Sally Ride Science

This recipe is from Osa, the late mother of one of my high school girlfriends, Sonja.  Her mother was a Norwegian native and made this whenever I would visit.  It's good anytime of the year with chicken or turkey, but an especially nice way to use Thanksgiving leftovers.  The recipe is shown here in my own mother's handwriting from a book of her favorite recipes she gave me one year for Christmas.  When my own mother is gone (and I hope that is many years away!) one of the things I will miss the most is her cooking.  

It's been a long time since I've needed any safety pins, and even longer since I've had hair!  I was rifling through a storage drawer looking for safety pins (prepping two baby quilts for quilting), when I re-discovered a stash of hair clips.  They are such a great alternative to pins when finishing (hand-sewing) binding.  I had forgotten about them!  I don't know how many times I've been stuck by pins in the binding process.  Even with the hair clips, I somehow always manage to run the sharp end of my sewing needle under my left thumbnail a few times, and the blunt end usually punctures the middle finger of my right hand at some point. Ouch!  I made this quilt for my niece Jeny.  She and her husband, Seth, are expecting their first baby Spring 2014.  Here she is opening the quilt at her baby shower in Kansas City, their home.

A&E: Quilt show brings common threads to Iowa Des Moines hosts national premiere of quilt show from China By Michael Morain If you haven’t seen hordes of needle-wielding visitors around town, you will soon. They’re heading this way for the American Quilter’s Society’s largest QuiltWeek ever, which opens Wednesday at the Iowa Events Center with displays, demonstrations, gadget sales and more than $44,000 in cash prizes. So yeah, it’s an invasion. But they’re pieceworkers. They come in peace. On the same day the expo opens, in fact, the State Historical Museum of Iowa opens an exhibition of American quilts the U.S. Embassy in Beijing recently trotted around to five cities in China. Call it textile diplomacy. The project celebrates “the common threads between our two countries,” Arts Midwest President and CEO David Fraher said. His Twin Cities nonprofit partnered with the U.S. State Department and a network of state arts councils to make the show happen. Des Moines is the first stop o...

The inspiration (upper right in photo) - what I am guessing may be an overshot woven coverlet? (Photo from  Tunestam's Antiques  in Mineral Point, Wisconsin) ~ October 2013 In process on the design board in my studio  Binding the quilt Taffy is not impressed Beautiful hand-quilting by Amish quilter On the bed Done! April 2015 Overshot is a return to something simpler, a welcome relief  from the tedious piecing of some of my quilts. 

November 6, 2013, official opening of "The Sum of Many Parts" exhibit State Historical Museum, Des Moines, Iowa David Fraher, President & CEO, Arts Midwest Peter Capell, Board Chair, Arts Midwest   With Caroline Trumpold (IA), Patricia Lei Murray (HI) and son of the late Marguerite Cox With Caroline Trumpold of Middle Amana, Iowa    Patricia celebrates the exhibit opening as well as her birthday with Gayle Jorgens and Stan Wai, designers of the award-winning exhibit catalog    This will be the only complete exhibition of "The Sum of Many Parts" in the US.  I am thrilled that it will be in my current home state of Iowa at the State Historical Museum .  Look for further announcements on programming (gallery talks, panel discussions) dates.     Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs Press Release    

SATs SEP 14 & 24, 10A-1P, Home Ec Workshop , Iowa City Fun large-scale Chevron quilt (finished size ~60x70").  Endless color combination possibilities.  (Suggested pairing: machine-quilting class taught by Codi Josephson - date TBD)

This recipe is from a dear friend, a fellow quilter, and one of my "adopted" grandmothers, Caroline Trumpold, of Main Amana, Iowa.  Dill beans are a German treat to look forward to every summer, if you are fortunate enough to find fresh yellow wax beans.  This year I made them over Labor Day after stumbling on the wax beans at a high-end grocer in downtown Iowa City .  The summer before I got the beans from a vegetable stand upon special request.  The recipe is for about one pound of beans.  I think I had two pounds and did a recipe-and-a-half of the brine.