FSU wants to catch reading difficulties early

Tallahassee is a hopeful place for those with reading difficulties. The NIH just awarded $8.5 over the next five years to FSU to continue studying dyslexia, and the web site invites participants in their study. According to Dr. Rick Wagner, the Florida Center for Reading Research will concentrate on early discovery of reading difficulty. (Previously, they were looking for genetic disposition, but that turned out to be not as fruitful as they'd hoped.) Now they want to be able to identify the difficulty in children as young as three years old; helping students early could eliminate later experiences of failure.

Oh frit! FSU fiber art show

Lanny Bergner's sculpture of screen mesh and frit
at FSU Museum of Fine Arts
Thread of Life exhibit

I saw the word frit at  FSU's Thread of Life exhibit at FSU yesterday. Lucky I was with Jennifer, who knows frit (A degree in ceramic engineering helps, she said). It's colored glass, but more complicated. I love frit. Lanny Bergner's mesh and frit sculptures are my favorite pieces in the understated, lovely exhibit. I was also happy to see three quilts by FAMU architecture professor and artist Valerie Goodwin

Yesterday was my second visit -- this time I studied methods of display, other than the conventional cloth pocket and rod for quilts. (Those were distinguished by distance from the wall; fluid cloth looks best when it's not flush but allows some air.)  Timothy Harding's simply-bound silk quilts were Velcro-ed to a wooden bar.

Koi, Timothy Harding

Harriet's Music Room (16" x 18"), one of Laura Breitman's refined fabric collages, seems to be a base of firm paper glued to foam core attached to a mat in a subdued frame. Her Water lilies  (below) was wrapped around a support, set inside and slightly away from a gold frame that was painted black within.

Water lilies, Laura Breitman. fabric collage

Water lilies, detail

 One of Judy Chicago's weavings is mounted to a larger fabric-wrapped board.

The show ends March 25.

Oatmeal cookies

Forgot to take cookies in back out of the oven

We've been eating light lately, or at least it seems light -- remember, Mom made dessert every night when I was growing up! Gradually we choose fewer desserts and less meat. So these oatmeal cookies are a treat, especially for C. They're his favorites. They're from the big Gourmet cookbook.

Oatmeal cookies

Beat together until fluffy:

10 T. butter, softened
1/3 C. light brown sugar
1/4 C. granulated sugar

Mix in:
1 large egg
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Add and mix until just combined:
1 3/4 C. rolled oats (not quick variety)
3/4 C. flour
3/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. soda
1/2 tsp. salt

At this point it's all done. But you can add chocolate chips, fruits, etc. Today I added about a half cup each of coconut, toasted walnuts, and golden raisins.

The recipe says make huge cookies of 1 heaping tablespoon each. I made smaller cookies. Put on parchment-covered baking sheets. Run your fingers under water and press each cookie down lightly. Bake at 375° about 12 minutes. I like 15 minutes. The cookies in the back of the photo got more than that!

I can't read

Distracted for good

A meander through learning -- the last paragraph is best. 

Playwright Hanif Kureishi, once at the bottom of his class, worries that education is lock-step, directing some away from their best talents.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/opinion/sunday/the-art-of-distraction.html

Red beans & rice -- then strawberry tart

Strawberry tart cooling

The red beans and rice we had last night for Mardi Gras were delicious -- but dessert makes a prettier picture. A long time ago I wrote "Good" in the cookbook margin above the red beans recipe. That's an  understatement. You can find it on page 3 of The New Orleans Cookbook, which you can buy today in paperback. Here's my version. I used frozen chopped peppers and onions (thawed, with the excess water squeezed out of them), and left out the pickled pork/bacon that's in the original recipe,  which would only make it better.

Red beans and rice

Soak a package of red beans overnight. Drain and rinse them and put in a big pot. Add:
1 large ham bone (Honey Baked sells ham bones. I bought ours at Connie's Hams.)
2 C. chopped onions
1/2 C. thinly sliced green onions
1/2 C. chopped green pepper
1 1/3 T. minced garlic
2 T. chopped fresh parsley
1 lb. baked ham cut in one-inch cubes (You can buy cubes in the grocery.)
1 T. salt
1/2 t. pepper
a shake of cayenne (to taste -- I added this at the very end)
2 crushed bay leaves
1/2 t. dried thyme
a squirt of basil from a tube

Add cold water just to cover. You can leave a bit of the bone above the water. Bring to a boil over high heat, then simmer for 2 1/2 to 3 hours, until beans are very tender. Stir well every half hour and add a little more water if it's getting too thick. Don't let the bottom burn. I had the lid on at first, then took it off to cook it down. When it's done, take out the ham bone and beat the beans a little with the immersion blender (This is what I do -- the original recipe keeps all beans whole). Serve it over rice. I used brown rice, the boil-in-the-bag kind. The original recipe calls for white rice. This is a great soup too, without rice.

For dessert I made strawberry tart, using my raspberry tart recipe and a pie crust I'd had in the freezer from Thanksgiving. To save time I just tossed the berries willy-nilly, rather than arranging them. It took about 30 minutes to bake it so the center was not runny.

Pralines for Mardi Gras

Backyard pecan trees this morning

These are pecan trees. It's where pralines come from.

I made some yesterday -- Mardi Gras was the excuse. Here's the recipe, from The New Orleans Cookbook by Rima and Richard Collin, who wrote it in 1974 and dedicated it "For the city and the people of New Orleans."

The squirrels eat our pecans, so we buy them at the farmers' market. They're harvested in the fall. You can order fresh pecans from many places, such as Sheffield Pecans. You probably won't want grocery store pecans ever again.

I always toast pecans first. Spread them on a cookie sheet and put them in a 350° oven until you get a toasty whiff, between 5 and 10 minutes. Watch carefully, so they don't burn.

Pralines

1 1/2 C brown sugar
1 1/2 C. white sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 C. milk
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
1/4 C. butter (They call for salted, but I used unsalted and it was fine.)
1 tsp. vanilla
2 21/2 C. pecan halves (toasted)

Combine the sugars, salt, milk, and cream of tartar. Stir over low heat until sugar dissolves, wiping the crystals from the side of the pan with a rubber spatula. Cook to 236°-238° on a candy thermometer, then cool to 220°. Add the butter, vanilla, and pecans and beat until creamy. They say use a wire whisk, but I used my immersion blender. When it began to thicken, I switched to a sturdy wooden spoon (not the long-handled one). Don't beat too long. I've done that before, and you end up with grainy candy. If you're a fudge-maker, don't beat as long as you would for fudge. Stop just before that.

While still soft, drop by spoonfuls onto waxed paper. (They say butter it, but that's not necessary.)  When the pralines cool and firm up, cut the waxed paper between them and wrap each one.

They say leave 4 inches between the candies, but that wasn't enough. I ended up cutting more waxed paper squares,  about 7" squares. Of course, it depends on the size of your candies. I made them two or three bites worth. After I wrapped them I taped them shut because they kept popping open. Clark said he felt guilty eating them after I'd gone to all that trouble.  But he managed.

Heart of Glass

Heart of Glass

No pulse, no

blood, no

hurt. Only

splinters.

Jaws and fish for dinner

Alligator skulls
Cedar Key Museum State Park

 St. Clair Whitman collected these alligator skulls. Alligators like grouper. Here's a recipe:

Grouper with tomatoes

2 pieces of grouper, each about 5 oz. (or some other fish)
salt
pepper
olive oil
1 small to medium onion, chopped
1 fat clove garlic, minced
2 tomatoes, diced
5 large green olives, stuffed, sliced
1 T. capers, rinsed
1 little can of chopped chilis
fresh lemon or lime juice

Saute the fish until it is cooked through (rule of thumb is 10 min. per inch thick).  Put it on a warm plate in a warm oven.
Make the rest of the ingredients into a sauce:
Fry the onions until soft and starting to caramelize. Add garlic and cook another minute, stirring. Add the tomatoes, olives, capers and chilis. Cook, stirring occasionally, until you like the sauce -- 10-20 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and lemon or lime juice. Spoon the sauce over the fish. We had this with noodles and broccoli, and it was good.

This my adaptation of this slightly more complicated recipe from Weeknight Kitchen. I also make a similar dish, in which you put all the ingredients in foil packets and bake it for about 40 minutes at 350°. That recipe calls for basil and leaves out the onion and garlic.

My favorite poet & a meatloaf sandwich

In the awful moving of a shelf of books I came across poems of someone I love -- me!

Certain men won't cry
until they learn
a beloved dog
is going to die.

For lunch we had meatloaf sandwiches: buns, tomato slices, some shredded Napa cabbage and horseradish sauce. The meatloaf was good the first day too, with baked potatoes and broccoli, It  suited the gloomy day.

For a guide, I use Sarah Leah Chase's recipe from Nantucket Open-House Cookbook. She calls for flattening out the meat mixture and spiraling it around provolone and prosciutto, which I skip. I used grocery store meatloaf combo of chuck and pork, and I did not exactly measure the other ingredients. I didn't have tomato juice, so used broth and squeezed in a little tomato paste from a tube. Here's the basic recipe:

Sicilian Meatloaf

Mix (I used my hands.)
1 1/2 lb. ground sirloin
1 lb. ground veal
1 medium onion, chopped
4 coves garlic, minced
2 T. dried Italian herb blend
1/2 C. chopped parsley
2 1/2 C. fresh bread crumbs

Add
2 eggs
1 C. tomato juice
1 T. salt
2 tsp. or less pepper

Form into a loaf shape on a baking sheet or shallow casserole dish.
Bake at 350° for an hour, or until the center is not pink.

Where ideas live

One of my tutoring students wants to write good essays. It's fun to work with such a motivated person. It made me want to write an essay.  I wrote it for her.

Where Ideas Live

An essay is like a snug cottage. It is a small and comfortable dwelling for your thoughts. Like any home, the essay is an expression of the one who lives there. It is full of things that the author cares about. The writer chooses words like furniture. She wants each piece to be authentic and placed where it will look best. The essay, like a private home, may reveal secrets. It may hint or tell you outright something fresh that you never before suspected.

The essay’s introduction is its front porch. It welcomes the reader and gives a hint of what may be found inside. It makes the reader want to open the door and read more.

The paragraphs are rooms. Each one has a special purpose, or topic. It is important to place furniture in the appropriate room. The stove does not belong in the living room! In the same way, sentences and details ought to fit right in the paragraph. Sometimes you will have to do some moving around. For instance,  I had the second sentence (“It is a small and comfortable …  thoughts.”) in the ending paragraph. As I worked on this essay, the sentence seemed to fit much better where it is now.

The essay, like a little home, must have clarity and order or it will be a mess. You must sweep out unnecessary words. They are useless and confusing, like too much furniture.  For example, at first I began this essay with, “An essay is a lot like a snug little cottage.” When I read it over, I saw I could shorten the sentence without changing its meaning. It is also important that you can move easily from one paragraph to the next. The more you write, the tidier your essays will be.

The back door is the essay’s conclusion. Before you leave, you glance back quickly, reviewing all the rooms you just explored. You breathe in the atmosphere of this cottage – the colors and scents of the word that make up its particular style. One day you may come back again, but as you open the door you get the feeling you have had a satisfying visit. When you hear the click of the back-door latch behind you, you know you are finished.

There are many larger and more imposing structures in the great city called literature -– palaces that are books, and skyscrapers full of short stories. But if you look closely, chances are good that you will find the heart of each structure is a related collection of rooms, or topics, each explored in a paragraph -- an essay.

Words are not the enemy

I'm trying to understand HOW a person can make words work for her/him -- when reading and writing seem the enemy. Yesterday's Diane Rehm show on NPR, The Dyslexic Brain,  has some insight. Listen.

Beach Walk
Cedar Key Quilt Show
January 2012

This is what the Judges' Evaluation said about Beach Walk:
Overall Appearance: "Great color choices, you really feel the water & sun going down."

Quilting: "improve finishing around edges and you have got a winner."

Additional Comments: "Really creates a mood of walking on the beach -- cold -- darkness or storm approaching -- very creative--"

That wasn't so hard! I don't know if I'll continue making evaluations public (there is a tiny public out there, isn't there?), but I want to. I am thrilled to be part of the Cedar Key show. I learned at Quilt Surface Design Symposium that the finest quilt artists have work criticized and even rejected sometimes. I'm at a point where I actually can learn from others' observations, as I  follow my own creative instincts. And I want to share. This is what it's like.

Here's more from Cedar Key. Unfortunately, Virginia Stevenson's lovely silk piece was not on the wall when we were there.

Angel Food Cake for Clark

Clark's birthday cake

It looks like a giant doughnut, but it's really Clark's birthday cake -- always angel food cake for him!

The recipe is from the Gourmet cookbook.

Angel Food Cake

1 cup cake flour (Don't use all-purpose.)
1 2/3 C. sugar
1 3/4 C. egg whites (usually about 13) Room temperature is best.
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cream of tartar
 1/2 tsp vanilla

for Glaze
1 C. confectioners' sugar
2 T. fresh lemon juice

Put rack in middle of the oven and preheat to 300°.

Sift flour 3 times (it says -- I don't), then sift together with 2/3 C. sugar. (I just mix the two and fluff them up with a fork.)

Beat the egg whites until frothy. Add cream of tartar and salt and beat until whites barely form soft peaks. Beat in remaining 1 C. sugar 2 tablespoons at a time. Add vanilla and beat until whites hold soft peaks. Add the flour mixture, 1/4 at a time, and fold in gently but completely after each addition.

Spoon the batter into ungreased tube pan (If you grease it, the cake will not cling to the sides and it will be a fallen mess.) Smooth the top with the spatula and then rap the pan on the table a couple of times. This is fun and is supposed to burst bubbles.

Bake 1 1/4 hr. Invert on counter and cool for 2 hours.
Optional: make a glaze by mixing the confectioners' sugar and lemon juice and spreading it on top of the cool cake. Serve with berries, whipped cream, ice cream or nothing.

Winter 4: the bird saved it

Winter
14 1/2" wide x 16" long
cotton, purchased and from used shirt, cotton batting 

Winter is finished, and I love its control and symmetry.  Didn't know I had that in me! For a time I hated the quilting -- I carefully designed the stitching and then all at once I loathed it! The lines on the pines seemed dangerously dart-like. I'd used heavy #12 thread, as Jane Sassaman does. I brooded awhile, and one gloomy day I decided to rip it all out, at risk of messing the piece beyond use. I crazily took my little orange scissors and snipped wildly at the right corner. I worked outside because that makes me calmer. I was snipping madly, not getting very far because of the close stitching, when a big wet plop made me stop. The ultimate insult: a bird flew over and pooped on my quilt! I ran inside and washed it off. That's when I realized all I needed to do was rip out the heavy threads. The rest was fine. Now the quilting is all in regular thread, which is right for this piece. Thanks, bird!

Turned-edge applique

1. Cut out shape from ShirTailor. Leaf pattern is first cut from 70 # paper (below).
2. Iron ShirTailor onto wrong side of fabric.
3. Cut around shape, about 1/4" outside the edge.

4. Make little slashes along curves, right down to ShirTailor, but not cutting into it.

5. Turn the edge inside and glue it down with UHU glue.

6. Sew it onto your piece, using either machine or hand applique technique. For this, I like hand applique.

Winter 3

First I sewed the designs onto the front, using a straight stitch close to the edge (photo below). Next I sewed a close zigzag stitch around the edges, covering the straight stitches. Then I held my breath and cut the back layer out. I taped the piece onto the lamp so you can see it (above). I skipped the smaller pieces, which are attached with double-sided adhesive bonding, and then sewn around the edges. This is machine applique, but hand-applique would also be beautiful, and you would treat the back the same way. This avoids layering for a lightweight, flexible top.

Winter 2

This is the design I'm making.

After I chose 3 shapes, I cut them out from fabric (here, all cotton) backed with Pellon ShirTailor. That's a light-weight stabilizer. I also ironed ShirTailor to the back of the base fabric, a mahogany-ish Kona cotton. This looks (and is!) an ultra-simple design, but settling on it took me lots of time and fussing. Maybe a week. I made the shapes from other colors and shades as well. I'd arrange them and then let the design sit for hours or days -- moving this and that a quarter-inch or so, stepping back, squinting. So many options! I stopped when it felt right. Then I added the circles. "When you have an empty space, put a circle in it," Jane Sassaman told us. I took a photo and then traced the design onto big paper, numbering the pieces to show which would be sewn on first (dark green bases onto the pine triangles, violet swirls onto base), second (black limbs), third (triangles), fourth (circles).

Winter 1

Winter quilt: Choose 3 shapes.

Jane Sassaman said -- I may not remember perfectly! -- get your shapes from flowers & other natural forms. I follow the lines of stuff I pick up in the woods -- longleaf pine from Phipps. First I drew on regular paper, then cut the design out and traced around it on heavier 70-pound paper. I did manage to draw the spirals, using my flexible rubber ruler. I enlarged it on Staples' copy machine. Jane also says simplify the shape -- so I will reduce that sawtooth effect on the pine. I decided not to use the curvy shape -- it may come to life in another piece someday. The middle-sized spiral fits best: winter wind in pines. This all took much more time than you would think, but finally I settled on three shapes for winter: the pine needles,  the spiral, and a skinny, straight-ish piece for the tree wood, which is not shown here.

Fall

I made this little (14 1/2" x 16") quilt using Jane Sassaman's guidelines -- from her workshop here one Friday & Saturday in November. If I remember right, on Friday we made shapes & on Saturday we played with them. But it's not that simple. I did most of the work at home. Jane told us to use three colors (I chose brown, gold, purple.) and then to simplify and exaggerate three natural shapes. I used leaves I'd picked up in Phipps Park off Miller's Landing Road. The swirl I copied from Marsha. I call it Fall and decided to make a series of the seasons at Phipps.