Jane Applegate Belzer
Photos by Shelly Belzer and author
The holidays are coming and it’s time for me to challenge my baking skills. I know that sounds dangerous because we all want our holiday treats to be just perfect. So why take on a new project instead of relying on tried and true recipes born from family traditions? I am fortunate to have a couple of friends who are very skilled bakers and they never make the same holiday treats twice. Cookies, pies, breads, cakes and candies that dazzle the eyes and the palates. Impressive. So this year I’m taking my cue from them and I’m baking Stollen or Christstollen as it is called in its German homeland. View more
For the holiday season OLLI Connects is featuring food blogs and recipes over the first three weeks of December followed by a discussion of our favorite issues on the final Monday of 2022. Deliciousness is on the menu beginning with Jane Applegate Belzer's beautiful Stollen. And don't forget to visit OLLI Connects on Thursday, December 8th to discover the identity of the To Tell The Truth competition winner. — Editors
Well, we have arrived at Week 4 of the To Tell the Truth Contest. How are you doing so far? Do you think you have correctly sussed out truth from fiction? Don’t forget to leave your True/False vote in the comment section below the authors’ biographies. After we compile all the responses, we will select the winner and announce his or her name and reveal the veracity of each of the ten entrants in December. Stay tuned for one more bonus episode this Thursday, but for now enjoy Marilyn Myerson’s The Haunting: Ghosts in my Life and Diane Henrikson Russel’s Pet Cards and To Tell the Truth. — Editor 
Welcome back to Week 2 of the OLLI Connects To Tell the Truth Contest. This time your challenge involves two entries by female writers. Strikingly different, yet uniquely emotional and evocative, these stories should hopefully provoke some head scratching. Please enjoy the ride and let us know your vote (True or False) in the comments section below the authors’ biographies. If you happen to be a little late for the party and missed the first installment, never fear! Just scroll back one week to cast your vote on Bob Strozier’s and Pete Terzian’s November 7th edition.
Many of us in OLLI-USF watched To Tell the Truth on television as we were growing up, and we (OLLI Connects ‘editors) recently invited our readers to participate in our own OLLI Connects “To Tell the Truth” contest. That is, we asked you to submit a story about something that you did or experienced and to tell it as a true story. Whether it was or not. We hoped to get four entries, one for each issue this month. We got even more, so most issues will have two tall (?) tales.
Sanibel photo by Ben Hendren/Andalou Agency/Getty
“Just a week or two, maybe less,” I heard my doctor quietly tell Gillian. She walked him to the door, wished him a good day, and came back to me. “You heard that, right Mom?” she asked, sniffling, holding the embroidered handkerchief her grandfather gave her when she was just a tot. And what a bright, energetic girl she was. She grew to be so accomplished. Married well as the old saying goes. Made me a grandmother to three amazing people. 
Like many girls raised in the 1960s, I dreamed that I would marry and adopt my husband’s last name. I even practiced writing my first name followed by the last name of my latest crush in beautiful cursive handwriting.
After two days in the care of Carol and Merlin, Beryl had yet to receive permission to return to Philadelphia. A few more adventures awaited her before she was cleared to embark on a flight home. Episode II concludes with her personal reflections and a warm story describing the purpose of her trip to Brussels.–Editor