When Mom passed away on April 23, she left a large cavernous hole in my heart. In time, after enough tears have flowed through it, stories will emerge. She left me with hundreds.
I found ten years worth of gardening/weather journals. Her recipe box is full of yellowed, stained recipes, oh-so familiar to me. They have their own notes, adjustments in measurements, additions and subtractions and when she served them. She was always experimenting and sharing baked goods with friends and workmates.
For now though, I hope all our readers will bear with me. Here is one of Mom’s favorite columns from 1997. If I could, I would bake a big enough batch of goodies to say thank-you to all who have been our friends throughout the years.

Bake a Thank You
Has someone done you a kindness?
Have they helped you in some way?
Perhaps it was life-saving, or just a deed
too small to say.
Did they help you get through a job;
work through a hectic day?
Were they there for hours at your side or
just a moment, then on their way?

Did you shake their hand heartily
in order to relay your delight?
Or call out as they left,
“thanks”—till they were out of sight?

Did you ponder over their kindness
even later down the road,
thinking back to when they helped you
to lighten or carry your load?
Another “thinking of you” thank you
might brighten up their day.
To turn the deed done ‘round about,
would prove true thanks holds sway.

Gift Giving Banana Bread

8 oz. cream cheese, softened
1 cup sugar
¼ cup margarine or solid vegetable shortening
1 cup mashed bananas
2 eggs
2 ¼ cups flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup chopped nuts, optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Grease and lightly flour a 9-5 inch loaf pan.
Cream cheese, sugar and margarine.
Blend in bananas and eggs.
Sift together dry ingredients. Add to creamed mixture just till blended. Stir in nuts.
Pour into pan. Smooth top.
Bake for about 50 minutes. Check and turn pan so all sides bake evenly.
Bake another 10 minutes. Check again for doneness. toothpick should come out clean except for a few crumbs. Bake only long enough to achieve this.
Bread will be moist.
Cool in pan 10 minutes. Remove from pan ontowire rack to cool. Wrap well in plastic wrap and foil. Refrigerate over night to ripen.