2nd Week of Advent and St. Nicholas Eve

Today starts the second week of advent. Advent is a time of vigilant waiting; I wait for something mysterious and unscheduled, with quiet excitement, and expectation. If I fall asleep to this awareness I risk missing the moment of joy, courage, or insight; the gift of grace that has the potential to feed me in ways I need.

And tonight is the eve of St. Nicholas Day. Nicholas was born in Lycia, which is now part of Turkey. Legend says he was a kind and generous man, who protected the poor and did many great deeds.

Agenda today:

1. Joy of Giving meditation

2. Journal queries

3. Donate to Toys for Tots
4. Make pfeffernüsse

5. Advent wreath ceremony

6. Plan activities for unity and peace

7. Fill shoes, deliver gifts

1. Joy of Giving meditation: 

• Center, and open your heart. 
• Bring a picture to your mind of all that you have to offer- your time, love, skills, information and wisdom, patience, smiles, and the things you make with your hands. 
• When you feel rich with blessings, breathe out your gifts to the universe.
• As you breathe in, feel the joy of giving fill you in return.

2. Journal queries:

How can I determine the right gift, the perfect gift, for each person? 

How can I get all the right gifts, and still retain the peace and lightness I want for myself this season?

3. Donate to Toys for Tots:

Any small, secret kindness is a gift from St. Nicholas.

Yesterday I found a gift to donate, and felt again the gentle joy of offering my love to an anonymous child.

4. Make pfeffernüsse:
In Holland children get pfeffernüsse on St. Nicholas eve, but when I was young we always got them closer to Christmas, from our German neighbor Bill Rueter. Bill brought us a small bowl of these spicy cookies every Christmas when I was a child.

Pfeffernüsse means “pepper nuts”, and they are supposed to be as hard as nuts! To eat them you need to suck on them until they soften. They improve with age- they get harder- so make them well in advance. 

One full batch- 150 small cookies.

This recipe comes from Bill Rueter's Grandma Ott.

Ingredients:

• 1 c. dark Karo corn syrup
• 3/4 c. sugar
• 1/4 c. vegetable oil
• 1/4 c. milk
• 1/2-Tbsp. anise oil
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. each of cardamom, nutmeg, cloves, and black pepper
• many cups of flour

Yield: 150 small cookies-

1- Preheat the oven to 400ºF. 

2- Mix together all the ingredients, and add flour until the dough is very, very stiff. Grandma Ott said, “When you are sure it’s stiff enough, add some more.”  When you can’t stir any more in, use your hands to kneed it in.

3- Form the dough into logs, and then roll one log into a thin rope. Break the rope into small bits and roll these into balls about 1/2-inch thick. (If they are too large, they will be hard to suck on.)

4- Place the balls close together but not touching on a greased cookie sheet. You should be able to easily fill two pans. 

5- Bake 10-12 minutes- the cookies should be cooked through and lightly browned. If you added enough flour, they will be soft at first, but get hard pretty quickly.

Check out this story about St. Nicholas’ donkey and the pfeffernusse.

5. Advent wreath ceremony: 

Tonight (and every night this week) we will light two advent candles, and recite two prayers:

"We light the first candle for the earth, which sustains us. May we cherish and care for it."

"We light the second candle for all the people of the world. May we find unity and peace."

6. Plan activities for unity and peace:
This week my theme is "Striving to find unity and peace with all the people of the world".

That's  a huge goal! Rather than get overwhelmed, though, I plan to do a little something positive each day.

Things I might do this week to create unity and peace:

• be peaceful within myself;
• be in harmony with people I interact with;
• work to learn about and appreciate traditions and beliefs of people throughout the world;
• study an issue that is relevant to human rights in the world at this time;
• challenge myself to work to create the conditions of peace- justice, equality, and freedom- in my family and community.

My life might seem insignificant in the vastness of the universe, but each life is essential to the well being of the whole. I demonstrate my compassion with small acts of kindness and generosity. When I renew this intention each day, the opportunities to show goodwill appear with regularity.

7. Fill shoes:
In Holland, St. Nicholas is called Sinter Klaas (he is the original Santa Claus). Children in Holland leave their shoes by the fireplace on this night, and in the morning they are filled with marzipan and small toys. The Dutch give simple gifts tonight, but they are often accompanied with riddles, or wrapped in deceiving ways, such as a small box nested inside larger boxes, or something hollowed out with a gift inside.

When my children were younger, we read stories about St. Nicholas, and celebrated with the shoes and gifts because- well, why not?? Any excuse for giving gifts and eating chocolate is a good one!

Even though my children are grown, and have left home, I have a few small gifts to leave at their doors. The most traditional St. Nicholas gifts are:

• Chocolate gold coins, symbolic of the coins Nicholas dropped down a chimney for three poor women.
• Oranges, another symbol of gold
• Candy canes- really candy croziers- bishop's staffs- like St. Nicholas holds.