Bianca Springer--Thanks I Made Them!

I skipped lectures at QuiltCon for a number of reasons—I wanted time with the quilts in the exhibit was the main one—between classes and the exhibit, I have no additional time. Then the auditorium set up is not my favorite for lectures—too big, too distracting and not enough bang for my buck. Finally, the on site experience is a sensory overload, whereas at home I can watch in an ideal environment. The only downside is that there is a limited time within which to watch the lectures, and this one was the last one I had a chance to watch. Bianca has a passion for garment making that is impressive. She is an inveterate upcycler who haunts thrift shops for vintage patterns as well as fabric, quilt tops, and quilts. She talked a bit about how she approaches making a quilt made by someone else into a garment. She tries to honor the spirit of the design the maker had in mind—which she is amazing at—and then points out that if she is buying it, no one who knew the maker is making space in their life for that quilt, so she is giving it a new life it wouldn’t otherwise have. She went on to walk the viewer through how to pick a pattern, how to make the garment, and the various ways you could make and embellish pieced clothing. It was very inspiring and I would seek out a talk by her in the future.

Tenth of December by George Saunders

This was on the New York Times list of 100 Best Books of the Twenty-First Century (so far, 25 years in), and there are two other of his books, one that I petered out on reading years ago and will get back to and one other. This is a collection of short stories, which are not my favorite, but I will say these are well written and enjoyable just not my particular cup of tea. The 10 stories in Tenth of December (the name of the last story and not anything else to do with these) are all about people. No matter the setting – a futuristic prison lab, a middle-class home where human lawn ornaments are a great status symbol –the stories are consistently about humanity and the meaning we find in small moments, in objects or gestures. He paints painful portraits of domesticity, of families, of death. The can be described as sadly happy, each story full of little truths that make us both amused and very uneasy. The author has a keen eye for detail and a way of portraying human foibles in hte kindest of lights.

Roasted Pork with Peach Sauce

This is a hands off meal, but requires long cooking--we were going our for the afternoon and popped it in hte oven before we left and it ws ready when we got home--we used some peaches we froze last summer for the sauce which worked beautifully. 6 to 8 pound bone-in pork butt 1/3 cup kosher salt 1/3 cup light brown sugar 1 teaspoon ground black pepper Peach Sauce: 10-oz frozen peaches (or use 2 fresh peaches) 2 cups dry white wine 1/2 cup sugar 1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon rice vinegar 2 sprigs thyme 1 tablespoon whole-grain mustard The night before your meal, use a sharp knife to cut slits into the fat cap; 1″ apart forming a cross-hatch pattern, but take care not to cut into the meat. Combine 1/3-cup kosher salt and 1/3-cup brown sugar in small bowl, then rub over the entire roast (including the slits). Wrap roast tightly using two layers of plastic wrap, place of a rimmed baking sheet, and refrigerate until ready to cook the roast (but no more than 24 hours). The next day, unwrap and brush off any excess salt mixture using paper towels. Season roast with 1 teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper. Spray your V-rack coated with non-stick cooking spray. Add 1 quart of water to your roasting pan. Place the roast on V-rack with the fat cap facing up and set aside while the oven pre-heats. Set an oven rack to the lowest position and pre-heat your oven to 325-degrees. Bake for 5 to 6 hours, depending on the size of the roast. Basting every two hours, adding more water after each basting to prevent the fond from burning. But don’t add so much water as to dilute the liquid. The roast will be finished when an instant-read thermometer inserted near the bone (but not touching) reaches 190-degrees. Place the roast on a carving board and loosely tented with aluminum foil for one hour. While the meat rests make the sauce. Pour the jus from roasting pan into a fat separator. After allowing the fat to separate for 5 minutes, pour 1/4-cup into a small saucepan. You can discard the remaining jus. Cut the peaches into 1″ chunks. Add your peach chunks, 2-cups white wine, 1/2-cup sugar, 1/4-cup rice vinegar, and 2 sprigs of thyme to the small saucepan with the 1/4-cup jus. Bring sauce to a simmer and cook for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. When the sauce has reduce to 2 cups remove from heat. Find and discard the thyme sprigs, then add the final tablespoon of rice vinegar and tablespoon of whole-grain mustard. Mix together and cover to keep warm. Cut around the bone (shaped like an up-side-down “T”) with a paring knife, then use a clean kitchen towel to pull it from the roast. Slice the roast using a serrated knife, and serve, passing the peach sauce separately.

The Anthropologists by Ayşegül Sava

This is a quiet novel. It is a meditation on modern life and modern love, with some juxtaposition between the older generation and the younger one, between those who immigrate and those who stay put, and finally between those on the brink of living fully adult lives, and those who are on the brink of it, maybe for some time to come. Asya and Manu have been living together in a foreign, unnamed city in a foreign, unnamed country for several years. Estrangement – from the city, from society, from the self – lies at the center of this story. Asya and Manu are not like their parents, who live in faraway countries and send dispatches, good and bad. They have a small social circle, but more often than not, it’s just Asya, Manu and their close friend Ravi who spend the days of their lives together – drinking, talking, dreaming, and revealing themselves in these still moments that they spend together.

Rachel Clark's Quilt Coats

I am taking a class with this artist in June and I wanted to watch her QuiltCon lecture to get a sense of both her work and what I am in for when I spend two days with her. She brought over twenty coats that were modeled by four different volunteers, and it was feast for the eyes. She grew up with garment makers in her family, but Rachel’s life as a quilter didn’t fully blossom until she got married to her husband, Gary, and moved from New Orleans, Louisiana to Watsonville, California in the early 1970s. After this long-distance move, she found herself without community for the first time.

Clark discovered that even though she wasn’t very good at approaching people and striking up conversations, she was very good at designing clothing that could serve as an excellent conversation piece. People will approach you to talk about what you wear—she did say in her talk that you should not wear it if you need to run through an airport—people who want to ask you about your jacket will just slow you down and you could miss your plane. Clark loved both dressmaking and quilting, and didn't feel the need to choose between the two. She explored the possibility of combining them to make unique clothes with quilting techniques. People were interested in her clothes, and in turn, interested in her. She used clothing to “invite people in.” Well, I share some of these traits with her—not the creative one or the garment maker one—the shy with people I don’t know one—and I hope this pieced garment phase I am about to enter will be a good one for me.