Ramona correspondent
It’s 5:30 in the morning, still dark outside, and I can see my breath. I’m sitting in my office with two parkas on, the hood pulled over my head and I wish, right about now, my leather office chair had one of those heating elements in it, like some swanky trucks that have heated seats.
It’s so cold in my office — which is the old bank building in Ramona — that my fingers didn’t want to come out of my warm cozy gloves. Then I spied an old pair of mittens, and cut off the fingers so I could keep my hands warm and still type! Yep, it’s cold! But neither eight degrees, or icy streets, or snow on my windshield, can keep me from my chilly office and the stiff computer keys to write this story.
What could inspire me so, that I’d brave the cold? The story of Ramona’s Christmas party on Saturday, Dec. 13, just must be told!
This wasn’t the first Christmas event to be held in Ramona. Connie Smith instigated an Angel Tree gift giving tradition for the kids for many years. She and Dan even brought Santa to town one snowy Christmas night on the fire truck, to deliver stockings to the kids.
When Pat and I moved to Ramona, we started a Festival of Lights, trying to inspire folks to put lights on their houses. We organized a Singing Angel Nativity in the park for several years and farmers posed as wise men and brought their farm animals. What made this December event so notable? All the people who chose to get involved! I always say it takes a lot of people to make magic, and that certainly was true for Ramona’s town holiday event. From event creators to the folks who attend, we all played a part.
It wouldn’t have happened if it hadn’t been for Collin Bailey and Jeannie Goza. They walked into my office in early November and announced they wanted to have a town Christmas party. They didn’t know it, but I had resolved to spend the month of December in “quiet contemplation,” and I’d told my sister — months before —that I wasn’t going to instigate any Christmas hoo-ha in Ramona this year.
“I was thinking that a chili supper would be great this time of year!” enthused Jeannie, who stood in front of my desk. “And I think we should go caroling around town,” added Collin, standing next to her.
Within 60 seconds I was hooked and my intention of quiet contemplation in December went right out the window! “I’ve had this idea of doing a four-alarm chili contest for ages, and having the fire department be the judges,” I suggested. “What do you think of that idea?”
“And we need to have Santa bring something fun for the kids,” suggested Collin. “Will you be Santa?” I asked. “We’ve got the Santa suit that Pat made.”
“Oh, I guess I could do that,” Collin replied, as he handed me a $20 contribution for the candy.
A few days later Jeannie and I spent an hour hammering out the details and creating the “to do” lists for her, Pat, and me. Collin lucked out and didn’t get a “to do” list because he’s a truck driver and never knows when he’ll be on the road. We did, however, get him to promise that he’d be home in time to play Santa!
At the November City Council meeting we presented the idea of The Chilly Christmas Caroler’s Cook-off — Collin created the name and I think I was secretly amused by the pun of the word “Chilly” also referring to the “Chili” that we’d be eating.
Before long I was in full swing creating invitations and mailing them to every Ramona resident. The city council wanted this to be a community celebration that got the city folks meeting the country dwellers; so more 100 families were invited. We soon realized the only building in town that had a hope of holding a big crowd was the Trinity Lutheran Parish Hall.
How grateful we were to have such a lovely facility for the community to use!
An RSVP was included with the Christmas invitation because we needed to know how many people we’d be feeding and how many would be bringing chili to feed those hungry mouths. Jeannie offered to make corn bread (some with jalapeno peppers) to accompany the chili and I agreed to make dessert. By the time the event rolled around, Kathy Matkins had added hot dogs and buns to the menu, and her co-worker, Steve Jirak, said he’d bring big bags of cheese to help make chili dogs.
“Oh, I always like my chili over a hot dog,” Kathy explained. And there were lots of folks just like her, the night of the party, because the hot dogs and cheese were disappearing so quickly I overheard Kathy reviewing her projections, and wondering out loud if she’d brought enough.
Weeks before the party I heard rumors of folks hunting up their best recipes. Candace Tajchman told me the cutest story about her mother-in-law, Teresa Tajchman, who was cooking a recipe that measured in pounds rather than cups.
“She had to go back to the store and get more green peppers because she didn’t have a pound-and-a-half!” Candace said.
I asked Teresa about this special recipe, because I heard Elizabeth Taylor’s name in connection with it. “The recipe came from a cookbook created by the Osage Mission in Neosho County. This was the first Catholic Mission in the State of Kansas,” she explained.
The cookbook had this notation with the recipe: “This recipe was used by Dave Chasen at Chasen’s Restaurant in Hollywood. It is the same chili that Richard and Elizabeth Burton ordered on many occasions, by long distance from Rome, and had flown to them while filming Cleopatra. The recipe was taken from Jack Carney, KMOX radio in St. Louis, and his 1974 show, Look Who’s Cooking. The recipe was given by the St. Louis Life Seekers.”
Teresa labored long over this special recipe, and then, wouldn’t you know it, she got sick and couldn’t be there. But she sent the chili with her daughter, Vickie.
“The only thing good about this flu was that it lasted just a day. By 9 that night, I was feeling better,” Teresa said.
Jeannie Goza secretly worried whether enough people would enter the contest to feed the crowd, but as the response cards rolled in, she was pleased to see 20 folks would be bringing chili, and close to 90 people said they’d be attending. In the end, we had 23 huge crock pots of chili. We could have fed another whole town!
The chili contestants were Jane Staatz, Margie Stroda, Ann Brunner Koch (on behalf of her dad, Lauren Brunner), Darlene Sondergard, Fern Leach, Amanda Radke, Myrna Eskeldson, Margaret Harris, Kenny and Lisa Stroda, Pat Wick, Don and Kathy Matkins, Angela Schmidt, Vickie Jirak, Teresa Tajchman, Tim Steinborn, Cheri Bentz, Bill and Shannon Bell, Donita Ryff, Ben Calvert, Dusty Weigert, Marissa Makovec, Paula Morgan, and Brendan Bailey.
Judges of the chili contest had a tough job.
“Have you ever tried to discriminate between 23 different chili recipes?” my sister asked in disbelief, as she coordinated the judging efforts.
The primary judges were Ramona Fire Chief Alan Bentz, Rohani Alcorn of Ramona, and Nancy Harrison of Hope. Alan brought fire helmets for the judges to wear, even though none of the chilies were so hot that they required protective gear!
When Donita Ryff arrived with her chili she said she didn’t particularly want it entered into the contest, but Jeannie Goza gave her no choice, which was great, because Donita’s modesty could have kept her from being the third place winner! She received $20 from the City of Ramona as her prize. Second place went to a Ramona newcomer, Amanda Radke, who had one of the most unusual recipes — a white pork chili that she served with white flour tortillas. Amanda won an oil change from Cardie Oil.
First-place winner was another Ramona newcomer — Ben Calvert — who won a $50 gift card from Barnes Food Center in Herington, for his beef chili.
“This was real tough!” Rohani Alcorn said, one of the judges. “We finally narrowed the winners down to six entries and then went back and tasted again. Above all, I looked for flavor because not everybody cooks with lots of flavor.”
Ironically, the only entry that appeared on everybody’s judging sheet in the top six entries was entry #5. When Pat, who was helping the judges narrow the field, went into the kitchen to see who made this entry, she realized it was her own chili!
“We can’t have the mayor winning one of the prizes,” Pat said to the judges.
“Pat’s chili was so wonderful in flavor, that when I learned it was vegetarian, I thought she cheated,” Rohani said laughing. “I couldn’t believe there wasn’t meat in it.”
Pat’s chili did have a meat-like texture, and some of the kids just swore there was meat in it, until I explained what they were eating was a gluten-made vegetarian burger. Pat confided the flavor in her secret recipe was due, in part, to the chilies she raised in her garden.
The big moment, as far as the kids were concerned, was the arrival of Santa on the fire truck. Jeannie Goza, one of Ramona’s volunteer firefighters, coordinated with Alan Bentz, who was driving the fire truck, to get Santa to the church on time!
We tried to keep Santa’s identity a secret. But Santa’s “cover” was blown the moment he jumped off the fire truck and emitted his first, “Ho, Ho, Ho,” and 9-year-old Cheyenne Bailey, pronounced, “That’s Uncle Collin!”
While we act as though Santa is what excites all the kids, it’s really all about what Santa brings — presents. That’s where my sister, Pat, entered the picture. Her job on this Christmas committee was to create 53 gifts for Ramona kids from 6 months to age 18. And she had a budget of $2 per child.
Pat was perfect for this task because there’s nobody who can make so much out so little. She’s fabulous at creating something out of nothing! But she had some elves who made the job so much easier when Billy and Rohani Alcorn brought a huge box of stuffed toys to the December City Council meeting.
“Maybe you can use these for the kids’ gifts,” they said who are in the surplus business.
By the time the Christmas party rolled around my sister’s living room looked like Santa’s workshop. Poor Tooltime Tim could hardly find a walkway to reach the sofa so he could watch his favorite television show, Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives!
This time of year my sister always has this hunger for a special experience — it’s like watching somebody yearn for Godiva chocolates but there’s only Brach’s.
“When my kids were little and Christmas was so much fun, magic-making was easy,” Pat said. “Usually Christmas comes and goes and that ‘hunger’ is never quite filled. But this year, I was satiated! I wrapped so many presents it was like eating sweets, non-stop!”
The cleverest gift she created was for the teenagers. She found a little wooden box that could be painted or decorated and inside she put a note: “A box, like a town, is only as good as what you put in it!” And then she included on a card a quarter from the State Collection of quarters, and a foreign coin (Pat’s traveled the world and collected coins), and she suggested perhaps the kids would like to start a collection of their own. Then she added sweets and other small items appropriate for each young person — if they were driving, it was a special key chain, or a small tools, or flashlight.
The little kids got cars and mittens, and stickers, and hats. And when Santa had gone and the wrapping paper floated to earth, the kids were ready to go Christmas caroling. I was equipped this year — I came with a boom box and Christmas carols and song sheets. In the end, the only song the kids really knew was Jingle Bells so we sang it at every house.
Jeannie arranged for a truck and trailer with hay bales and volunteer fireman Eugene Remmers, drove the rambunctious carolers around town. Alan Bentz drove the fire truck ahead of us, signaling with the swirling red light that something unusual was underway.
Jeannie and I had created gift bags for the folks who couldn’t attend the party. Each bag included a sample or two of chili, cornbread, Christmas cookies, a candy cane, and a little gift from Santa. The children rolled off the hay wagon and stood at the door singing Jingle Bells, while Santa and his elves presented the Christmas goodie bag.
“Oh, that was so wonderful to receive that bag,” Frances Hanschu said. “I was talking with Betty Stenzel, and she said the chili sample she got was the best she’d ever tasted! Mine was really good too!”
I had told Ralph Bernhardt, when I put up his Christmas lights, to be sure and stay up on Saturday night until Santa arrived.
“Oh, I don’t need to see Santa,” Ralph said. “I’ll probably be in bed by that time.”
But on that lovely, almost warmish, full-moon night, Ralph answered his door, and judging by the sly smile on his face, he was secretly pleased to see Santa on his doorstep.
When we stopped at Harold and Betty Ohm’s place, Betty was prepared. She graciously came outside with a plate of candy to offer the carolers.
The caroling party had planned to stop at Tony Meyer’s house, but at the last minute, Tony called and said he wanted to attend. Tony loves being in on the excitement. So Don Matkins went and got him and we gave him a seat near all the action so he could watch the kids open their presents. No doubt this was the most rambunctious Christmas event Tony has witnessed in the 96 Christmases he’s observed!
“Oh the party was just wonderful,” Darlene Sondergard said. “Way before the party even happened, folks from our senior citizen group were excited and talking about it!”
My favorite part of the event was seeing how many people made it happen — and I’m not just talking about the folks who brought chili. Fern Leach, city treasurer, helped serve the meal and her former husband, David, joined in afterwards and helped clean the parish hall. Jim Thompson stayed until the end and cleaned and mopped the hall floors. Kim Young and her son, Nathan, helped put the parish hall like we found it, down to the last ornament on the Christmas tree.
Don and Kathy Matkins were at the parish hall for five hours straight, doing whatever was needed — setting tables, keeping the hot chocolate coming, serving, or cleaning up afterwards. Ramona’s vice mayor Art Stroda worked throughout the day hauling props and getting power strips ready for 20+ pots of chili. Pat and I spent a day hauling decorations from our storage shed, so we could transform the parish hall into a Christmas wonderland. Jeannie Goza joined us in decorating, and then helped oversee the evening event.
Zeb and Norma Wright contributed money for the drinks at the party. The Sondergards and Fikes gave money too, to be used wherever needed. The week before the party, Art Stroda worked tirelessly to get Christmas lights on houses around town and main street buildings. Art and I would meet on the street in our vehicles. With windows rolled down we’d update each other.
“I just got lights over to the Thompsons,” Art said. “And I’ve got some red ones we can put on the fire station.”
“I’ve got the hooks to hang them,” I replied. “Do you need more extension cords?”
Ramona is looking very twinkly right about now. Main Street looks like a little candy land. The city council voted at the December meeting to give every household $10 in January to help defray their electrical bill, if they put up Christmas lights from Dec. 15 through New Years. That incentive brought more light to several streets in town.
One of my cherished memories from this Christmas was when Cassy Thompson, 12 years old and an excellent baker, came to my house to help make the Christmas cookies for the party. We mixed the dough at my place, but soon moved our cooking endeavor to my sister’s house because she has a convection oven, which makes perfect cookies!
With Santa hats on we baked mounds and heaps of cookies, and while they baked in the oven, we helped Pat wrap the Christmas presents for the little kids in town. It was one of those perfect moments that are so prevalent this time of year.
“Oh, I just love town events!” Cassy said, as though adding a cherry atop the whipped cream of a perfect holiday memory.
But the statement that sums it all up, is one that was found on the little Christmas gift Santa gave to every resident with a Ramona address. Whether present at the party or not, each family received a little blue notepad and pen compliments of the City of Ramona. On the cover of the notepad is a picture of two mountain climbers, assisting each other to the top and the inscription reads: “TEAMWORK, together we achieve the extraordinary.”
And that’s the news from Ramona — not all of it, but some of the best — where a traffic jam is impossible because nobody wants to be out on the icy streets, and any smart dog is snuggled up in its doghouse! Have a blessed holiday.