The people who love your babies are forever precious. I was thinking about Harvey and Mary Jane Hyatt this week and how much they meant to our family when our kids were small. Mr. Harvey and Miss Mary Jane worked in the Marietta First Baptist nursery for decades, and they snuggled and loved both of my kids as their very first Sunday school teachers. I wanted to write about the Hyatts—and share Mr. Harvey’s recipe for cheese straws—but I couldn’t think of a better way to tell you about them than what I wrote in an article for Fathom Magazine a few years ago. I miss them very much.
It All Starts With Rocking the Babies
“I rock the babies.” That is how Vivian Hughes introduced herself years ago at a church conference. It was so long ago I don’t remember the topic of discussion, but it was important enough that many members of our Baptist church got up to speak. For Miss Vivian, the babies of the church were her personal ministry and baby rocker was her identity in the body of Christ. She rocked my first baby, and I can attest to her skill at it.
By the time my daughter was two-years-old, we were living in a new city and a new crop of baby rockers was rocking the babies at our new church. They loved loving her every bit as much as Miss Vivian did, and church was one of her favorite places to go. One lovely couple, Harvey and Mary Jane Hyatt, had been staples of the nursery ministry for decades. In their late-seventies by the time I met them, Mr. Harvey and Miss Mary Jane never had children of their own, but they loved generations of babies that they rocked in the nursery over the years. Mary Jane took care of the older babies, and Harvey taught the two-year-old Sunday school class.
Every year our church had a Fall Festival where the kids dressed up in costumes and played carnival games in the gym. I was determined to be one of those moms who made Halloween costumes, an urge I quickly got over, and I decided that Abby was going to be a clown. I found the perfect pattern for a child’s clown costume at the local Joann’s—the cover said it was a two hour project from start to finish—and sat down the day before to cut out the fabric and sew the costume. The pattern makers had clearly over-estimated my sewing skills, and ten hours later, I finally had a completed costume.
To my dismay, when she tried it on the next day, I discovered I had greatly over-estimated the size of my child, and the clown suit swallowed her whole. In fact, the costume did not fit her properly until she was six-years-old. Frantic alterations ensued, and between safety pins and ribbons, I was able to get the thing downsized into something she could wear. She looked as ridiculous as she did adorable, but she didn’t know that.
The Fall Festival was a fun extravaganza with loud music playing and lots of colorful decorations and people milling about. There were games like Clothespin Fishing and Toilet Paper Toss along the perimeter, bounce houses at one end, and a cakewalk going on in the middle of the gym floor. Kids were running wild showing off their costumes to anyone who would look at them. To my toddler, it was completely overwhelming, and after a few minutes, she found Mr. Harvey, crawled up in his lap, and watched the goings-on from her refuge. He held her for almost an hour.
What Mr. Harvey, Miss Vivian, and all the many others whose calling is the church nursery give to our children is their first church experience of the love of Jesus. The children sing, “Jesus loves me, this I know,” but it is Mr. Harvey who gives them a hug and tells them how happy he is to see them each Sunday. He models God’s love for them. They are not old enough to understand the deep theology of the Christian faith, but they know church is a place where grownups love them and God does too.
This love builds a strong foundation for children as they grow into youth and the issues they face get bigger. Recently, a seventh grader in our community took his own life, reportedly after he was bullied at school. The first Sunday after his death was an all hands on deck morning for youth leaders, ministers, and Sunday school teachers at our church who were called in for extra support for our students that day. The kids mostly just needed to talk, so we listened. It was an opportunity, however, to remind them that they have adults in their lives they can talk to about anything no matter what—their parents’ friends, their friends’ parents, their teachers and coaches. Many of those adults are in our church, and they should never hesitate to reach out.
That is what church can be for our children no matter their age—a place where they are loved and accepted, a safe harbor in a storm. They need to understand they have a support system of adults who will always be there for them, and it all starts with people like Mr. Harvey, Miss Mary Jane, and Miss Vivian who rock the babies.
Mr. Harvey made the best cheese straws anywhere. Each summer we worked the Vacation Bible School staff snack room together. (Teaching small children is not my spiritual gift, so I volunteered to feed the ones who could to it well.) Everyone looked forward to the day each summer when Mr. Harvey brought in his delicious cheese straws. He made a ton of them, and they were always gone by the end of the morning. He was kind enough to share his recipe in the church preschool’s fundraiser cookbook.
Mr. Harvey’s Cheese Straws
1 lb. Extra Sharp Cracker Barrel Cheese
3 sticks Blue Bonnet margarine
4 cups plain White Lily flour
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp red pepper (scant)
Shred cheese. Mix cheese and margarine until smooth. Add flour and mix until smooth. Continue until all flour is used. Dough will be stiff. Put part of dough in cookie press. Squeeze onto cookie sheet. (You can put rows of cheese straws very close together as they do not spread when cooking.) Score to make straws about 2 1/2 inches in length.
Bake in 350 degree oven for 15 minutes. Remove and let cool a couple of minutes on cookie sheet. With spatula, finish cutting through cheese straws. Place on paper towels until completely cold. Store in airtight containers.
Makes 225-240 2 1/2 inch cheese straws.
Helpful Hints:
Margarine should be room temperature.
Sometimes more flour is needed.
Cheese straws brown better when you use dark colored cookie sheets.
Cheese straws will not break as easily if wax paper is placed between layers when storing.
Cheese straws will start getting brown at the ends when done.
A funny thing that happened when I submitted this piece to Fathom for editing highlighted something we do in the South that’s not always done elsewhere. We use Mr. and Miss plus their first name in addressing older people who are close to our families. I never thought twice about it until the editor emailed me asking if Mr. Harvey and Miss Mary Jane were brother and sister. After I stopped laughing, I wrote back to tell him that’s how we address our elders in the South, and we need to leave that part in. Do other parts of the country address close elders this way, or is it just us?
Spring is moving right along, and it’s soon going to be graduation season at our house and many of yours as well. I’m still in denial that my baby is graduating. My graduate won’t let me throw him a graduation party—we threw him an Eagle Scout Court of Honor instead—but if yours will, you’ll want to make some of Mr. Harvey’s cheese straws for the snack table. By the way, that clown Halloween costume that took so long to make, Abby wore it two Halloweens in a row, and Daniel wore it three. I got my time back out of it for sure.
Until next time,
Karla
They were amazing human beings & wonderful friends.
Mr. Harvey 💜💜💜