$11 buys a Few Books for a New Teacher's Library

We went to the Minneapolis Central Library for the Friend's Seasonal Book Sale the first day of the $2 a paper sack week. Our intent was to stock Matt's youngest sister's first grade classroom on the Iron Range. She'd been buying books once a month or so, but this is a much more efficent way to accomplish the same purpose at a significantly less cumbersome cost. $11 bought her kids 186 new to them books for their classroom. Books about sports, letters, numbers, science, geology, space, other countries, persons of historical interest, story books with accompanying audio tapes. . .we scored-- big time, and thus, so did the kids.



Once we'd accomplished our book mission we spent a few hours in the library, perusing engineering texts about materials and calculus,




and wandered through The Precious Object. An exhibit sponsored by the Twin Cities Decider, mnartists.org, and Hennepin County Library. It was amazing.





If you go, do make sure to examine every nook and cranny on this sculpture. It merits a trip to the hands and knees. . .

Art Lunch

Spent my lunch hour perusing the new show, Vital Culture, at Gallery 13; the gallery that's taken over two spaces in the building behind US Bancorp Center. They used to house a hairdresser and box store and now they're filled with Buddha trees and Barbie pin ups--a huge improvement in my opinion. The husband-wife team that runs it always talks to me like an old friend when I stop in, artfully reintroducing themselves in a way that doesn't admit that they don't remember my name. I'm thinking I'll make it easier next time, and just wear my badge, if I ever find it.

A lot of the pieces they have are on their website: Gallery 13 on Fine Art America

These are the ones that sucked me in today. . . and I'm sure next week will bring more.

Godzilla! Get him!!



Blök what is your story? I wish I'd made the opening so your creator could tell me.



Not blocks for your toddler to stack!

Barbie pin ups, but not my favorite, which was a Barbie with a wine glass and some of her garments on a line.


The Buddha tree!


Close up of the paper molds.



I actually returned to the office refreshed, how refreshing!

Project Feerwatch on Woodlawn

Project Feederwatch started in November, and with it the Musich Family Citizen Science Project for the winter. I originally heard about the program on MPR, in June, asked the boy about it and signed us up, knowing we would be in our new house, and hoping that we'd be able to sit on the couch together and enjoy the peace of watching birds and keeping our hands busy with some needle arts.

This weekend we nearly accomplished that vision of domestic bliss. I was sitting on the couch watching the birdless feeder as I drank my coffee and Optimus put in his bird song CD. He followed along in his guidebook curled up in the nook of my knee, letting me know when the bird we were listening to was one we might see at our bird feeder because it had a year-round range that included our spot on the map of Minnesota, occasionally throwing out tidbits like--"look, this bird lays eggs in other birds nests" or "this one we might see at our feeder in the summer, because it comes here then."


The bird activity is nonexistent in the morning. Maybe the birds don't like the chill that early? The early afternoon though is amazing for the volume of activity that occurs in the general vicinity of our bird feeder. These pictures are a sampling of the three most common birds we see at our feeder: House Sparrows, Black-eyed Chickadees and Northern Cardinals (both the male and the female have put in an appearance, but the male is pictured here.). We even had a Black-eyed Junco put in an appearance for good measure.


Black-eyed Junco


Black-capped Chickadee and House Sparrow (on top of hook)


Smug Male Northern Cardinal


House Sparrows

Sunday Afternoon Canning with Jane

My childhood friend Jane joined me this Sunday to try our hand at making Jam and Jelly--two of the recipes from the canning class I took through the MN Horticultural Society on Tuesday. I started the process before she arrived, so we could get both the Pomegranate Jelly and the Ginger Apple Fig Jam done before the end of the day. Figs are surly little buggers to process, I can see why you don't see them included in many processed foods.

Let me start by saying we accomplished our goal in about 5 hours, with an hour of downtime where I taught her how to embroider (two domestic skills learned in one day!!!) and she proved that it is possible to make something look as nice as our grandmother's handiwork.

I tried to incorporate all the tips I'd noted in the margins of my recipes and managed to forget one of the most important--stir your Jam with a sterilized chopstick! Why would I do such a thing? To work out the air bubbles of course. Air bubbles cause your Jam to heat unevenly, and can cause the chunks of fruit to dry out in the spots that are touching the bubble. I'm new at this, so I'll be ok with it this one time.

For some reason, the Pomegranate recipe said I would only have a yield of four 1/2 quart (8 oz.) jars, and I was left with seven. Did we mis-measure? Maybe. Did she mis-type the yield, maybe. I'll have to try and make it again, then let you know.

While the Fig/Sugar/Lemon Juice mixture finished out it's first several hour stewing in your own juices stint we got to work on the Pomegranate Jelly. Measuring out the ingredients and getting it cooking on the stove. I used the opportunity to test my new candy thermometer (worked great) and we made sure to take some candid jam/jelly making shots for posterity.

Do you know the story of the pomegranate?


Cutting up apples


Sure that's gel stage


Checking the thermometer to be sure


Mixing the texture back in


Magnetic stick too short? Improvise!


Embroidering the lotus with appropriate seriousness. . .



Finished Product