More summer bounty

My neighbor, Mary Mac, works at a farmers' market. She brought me some strawberries the other day. I was tempted to eat them all while standing over the sink. But I did stop soon enough to make a quick fruit cobbler before they were gone.

This is so simple and you can make it with any fresh or frozen fruit you have on hand.

Ingredients:
2 Tablespoons butter
1/4 cup and 2 Tablespoons flour
1/4 cup and 2 Tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup and 2 Tablespoons milk
1 cup sliced strawberries, or raspberries, or fresh peaches, or nectarines, or whole blackberries
1-1/2 teaspoons sugar

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Put butter in a small casserole dish and put it in a microwave to melt it. Remove from microwave and swirl it around to coat the sides and bottom of the casserole.
In a separate bowl, whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt to mix. Add milk and whisk it into the dry ingredients to make a smooth batter. Pour batter into the casserole, then scatter your fruit over the batter. Sprinkle 1-1/2 teaspoons of sugar over the fruit.
Bake at 350 degrees until the batter browns and the fruit bubbles. My oven takes 50 minutes.
Serve warm with ice cream, or cold with cream.

Box of books

 It is fun to get a big box of books -- my Knitter's Weaving Book is all printed. Now copies are ready to go out in the world.

My friend Katie and I went to the Lambtown Festival in Dixon 10 days ago. I introduced my KWB to a few yarn vendors. We watched the sheep shearing competition for over two hours.

 There was a Sheep to Shawl competition, too. Three teams of spinners and weavers started at 10 a.m. with a washed sheep fleece and turned it into a 19-inch by 72-inch shawl by 4 p.m. The spinners (two to a team) grabbed rolags of carded fleece from the carders and began to spin yarn. The weaver (1 on each team) waited patiently for the first yards of yarn so she could begin weaving (the looms were already warped). One person on a team was assigned to be an information source and tell the public what was going on. The information person could switch assignments and take a spinner or a the weaver's place, and someone else became the explainer. We checked on the progress on and off throughout the day. One team had to drop out near the end due to a mechanical problem. The first to finish was not necessarily the winner because the teams were judged on the quality of the shawl design. It was fun to watch.

 I'm looking forward to getting my Knitter's Weaving Book on the market. If you know of a good place for me to send a review copy, please tell me. You can buy a copy by going to my Thresh Publications website (or clicking on the graphic below) and using PayPal.

 I am working on a project for the next book, Knitters' Weaving Projects. Right now I'm weaving a checked beret with a knitted headband. I am looking for projects and will be holding a contest to find good ones. Let me know if you are interested.

So far, so good.

Night visitor

This opossum has been hanging out in my house. He (or she) has been coming in through the cat door and eating the cats' food and drinking water. The critter scattered food and dipped some in the water bowl. I put out a call for help on the Bethel Island area of Facebook. I received over 50 suggestions -- some of them were very funny.
One nice lady, Linda, came over to my house and brought a cat trap for me to borrow. I set it up last night and this morning the possum was in it. I took him for a long car ride (in the trunk so he could not see where we were going). He has a new home in as yet not built waterfront development. I hope he is happy there.
Thank you all in my community for your support.

Got some 'splainin' to do

I made the chocolate quilt top and took progress pictures as I went along. I know what I did and how it went together, but now I have to explain how to do it so I can put out a pattern for others to follow. I have 10 draft pages of Dear Hearts so far. I will look for a pattern tester to try it out in another color-way. I'll show the tester my project and hand over the pattern draft pages. I won't add any verbal explanation. If she or he gets terribly stuck we can talk and I can add more words or pictures. It is an interesting process to come up with a final, salable pattern.

 

Where did Feather go?

Last evening, way past dinnertime, I started to worry about my cat, Feather. I called and called him but his big white form did not emerge from the darkness outside. By 10:30 PM I was really worried. I had to go to bed. I passed by my sewing room door and thought I'd peek in there. To my great surprise, there was Feather. He had not made a sound. I did not go into my sewing room all day yesterday. I don't even remember opening the door once during the day. Very strange. I am sure he was comfortable because he had lots of soft piles of fabric to cuddle with.

 

And, speaking of cats, we have a new resident in the house. Her name is Phoenix. She is less than a year old. She was abandoned by a family which moved out of a rental house on Taylor Road in late March. The day after they moved out, the house caught fire and burned to the ground and burned up the house next door, too. A cat rescue organization found her and she was in "foster cat care" for a while. A friend called me and asked if I wanted a cat. I did not want a cat, but when I heard her story I said, "bring her over." When I saw her I was so surprised because she looked just exactly like our old cat Aucuba who lived with us for 18 years. Phoenix seems to be the right name for her because her coat looks as if it is "sooty." She knows her name now, is very pleasant, and gets along very well with Feather. I've tried and tried to take a good photo of her with no luck. She looks grumpy in her pictures, but she isn't.

Island Crab Feed and my checkered past



Photo by BrendaLou Scott

Last Saturday, I attended the Island's Annual Crab Feed benefiting the Santa Sack program. There were hundreds of people in Scout Hall (our community center). The Santa Sack program gives gifts to needy children in the Bethel Island area and holds a Christmas party for them.

The Hall was so full and I wandered around looking for someone I knew. People come from neighboring towns for this delicious event. I did not see a familiar face (except my friends tending bar, collecting 212 tickets, and helping in the kitchen). After fifteen minutes I had almost decided to leave and go home. Then I spotted a quilting friend, Maxine. Whew, I had a dinner companion.

We had all the crab we could eat. The servers were high school students doing their community service work. They kept the huge platters of crab, French bread, and melted butter coming without a moments pause. They also kept the waste buckets coming for the empty crab shells. There was pineapple upside-down cake for dessert. What good workers they were.

As I was getting dressed before the event, I pulled on a favorite pair of black and white houndstooth wool pants, and thought, "I've had these pants for a long time." I pulled on a black jersey from my high school class reunion in 2008. I spiffed up the outfit with my brand new red corduroy Big Shirt from L.L. Bean.

Yesterday, I was looking through some old photos trying to find pictures I could use to promote my 40th anniversary reprint of my little Spinning with a Drop Spindle booklet. One photo surprised me.

There I was in 1974, spinning on my spindle wearing the same houndstooth pants. Yes, I realized I've worn these pants for at least 38 years!

So, if you know any knitters that might enjoy spinning their own yarn, click on the cover picture and get them a nice little Christmas present. It's time for me to get a new pair of pants!

Thanksgiving for 600 people

For the last ten years, a free Thanksgiving meal has been served at Scout Hall, Bethel Island's community center. Usually 200-300 people show up to enjoy the feast. This year, nine (9) days before Thanksgiving, our Chamber of Commerce manager, Cha-Cha, found out that the church group from Antioch which had been putting on the dinner was not going to do it this year.

Cha-Cha posted a notice on our Bethel Island Facebook page and asked for help. She said it "was an overwhelming request for me to even comprehend." Help poured in. Offers of money from businesses and service groups and individuals, turkeys from the grocery store and restaurants, pies, dressing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, aluminum containers and paper and plastic supplies were all donated. People volunteered to come to Scout Hall and cook during the days before Thanksgiving. The hall has a well-equipped kitchen and large professional refrigerators so this was possible. Other people cooked at home and brought their platters and bowls full of hot food to the hall Thanksgiving morning.

The Island population is around 2,500 people (including neighboring Hotchkiss Tract). The annual dinner is served to anyone who walks in the door, and is delivered to shut-ins that day. There are many single people on the island, and we have a high population of elderly folks because this is a retirement place.

 Food Bank coordinator from the Island Baptist Church, Celia, and Cha-Cha

Cha-Cha reported the next day that an "astounding number of meals were provided -- 535 meals were served at the hall and delivered to shut-ins. Gosh, I was flabbergasted." Bags of packaged-good groceries were given to those who needed them on Thanksgiving when they left after their meal.
On Friday morning, a group arrived at the hall to bag up the remaining food for the Food Bank where another 65 people were fed. Cha-Cha said, "Thank you certainly does not seem like adequate praise to you. But we did it. . . . To see the smiling faces, to see. . . .groups of friends gather to share a meal rather than sitting at home alone. You all made it possible. Aloha Nui Loa. ..."

As if that were not enough, Saturday morning we saw Cha-Cha and her good friend Ron Dolittle in the community park next to Scout Hall unpacking containers of outdoor Christmas decorations and lights. The Saturday after Thanksgiving is the traditional day to get the park ready for the holidays.

Scout Hall in the background
Ron attached lights to the light poles using a tall ladder that Scott Bigness provided, and Dorreen Oxford brought some new (to us) decorations for this year, including a singing Santa for the sleigh.

I've got the picture now

I found my inspiration on Tanya Watanabe’s Blog. She showed a photo quilt she was making with a pattern by Karen Montgomery called “Picture This Pattern.”  Click on Tanya’s quilt to go to her blog.

 What a clever idea. I sent off for the pattern this morning. In the meantime I sketched out my ideas for arranging the fire station quilt. Putting the miscellaneous photos in film strips is such a good solution. I have not found a background fabric or figured out the border yet, so I just filled in with grey. I’ll be using my own dimensions, but credit must go to the pattern designer, Karen.

 You can click on the photo below to order the pattern from the Quilt Company.

How to arrange the elements?

I sure would like some help arranging these quilting blocks into a coherent quilt. I’ve made the blocks and printed photos on cloth for our fundraising quilt for the Bethel Island fire station refurbishing project. The largest block is a whole station view which is 32.5” wide by 17” high (unfinished size).

The other elements are: a strip 19” long by 1.5” wide saying “There is no future without a past” (I can appliqué this strip anywhere on the finished top); a Dalmatian dog face with floppy ears -- 6” wide by 8” high; a fire badge -- 3.25” wide by 3.5” high;  a contemporary photo of the fire station – 10.5’ wide by 6.75” high; a vintage black and white photo from 1951 – 10.5” wide by 7.75” high; a composite photo made from a contemporary picture and part of the vintage photo – 18” wide by 9.25” high including the cloth frame. (I think I shot the elements and the large block at the same scale, but I’m not positive.)

 I can make filler blocks to put around the elements and make top all fit together. I thought I’d use Marcia’s Quilter’ Cache 8-inch block called Maltese Cross because it is a symbol used by firefighters. I can make it in any color combination and any appropriate size. I can make filler strips and sashing to fill in the gaps, too.

If you have an hour or two to spare can you help me? You can click on the photos and print them out. Then cut the elements apart and shuffle them around on a piece of paper. When you get them arranged, tape or glue them to the paper and put your arrangement in your scanner and/or copier and send it to me. Of course if you have a graphics program you can use that. My e-mail address can be found in my profile, but you can send me mail at: christine (at sign) winnowing.com. Thank you very much. I have to present the quilt top at the county historical committee meeting on Thursday.

I have a few more touches for the largest block. I have to appliqué a sign saying “Bethel Island Fire Department” above the window. 

Bits and pieces coming together

My last posts have been all about our island fire station closing. It’s been very upsetting to me and all of us living here. However there is hope for getting the station to serve an important function. We’ve applied to have it declared a historic structure. If it is designated, then we can start refurbishing it with the help of a licensed contractor supervising volunteer laborers. Funds will be needed for materials.

How do people raise money for a good cause? They make quilts, of course. My printer has been printing, my machine has been humming. Today I did a template for the centerpiece.

 I enlarged my sketch and am now laying out fabrics to use. The stripe at the top right will be for the Quonset Hut building front section, the red brick fabric will be used for the brick outside-wainscoting along the front, the brown for the shingle trim, the off-white for the cement block walls, and the blue for the sky. It’s fun to pull from my stash. I’ve found two fire truck photos to put in the bays. I’ll print the photos on fabric.
This is the photo (below) of the station that I am copying, but the quilted one will have the doors open.

 I’ve finished another aspect of the quilt by printing a composite photo on cloth (2012 and 1951). I am really pleased with it. It will be fun to quilt around the arched Quonset Hut roof tying the two parts together. I’ll emphasize a few other details with quilting, too.

I needed help with a caption for the composite piece. So I went on Facebook to our Bethel Island group, posted a photo, and asked for ideas. Jack Whitener, our Island fire chief from the 1970s and 1980s, came up with a wonderful caption: “There is no future without a past.” I printed it out the caption on fabric and I will appliqué it on the finished quilt.

Saving grace (we hope)

Heather Campbell and I took our “Application for Nomination” to Martinez yesterday. We are hoping to get the Bethel Island Fire Station approved as a historical building by the County’s Historical Landmarks Advisory Committee, and then by the Board of Supervisors. If the building is chosen, we can refurbish it and have it ready as a command center and gathering place for paid-on-call firefighters and emergency medical responders here on Bethel Island.

East Contra Costa Fire Protection District (ECCFPD) could not fix up the building because it was in a floodplain and had to be raised up in the air if they worked on it. However, there is an exemption from the FEMA floodplain rules if a building is a Historic Structure it does NOT have to be raised above the mean flood height.

The BIMAC approved the application at Tuesday night’s meeting and put up some money for the application fee. Islanders also contributed for the fee. Thanks to Page Pratt, Grant, Dori Anderson, and Marguerite Lawry we could pay the $500 application fee yesterday!

            See my post from July1 about the closing of the station.

Mixed blessings

 It’s good to go to church, at least for me. You never know what abundance you will receive. Today, at St. Alban’s in Brentwood a parishioner brought lots of fresh fruit to give away. That’s the wonderful thing about living in East Contra Costa County, California. There are fruit orchards, berry patches, and corn fields. It’s the perfect growing spot. I took some plums and peaches home.

My neighbor, Mary, works at a farmers market and yesterday she stopped by my house and gave me a basket of very ripe strawberries. I ate most of them last night.

To preserve these treats, I made a quick batch of mixed fruit refrigerator jam. My jam is 100 times better than the stuff called “mixed fruit” at the supermarket.

My blessings were mixed, but all good. Here is a guideline recipe. I did not use any water or lemon juice, just fruit and sugar today. It cooked for about 20 minutes.

The doors rolled down this morning

 A few of us were there at 8 a.m. this morning, July 1, 2012, when the last shift went off duty. A new shift didn’t arrive to take their place. Our Bethel Island Fire Station is closed.

Ben Whitener, Karen Israel, Captain Robert Ruddick, Joni Fraga-Pratt, Page Pratt, Bob Kenny

It was a sad goodbye. A volunteer fire department started on the Island in 1948. In the early 50s, a Quonset Hut was erected to house the engine. In the 1970s a paid chief and an assistant were hired and the station was manned 24/7 with paid-on-call volunteers. The firefighters have been protecting the Island for 64 years.

A single medical emergency person will be on the site for a while. Engines will come to the Island from the nearby towns of Oakley and Brentwood (over 5 miles away). The reason for the closure, we are told, is that a bond measure on the recent ballot did not pass.

This morning, about 45 minutes after the station closed, a medical call came in. The firefighters just stood there. They could not go to give aid. About 10 minutes later a fire truck from Oakley arrived on the Island.

Plans are afoot to preserve the station and get it designated as an historic structure. You will learn more about this in further posts.

Box of books

 I picked up my little box of books Tuesday. These are review copies of Spinning with a Drop Spindle. I am sending them out to spinning and weaving stores to see if they would like to buy some. I have a long way to go before I have notified the fiber world that it’s back in print.

I remember this process from years ago. There was no internet back then. We went to the library and looked through telephone yellow pages and picked out stores with names that sounded promising. It is much easier today because I can search online.

I ran across an old friend at Halcyon Yarn in Bath, Maine. She is still in business 40 years later. I called her and she remembered selling the booklet years ago. I’m sending her a copy today and I hope she will write a review “blurb” for the back cover. Another friend, Susan Druding, was a pioneer retailer with her store Straw into Gold in Berkeley. Susan was one of our very first customers and sold thousands of copies of Spinning with a Drop Spindle. She now owns Crystal Palace Yarns and wholesales yarns, not weaving and spinning tools. Susan said she will write a comment for the back cover.

There is a big Conference of Northern California Handweavers at the Oakland Convention Center from May 18 through the 20^th.  I think it is way too late for me to sign up as a vendor, but maybe a fiber arts distributor will have my spinning booklet in stock by then. (I am prepared to order a big, fast print run if there is interest.)

And I have them for sale on my other website: Thresh Publications. Wish me luck.

Raindrops falling on my face

It’s around 4:00 in the morning. I am awake. I awoke because I felt a drip on my face. I was puzzled. I felt another drop. I touched my pillow and it was damp. What the??? I got out of bed and turned on the light and saw water standing on my bedside cupboard. Oh.

 There is a stream of water pouring through the ceiling.

 I grabbed towels and spread them around on the cupboard, on my bed, on the floor. I put a dishpan on the cupboard. It is filling up fast.

I’m going to be up the rest of the night emptying the pan. It fills up about an inch every 10 minutes. As long as I’m up I might as well blog.

I hired some fellows last week to clean out the gutters and weather-strip the doors. I thought I was prepared for this storm. Darn. I’ll have to wait until 8:00 a.m. to call them and probably call a roofer.

Update 10:40 a.m.

The leak has stopped! My old friend, Tom Knorr, came to the house right after I called him this morning. He climbed up to the roof through a skylight. He found standing water (see my post from 2009 here). He took apart the drain coverings and the water rushed out the drain pipes. It was a waterfall. Within a half hour the drip in my bedroom stopped.

Tom and I used to work together at the island levee district. I am sure glad he was willing to come and help me out. There is more work to be done up on the roof, so he will come back and figure things out when it’s dry. Right now I have lots of towels in the dryer.

Awwww

This picture is from the Golden Retriever Rescue of Southern Maryland’s blog. Go to their main site: here and make a donation for providing such a cute photo. Or you could contribute to your local dog rescue organization. I couldn’t resist.

Thanks is good for you

The New York Times ran an article on the health and well-being benefits of gratitude -- A Serving of Gratitude May Save the Day. See this link.
“Cultivating an ‘attitude of gratitude’ has been linked to better health, sounder sleep less anxiety and depression, higher long-term satisfaction with life and kinder behavior toward others, including romantic partners.”
I had a lovely day yesterday. My neighbor, Mary, and I shared Thanksgiving. She brought white turkey meat and I roasted a turkey thigh (she doesn't like dark meat and I love it). I cooked dressing, mashed potatoes, and peas; and she brought gravy and cranberry sauce. The meal together was just what we both wanted so we didn’t have to get on the road and travel any distance.

I am grateful and I feel very healthy after a good night’s sleep.

This looks beautiful (to me)

 It may not look beautiful to you, but it means I’ll be snug as a bug in a rug this winter. This is the new insulation under my house. It went in yesterday and tonight my feet are warm. I’m fortunate to have two thoughtful sons. My youngest son and his boys brought the rigid insulation boards and did some preliminary work at the end of October (click here). It was pretty complicated work going around all the ducting and pipes under the house so we decided a carpenter was necessary for the job.

My older son, Rob (click here) had a job assignment near my home this week. He has a good friend, Richard, in the area who is a skilled carpenter. Rob had him come out to my house and look at the work to be done. Richard arrived early yesterday morning and worked until after dark to put up the insulation. I am so pleased. Rob cleaned up the debris under the house last night. I took a photo, but you’ll have to look very hard to see him under there.


I am a lucky mom.

Fall – on the farm and at home

Our little St. Alban’s Episcopal church held a big annual fund raiser called Fall on the Farm in October. The congregation is small but the event attracted lots of visitors from all over the east county area.

Friends greeted friends.

 The cakewalk was a very popular attraction.

 My friend Sidney did a good job of guarding the cakes.

 The silent auction was a big success because the offerings were really nice. We sat a long tables and enjoyed a delicious dinner too.

 Back on the homefront I was preparing for winter with the help of my son and his boys. They arrived full of enthusiasm to insulate the underside of my house.

 Davis went to Home Depot and bought enough rigid foam insulation sheets to cover the area. He had store cut them in half so they would all fit in his SUV. They are bulky so he had to make two trips. The family crew worked pretty hard trimming and placing a couple of the sheets. They stacked them up and we all decided to find a skilled carpenter to complete the job.