A Little Crafty

Last week I was inspired by our trip to Sedalia. When we were in one of the flea markets, I stumbled on some beautiful quilted bags. That is the rage this year--travel and personal quilted bags. Of course I didn't like the prices, and remembered that I had some fabric set aside from my favorite quilt fabric store, The Quilter's Harvest, in Higgingsville. The ladies there had helped me put together a selection of fabrics, all nicely coordinated, starting with the Mary Engelbreit pre-quilted fabric, and on to fat quarters and eighths. So I was ready to sew!

Originally I had intended to just make a purse, but thankfully, those ladies at Quilter's Harvest can also read minds. I had enough to make a bigger tote! So got it put together in record time for me. To complete the bag, I used my beading skills to put together a beaded charm, with an angel pendant. Then, because I still had some leftover fabric, I sewed up one of those Wonder Wallets, having gotten the pattern from Miss Dixie, our Elderberry Leader. Now I am ready to travel in style!

MO Berry Picking

A few weeks ago when we did the "Ozark run", we returned with a huge bag of freshly picked Arkansas blueberries. Those were already picked by people in the field. Today we picked our first black raspberries of the season. Practice run for hitting the blackberry bushes. First you put on jeans, and long sleeved shirts, then hats, then spray head to toe with Deet, grab a bucket and go. Our patch was luckily at the edge of our woods, so we didn't have to go very far, and also luckily it had just rained during the night, so we didn't get overwhelmed by ticks or chiggers. Or maybe they just didn't like our sprayed bodies. So we got about 2 cups in this round. Have to return in about 2 days. I guess we could go up there tomorrow morning for a breakfast bowl of berries, but it's just too much effort to prepare, so the little woods critters can enjoy the ones that turn today. After picking, I wandered down to our garden and cut a bunch of rhubarb, and after chopping and de-stringing it, got about 4 cups worth. So of course I had to make a raspberry rhubarb crisp out of all this wonderful fruit. Perfect for tomorrow's church ice cream social!

Recipe for Raspberry-Rhubarb Crisp

2 cups fresh raspberries (wash and rinse well, sprinkle about 1/8 cup of sugar over the berries and let set in a bowl)
4 cups diced rhubarb
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch

Drain raspberries, reserving juice. Add enough water to this juice to make 1 and 1/2 cup liquid. In a large pyrex mixing bowl, mix together the cornstarch and sugar. Add the liquid. Microwave on high, stirring frequently, until it comes to a boil. At this point, I use a wire whip. Continue to boil 1-2 minutes, still stirring every 30 seconds, until thickened. Now add the berries and rhubarb to this mixture and set aside.

In another bowl, mix together:
1 and 1/3 cup quick cooking oats
1 cup flour
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup melted butter

Set aside 1/4 cup of this mixture for the topping.
Press remaining mixture into a PAM sprayed 13X9 inch pyrex baking pan. Bake in a preheated oven 8-10 minutes until set. Remove from oven, spread fruit mixture over the flour mixture, sprinkle the topping over all (I threw in a couple of tablespoons of chopped pecans for texture in the topping), and put back into the oven, baking for 35-40 minutes, or until the rhubarb is tender. By the time this is finished your whole house will smell wonderful! Cool the crisp and serve with ice cream. I got this recipe from Taste of Home, my favorite cooking magazine, but adapted a bit.

Now you can go berry picking in your woods, or grocery store or farmer's market.

Book pages

Discovered a Nebraska writer who writes about Missouri, and thought her latest book, which takes place in MO, was worth a book talk. Jonis Agee is the author, and the book is entitled "River Wife". The story begins during the New Madrid earthquake, in 1811, and centers on a young teen girl, Annie, who is abandoned by her family during the earthquake, because their cabin collapses on her, her legs are crushed, and they leave her to a certain death. She is rescued by a French trapper, Jacques, who cares for her and eventually falls in love with her. They marry, open an inn for river travelers on the Mississippi, and he becomes a pirate. Boats are deliberately led astray onto shoals and banks so he and his buddies can strip them, passengers and crew members are murdered for their cash and jewels and Jacques begins to build a grand house to store his wealth. Fast forward to the 1930's, future generations of this same family. Clement, a grandson, brings his new bride back to the house and becomes a whiskey smuggler during prohibition. Again, wealth is brought to the family, along with great pain, because he gets caught up in murder, prostitution, and general violence. The stories are told in Annie's diary, and by Clement's wife Hedie, and describe a different river life from Mark Twain's, yet with the same sense of yarn spinning. The perfect book to grab and read while you set beneath your porch ceiling fan and wait out the heat and humidity.

MO travels--Part II

This week we went on another Elderberry trip, called a "Mystery Trip", because only our fearless leader, Miss Dixie, and the bus driver, Bob, knew where we were going. It was another fun-filled bus trip. She had planned a little rail trip, but Amtrak got their trains stuck up in Iowa because of the flooding, so that was ok, we just pretended to be on the rails. We ended up in Sedalia, where we toured the Pettis County Historical Society Museum, saw Katy the black bear, named for the Katy Railroad, and had an interesting tour of their artifacts. Then on to the Sedalia Train Depot, an historical brick and limestone structure, which was lovingly restored to its original beauty. We toured that, and had a wonderful tea luncheon in the women's waiting room side of the depot. During our luncheon, we were treated by a Vintage Fashion Trunk Show, presented by Mrs. Carolyn Miller, a local Sedalia resident, who collects vintage clothing and accessories, and does professional shows with them. She talked about the history of clothing from Victorian times to the 70's, and shared stories of each era with us, which illuminated an interesting part of women in history, through their clothing.

Then we toured downtown Sedalia, and various local residents boarded our bus in costume and character, representing local professions and areas of town, such as the bordello district (yes, we had three of those lovely ladies on board), and of course the local mortician who measured our own mortician who is one of the Elderberries. This was a great trip back in time, and all the local residents did an excellent job recreating history for us. Got to do a little shopping and exploring the tea shops of the downtown, and then stopped at the Russell Stover store as we left the area--chocolate fixes for all!

We completed our trip with a fantastic dinner at the Settler's Inn by the Arrow Rock exit on I-70. If you are ever out that way, be sure to call them for reservations--their meals are excellent! Everyone left stuffed and ready for the last leg of the journey home.

MO travels--Part I

Even though the gas prices are way up there, we have been traveling a bit, just in our home state, and finding some interesting things to do and see. Went down to the Ozarks last week to do a "mom check", and help out a little bit at her house. While there we dashed into Branson, and discovered a really neat bead shop, just a little walk from Dick's 5 and Dime store, probably the most popular and reasonable tourist destination in Branson. I found some beautiful silver beads, and coral--yes I felt guilty buying the coral, but what can you do, when you want to merge turquoise, silver and coral in the same necklace? Anyway, now I have a new project to start with my purchase.

So on to the lake house, and watching nature. We sat on the deck and observed two lizards chasing each other up and down a tree for 45 minutes. I think he managed to capture her a few times during the chase, but we are only amateur lizard observers, so don't really know. Then as we departed, Ms. Foxy came out of her den in the culvert pipe to say goodbye and good riddance to Molly our dog, who chased her away from the compost pile every morning.

My Woodland Garden

I have been working on a woodland garden for the past 5 years. It actually began about 10 years ago, when my mom gave me a start of an heirloom mock orange bush, and said, here, it doesn't like these Ozark rocks. Why don't you try it up north? So I plunked it in the ground, on the south side of the house, but in dappled shade and sun kind of elements. It started growing, and then it started blooming in the late spring/early summer. So I guess I had to put some other stuff around it.

What began as a dog run for our chocolate labrador years ago, transformed into a jungle gym site and picnic table for the pool breaks, has now become a quiet spot to just set and relax on a bench (recycled from our front door patio), listen to the birds, and look at the flowers. I have lots of gifts from friends and family, to spice up the garden, along with purchased plants, like a butterfly bush. Periodically the black snake slithers through the garden, leaving his coat/skin on the wrought iron clematis trellis. He must like his back scratched with it. The garden gnome guards his domain and watches over it with his shovel in hand. I wonder what he thinks of Mr. Blacksnake?

More of Powell Gardens

The fountains and waterfalls are also beautiful, and lakes and footbridges make the trails interesting. Even on a hot day, the cool mist from the fountains and breezes off the waterfalls and lakes creates a haven of comfort from the heat.

Celebrating the first day of Summer

We decided to do a "walk-about" to kick off the arrival of summer, so took a little drive down to Powell Gardens, where the butterfly festival was going on, and Chapungu sculptures were in place for summer visitors. Every view was extraordinary, and a kodak moment. We saw butterflies, caterpillars, birds of all different varieties, Canadian geese aplenty, a few black snakes pretending to be tree branches (one really liked the wisteria for some reason), and lots of other gardeners or gardener wannabes on the trails. The sculptures were beautiful, and situated in perfect views with flowers and blooming shrubs and trees framing them. If you are in MO, you need to visit this place, KC's own botanical garden