Late Summer in Michigan, Quilts, and Books

My 1857 Album quilt is finally complete! In 2016 Gay Bomers of Sentimental Stitches shared her patterns based on a historical quilt. I finished the top in 2017. A few months ago I took the top to a local machine quilter, Maggie Smith. She did a wonderful job!

I bought the green, red, and orange fabrics online. I found they frayed too easily for applique. That will teach me to buy online! Applique requires a tight weave.

The one things I would recommend is to wait until the top is done before adding the corner petal units. Mine came out wonky. I should have removed them and restitched them. But I didn't. Because I am complacent and lazy, lol.

 I substituted some of the original patterns and made up my own, like adding the printed portraits of 1957 presidents.

I made a Halloween table runner. I created the applique in the center based on the print. 

After a long stretch of 90+ degree heat it cooled down a bit and two weeks ago we went to the Stage Nature Center in Troy, MI for our walk. 

The Rouge River flows through the park.

The meadow flowers were blooming.

 The last time we visited we saw close to 20 deer, but this day we only saw one.

Our Rutgers tomatoes and apple trees are coming into peak season!

After my brother returned from backpack hiking into the Porcupine Mountains in the Upper Penninsula of Michigan he invited us to his place for a corn roast and for my birthday presents--Charlie Harper coloring books and The Man Who Planted Trees with woodcut illustrations.

Two weeks ago on my Sunday walk I came across a neighbor's garage sale and picked up a book by Pat Cox.

 I am quite charmed by Millie's Quilt.

 What a great scrap quilt this would be!

 Also pictured is this Single Wedding Ring quilt circa 1915.

I caught my interest because I have an heirloom quilt from my husband's great-great-grandmother that is a Turkey red and white Single Wedding Ring and I had thought it dated about 1915.

Harriet is pictured below on the left with her mother Margaret Scovil Nelson and holding her daughter Grace.

We went on a trip to Port Huron, Michigan. We donated Harriet's New Testament to the Port Huron Historical Museum for a long-term loan. The book is said to have belonged to John Riley, an Objibway chief, and son of an early Michigan trader. Riley was a translator for The Treaty of Saginaw. He and his brothers James and Philip are mentioned in history books with Louis Cass, fighting for the Americans.

I just hung this handkerchief quilt wall hanging which I made some years back. The Japanese contemporary handkerchief is beautiful! I added three borders extending the motifs.

I was recently contacted by a man who saw my review of Simply Austen. He noted I had studied with Prof. Toby Olshin at Temple and was excited to find someone else who remembered and revered her.

As if I didn't have enough books to read...I jumped on the bandwagon to join The Goldfinch readathon sponsored by Little, Brown on social media. It was on my TBR shelf and it was a good excuse to pick it up. I am so glad, too--it's wonderful!

The Goldfinch 

Our local library is having a book sale. I picked up some vintage books.

 The Sunbonnet Babies are adorable.

 I can't resist this pattern with the baby reading a book.

 A cat lover has joined our family. Perhaps these patterns will be of interest to her.

I love Rumor Godden's fiction and memoirs about living in India. She also wrote books for children, like The Mousewife.

What have you been doing this summer?

We Love Anderson Cooper by R. L. Maizes

What a fantastic title! We Love Anderson Cooper is the title and a line in R. L. Maizes first short story in her collection, a parental response to their thirteen-year-old son's inability to be frank about his sexual orientation until he chooses the absolute wrong moment to out himself. He imagined it all going down differently. It is hilarious and heartbreaking.

"We love Anderson Cooper" therefore you should know I would accept you. Does it really follow? 'I'm not prejudiced' --fill in the blank for any person or idea. Isn't that what we do? I have black friends/gay friends/lesbian buddies/Muslim or Jewish or Christian or Hindu friends. How can you think I am prejudiced?

Geez, guys, just tell your son you love him!

Oh, we do love to feel superior to people who struggle and fail when we know what they should do. And these stories are filled with folk whose actions don't make sense to us.

And yet it is the best they can do.

We are all doing our best, and the even most wise and centered and rich and sane of us can find ourselves veering off into the gray and cloudy areas, just like the people in these stories where animals hold special places in people's lives and magical abilities and influences sway lives and jealousy and change brings division. We laugh, we feel empathetic pain, we recognize social and cultural truths.

Maya spent fourteen years caring for her employer-turned-lover and at his death found herself unprovided for. His kids dismissed her without a thought. Now she has to find her own way.

A talented artist whose art isn't selling becomes a tattoo artist and finds not only success but perhaps the ability to not only alter but to change lives.

A mid-life Jewish man is jealous when his cat prefers his lover. Worse yet, she is suddenly introducing Christmas into his life--cookies and trees and carols--and the cat likes it. "This is how assimilation begins--with baked goods," he thinks.

After her father's early death, Charlotte's mother gets a bird and transfers her affection to it. The sin of omission is strong in Charlotte's life.

At the last minute, a bride stops her wedding.

A couple are adopted by a sometimes vicious feral cat which their daughter adores and imitates. The parents are at loggerheads over the cat's place in the family.

A man is relieved when he losses his high-pressure, lucrative job. His wife can't believe he is happy delivering pizza. He can't convince her to downsize their life.

A therapist's heirloom couch breaks and seems irreplaceable. She finds the 'right' one, which affects her clients in a positive way.

A girl adores her aunt but is jealous of her aunt's adoration of her son. She gets even in a very dark way.

After nursing her ill husband, the loss of their dogs causes him to leave her.

These are memorable characters.

I read a copy purchased by my local library at my request.

We Love Anderson Cooper
by R. L. Maizes
Celadon Books
On Sale: 07/23/2019
ISBN: 9781250304094
hardcover $11.99

from the publisher:In this quirky, humorous, and deeply human short story collection, Pushcart Prize-nominated author R.L. Maizes reminds us that even in our most isolated moments, we are never truly alone. 

In We Love Anderson Cooper, characters are treated as outsiders because of their sexual orientation, racial or religious identity, or simply because they look different. A young man courts the publicity that comes from outing himself at his bar mitzvah. When a painter is shunned because of his appearance, he learns to ink tattoos that come to life. A paranoid Jewish actuary suspects his cat of cheating on him—with his Protestant girlfriend. 

In this debut collection, humor complements pathos. Readers will recognize themselves in these stories and in these protagonists, whose backgrounds are vastly different from their own—we’ve all been outsiders at some point.

about the author R.L. Maizes was born and raised in Queens, New York, and now lives in Boulder County, Colorado. Maizes's short stories have aired on National Public Radio and have appeared in the literary magazines Electric Literature, Witness, Bellevue Literary Review, Slice, and Blackbird, among others. Her essays have been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Lilith, and elsewhere.  

Maizes is an alumna of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and the Tin House Summer Writer’s Workshop. Her work has received Honorable Mention in Glimmer Train’s Fiction Open contest, has been a finalist in numerous other national contests, and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. We Love Anderson Cooper: Short Stories is her first book.

A Day Trip To Port Huron, MI

We took an overnight trip to Port Huron, Michigan to donate two family heirlooms to the Port Huron Historical Museum. 

Gary's New Testament has been in his family for almost 200 years and was given to his great-great-grandmother Margaret McDonald Scovile by John Riley, a Native American important in Michigan history. It will now be part of the museum and eventually go to a Native American museum in the future. 

The John Riley New Testament belonging to Margaret Scoville

Andrew Kercher, Manager of Community Engagement for the Port Huron Museums, did a quick search and determined the New Testament was published by the American Bible Society. The ABS was founded in 1816. This book may date between 1818 and 1820! Read my blog post about the bible here.

My father's flea market find of a brass oil can for a lighthouse fourth-order fresnel lens will also be part of the museum collection.

The brass fuel can for a fourth-order fresnel lens

Port Huron is situated where Lake Huron narrows into the St. Clair River, which then flows past Detroit and into Lake Erie. It is the site of Ft. Gratiot and the Ft. Gratiot Lighthouse, the first Michigan lighthouse.

St. Gratiot Lighthouse complex

My contact Shelly arranged for us to stay overnight in the lighthouse keepers home, built in 1870. The house is beautifully restored circa 1930. Bunk beds in the bedrooms are perfect for groups.

Freighters

We had lunch at Freighters, enjoying the beautiful view of the river and the freighters streaming downriver. 

freighter under the Blue Water Bridge

Freighter coming down the St Clair River

After lunch we walked along the river as a freighter went by, stopping at the Thomas Alva Edison Museum in the Port Huron Train Depot.

Thomas Alva Edison museum

There were nice educational displays about Edison's life and work, and artifacts like this beautiful Edison machine that played wax cylinders.

We stopped along the St. Clair River to see historical markers, like this stone marker. We later met the man responsible for this memorial!

Next stop was the museum housed in the Carnegie Center. We saw artifacts of native beadwork.

And Great Lakes Maritime displays.

Musical instruments and a violin maker's shop were in another room.

They have a nice collection of vintage clothing, Civil War era rooms, and much more!

We met with members of the Port Huron Museum and the Blue Water Indigenous Alliance and formally donated the John Riley New Testament. I told the story of my research into the bible and what I had learned about Riley. The group had recently held their first Pow Wow in many years. Read about it here.

For dinner, we enjoyed the shade and cool breeze on the patio of Tia Gordes. The Mexican food was excellent. I had chicken mole and Gary had poblanos.

 Back at the lighthouse, we walked around until dusk.

 And then settled into the 1930s era restored rooms to read our books until dark.

I was pleased not to miss the sunrise over Lake Huron. The sun was a ball of bright red.

For breakfast, we returned to downtown Port Huron to Chef Shell's, right next door to where we had dinner. We had wonderful omelets but had to take home a doughnut each after watching streams of people coming to buy a dozen at a time.

 We found out why they advertise they have "the best darn donuts!"

On the way back to the lighthouse we saw another ship and talked to a lady who warned us that the largest ship on the lakes was due in 40 minutes. We ran back to the lighthouse to turn in our key. At the Coast Guard Gift Shop, we bought a coffee mug and magnetic bookmarks.

First, we saw a 'salty.' This area has one of Michigan's salt mines. I researched the Michigan Room at the public library and found that Gary's great-great-grandfather Jacob Bellinger appears in the 1919-1922 city directories as a manager at Morton Salt in Port Huron.

Gary decided to walk up to the top of the light. I did not go since I have been experiencing vertigo.

Then finally the MV Paul S. Tergurtha came by, blowing its low horn to warn the sailboat and other craft to clear way.

 It was time to say goodbye to this historical light. 

I brought home several beach stones and a magnetic book mark.

Before leaving town, I had to stop at the Sew Elegant quilt shop where I picked up fabric with a daisy meadow print.

We hope to make a day trip back to Port Huron. We had a lovely time.