Flea Market Bargains

Several years ago I started a small collection of red and white crocheted hot pads after seeing a friend use hers for coasters. Today at the Royal Oak Flea Market I found a gal selling them for 50 cents each and bought up a whole bunch!

They are so cherry and fun. I just love them.

If you crochet you can get vintage patterns for free at Crochet Pattern Central and at Free Hot Pad Crochet Patterns

See Lori Holt's blog post on Bee in My Bonnet about her collection here..

1962: What's Cooking?

 The March 1962 issue of Family Circle had lots of ads for processed foods. My mom was a big processed food user. It was the culture of the time.



Remember that pudding cheesecake with a graham cracker crust? I think they served it everywhere.

Luckily the only time I had SPAM was when the Girl Scouts went on an overnight camping trip. We each had to bring our own can of SPAM to grill over the fire at breakfast

Just open the can. Make some Biscuit biscuits. Dinner served.

A typical lunch: packaged sliced cheese and canned soup.

I never had waffles for breakfast growing up. These ginger spice ones look GOOD. 

 Meat was standard fare for all meals.

 Vegetables were offered on the side, kind of like pickles or rolls.

Well, even the applesauce had a traditional colonial theme going on. Pennsylvania Dutch.

Guide to Traditional Decorating, 1962 style

The March 1962 Family Circle magazine offered ideas for decorating in the 'traditional' style that the women in my family favored. I think that the cover of this magazine influenced Mom's decoration of the dining room of the house we moved into in 1963.

Mom chose a blue and white wall paper with a repeated eagle motif  and outfitted the hutch with blue flow plates from her great-grandparents. She had Dad install a chair rail and painted the wall beneath it blue. Mom had a braided rug too, just like in this picture.

 I loved that room.

Mom's hutch with the blue flow in my home.

Another dining room idea offered in the article was more elegant and traditional and less colonial.

 Living room ideas included this wild gingham check motif! Love those toile' fabrics.

The couch and chair and even the tables look similar to what I grew up with. We even had a white painted fireplace for a while.

This more elegant room has drapes similar to ones Mom had in the later 60s, a Jacobean influence. I always loved the camel back rolled arms sofas and owned one for many years.

 We have had wing chairs for many years. Again red and blue but with a deeper red, paler blue and creamy beige.

Bedroom ideas in red, white and blue

My mom bought Family Circle and Women's Day at the grocery store, and would get me a Golden Book. She once said that had she had her health and worked she thought she would like to have been an interior decorator.

Mr. Adam's Last Crusade by Joseph Wheelan

I have become a huge John Quincy fan, and the more I learn about him the more impressed I become. When I found Mr Adam's Last Crusade: John Quincy Adam's Extraordinary Post-Presidential Life in Congress  I had to read it.  And I did, in three sittings. Wheelan has written an inspiring book, offering a concise overview of JQ's early career and a moving study of his time in the House.

After a failed presidency he expected a  peaceful retirement at Big House, the home of his parents, reunited with his library of 6,000 books.

Then he was elected to the House of Representatives. "My election as President of the United States was not so half so gratifying to my inmost soul" he wrote. And he quoted his hero Cicero, "I will not desert in my old age the Republic that I defended in my youth."

JQ was a throw back to another world, the world of the Founding Fathers and the Declaration of Independence, when duty and freedom of speech and sacrifice were not just ideas. He eschewed political favoritism and party politics. It made him unpopular. His intelligence and prodigious memory, paired with a sharp wit and verbal prowess, made him a formidable enemy.

"Slavery is a slow poison to the morals of any community infected with it. Ours is infected with it to the vitals."JQA

64 years old in 1831, JQ took up arms to battle what he believed was the greatest threat to America: slavery. The House had enacted a 'gag' on all discussion of slavery and JQ was determined to end it. It took eight years. He was vilified, his life threatened, the House tried to silence him. Every day he walked to work and brought up petitions that brought the wrath of the House and the South upon his head.

He became friends with abolitionists Theodore Weld and Angelina Grimke' Weld. JQ had been anti-slavery since 1820, but now became a self-avowed abolitionist.

"...the acutest, the astutest, the archest enemy of Southern slavery that ever existed." Representative Wise of Virginia

He voted against the main on other issues. He was no believer in expansionism, especially if it meant expanding slavery into new states and if it meant taking lands away from rightful owners. He was against the removal and extermination of Native Americans. He fought for the James Smithson legacy to be used as it was meant, resulting in the Smithsonian Institute. He voted to ban dueling. He even defended women's right to petition.

"They call Adams a man of one idea, but I tell you what it is, he had got more ideas than all of us put together." South Carolina Congressman Isaac Holmes

Then there was the Amistad trial. Don't rely on the Spielberg movie to learn about JQ's involvement or the importance of the trail. Read this book.

JQ was getting old, his hand was palsied, his eyes wept, he had rheumatism. He would not give up because there was no one to take his place. His eyes still  burned with passion and vitality. His mind was as sharp as ever. And he was at the height of his popularity.

He suffered a series of mild strokes, clung to his faith, and waited for the inevitable. On February 21, 1848 he was in the House when he suffered a stroke. All Washington closed down as "America's last living link between the present day and the fading Revolutionary War era of Washington lay dying in the U. S. Capitol" (from Mr Adam's Last Crusade).  On February 23 he died in the House Speaker's chamber.

In his day he was already an anachronism, a man without party loyalty, an original thinker, an independent voter without consideration of his own political or personal capital. His soul was rooted in the days of the Revolution when he watched the Battle of Bunker Hill with his mom and accompanied his father John Adams to Paris. He had known Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, Dolley Madison. He lived into an America growing from the Industrial Revolution and clamoring for more land and more wealth. His questioning but firm faith was old fashioned in a time of Transcendentalism. JQ was America's better angel, a voice for the core values of it's foundation.

Has there ever been another like him?

John Quincy Adams Coming Along

I decided on the final layout for the John Quincy Adams Presidential Quilt. Under the portrait I inked the beginning of a thank you letter from one of the captured Mendhi Africans who JQ represented in the Amistad trial.

The eagle, stars and flowers are from a preprinted reproduction panel. The gold fabric circles will help the stars stand out.

I hand basted all the pieces in place. The circle stars were basted around freezer paper circles first.

I will later embroider or pen more detailed information: name, dates, notes of his accomplishments.

I included portraits of presidents he served under: George Washington assigned him Minister to Holland, James Monroe appointed him Secretary of State, and the State of Massachusetts elected him to the House of Representatives when Andrew Jackson was president. And of course I included his father, John Adams.

I started the motifs today. It is so good to finally get back to creative efforts! It is invigorating!

John Quincy Adams, Champion of Human Rights, Gets a Quilt

When Sue Reich called for quilters to make a small presidential quilt I jumped at the chance to ask for John Quincy Adams. I had just read a biography on Louisa Catherine Adams. I had read about JQ in Bunker Hill, the John Adams by David McCullough, and in other books on American history.

People don't have a very clear image of JQ. He was raised for public service by his parents, Founding Father and president John Adams and Abigail Smith Adams. They expected superhuman achievements and JQ endeavored to meet the task.

When John Adams became Minister to France, 12-year-old JQ accompanied him. He was beloved by Thomas Jefferson. JQ traveled across Europe, studying under his father and at the finest universities. Back in the US he attended Harvard and followed his father into law.

George Washington chose JQ to be Minister to Holland. After his father left office he returned home and became a US Senator. Party politics intervened, and he left to teach at Harvard.

Then he was chosen to be Minister to Russia. He had married the London born Louisa and together they learned to navigate the Czarist court. Louisa became the pet of many a grand lady. He was called to France at the end of the Napoleonic Wars to represent America in forging the Treaty of Ghent. Louisa stayed behind to sell off their household, pack up, and travel with her child,  a dangerous winter journey of 3,000 miles to join him.

James Monroe asked JQ to be his Secretary of State, and he accomplished his greatest achievements. He forged the Monroe Doctrine and treaties incorporating Florida and Oregon into US territories.

The disintegration of the Federalist party left only the National Republicans, which had four candidates. None received a majority electoral college vote and the vote went to the House. JQ won because of Henry Clay's vote.

As President JQ focused on infrastructure to facilitate trade, education, and scientific research which he deemed needed to support a growing nation. He made sure the Smithson money went to create the Smithsonian Institute and was involved in the creation of what became the US Naval Observatory.

A one term president, JQ did not leave public service for long. He was called by Massachusetts to the House of Representatives. Never popular, a fierce independent and true to his own values, JQ was an eloquent spokesman for lost causes. He did not support President Jackson's removal of Native American peoples. He fought the "gag rule" against discussing slavery and finally ended it, as described in America 1844.

"Old Man Eloquent" was an abolitionist, as were his parents. When a ship of captured Africans mutinied and took over the Spanish ship Amistad, JQ was approached to represent the Africans at trial. He accepted, pro bono. In a seven hour presentation he argued that the Africans were not merchandise, but free men taken by pirates. JQ won the case and the grateful Mendhi men wrote letters of thanks.

It was reading these letters that was my "ah hah" moment. I had been struggling on how to present JQ, using quilt methods of his time, broderie perse in particular. What about JQ would reach and move a viewer of the quilt? I knew it had to be the Amistad case, representing JQ's deep dedication to liberty and Civil Rights.

The same day I had my breakthrough I learned that Sue Reich was offered a contract by Schiffert Publishing for "Patriotic and President Quilts" and it would include the Presidential Quilts Project!

All afternoon yesterday I worked on the quilt in a creative heat.

We had pizza for dinner.

Learn more about Sue Reich at
http://www.coveringquilthistory.com

"Only Connect"

Oakland County, MI is one of three area counties included in a State of Emergency declared by Governor Rick Snyder. Record rainfalls were recorded Sunday night, topping a hundred year record.

Sunday evening while it was raining hard my son had noticed an unusual amount of traffic going down the street. We looked out and saw there was flooding at the end of our block. The water covered the tires of trucks pushing through. Streets all over the area were blocked by flood water and drivers were looking for alternate routes. Some left cars and walked home in the driving rain.

Detroit expressways were filled with water. A thousand cars were abandoned. A 100 year old woman drowned. The news coming in on Monday was devastating.

Yesterday I went to a quilt shop some miles away. Everywhere along the streets are piles of what were once finished basement family room comforts: home theater chairs, couches, mattresses, bookcases and media storage, children's toys, suitcases, boxes of Christmas ornaments, mementos.

Just a block away houses were flooded.

The block behind us was hard hit. 

People have told me about the water reaching their front door, new trucks totaled, newly finished basement family rooms destroyed. Washing machines, dryers, furnaces, hot water heaters no longer functioning and not repairable. None of which is covered by typical homeowner's insurance.

In June we had a serious foundation crack filled. It required cutting out and repairing drywall. It cost about $800. We had no water in the basement on Sunday. It was a lucky break we had the work done when we did. We are on a long hill side. Work had been done on the city sewer and the line from the house. We were so lucky.

I had just switched insurance carriers days before the rain. I knew we had $5,000 coverage for sewage backup. That would not cover much I now realize.

I cry when I see the piles along the road. I imagine the pain people are feeling. Had it been us, I would have lost my quilts, my new and vintage fabric stash, my Bernina, my handkerchief collection, my books, my family photos and slides, my quilt patterns, my writing files, my genealogy papers. My quilt "I Will Lift My Voice", which was in the 2013 American Quilt Society shows in Lancaster and Grand Rapids, was appraised for several thousand dollars. And it is only one of many still in pillowcases in boxes downstairs.

"Only connect" E. M. Forster wrote in one of my favorite novels, Howard's End. I can connect to the loss of these families because I can imagine what my loss would have been.

Last fall articles appeared about a study showing that literary fiction by writers such as as Don DeLillo, fosters in readers a psychological awareness and social empathy that carries over into real life. Genre and popular fiction leads what you are to feel while reading. Literary fiction allows the reader to fill in the blanks, co-create the character.

I have just finished reading two books about families dealing with crisis, grief and loss. In recent months I read The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway and Don DeLillo's White Noise. Could my constant tears be rooted in having read such books?

I am no psychologist. I have no idea if there is a connection. Perhaps I just have an overactive imagination... which would be feed by having read so many books...