on pie, return to oven for a few minutes to brown the top of the meringue.
Cool pie before serving
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Constance Guidotti has been a Cupertino resident since 1953 and lives with her husband on what remains of the “family compound” near Stevens Creek Park. The Guidotti family has lived on their property and other properties adjacent to their home since the early 1940’s. The adjacent properties have been sold over the years. She and her husband continue the family tradition of a large vegetable and flower garden. All their children, grandchildren and great grandchildren live within 20 minutes except for one grandchild who with her spouse is attending school in Oregon. They continue the tradition of family dinners and celebrations.
Constance is a mixed media artist who shows locally and was selected as the distinguished artist for the city of Cupertino in 2003. She enjoys writing short stories about family for a memoir and family history that she intends to share with family and friends.
A Homemade Christmas, written specifically for KitchenScraps on Women’s Memoirs, describes some of the family traditions that have been at the center of her life.
(c) 2009 Constance Guidotti
