Showing posts with label quilting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label quilting. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 2, 2019

Threads of Life by Claire Hunter

"Sewing has a visual language. It has a voice. It has been used by people to communicate something of themselves--their history, beliefs, prayers and protests."~ from Threads of Life by Claire Hunter

Twenty-eight years ago I made my first quilt and it changed my life. As I honed my skills I was inspired by historic and traditional quilts but also by art quilts.

Early on I dreamed of being able to make quilts that represented my values, interests, and views. I eagerly learned new skills, from hand embroidery and hand quilting to surface design, machine thread work, and fusible applique. I have been making a series of quilts on authors I love. I have created a Pride and Prejudice storybook quilt, an Apollo 11 quilt, and embroidered quilts of the First Ladies, Green Heros, and women abolitionists and Civil Rights leaders.
With my quilt I Will Life My Voice Like A Trumpet,
2013 AQS Grand Rapids quilt show

I was excited to be given an egalley of Claire Hunter's book Threads of Life: A History of the World Through the Eye of a Needle. 

Hunter identifies themes in needlecraft including power, frailty, captivity, identity, connection, protest, loss, community, and voice. She shares a breathtaking number of stories that span history and from across the world.

Hunter begins with the history of the Bayeux Tapestry, a panel of wool embroidery showing scenes from the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Its history illustrates the ups and downs in cultural attitudes toward needlework.
detail from Bayeux Tapestry 

It was forgotten, nearly upcycled, and used for a carnival float backdrop. Napoleon put it in a museum until it fell out of fashion and was again relegated to storage here and there. Himmler got a hold of it during WWII and publicized the artifact and saved it from destruction. Then the French Resistance took possession of the Louvre and the tapestry.

900 years later, the tapestry attracts thousands of viewers every year, a worldwide cultural icon, and inspired The Games of Thrones Tapestry.

Yet, we don't know who designed the tapestry or embroidered it, the challenges and tragedies they faced. They remain anonymous.

I was familiar with the Changi prison camp quilts created during WWII by women POWs in Japanese camps. Hunter explains how the women created images with personal and political meaning to tell loved ones they survived.
quilt made in the Changi Prison Camp

I have seen Mola reverse applique but did not know it was an invention of necessity. Spanish colonists in Panama and Columbia insisted the indigenous women cover their chests. Traditionally, the women sported tattoos with spiritual symbols which they transferred to fabric. In many cultures, cloth has a spiritual element.
Mola Blouse, c. 1990, from the International Quilt Museum
Hunter also touches on Harriet Power's Bible Quilt, Gees Bend quilters, the Glasgow School of Art Department of Needlework, and Suffragists banners.

There was much that was new to me. How  Ukrainian embroidery was forbidden under Soviet rule as they systematically dismantled cultural traditions. Or how the Nazis used Jewish slave labor to sew German uniforms and luxury clothing.

Hunter tells stories from history and also how needle and thread are employed today as therapy and as community engagement and to voice political and feminist statements. She tells the memorable story of guiding male prisoners in the making of curtains for a common room and how she worked with groups, Austrian Aboriginies and Gaelic women, to make banners addressing displacement and community disruption.

We also read about the history of sewing, the impact of industrialization and the rise of factory production, the home sewing machine, the shift from skilled craft to homemade decorative arts.

Art quilters and textile artists like Faith Ringgold and Judy Chicago are discussed.

Social awareness needlework included the quite well known Aids Quilt but also the little known banner The Ribbon, created to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Justine Merritt organized the sewing of peace panels to be stitched together. 25,000 panels were made. 20,000 people collected on August 4, 1985, to wrap the 15-mile long Ribbon around the Pentagon, the Arlington Memorial Bridge, the Lincoln Memorial, and to the Capital and back to the Pentagon. The media and President Reagen ignored it.

Threads of Life may seem an unusual book, a niche book, but I do think it has a wide appeal that will interest many readers.

I was given access to a free egalley through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Threads of Life: A History of the World Through the Eye of a Needle
by Clare Hunter
ABRAMS
Pub Date 01 Oct 2019
ISBN 9781419739538
PRICE $26.00 (USD)

from the publisher

A globe-spanning history of sewing, embroidery, and the people who have used a needle and thread to make their voices heard 

In 1970s Argentina, mothers marched in headscarves embroidered with the names of their “disappeared” children. In Tudor, England, when Mary, Queen of Scots, was under house arrest, her needlework carried her messages to the outside world. From the political propaganda of the Bayeux Tapestry, World War I soldiers coping with PTSD, and the maps sewn by schoolgirls in the New World, to the AIDS quilt, Hmong story clothes, and pink pussyhats, women and men have used the language of sewing to make their voices heard, even in the most desperate of circumstances. 

Threads of Life is a chronicle of identity, protest, memory, power, and politics told through the stories of needlework. Clare Hunter, master of the craft, threads her own narrative as she takes us over centuries and across continents—from medieval France to contemporary Mexico and the United States, and from a POW camp in Singapore to a family attic in Scotland—to celebrate the age-old, universal, and underexplored beauty and power of sewing. Threads of Life is an evocative and moving book about the need we have to tell our story. 

Wednesday, August 7, 2019

WIP, TBR News

Like many quilters, I have multiple projects going on at once. Some in the design stage, some in the sewing stage, and some waiting for inspiration to know how to finish them. I have two with long-arm quilters as well.

I am trying to finish projects. And trying to check off as read books on my TBR shelf as part of NetGalley's #Reviewathon. 

I have conceded I am no longer able to quilt fast enough to keep up with my quilt tops. I just picked up a quilt from the long-arm quilter. It is BIG. The fabrics were from Dear Stella. Now to bind it off!

For a simple pattern, it was not easy for me. The pattern did not work for directional fabrics and I had to make hard decisions.
 the quilting
 The back

I have made four pillowcases and a throw pillow to go with the quilt. And I am making a throw with the scraps!

Here is my latest quilt top finish! I bought the pattern from Bunny Hill several years ago. When I saw this fabric collection from Connecting Threads it all came together in my head and I love the result. I left it with the long arm quilter today.


I caught up with Barbara Brackman's new block of the month Hospital Sketches on her blog Material Culture. I love applique so these are a joy to make. 

See Barbara's post on the project with photos from some of the marvelous quilters participating here.

I finished the just for fun and play quilt with the Jane Sassaman Folk Tales fabrics. My son loves it and it will go to him.

This little quilt includes an antique quilt block in the center. It will soon be on display at our local library.

I have been requested to make a table runner with this adorable print from JoAnne Fabrics.

The flu has been going around in my family. On my birthday we couldn't have a celebration so I treated myself to a trip to the bookstore and purchased The Overstory by Richard Powers and All the Lives We Ever Lived by Katherine Smyth. I have wanted to read The Overstory since it was a galley but wasn't able to get my hands on it. Smyth's book about reading Virginia Woolf is a good excuse to revisit To The Lighthouse.
I am currently reading
  • Cold Warriors by Duncan White. I am learning more about the Cold War history than I ever imagined.
  • A Polar Affair by Llyod Spencer Davis, an immensely readable and enjoyable history of the study of Penguins.
  • The Long Call by Anne Cleeves, a new detective mystery series
  • Threads of Life by Claire Hunter, how through history women have used needlework for self-expression and political power
  • We Love Anderson Cooper by R. L. Maizes, a short story collection
I need to get moving for these are all books coming out in late August or September, along with Out of Darkness, Shining Light by Petinah Gappah which I have not even started!

Then still on my shelf are the galleys for

  • Adventure of the Peculiar Protocol by Nicholas Meyer, a new Sherlock Holmes mystery
  • Inventing Tomorrow by Sarah Cole, about H. G. Wells
  • Broke by Jodie Adams Kirschner, about the housing crisis in Detroit
  • The Book of Science and Antiquities, a novel by Thomas Keneally
  • A Good Neighborhood by Therese Anne Fowler, a novel about racism
  • Family Record by Patrick Modiano, a novel about how "history influences identity"
  • Blow Out, in which Rachel Maddow takes on the fossil fuel industries

I won another book from LibraryThing

  • Mighty Justice: My Life in Civil Rights by Dovey Johnson Roundtree. I just started it--powerful prose and story!
I am still waiting for other LibraryThing wins: Falter by Bill McKibben, Archeology from Space by Sarah Parcak, Country by Michael Hughes, and Inland by Tea Obreht. I have been disappointed that these Early Reviewer wins from January, April, May, and June have not been fulfilled.

And from GoodReads I won
  • America is Immigrants by Sara Novic
NetGalley is running a #Reviewathon to encourage readers to plow through those TBR lists. I need to get to work!

Wednesday, May 29, 2019

Blended Embroidery: Combining Old & New Textiles, Ephemera & Embroidery

I love the idea behind Blended Embroidery by Brian Haggard. His art is a collage of textiles, vintage images, and ephemera printed on textiles, embroidery, and embellishments.

The Lacemaker by Brian Haggard
Haggard loves finding old pieces and repurposing them. His studio is filled with buttons, beads, laces, trims, threads, and textile pieces--even imperfect pieces.

Haggard shows how to make free form embroidered leaves and embroidered felt flowers, soft bows, walnut stained fabrics, photo imaging, attaching doilies and printed images.
Pincushions and sachets made of vintage images scanned on fabric
Chapters include

  • Where to Look for Blended Embroidery Inspiration
  • But It Looks Like Trash
  • Materials, Fabrics, and Supplies
  • Basic Stitches 


Projects include

  • The Lace Maker
  • Paisley Proper
  • Scissor Sheath and Scissors Holder
  • Pincushion
  • Travel Bag
  • Renaissance Revival
  • Friendship Pincushions and Sachets
  • Sewing Butler 


A Galley and About the Author is included.
Scissors holder and pincushion
Many of the Galley projects are a form of crazy quilting. The creativity is inspiring! I especially love the quilts that include antique family portraits printed on fabric!

Haggard's previous books included Crazy Quilted Memoires and Embroidered Memories. Visit Haggard's website at http://www.brianhaggard.com/

I received access to a free ebook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Blended Embroidery: Combining Old & New Textiles, Ephemera & Embroidery
Brian Haggard
Book ( $27.95  ) eBook ( $22.99 )
SBN: 978-1-61745-809-5
UPC: 734817-113393
(eISBN: 978-1-61745-810-1)

Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Paint-By-Number Quilts: 4 Animal Appliques with Vintage Style by Kerry Foster

Have you always wanted to make a pictorial quilt? Learn new skills with
Paint-By-Number Quilts by Kerry Foster. Foster offers patterns to make four animal quilts that are too cute to resist.

Fabulous Fox shows how to use preprinted fabrics for an effective background.
First, she covers what tools and materials you need then she shows you how to choose fabrics. She offers two applique techniques: prepared-edge machine applique, prepared-edge hand applique, and fusible applique.
This bear quilt has the look of a vintage park travel poster!
I was interested in the first technique which I have not tried. Using freezer paper and glue, the sections of the image are built up then placed on the background fabrics. The applique can be machine or hand stitched. A numbered color chart correlates to the pattern and yardage by color is given. Instructions for assembling the applique include illustrations.
The off-white background suggests a wintry day. Note how Foster outlines the antlers.
The projects include a Racoon Mug Rug, pictured on the cover of the book. It is just adorable and measures 10" x 9". The Grizzly Bear Wallhanging measures 45" x 32 1/2".  Fabulous Mr. Fox Wallhanging, 37 1/2" x 46 7/8" is one of my favorites. The Whitetail Stag Wallhanging measures 18" x 29."

The section on Finishing includes notes on how to quilt the noses, antlers, and eyes, create a 'furry' look, and how to quilt backgrounds.

In 32 pages we get all the instructions needed to create our own versions of the quilts!

Kerry Foster, from her website

Visit Kerry's blog at
https://pennydog.com/blog/

Visit the Blog Tour for the book at
https://www.ctpub.com/blog/paintbynumber-quilts-blog-tour/

I received a free ebook from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

PAINT-BY-NUMBER QUILTS: 4 Animal Appliqués with Vintage Style
Kerry Foster
Format:
 Book ($19.95)
eBook ($17.99)
8.5” x 12”
32p booklet + pattern sheets, color
ISBN: 978-1-61745-538-4
UPC: 734817-112549
(eISBN: 978-1-61745-539-1)

Wednesday, June 20, 2018

Patchwork Loves Embroidery: Small Quilts and Gifts

I had been quilting for about fifteen years when I decided to relearn embroidery. I had learned the basics as a Brownie, but that was the last time I put needle to floss. 

My first project was The President's Quilt by Michael J.Buckingham! George Washington looks pretty sad, but by the time I got to Bill Clinton I had embroidery down pat.

I have enjoyed mixing quilting and embroidery ever since. And so do many of the gals in my weekly quilt group.

Australian quilter and embroiderer Gail Pan's new book offers fourteen projects that will win your heart. Many are perfect for gifts. Some you won't want to five up. Like this adorable sewing theme collage that includes vintage buttons, supplies, and trim with embroidery.
Memories of Sewing, 12 1/2" x 13 1/2", framed. 
Bees have become a favorite theme in recent years as a reaction to the environmental threats they face. This sweet wall hanging has an attractive appliqued frame. 


Beautiful Bees, 17 1/2" x 20 1/2"
Needlecrafters will love this needlecase with a butterfly. The folded case, when open, has pockets for your small scissors and supplies and a piece of wool to slide your needles into for safe keeping. It closes up with a ribbon. So simple!  

Butterfly Stitches, 4" x 4"
The quilters I know love to make totes to carry their projects in. Gail's tote has sweet flowers and simple patchwork, a nice long handle, and boxed bottom.
Pretty Floral Tote, 18" x 14 1/2" x 3"
Can you ever have too many pouches? I have one in my purse with my essentials. I keep my jewelry in them. I use them to carry sewing supplies for my projects. Gail's version features a bicycle with a floral basket, a beloved theme that is so popular today. In the pocket she has a thimble and other supplies.
On the Go Pouch, 7 1/2" x 7" folded
This small wallhanging has a 'sampler' theme, which Gail has made in bluework.
Love and Dreams Wall Hanging, 16 1/2" x 19 1/2"
I have a friend who just loves rabbits. You will love this bouquet-carrying rabbit with its oversized floppy ears. Skip the wrapping paper and put your gifts into this delightful bag.
Bunny Delights Bag, 8" x 10"
Another popular theme is snowmen. You can decorate with snowmen all winter long. Gail's table topper has snowmen and snowflakes with a simple patchwork pattern in reds. You can use blue, too, or even whites printed with snowflakes.
All Around the Snowmen Table Topper, 26 1/2" by 26 1/2"
Other projects include Pretty in Blue Pincushion, Pumpkins and Sunflowers pillow, Wildflowers Table Runner, Just Sew Sewing Keeper, Teatime Table Runner, and Delightful Dresdens Wall Hanging--with embroidered Dresdens.

General instructions for embroidery and quilting are included, along with lots of photos and pictures. Links to online patterns to print and how-to instructions are provided in the ebook.

Learn more about Gail and see her other patterns at her website Gail Pan Designs.

Patchwork Loves Embroidery
Gail Pan
That Patchwork Place
ISBN:v9781604689006, 1604689005
Paperback
$25.99 USD, £22.99 GBP

from the publisher:
Best-selling author Gail Pan returns with a new collection of designs that are a dream to embroider and a delight to admire! Inspired by Gail's daily walks, an abundance of sweet motifs includes bees and bunnies, houses and hearts, and her signature bird, leaf, and vine stitcheries. New to embroidery? Learn just eight simple stitches to create any project in the book. Choose from a pillow, pouch, pincushion, and tote, plus wall hangings, table toppers, and sewing-related items. Enjoy your finished projects at home or give them as gifts--you'll want to make them all!

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Learn How To Make Landscape Art Quilts, Step-by-step, with Anne Loveless


Michigan quilters are proud of our own Ann Loveless who won the 2013 Grand Rapids ArtPrize for her Sleeping Bear Dune Lakeshore landscape quilt (seen on the book cover) as well as a viewer's choice award. The dunes quilt is constructed in 5 'x 5' panels. But Ann's techniques also create smaller quilts, and in this book she shares her methods.
Ann Loveless with her prize-winning quilt
Most of Ann's quilts are inspired by Michigan scenes, places, forests and flora: Trillium, sand dunes, Pictured Rocks along Lake Superior, lighthouses, the Mackinac Bridge, birch forests, quiet ponds.

The book is in three parts:
  • Planning, designing, and preparing to make your art quilt
  • A Photo Gallery of Collage Quilts
  • Constructing and finishing your art quilt
Ann also shares her quilt story and resources.

Ann's own quilts help to illustrate basic concepts of color theory and color value, and she covers composition, selection of inspiration photo, and photo transfer methods. She covers fabric choices and threads, supplies, and quilting options.

Ann's approach is improvisational. She does not create patterns, but freeform cuts fabric and places her pieces. The raw edge applique is machine quilted. The result is an "impressionistic" look. She also creates "confetti" quilts with pre-fused fabrics on a fused mosaic background.

Now, for many quilters that sounds impossible. But it is how I created my Shakespeare and Edgar Allan Poe portrait quilts. I hand drew the face, cut out the background face fabric, and free hand cut and placed pre-fused pieces. You have to trust your instinct.
Detail of William Shakespeare by Nancy A. Bekofske

from Landscape Art Quilts by Ann Loveless
Many of the Gallery quilts include her inspiration photographs and details of the quilt. At her website you can see her small mosaic, collage, impressionistic, and large fabric mosaic quilts currently for sale at her shop State of the Art Framing and Gallery in Beulah.

In Part Three, Ann walks you through duplicating one of her art quilts. Lake Collage, 14" x 18", is a typical Michigan view of the lake seen from a sandy lakeshore framed by trees. Photographs and text explain every step in great detail, right through making the binding and rod pocket. It is the best step-by-step guide I have seen.

I highly recommend this book for quilters who want to learn how to make landscape quilts.

I received a free ebook from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Landscape Art Quilts, Step-by-Step
Learn Fast, Fusible Fabric Collage with Ann Loveless
Ann Loveless
Kansas City Star Quilts
ISBN: 978-1-61169-145-0
 Book ($27.95)
 eBook ($19.99

Saturday, August 26, 2017

Nancy Gets the Quilt Pox

I am glad to have an upbeat post after sharing my very bad year!
At my quilt frame, wearing a dress I made. 
In January 1991. at a mom and pop grocery store in downtown Hillsdale, I opened a quilt magazine and saw a quilt of appliqued leaves. I thought, I'm going to make my brother a quilt for his college graduation.

Gary and Chris at a church ice cream social.
Chris in a short set I made.
I had been sewing clothes for my son, short and shirt sets and Velcro closing jackets, and dresses for myself. The lady at the fabric shop downtown always asked if I made quilts and I always said no. I did not think I could do it.

I gathered fabric scraps from sewing projects because I thought that's how quilts were made. I cut out the leaves and machine sewed them on to backing squares, sewed the squares together and added borders. I did not cut off the selvages and the printed selvage showed in one seam! I did not remake it.
My first quilt, Maple Leaf
In my ignorance, I bought a spool of button hole thread to quilt it. I layered the quilt top with batting and a backing. And proceeded to hand quilt without a thimble or a hoop. I was really basting it together.

It was a hot mess. But my Grandmother Gochenour was visiting Dad and he brought her to visit for a day. She was impressed. She said she always wondered if I would "do anything." I finished the quilt and presented it to my brother upon his graduation from Lawrence Technological University.

I sent a photo to the magazine that had the pattern and they shared it.
A newspaper notice about appearing in the magazine
I immediately started another quilt. I liked a block pattern in a magazine of a simple four square block with an appliqued heart in the center. It didn't have instructions for a full quilt.

For fabric, I decided to use Mom's painting smocks in red plaids. I had a Georgia Bonesteel book on the quilt as you go method where each block is quilted and then the layered blocks are sewn together, and that is how I constructed the quilt.
My second quilt, A Mother's Love Will Always Keep You Warm
in which I used Mom's plaid painting smocks
I was in the middle of the quilt when Gary told me that a new church member was a quilter and wanted to meet me. Holly had studied with the Amish and took one look at Hot Mess No. 2 and decided she had to teach me a few things.

She spent an afternoon at the house showing me how to applique, use a thimble, and the quilt stitch. My second quilt shows the progression from ignorance to basic competence.
Chris with Christopher's World, my third quilt.
By this time I was hooked. I made Chris a quilt using the Moon Over the block, made with jungle fabric from curtains I had made for his room and a fish fabric. This time I had to take it apart and remake it as I did not check that the blocks were a uniform size first. Holly let me put the quilt on her quilt frame to baste.
A House for All Seasons used the Madison House block from Quilts! Quilts! Quilts!
I made a quilt with twelve house quilt blocks, one for each season, and wrote an article on living in a parsonage and dreaming of a house of my own and sent it to Quilt Magazine who published it for $25.
Nancy Goes Reto incorporated an incomplete 1930s top (pink blocks)
I bought an incomplete top from an antique shop and finished a 1930s Bow Tie quilt, Nancy Goes Retro. The added blocks included reproduction 30s fabrics and vintage fabrics.

I made a quilt for both of my grandmothers and for my mom's sister.

I made my Grandmother Gochenour an old-fashioned quilt,
a scrappy Bow Tie with hand quilting.
Grandma (Greenwood Ramer) Fisher with her quilt.
I set up a quilt room in the basement. The room was huge, one end well lighted, and it was well heated. Chris had a playroom on one side and kept himself busy while I sewed, making cities and roads with the fabric scraps and empty spools.
"The Quilters" hand quilting around a quilt frame
Holly and I joined the quilt group that met at the church. The ladies made quilt tops and sat around a frame to hand quilt, and sold the finished quilts. They used the funds to support charities.
A star sample made by The Quilters 
These ladies taught me so much. We went on group trips to quilt shops and quilt shows. We sold quilts in Topeka, IN and displayed them at Sauder Farm, OH.
Newspaper article on The Quilters includes information about the members, including me (beginning at lower right above and continuing below).
Newspaper article about The Quilters.
I am at the near right.
When I learned that the ladies had once put on a quilt show I started bugging them to have a show while Gary and I were still there. Sure, they said, if I do the organizing they would help with the manpower.

I knew I could do that. I did the advertising, made flyers, got ads and articles in the local paper, and listed the show in national magazines. We called it The Quilter's Palette and we ran it in conjunction with the annual town art and garden tour.
Newspaper article on the Quilter's Palette
with photo of my Sunflower applique quilt In the Garden
The show was a success. I had drawings with names and addresses so when we decided to run it the second year I had a mailing list to send postcards to. The second show was a success as well.

Newspaper article about the Quilter's Palette
showing quilts by Claire Booth

My Woodland Christmas 
I entered Quiltmaker Magazine's design contest twice. I won $100 each time, first for Dobbin's Fan and second for a Christmas Tree pattern. But I found out that they changed up my design quite a bit!
Quiltmaker Magazine with pattern based on my submission
I found the Dobbin's Fan block in an old book. It was
adopted for a pattern in Quiltmaker Magazine.
When a speaker from the Michigan State University Museum came to town to talk about the Michigan Quilt Project I saw a slide of a quilt I just loved, the Mountain Mist Sunflower Quilt. I bought the pattern, gathered fabrics, and hand appliqued and hand quilted it. I added bugs and creatures to the pattern. I had become a very good hand quilter.
In The Garden was my first big applique project.
With me and Chris.
In 1993 I saw a magazine advertisement for Handkerchief Quilts by Sharon Newman and I had to make a hanky quilt. I started collecting handkerchiefs and over the years have made numerous handkerchief quilts. I have 1,000 handkerchiefs in my collection!
Working on handkerchief quilts
We did not have much money and I wanted to my hobby to pay for itself. I taught basic skill classes at a quilt shop in Jackson, MI, sold quilts, and even was commissioned to make quilts.
One of my commissioned quilts was a Georgia Bonesteel pattern. Hand quilted.
We had missed P.J. so much after losing him. Chris and Gary were clamoring for another dog. I thought Chris was too young, and I did not want a dog that barked all the time or who thought it was the boss. I suggested Gary talk to the vet for suggestions.

The vet introduced Gary to Lacy who was in the office to be spade. She had given birth and the home breeders could not find homes for all the puppies. Lacy had one girl still needing a home. Gary liked Lacy and that evening he took Chris and I to meet Kili.
Chris and Kili. They have the same smile!
Kili was a four-month-old Shiba Inu. We just loved her and the next day brought her home. She was house broken and crate trained and was very well adjusted. She was the heart of our family for almost seventeen years.

Kili and Me
After Chris started Kindergarten I applied for jobs. I was hired to run a children's time at a bookstore in Jackson, MI. I read a book and led a craft project related to the book. I took my guitar and sang a song, too. I made a vest and I always wore it and a denim skirt.
newspaper article about my storyteller position at a bookstore
I applied to be a reading aid in the school. I did not get the job although the people I would have worked with were eager to have me. The Superintendent of Schools and I did not get along during the interview, especially after he asked illegal questions. I also applied to work for the library downtown, but the job went to a local man.

But I kept busy anyways. I taught a class for Senior Citizens through Discovery Through the Humanities.

When an opinion column appeared castigating the normalization of gay and lesbian parents I wrote a countering opinion. I had no idea how radical this was to do in a small community.

  I received several letters of support.

Chris was inattentive at school and after teachers complained we pressed the school to test him. They discovered what I already knew: in first grade, he read at a fifth-grade level and was a grade ahead in math. I had spent a lot of time with Chris, reading and doing learning activities. I later realized I had been homeschooling. Plus, PBS shows like Reading Rainbow and Sesame Street taught him all the basics.

Starting after Christmas break Chris was jumped to second grade with warnings that children rarely adjust. He was determined and did well. By third grade, he was happy and loved school. He had also joined the Scouts and Little League.

Gary and I had bought a pump organ and Gary took classes at the Conklin Reed Organ Museum to learn how to restore it. He also refinished a 1850s rosewood meoldian and bought a 1913 Victrola and started collecting 78 records.
Newspaper article on Gary's project restoring a pump organ
I had stumbled upon an auction one day and was fascinated. Gary and I soon were going to auctions, buying antiques, and for a while, I even had a booth in a local antique mall.

My quilt group made new church paraments and I contributed several sets.
I created the parament sets on the bottom.
Clair Booth made the communion sets on the top.
Church Conference report with photo showing parament I made
I made a liturgical stole for Gary and Easter Sunrise for behind the altar.

Easter Sunrise quilt by Nancy A. Bekofske
When an exchange student from Russia stayed with a parishioner's family I made a signature quilt for him so he could remember the church friends he had made in America.
Signature quilt I made for the Russian exchange student (on the left)
Our last year in Hillsdale I got a job as a part time church secretary at the Lutheran Church and also several temporary full-time jobs at Hillsdale College. I would have been hired full time at Hillsdale College but we knew we were going to be moved. How that happened is another story.

Hillsdale UMC