Judy – Page 11 – Dear Liza

Happy, Tasty Thanksgiving!

Dear Liza,

Our Thanksgiving was busy and full of food and family.

It started quietly, with Auntie Bridgett and I watching the Macy’s Parade. We enjoy the floats, musical numbers, and the marching bands. But the special thing about the Macy’s parade is the giant balloons. This one, being a minion, is particularly adorable.

We got the appetizers set out for when Auntie Katie, the cousins, and Douglas came over. It’s it a pretty spread?

Once the company arrived, we chatted, and then the ukuleles came out. Katie and Douglas practice a lot, and they sing well together. Cousin Jasper brought his drumsticks and played a nice accompaniment on Kestrel’s heavy leather purse.

Once the dinner was ready (thanks to Bridgett’s good help!) we all settled down and ate ourselves silly. Of course, we kept an eye on the desserts waiting for us!

But first, a walk. Grandpa Nelson was worn out, but the rest of us layered up and made a pleasant round of Laurelhurst Park.The sun was going down as we visited with the ducks and wished them a happy turkey day. They were not amused….

Back to the house for dessert! Auntie Katie had brought a pumpkin and apple pie and tiny breads shaped like turkeys. These, along with the pinwheels and mince tarts I made, filled us right up to the top.

In fact, we all realized that if we sat down, we’d all fall asleep! And since Katie had work to do at her bookshop to get ready for Black Friday’s big sale, we all said goodnight, packed up the leftovers to share, and sent them on their way.
Happy Thanksgiving!!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Gearing Up for Thanksgiving

Dear Liza,

I remember my Momma, your great grandma Billie, making wonderful Thanksgiving feasts for family and friends. It seemed to me that it all happened effortlessly, but I was a pretty clueless child. I now realize how many shopping trips and hours of preparation went into those feasts.

It has taken me many years to realize that as delicious as the feasts were, it was not just the food that made them special. It was the being together and the feeling of being completely surrounded by fun and love. And cousins…. Lots and lots of cousins.

And I love Great Grandma Billie’s turkey platter more than I love roasting the turkey that goes on it!

I have figured out that a giant bird on the table is a Norman Rockwell image, not my ideal dinner.

So my Thanksgiving dinner this year, though still special, looks different than my Momma’s. I will making turkey, but just the thighs, because that’s the part we like, and the proteins will include bratwurst sausage for Kestrel and roasted tofu for Douglas. I have mixed sweet apple-y mincemeat and gluten free walnut shelled tarts for Auntie Bridgett as well as pinwheel cookies for Grandpa Nelson.

Auntie Katie has promised bread (she and Cousin Kestrel do a fabulous job!) and pies.

One thing I am following Momma in, though, is advance prep. One small chore a day in the week before Thanksgiving makes that day a lot more pleasant. I started Sunday with the cranberry sauce, so the flavors will be all melded together. Monday, the pinwheel dough got mixed up, rolled, and frozen. And today I make the mincemeat and walnut tart shells.

Slowly, slowly, catchy holiday.

Love,

Grandma Judy

The Beauty of Ginkgos

Dear Liza,

Fall just keeps falling! Our local ginkgo trees have been blindingly yellow for about a week, and are now dropping their leaves.

Just up the street, a young ginkgo in the parkway has carpeted the sidewalk, grass and half the road with brilliant yellow.

The strong winds make for some odd landing sites for the leaves.

This nearby cactus has a bit of haunting decoration….Ouch!

And in Laurelhurst Park, we get a double treat as the tall old ginkgo is reflected in Firwood Lake. Enjoy the color while you can!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Keeping Things Straight, Sort Of

Dear Liza,

I am finally getting to the middle part of my French map quilt, and it is a challenge.

First, the iron-on adhesive that I used to stick the purple Massif Central to the green plains makes embroidering a real chore. Instead of sewing easily along, I am having to stab each stitch through, and it is tiring!

Also, I have realized that the “rows” in the west don’t line up with those in the east. They are a bit wonky, which is fine, but how could I make them look good together? I don’t want to see it out of whack every time I look at it.

So I decided to baste some swoopy lines from east to west, to help me join the two sides in a cohesive manner. These took a few days to do, because of the thick fabric, but I think they will be worth the effort.

I’ve got a chunk of it done, and I like it so far.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Jay Ringer at The Foxtrot Lounge

Dear Liza,

It was rainy and chilly Sunday, but the new Foxtrot Lounge was open for coffee, tea, sandwiches and music, so Auntie Bridgett and I bundled up and walked over.

There wasn’t a big crowd, because even in Portland most folks will stay home a cold, wet Sunday.

We ordered some hibiscus tea, found a table on the patio by a heater, and listened to the music, a wonderfully sweet, nostalgic sound.

Once I had warmed up with a cup of tea and the music had stopped for bit, I headed over to the gazebo across the yard to see who was making it. I met Jay Ringer, a talented and soft-spoken fellow. He plays the pocket trumpet, melodian, and electric keyboard and sings, all very well. His playlist includes The Beatles, Donovan, Jim Croce, and standards from the 1940s to the 1980s, music I grew up with and have grown old to.

Foxtrot Lounge
Jay Ringer
Musicians in Portland
Cafes in Sunnyside
New businesses in SE Portland

We enjoyed looking at the decorative panels and fountains, oriental but not stuffy, exotic but not spooky, just the right quirky vibe for our part of town.

I know we will spend many happy hours at Foxtrot.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Ruthie’s Leaves

Dear Liza,

My buddy Ruthie Inman has been busy starting up a new art gallery in Peoria, Illinois, called Artful Journey, so we haven’t had our online class in a while.

So when we got together last week, we had a wonderful catch -up as well as an art project together. Ruthie had asked us to collect, trace, and cut out some lovely leaves to start.

Then we traced the shapes, overlapping them a bit. Ruthie directed us to decide which leaves would be the top layer, and watercolor them a light yellow.

To show the other layers of leaves, we gradually got darker as we went.

I wasn’t totally happy with my brush strokes, since I was using the wrong brush. In the months since we’ve done any watercolor, I have misplaced my soft brushes! Still, I pushed through.

Once it was done and dry, I realized I needed some stronger colors and more delicate lines… and maybe some nice hard outlines. Fortunately, that is always an option. But first, lunch!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Colors Close to Home

Dear Liza,

It’s been very cold for a few days, and today I just didn’t feel like venturing very far from home.

Fortunately, there are plenty of lovely colors right outside our door! The leaves, before they turn to mush, what we call “ leaf jam”, make a mighty pretty carpet.

Our gardeners blew tons of leaves onto the parkway, where they just sit and look great.

And, looking carefully, I caught this perfect leaf perched in a bush. How can we mourn for summer when we have this beauty?

Love,

Grandma Judy

Election Coping Journal

Dear Liza,

Leading up to the second election of Donald Trump, I was feeling anxious. What would a second Trump term mean for the country? Our foreign policy? Our civil rights? How would we viewed by the rest of the world?

As always, I turned to “making stuff” to cope. I chose this tiny 1948 atlas, which Auntie Bridgett had found in a teeny free library when we first moved to Portland. Now, I saw it as a place to put my anxiety about the.world’s future.

I dug into my collage words box and in an old “French phrase a day” calendar, found just what I needed.

“It’s discouraging.” “You’d think it’s a cult.” “We could go someplace else.” Yes, maybe we could.

I tried to stay in the same color family as the atlas itself, stenciling and stamping, as I created images that expressed my anxiety.

But after a few days of cutting, pasting and realizing who our new President was, I realized that my ‘coping’ mechanism was making me feel worse, by focusing on the awful helplessness. I was in fight or flight mode, and because of family obligations here, we can’t “fly” at the moment. So I needed to think about what I could do to fight, here and now. Again, I found phrases to express myself.

“Calm yourself.” “Don’t cry”.

Of course, the words alone won’t fix anything. I need to, as Mr. Rogers advised, look for the helpers. I can engage with local charities and national groups like the ACLU to make a positive difference in the lives of people who will feel the brunt of Mr. Trump’s announced plans.

And realizing I can do that has been very good for my mental health.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Rainy Afternoon

Dear Liza,

We have a lot of rainy days in our forecast, so we have decided to just go for walks, knowing we are going to get wet. The grey cloudy light makes the pictures darker than usual, so they look almost magical.

We walked around the park, amazed at the carpet of leaves and the thousands yet to fall. The giant ginkgo tree stays yellow for a week or so, and will drop all its leaves almost overnight.

It was so dark at 1 o’clock in the afternoon that the park lights had come on.

Bridgett got very engrossed in looking at a pair of squirrels chasing each other around the trees. I’m not sure if they were fighting or flirting, but they were so busy they didn’t even notice us.

This tall oak will hold onto its fall leaves for months, until it is ready to spout the green leaves of spring.

Knowing that spring is many long wet months away, I may need to carry the sunshine inside me.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Downtown to the Sixties

Dear Liza,

My buddy Cynthia and I headed downtown last week to our Portland Art Museum. The remodeling work is still going on, so floor space is limited, but what they have on display is really interesting.

Upstairs, there is a collection called Psychedelic. Mostly, these are posters for rock concerts in San Francisco in the mid to late 1960s, when I was too young to go to rock concerts. Still, I knew the posters were cool even then.

Groups like The Byrds, Moby Grape and The Jefferson Airplane gave concerts at the Filmore Theater, and posters like these made sure everyone knew this was The Happening Place. We enjoyed the incredible colors, and wondered how they would react under black light.

There were also mannequins with fashions from the era standing about. Mini skirts in metallics and wild colors took me right back my days as a wanting-to-be-cool pre-teen.

Downstairs was a collection of photos taken by a very young Paul McCartney when the Beatles were on their first tour of America.

Since I was all of eight years old, I remember the mood of the time very well. Any news about the group was BIG news, and their music was in all of our ears.

Considering the frenzied energy that went wherever the Beatles did, Paul’s photos capture a more playful, relaxed mood.

Cynthia and I chatted about all sorts of things (as we always do), as we looked and remembered our own 60s journeys.

And when our tummies were empty and our feet were tired, we headed past a leafy church for lunch at McMenamin’s.

Days out with friends are good for the soul.

Love,

Grandma Judy