Reading and listening and a wee bit of stitching

The other day, this well loved library book came home with me. Looking for something simple and cozy to read while sipping afternoon tea, this seemed just right. Tasha Tudor’s legacy lives on here in Vermont, and photos for the book were taken by legendary Vermont photographer Richard W. Brown. It’s a gem.

Our book group gave The Square of Sevens mixed reviews. A historical fiction novel written by Laura Shepherd-Robinson, the book tells the story of a young and orphaned fortune teller and her search for answers about her life. Some thought it needed editing, some thought the plot line was convoluted. Some were intrigued by the “square of sevens” technique for telling fortunes. If you read it, what did you think? (Gail N?)

Hannah, Lindsey and I had a good conversation via Zoom about Robin Wall Kimmerer’s The Serviceberry. The premise of abundance and reciprocity seems even more challenging these days, but also something to aspire to. Batman who has a fondness for the serviceberry bushes in our yard read it too. He majored in economics in college and has an MBA and he was also (surprisingly?) intrigued. A very quick read, I recommend it to you.

As our days wind down with Ted Kooser’s Winter Morning Walks, I cherish each passage. Another spiritual anchor for these raw times. We’ll need to find a spring devotional reading! Any ideas?

Our book group is setting aside both March and April to read Familiaris, David Wroblewski’s follow up to The Story of Edward Sawtelle. It’s 975 pages will not be for the feint of heart!

I have put in an interlibrary loan request for Dean Spade’s Mutual Aid, building solidarity during this crisis (and the next). Our small rural library depends on other libraries in the Vermont system to share titles as we do. And I borrowed the Mahjong set from our “Library of Things” as I am hosting our game on Sunday afternoon.

I stitched this patchwork pouch (lots of fussy cutting!) for Theo’s third birthday and enclosed two stickers…the play sticker is from my friend Lori Roberts and the kitty is from Gather Here. His name is Theodore and he is the shop cat! Batman made a fire station for all of Theo’s matchbox emergency vehicles. Sure do wish I could bake that boy a cake and drop by with it. :-)

Here’s the latest page I’ve been working on for my 100 days of stitching project.

Yesterday I listened (in my studio) to an Apple podcast with Trevor Noah talking with Robert Putnam, author of Bowling Alone. They discuss how building community may be more important than ever. A documentary Join or Die will be playing locally here soon, following Putnam’s journey as he researched Bowling Alone. I got a lot from the podcast, it’s worth a listen, I think. Looking forward to the film.

Krista Tippett has a Substack posting that is quite lovely (I just love how her brain and heart work as a team.) on the wisdom of pulling back from the news. You can read it here.

Have you heard of The People’s Union? They organized today’s “buy nothing day”, a 24 hour Economic Blackout. You can read about it here.

Dearest readers, what have you been reading, listening to, stitching, knitting, cooking, baking, playing…

Do share in the comments below, so that we all might have a peek into what is bringing you light and joy and hope!

With warmest wishes, me.

being together

This is Batman, shoveling the porch roof before our big storm came through a week ago.

Batman, clearing off the porch roof, before the next storm blows in.

Our front walkway, after nearly two feet of fresh snow. Our home weather station registered a wind gust of 53 mph so you can imagine the drifts around here.

The ground level windows in my studio got a drifting treatment as well!

The ground level windows in my basement studio took quite a hit from the drifts, too.

I do love a snowy winter, but I’m not sure how much more we can accommodate!

I had a meeting at the library this morning, and on my way home I spotted this tired guy, posing next to one of the snow plow markers. I pulled my car over, hopped out to greet this fellow and snapped his portrait. Bless the person who made him and left him by the side of the road for smiles.

On the first of February, we hosted our friends L&N for an Imbolc gathering. We ate by candlelight and served cauliflower cheese pie (from Moosewood Cookbook). We raised a glass to the four mama goats snug in L&N’s barn, who will be birthing kids some time later this spring. Halfway between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox, Imbolc reminds us of living on the cusp of things. The past and the future. The dark and the light. It reminds us of hope.

We also had the pleasure of trundling into our local music hall to hear Vermonter Ida Mae Specker and her dad, John, open for Jake Blount. Ida Mae and her dad fiddled up a storm and the floor of the venue was thudding with the sound of so many tapping toes. As we all came out into the chilly night Batman and I lifted our heads to the sky as flurries floated down from the dark night. Inhale. Exhale. Smile.

A few nights later, I went back down to Chandler center for the arts to see The Grand Kyiv Ballet perform Swan Lake. The audience was as magical as the ballet…people of all ages, including adorable kids with their parents or grandparents shedding layers of outerwear as they found their seats, settled down and watched the dancers, spellbound. Chandler center for the arts is located in Randolph, VT, and the town has a sister city in Myrhorod Ukraine so you can bet there was a thunderous standing ovation at the end!

Thanks to generous friends, S&G, I have had a break from some of the world’s madness by sitting with our devoted Mahjong group. A few months ago, S invited anyone in our book group to join her daughter, G, who is a professional Mahjong teacher, to learn to play the game. (South Shore Mahjong for anyone who is curious.) Now some of us are deeply enmeshed in this fun (and absorbing) game. Sometimes my brain hurts after we play, but my face is sore from smiling and my heart is full of fondness for these women who are taking a break from the news and sharpening minds as well.

Last night we hosted our friends K&J for a Sunday night supper, something we are hoping to make a regular thing. If we are to survive the challenges of overwhelm, lies, confusion and grief, connecting with friends in an intentional way will certainly help! K&J came up and over the ridge and we had a lovely evening of conversation and good will.

They brought this beautiful bouquet from their flower CSA. From the Raven Hill Farm website, “We grow flowers because flowers spread joy and everyone could use some extra joy in their life.” Indeed. :-)

Dearest readers, loneliness and fear are the enemies of these times. There are many ways to gather…around a table, in a venue, on a trail, in groups of volunteers, in protest, in solidarity, with kindred spirits, with strangers who may become friends. May each of you find ways to feel connected and BE TOGETHER as we wade through these tough times. Hold hands, keep the faith and try really hard NOT TO DESPAIR!

And thank you for bearing with me as I try to stay in touch with you. Squarespace and I have been in quite a tussle lately, and I’ve switched from our desktop to my i-Pad, so I’m still learning a few things.

I would like to welcome new subscribers Juliann, Dee and Laurie. Glad you’re here!

If all goes well, tomorrow I plan to be back with a making and mending post, so we’ll be back to sewing.

XO

grief

I sat with anger long enough until she told me her name was grief. -C. S. Lewis

Dearest readers, technical difficulties and the circumstances of our nation have kept me away from this space. Sadness and grief have been nipping at my heels. As I try to outrun them, I have been at a loss for words to share here. But as things have spiraled, I’ve been working on finding clarity.

The February spread in my planner seems appropriate.

We did our usual Saturday errands in Montpelier, starting with a stop at Bohemian Bakery, then on to the winter farmers’ market, Agway for birdseed and then to Hunger Mt Co-op. We were delighted to see that the Phantom had made a visit to downtown Montpelier. Read about this wonderful community project here.

Things like this will keep us going.

I have some sweet things to share with you and I hope to post more over the next few days. Bear with me as I try to keep light and hope and mutual aid front and center.

xo keep the faith.

technical problems

I’ve been having problems posting here. Cora’s tail is a placeholder for all the things I want to say. We’ll get there soon.

Hang in there.

Maybe this is the new normal.

reality

Sunset on Monday afternoon.

More sunset on Monday.

Well, dearest readers, it has taken me a while to collect myself, relax my shoulders and pop back in here at sewandsowlife. It’s been an exasperating week and a half, hasn’t it? We all have our own version of what it’s been like to make our way through the chaos…

Meanwhile, it’s been a gorgeous January up here on the hill. Cold, sometimes bitter, and snowy! Ted Kooser and his poetry have matched things quite nicely. Nearly each day we have light flurries to replenish the soft landscape. The clouds come and go, sometimes allowing a bluebird sky to distract us from whatever we are working on. Stop. Look. Smile.

Things are blooming on the windowsills, produce is still coming up from the root cellar…carrots, onions, beets. And tomato sauce (made from tomatoes grown in the hoop house) from the freezer has been used on pizza and in soups. Ordering seeds is on our “to do” list. And this is the time when you might find a jigsaw puzzle spread out on the dining room table.

Here are the next three pages of my 100 days of stitching book. I am ahead of schedule, I just won’t stop, and I think I am working out some feelings with this work.

The tiny rosey cheeks of these suns prompted me to pull in the pink primrose, and the neutral fabric had a selvedge that I loved.

Liberty of London, and a bit of reverse appliqué with a scrap of hankie seemed a perfect match for these very unique vintage buttons.

I drove up and over the ridge to my friend Ellen’s house last week for tea. She had all of her pages cut out for her 100 days of stitching project. This will be her first year of participating and I can’t wait to see her progress. She does stunning handwork. :-)

Batman left his beloved barn jacket out in the woodshed and either some mice or red squirrels had quite a time with it! They chewed the canvas jacket and the woolen lining. This jacket has undergone a bit of mending several times before, and now it’s ready to carry on, once again.

You may recall that we had a wonderful adventure in Scotland a few years ago.

Batman made these Danish and we served them to my brother and sister-in-law when they came up to visit a few weeks ago. They were a big hit! As we often do, we sat around that evening chatting. We were making up ideas for our next chapter. We decided it might be fun to put our stuff in storage and rent two narrowboats, one for us and one for them, and spend an extended time living on the canals of Britain. Doug thought it would be a good idea for our boat to have a modest commercial oven so that Batman could bake goodies and we could sell them along the canals. I would sew bits and bobs to sell. Doug would be a bird walk professional and Ra would ride horses whenever we moored near a working stable.

Friends, these are the sorts of evenings that will save us. Dinners with friends and candle light and laughter. Along with restricted news consumption, social media fasts and local organizing. Volunteer work and supporting causes we cherish. Resting along with resisting. Fresh air and creativity. Mugs of hot tea and snail mail. The list goes on and on. We will keep showing up.

Know that I am with you, dearest readers, in spirit. (And welcome to new subscribers Tina and Charlene and here’s a shout out to our college buddy Tracy, who just found sewandsowlife.)

Want what you have.

Do what you can.

Be who you are.

-Forrest Church

xo -me

quietly and gently

Yesterday afternoon I spotted an owl sitting on a branch right outside my studio window. It sat for quite a while, and so did I, each of us still and observant. A healthy pause, I’d say.

The goldfinches, cardinals. chickadees, blue jays, nuthatches and finches are eating us out of house and home. It’s been a cold and snowy winter here and I wonder at how the tiny birds manage to stay alive. The deer tracks have laced themselves all over the yard and I’m glad hunting season is over. I spotted a flock of sweet snow buntings up by the meetinghouse the other day. And on the way home from a library trustee’s meeting on Wednesday night I had to pull over to watch the full moon flirt with the clouds along the ridge. Most early mornings I am comforted by the sound of the town plow, either clearing fresh snow or laying gravel on the road. There’s a reassuring hum in rural life that I find especially precious.

All of this has fit so nicely with Ted Kooser’s poetry this week.

You may recall that last weekend Batman and Lindsey embarked on a three day baking adventure via FaceTime. Here’s an “action shot” of Lindsey in her Detroit kitchen, rolling out dough. She made both croissants and morning buns, shown above. Batman had a bit of a struggle, ‘cause we think our yeast may have been too old. We now have fresh yeast and he is working on Danish pastries for the arrival of my brother Doug and his wife Ra tomorrow morning. (Batman has been using King Arthur’s Baking School as his new text book.)

The next wave of paper white bulbs have come up from the root cellar and awaiting their blooms is a practice in patience.

Today marks the first day of Ann Wood’s 100 days Stitch Book! Ann writes about staying open to what comes to you…but I most definitely have a theme for my book. Given what’s about to happen in this nation soon, I am approaching my daily sewing as a time of meditation…QUIETLY AND GENTLY.

I’m very excited that my friend Cathleen will be joining us again this year, and she has talked our friend Ellen into stitching, too. My blogging friend Sarah has said she may join us and maybe Marsha will too? Anyone else out there? Let me know!

This wee crow is my sewing companion, and she perches wherever I may pick up a needle and thread. Sometimes I find her in a different place than where I left her and that’s when I know Cora has been on the prowl.

Friends, I must tell you that you completely amazed me me all of your kind comments and “likes” on my last post. I’ve answered them in the comment section and want you to know how much your interest in sewandsowlife means to me.

I’ll be back on Monday evening to write a bit more about sewandsowlife and debrief from the day.

Until then, take care, dearest readers.

xo

here we are...2025

Hello friends. I’m so glad to be back in this space. Batman and I have been a bit under the weather and so we missed most of the New Year’s razzamatazz. Honestly, I didn’t miss all the analysis/advice/commentary that comes with the transition from one year to the next.

I’m here on the hill, just trying to balance news from the “real” world and my own sanity.

Perhaps you are working on this too?

In terms of blogging, I’ll be sticking to my own little comfort zone for now, and perhaps you will find some refuge from the news storm here at sewandsowlife.

One of the things I’ve been playing around with are amulets. Amulets are thought to confer protection and/or good luck to the person who wears it. I made this one for a friend facing big health challenges. The wee bit of balsam, a birch heart stitched onto a scrap of cotton, (hand dyed with indigo from our gardens) and a pewter token all fit into this little pouch, which can be worn close to the heart.

I have more in the works, and will share them with you soon.

Started sometime in 2008, this quilt came out of the washer and dryer today…yes, that’s seventeen years…from start to finish. I feel no shame. I stay away from the quilt police. I AM happy as heck to have this quilt finished and am already scouring my studio for the next project. PJ’s for Batman, I think, using fabric I bought when he was in graduate school!

I do love how the pieced strips reflect the mountains and snow right outside our windows. And the technique for piecing creates accurate matches at the seams. This is my third “Seminole style” quilt and I may revisit it again.

Backed with a polka dot flannel, the quilt is extra cozy.

Our book group gathered on Friday night to discuss Sandwich by Catherine Newman. We did, indeed, create a picnic for our shared supper, and a few friends brought vintage photos of their visits to the beach. Our February book is The Square of Sevens, thanks to a recommendation from blog reader Gail N.

I received The Universe in Verse from a friend and my girls and I are reading Robin Wall Kimmerer’s new book, The Serviceberry together. I also found a reprint of The Diary of an Edwardian Lady, a book that will join Dorothy Wordsworth and Beatrix Potter on my “tea book shelf”, but not until I have read it first!

I also listened to Joy for Beginners, by Erica Bauermeister on yet another trip to Massachusetts. I think my friend Anne Butera recommended it to me and I loved it. It’s a fun escape hatch when you really need one.

Batman (in Vermont) and Lindsey (in Detroit) are baking croissants in tandem this weekend. Our family did some fun cooking/baking together via FaceTime during the pandemic. After becoming fascinated with the laminator at Bohemian Bakery last time we were there, Batman decided to take this baking adventure on. A three day process, I’ll share results with you next time.

This has been quite a long blog post…

A few more things and then I’ll sign off:

  • Ann Wood Handmade is gearing up for her next 100 day stitch book! She’ll begin on January 17th and you can bet I’ll be there too. My book from 2024 can be viewed here. Will any of you join us? I sure do hope so. It was a wicked fun project!

  • We discovered another wonderful distraction from the real world. Canal Boat Diaries, streaming on Acorn TV follows the travels of Robbie Cumming on the waterways of England. Drone footage and videos bring the viewer through quiet byways along Britain’s canal system. It takes us back to our narrowboat adventures in Scotland in fall of 2023. :-)

  • Lastly, blog reader and friend Judy asked in the comments on my last post about scrapbooking/journaling. I’m actually trying a new planner this year, and will create “mood boards” for each month. Below, is the inside cover of the planner, with images to remind me of what I’ll be working on in 2025. Curating. Nourishing. Creating/playing.

Day by day, friends. With love in our hearts. Onward into 2025!

xo

old year's night

Little Theo and his mom and dad shared five days with us last week, driving to Vermont from Ohio. He helped Batman cut down a small tree and decorated it with straw ornaments from Sweden. We baked cookies, read books, played cars, did crafts, visited King Arthur and the Montshire Museum, went antiquing and sledding, too. We wrung the days dry! And slept well at night!

I read a fascinating story on npr this morning about The Okalolies of Old Year’s Night: Celebrating tradition on the world’s most remote inhabited island. (Sometimes I wish I had majored in anthropology in college.)

And, so, I am writing to wish you a fine Old Year’s Night. May you find strength and inspiration as you turn toward the new year. In all the times of our lives, this feels like the year to create and hold fast to our aspirations and hopes.

May we remember with gratitude, two remarkable people, whose legacies I’ll invite with me into 2025. Jimmy Carter was the first person I voted for in a national election and his time with us has fanned out to cover a century of a life well lived.

And Nikki Giovanni, whose words wove into America’s widening awareness of different perspectives.

This morning, just as the sun rose over the ridge behind us, the light leapt onto the hills to the west and lit up the sky with a fleeting blast of salmon/orange. Snow is due tonight, to refresh the subdued landscape. I will be waiting for it, along with the fresh start that comes with a new year.

Batman and I listened to this piece on npr the other day, and it moved us both. I will come back to it more than once this year, I am sure of it. Amazing Grace was first performed on New Year’s Day in 1773, over 250 years ago.

So dearest friends, be safe tonight. I’ll “see” you next year. Godspeed.

xo