As we at The Madera Tribune prepare for our final Special Section of the year, a magazine called “2025 Year in Review,” it made me review my own personal year and what happened during this year that I want to remember. It’s been a quick year. It seems like it was only about four months long, but here we are at almost the end of 2025.  This year I lost a very dear member of my family, the wife of one of my cousins. Glenda died suddenly just a couple of weeks before our family

Courtesy of Nick Salinas Madera County workers put the County emblem on the County of Madera Christmas Tree, which will be lit on Friday at 6 p.m., just before the annual Christmas Parade, which will begin at 7 p.m. Christmas nostalgia is the sentimental longing for past Christmas celebrations, often triggered by sights, sounds, and traditions. Often, we spend time and effort to create these conditions that we long for, only to be disappointed by the less-than-optimal result.

‘Tis the season for gaining weight. It starts before Thanksgiving and lasts until after the ball drops in New York on New Years Day. There are parties and dinners, and get-togethers with spreads of appetizers and desserts, chocolates, cheeses, breads, chips, wines, and other spirits, cakes, pies, potatoes, egg nog, and much more.  The list goes on, and depending on the culture of the gathering, it could be much more extensive than what I have just described. Many years ago, w

Thursday is Thanksgiving Day, a special day set aside for recognizing and giving thanks for all the many good things in our lives. It is by far my favorite holiday of the year. I have many fond memories of Thanksgiving Days during my life. As I was growing up in central Florida, my family always spent Thanksgiving at my Aunt Sybil and Uncle John’s house in Dade City, which was about 40 miles from where we lived. Aunt Sybil was one of my grandmother’s four sisters. Her husband

Cat Campbell/For The Madera Tribune If you like molasses, you will appreciate a slice of old-fashioned, shoofly pie. While most of us wouldn’t dream of leaving out the famous traditional pumpkin pie as a Thanksgiving dessert, it is nice to know that there are many other delicious desserts that can share the table. My family always has to wait a while before we delve into the sweets, as our usual Thanksgiving meal doesn’t leave much room for anything else. During that waiting

The holiday seasons are upon us now. We just passed the fun Halloween time, and then November brings the season of harvest and thankfulness. Thanksgiving reminds us to show our gratitude for all our blessings, which are many. December brings the countdown to the celebration of the day we know as Christmas. According to an old poem written in the late 1800s by Christina Rossetti, “Love came down at Christmas.” It was Jesus who taught us to love each other. In fact, he commande

Bee’s Bakery Cafe, 40250 Junction Drive, will host Italian virtuoso guitarist Alberto Lombardi for a food and win event on Friday, beginning at 5 p.m. Lombardi is an internationally renowned acoustic fingerstyle and electric rock player. Dinner begins at 5:30 p.m. and the show starts at 7 p.m.

Daderot, Wikimedia Commons Baking some homemade dinner rolls will make your kitchen smell cozy and comforting. Even though I love dinner rolls, I only have them during big holiday dinners. The thing is, that type of dinner is also the time for lots of other special foods, and a plate can only hold just so much. Sometimes the rolls don’t find a place on my dinner plate. But they sure come in handy much later, when a midnight snack attack puts leftovers to good use. Perhaps a m