Farewell to Fall

The last day of November seemed to creep up on me this year. Maybe it was the election. Or Hurricane Sandy's winds that swept across Michigan. Or my art and photography classes in Arizona. Or a Thanksgiving celebration with family and friends that went by all too quickly.

The calendar says that we still have almost three weeks until the winter solstice, a day of reckoning for many cultures. Then comes Christmas and Hanukkah and the start of 2013. Remember when we all were wondering how to say "twenty-oh-whatever?" We got over that and are now well into the second decade of the century.

Grandson Finn showed me how to put several different colors onto a big rubber stamp of a leaf. Finn's art expertise is amazing. The leaves on today's image are my take on Finn's art lesson for his grandmother. We used a water brush and watercolors. Thanks for the lesson, Finn! I will learn a lot more from you in the days ahead.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Tabletop Raptor

Whoa! What's that on the patio table?

I had just finished emptying the SD card from my camera after a long morning walk. I took photos of trees and birds and mountains. I was feeling pretty pleased with the morning's photography session and then I happened to glance toward the back patio.

A raptor -- a fairly large raptor -- was sitting on the patio table. The bird stayed long enough for me to grab my camera and get some shots of it through the back door.

My guess is that the bird might have seen its reflection in the glass of the table and come looking for some raptor companionship.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Honey Crisp

Ed made a dish of apple crisp last weekend using two Honey Crisp apples from a Christmas box of apples that came from our friend Jim McCartney's accounting firm. Ed washed, cored, and sliced two of the lovely apples. He kept the peels on the apples.

He arranged the slices in the bottom of a small glass baking dish that had cooking spray on the bottom surface. Then he took equal parts of brown sugar, unbleached flour, oatmeal, and softened butter to make the topping. Use about a quarter to a third of a cup of each ingredient. Add a teaspoon (or a little more) of cinnamon and mix the topping well using a fork.

Ed spread the topping over the apple slices and baked the dish at 375 degrees for 20-25 minutes. He used the convection oven setting which lowers the temperature to 350 and circulates the air in the oven. Then he turned off the oven and tented the dish with aluminum foil.

The Honey Crisp stayed in the oven for another hour to an hour and a half before we removed it. We served the crisp, warm from the oven, with a cup of hot coffee.  It was a delicious combination -- the warm, fruity crisp with mellow apple flavor and the hot, tangy coffee.

This recipe makes four servings. Enjoy.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

White Giants

Ever since I started playing with black and white darkroom techniques I have been wanting to see what an image of wind turbines would look like with the "Ansel Look." Here's my first run through. I caught the turbines in sun on a somewhat hazey day.

The turbines stand as gigantic white columns, dominating the image with their starkly sculptural blades. 

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

First Snow

Sunday morning brought the first snow of the season to Cedar Bluff. The Adirondack chairs stay outside all winter so they become part of the setting for this portrayal of the fresh snow. 

I like the way that the arches of the chairs stand out against the backdrop of Lake Huron and White Rock Shoal. You can just see the ice that is already forming on the rocky shoal. This is truly a late November photo for the Great Lakes.

Here's another post from January 2011, much like this post.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Birthday, Birthday!

Max is the star of the birthday show for today. Here he is basking in the glow of candles and the warm wishes of his family. But just check out this next photo.

His Mom made an incredible chocolate layer cake and his aunt made sweetened whipped cream. It was birthday heaven for all of us. Somebody fixed a pot of strong coffee. It was a perfect moment of food and family. Mmmmm, seventh heaven for his foodie grandma who writes this blog.

Happy Birthday, Max!

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Thanksgiving Sweetie

Baby Val was a very happy camper on Thanksgiving. She had just finished her sweet potatoes and was giving her Daddy the very best of her smiles. Grandma WJ just happened to catch one of those smiles in this photo of little Vallanee Rose. It's a gem of a smile on a little sweetie's first Thanksgiving Day.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

IPhone Kids

The cousins all wanted to hold Baby Val on Thanksgiving night. It was a cute sight -- kid upon kid with the resident IPhones all trained on the foursome.

That's Hannah with Kaleigh Clark and Finny. Kaleigh is clutching Vallanee who is not too sure about all the cameras and all the commotion.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Thanksgiving Week Daffodils

The Daffodil Planters Extraordinaire showed up at high noon on the Wednesday of Thanksgiving Week to plant Ed's 65th birthday daffodils. Armed with spades, shovels, kneeling pads, gloves, and willing spirits, the crew finished the job in a quick half hour, planting 41 clumps with about 260 bulbs.

Spellbinder bulbs from Landreth Seed Company in New Freedom, PA

Back in April, Bill Esch and I planned a company-wide 65th birthday party for Ed that included a card shower, a cake in the shape of an old fashioned crank telephone, and a request for a buck or two from everybody so we could plant daffodils along the Museum Walk in downtown Pigeon. The employees honored Ed with a generous amount of money -- for the daffodils, and some more that will go toward irrigation lines to keep the roses and daylilies and other plantings watered in the dry months of summer.

I order the daffodils bulbs (botanically, a daffodil is a narcissus) from Landreth Seed Company out east. That's their box on the lawn along the Museum walk. Come next April, the split rail fence and paver walk that leads to Pigeon's Musum Complex should be a show place of yellow daffodils.

 

 

Photos by Kathy Kent and Wanda Eichler

 

Copyright 2012

Wanda Hayes Eichler

The New Normal

On the day before Thanksgiving, here in Huron County, a gentle fog blanketed the countryside with layers of cloudy white. Trees and buildings faded into the soft distance. The sun tried to burn through the dampness of the morning.

By noon, blue skies dominated the day and the temperature rose almost to 60. It is a day very unlike the often wintry late November days of years gone by.

NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) tells us that October of 2012 was the 332nd consecutive month of above average temperatures. That means that if you are 27 years old or younger, you have never experienced a month that was colder that average.

Weather like today's foggy November morning is the new normal.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Pleasant Shapes

A very large and heavy vase graces the entrance to our desert home. Made of metal, the vase was used to hold silk plants and now stands as a sentinel at the front door.

I like the shapes in this photo -- the shadows, the curves of the vase. The texture of the stucco wall sets off the dramatically dark vase. This photo, kind of artsy-fartsy, was taken in morning light using my Sony Cybershot point-and-shoot camera. I took the image into my "darkroom" (really, I'm using Photoshop with some add-on's) and this is the result.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Bald Eagle Skull

During the second day of the "Ansel Look" black and white photography class at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum, instructor Stephen Buchmann showed several of us how to photograph using a mirror as a surface. Another student, Tim, who was using a Minolta system got great results with a tripod and the Minolta equipment. I watched for a while but didn't want to interrupt his work flow.

"Oh just try one," Tim said as he held the auxiliary LED lights and gave me advice on where to shoot using my hand held Nikon SLR camera. The subject at that time was the skull of a bald eagle.

The above photo is my result from that one shot. I did not use a tripod and I did not plan the shot. I listened to the coaching of a fellow student and benefited from the expertise of an instructor who knew the mirror techniques.

I took this shot into my "darkroom" and here is the result of a half hour or so of work. This image of the bald eagle skull helps one to understand the power of the hooked beak in this bird of prey.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

New Eyes: The Ansel Look

Tucson Mountains - February 2012 -- by Wanda Hayes Eicler

Second Post in the New Eyes Series

The new eyes that I'm finding in art and photography classes at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum ushered me into a black and white mode this week. I'm taking Stephen Buchmann's "The Ansel Look" photography class and learning how to convert my color images into black and white.

Photography feels like a far cry from my usual quilt and knitting design work, yet the technicality involved in photography echoes the precision that is employed in needlework. Ansel Adams used rich blacks and bright whites in his iconic images of National Parks and the High Sierra. Those contrasts were a result of his incredible eye and his darkroom techniques. I'm learning new ways of producing similar black and white images in digital photography, both in the camera and today's darkroom, the computer.

A quote from Ansel Adams that instructor Steve Buchmann (a fine photographer and an entomologist at the University of Arizona) shared with the class is this: "A good photograph is knowing where to stand." Steve showed us a photo of Ansel Adams standing on his woodie station wagon with camera and tripod, photographing from on top of the vehicle. Here's a sketch of that photo, taken from my daily art journal.

My new eyes are seeing new contrasts in black and white. That's good. That's what classes are for -- learning new ways of seeing.

First Post in the New Eyes Series

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Arizona Hummer

So tiny, this Arizona hummingbird, probably a juvenile Anna's hummingbird, posed for me one day this week. Fluffy and fragile, the little bird looks confidently toward the camera.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Artistic License

Ed and I were very focused on our pizzas at suppertime last night. Seated on the terrace of the restaurant, with a spectacular view of sunset over Tucson and the mountains beyond, we became aware of the conversations among ten or so people at the table next to us.

"Sounds like Dems, " I said to Ed as we both could not help but overhear the support for President Obama and the ongoing analysis of the day's political happenings.

We got up to leave, and being a child of Stan (my Dad has always loved talking to people, whether he knows them or not. Right, Dad?), I stopped by their table and said, "Hey, you guys sound like Dems."

Well, they were Democrats and it turned out that the local Democratic club was meeting that night, right there, and that the guest speaker was David Fitzsimmons, editorial cartoonist for the Arizona Daily Star whose work is syndicated in over 700 publications worldwide.

We showed up at the Dem meeting, enjoyed David's talk, complete with cartooning, and got to meet David. We also turned out to be the 99th and 100th persons to join that group of Democrats and David took advantage of that notoriety and called us up front for some fun cartooning.

Here's the cartoon that David drew of us. Yes, he did use a jungle theme for the drawing. Not my fault since David has artistic license. Make that Democratic artistic license!

Thank you to David for the drawing and to Karen Wiley for her photography skills.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Birthday Kid

So, this is a photo of my Kindle Fire that shows the credits for the NBC show, "Chicago Fire," that is on network television on Wednesday nights. Look closely and you will see that Will Eichler is the B camera operator on this show. Yep, that's my kid!

Today is Will's birthday and, of course, he will be working in Chicago, filming another episode of the show. Happy birthday, Will! Today you are my birthday kid (and a darn good camera op, if I don't say so myself).

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Green Val Block

I'm not getting out to golf this November here in Arizona, but the Arizona Val quilt blocks are starting to pile up. Here's one of the latest, all done in various green fabrics with the diagonals (those are Thangles, remember?) being a deep chocolate brown or a rich rusty red.

I need twenty five of these blocks for the quilt that I am making. So I'm cutting strips and making Thangles and running from the sewing machine to the ironing board.

Dad will find this pretty amusing, since he's been used to having the women around him sewing all of his life. Right, Dad?


Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Young Owl

An owl flew during the Raptor Free Flight at the Desert Museum on Sunday afternoon. So did four Harris hawks, another hawk (whose nomenclature I have forgotten) and a Peregrine falcon. The birds fly right over the heads of the crowd.

Staffers move about in the desert from perch to perch, bidding and calling the birds by bait and by motion. You are cautioned not to hold a camera above your head, or your hand. These birds have learned to fly on command and a raised hand will call them.

It's a pretty incredible experience to see birds this close. The owl's feathers are highlighted by the sun that is coming from behind this creature. What a beautiful bird!

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Pint Jar Mania

I'm a big fan of wide mouth pint jars. They wash up faster than zip top freezer bags. The glass is clear so you can see what's inside. The wide mouth makes putting food in and taking it out easier than with a regular mouth jar.

This morning I turned the oven on to 350 degrees and got out a 9 inch round cake pan. I stacked thin slices of french bread that had a dab of butter and some garlic seasoning on each one. I know, I should have used olive oil. The butter was right on the counter and I didn't think twice.

I toasted the bread for about ten minutes and then put in a pan of coconut for about the same time. I had to watch the coconut since it darkened (toasted) very quickly and needed to be fluffed and stirred with a fork.

The garlic toasts (and yes, that butter does taste good) get topped with a slice of Havarti cheese and make a great snack or appetizer. The toasted coconut will top a salad or a bowl of cereal.

Eat good food!

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

New Eyes: Pinecone Mug

The actual pinecone mug

"We need new eyes for seeing, new hands for holding on. . ."

 

 

I'm taking an art class. The class is named "Pencil I." My grandson Max said to me, "Grandma, does that mean you can take Pencil II when you get done with this class?" Smart kid. Probably much smarter than his sixty-four-year-old grandmother who is learning to see with new eyes. 

 

"I can teach anyone to draw," instructor Catherine Nash told us right at the beginning of the first class last Thursday. "Drawing is a language, and observing and drawing in real time can be very meditative," she added as she introduced the class to the basics of setting a plumb line and seeing the triangles that develop between the straight lines and an object. Catherine uses words from science and math like "apex" and "constellation" and "triangulation" as she teaches drawing. 

 

Observing in real time. Meditation. Drawing. These are all skills that can be learned. I wouldn't have come from Michigan to Arizona to take the basic class if I hadn't believed what she was saying to be true. I knew that I was in the right place and was ready to learn. Call me a motivated adult learner. That I am, indeed.

 

I'm going to try to write a few blog posts that I'm calling "New Eyes." These posts will attempt to capture some of the learnings (are they "new" learnings? Or is that redundant? Aren't all learnings new?) that are flowing to my brain. The phrase "new eyes" comes from the lyrics to "Help Us Accept Each Other," a hymn that is a favorite of mine. "We need new eyes for seeing, new hands for holding on," is what the poet wrote.

 

Pinecone mug on Tuesday, before first class

For the first example, let's look at my morning mug of coffee on Tuesday. I usually pick up my pen and draw my first cup of coffee. That drawing helps to anchor my day. I record the temperature, times of sunrise and sunset, and write the date on the same page of my art journal. The Tuesday mug is representational. All drawings are, but on Tuesday I did not see or know about plumb lines that can frame an object. Plumb lines help one see shape differently.

 

Pinecone mug on Sunday, after first class

 

Now here's this morning's mug with two plumb lines drawn. Already I'm seeing a difference in my sketching. The line of the handle feels more accurate. The flow of the lines that create the sides of the mug are starting to change, maybe for the better.

 

The new eyes are starting to kick in. Things look different to me and that is an exciting way to view the world each day, even if the view is of a simple coffee mug.

 

Copyright 2012

Wanda Hayes Eichler

 



Mountains and Clouds

It is a dramatic partnership, that of mountains and clouds. Add a low pressure cold front and the drama is heightened. The clouds are titanium white on top, grayish black underneath. Mountaintops lie hidden. Above, the blue sky fills in the picture, like some sort of eternal backdrop that is undisturbed by the turmoil of weather.

Shadows creep across roadways and crawling over mountains. Those evening shadows, dark gray shapes that bring night to the desert, are captured in this image, taken about an hour before sunset north of Tucson yesterday.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Grumpy, the Hawk

Walking out of the education area at Tucson's Arizona Sonora Desert Museum, I got to meet Grumpy, one of the many birds of prey featured at the Museum. His docent identified him as a Harris hawk and said that Grumpy is one of the original raptors at the museum.

The Raptor Free Flight is a popular program at the museum. Several raptors perform their flight patterns right over the heads of admiring humans. The trained raptors also greet museum goers at various spots and times throughout the grounds

It was a thrill to get this close to this magnificient creature yesterday. My art class (I'm taking Pencil I at the Art Institute) went well, lunch at the grill was great, and meeting Grumpy capped off an exciting day.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Crispy Critters

This collection of critters, mostly insects, got caught on the sticky board inside the garage. That big one looks to be a gecko. I really didn't want to do a much closer analysis.

I'm just glad that sticky boards, designed to trap scorpions and used instead of chemicals, stop these critters from getting inside homes in the desert.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Red Chair, Blue Chair

Just outside the front door of Graywood West is where the red chair and blue chair brighten the east patio. The walls of the courtyard are painted with the same soft taupe that our house is painted. As a matter of fact, every house in the development is painted with the grays and greens and taupe of the desert. So there isn't a lot of color.

The courtyard needed some eye popping color. The little Ikea chairs with their turquoise pots of agave bring a welcome change to the constancy of the gray green desert landscape.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Election Day Thangles

I've been at my sewing machine this Election Day. I voted absentee last week; made my contributions; put up signs.

I'm keeping up with Twitter today, doing my Proposal 3 support for renewable energy. I've said my prayers and will say them again.

I guess I'm like a lot of people today, wondering if I could have done more to help get out the word and get out the vote. Like all things that we believe in, we always wish we could have done more.

So, I'm sewing Thangles for a big block quilt that is a big deal. I'm working on 100 little blocks that will go together to make 25 big blocks. Each little block requires that I make four Thangles. Doing the arithmetic means that I will be sewing 400 Thangles (and maybe more) before this quilt is done.

And, as I sew, I'm hoping for a good election -- one that gives us stability and continuity. One that turns the corners that are necessary, but stays the course where we need it. Like my big block quilt, there are a lot of little pieces coming together today.

And tomorrow, there will be more blocks to sew, more pieces to figure out. Seems like quilting and democracy have a lot in common.

Anyway, that's what I think today.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Harry Truman's Voting Advice

Go to the polls tomorrow and vote your convictions

 -- your hopes -- and your faith in the future.

 If you do that, under God, we can lead the world to freedom and security.

Harry Truman

November 1, 1948

These are words that Harry Truman wrote for his last speech of the 1948 campaign. Truman prepared his remarks for a radio speech to be given on the night before the election. Campaigning was done and he had returned home to Independence, Missouri.

His handwritten notes were transcribed, the speech typed up, and the president must have tossed the notes into a wastebasket. A White House reporter retrieved the notes and, after some years, Harry Truman's discarded speech has ended up at the Truman Library.

I happened upon Mr. Truman's speech when I was doing some reading on the Truman Library's website. I was born in February of 1948, so I would have been almost nine months old at the time of the election. My mom and dad lived in Appleton, Wisconsin where my Dad was serving three small churches and finishing his undergraduate degree at Oshkosh. I have always been interested in the events of 1948, the year of my birth.

My parents, born in the 1920's on dairy farms in eastern Wisconsin, had already experienced the Great Depression and World War II. My older sister came along in 1946 followed by me in 1948. We were born touching the post war years -- baby boomers, we would come to be called -- to parents who knew only FDR as president for most of their years as teenagers and twentysomes.

Truman's election in 1948 was pivotal. His administration would carry out the integration of the armed forces. He would keep the social contract that FDR and many others forged to bring the country out of economic disaster. It is Truman's presidency that spanned the years when manufacturing turned from warplanes and tanks, to cars and refrigerators.

But on that election eve in 1948, Harry Truman's words rang with commitment. In his handwriting, you can even glean a bit of nostalgia, maybe even homesickness, as he arrived home and gave that final speech. Thomas Dewey was seen as the favorite. Harry Truman had come home to vote.

His discarded words, retrieved from history's wastebasket, stand for tomorrow's election. Vote your convictions, your hopes, your faith. Things will work out.

It's good advice.

Copyright 2012

Wanda Hayes Eichler



I See You On TV

There were two very familiar figures watching the Michigan State football game from the side lines yesterday. Daughter Liesl, wearing her prized band jacket, is framed in the gray oval with John Schwarz, Spartan Marching Band visual assistant.

Both Liesl and Schwarz (we call him by his last name) are band alumni; both played trumpet during their band years. That's MSU's quarterback, Andrew Maxwell, on the field. State lost a heartbreaker to Nebraska in the last seconds of the game which was broadcast nationwide on ESPN2.

So, today's blog post is "I C U on TV." Got it? And yes, I did have to rewind the DVR and pause it to get this shot.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Just Scrappy

It's a favorite of mine, this scrappy quilt. It uses light and dark fabrics in a sixteen patch block that really mixes things up.

The lights and the darks meet in diagonal lines that cross the quilt and make the primary pattern that moves in a straight line through the blocks.

Maybe a quilt like this gives hope to the partisan nature of this fall election. Two opposing sides, with scads of equal pieces, arranged strategically, crossing and completing each other.

We could hope for such a patchwork pattern that works in our national dialogue.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

One Vote

I voted my absentee ballot yesterday. Sitting at my grandmother's dining table in our farmhouse, I finished marking all of the arrows that indicate my choices. Then I followed the directions for refolding and repackaging and mailed the ballot.

In Michigan you can vote absentee if you are over 60 years of age without claiming a hardship, such as being out of town on election day, or inability to get to the polls. Because I have been in Houston for quilt market over election day I've been voting absentee for several years.

I miss the feeling of participation that comes when you show up at a polling place, claim your ballot, and vote. What I do appreciate about early voting is the time spent alone with just me and the ballot. I find that I am more focused. There isn't another voter waiting for a place, so the pressure is off to hurry through the process and be done.

It's an incredible responsibility and a right that I treasure as a citizen. My choices along with the choices of millions of Americans will determine how we govern each other in the days and years ahead.

After all the ads are over, all the mailers have been mailed, all the arguments have been made, it's just one voter and one ballot. That's what counts. One vote. Each and every one vote.

Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler

Howell Halloween

Hannah, Matthew (Max's preschool friend) and Griffin ham it up for the camera

Six households of Matas and and Weilers and Eichlers and Clarks were represented at the crock pot Halloween held at Liesl and John's place in Howell last night. Lined up in the kitchen were pots of chili, potato mushroom soup and mac 'n' cheese. Veggies and fruit, fresh bread, chips, crackers, and salsa completed the menu.

The kids had little interest in food, but they ate heartily (now, that is a conundrum -- no interest in food and hearty eating!) both before and after tromping about the neighborhood on their trick and treat adventures. I did not spot a single child feasting on candy. There was too much good food to eat, prepared by three smart mothers of young children.

Grandma Linda and Clay ponder Vallee's next move

Half of the adults accompanied the trick-or-treaters. The rest of us were on door duty (handing out candy), kitchen duty (making coffee, serving chili), or on baby duty with Miss Vallanee. Clay got feeding duty. Val promptly showered him with whatever it was that she was eating. "Got another napkin?" was Clay's cry as he shoveled spoon after spoon of food into the small eating machine.

Mosby the Travelling Dog enjoyed all the comings and goings of the humans around him. He kept trying to get out the front door and finally stood watch as trick-or-treaters ascended the porch steps to receive their candy repasts.

Funky CSA squashes and pumpkins on the dining table

 

An assortment of funky squash, curly gourds and little pumpkins decorated the dining table. Low votive candles tucked in among the assorted squashes added a soft glow. Liesl and John belong to a CSA that raised most of the interesting and edible decorations.

 

Liesl's text to me this morning captures our delight at being in Howell last night. "Thanks for driving down," her text says. "Finn told me he was happy to raise his hand in school that he would see his grandparents today."

 

And, yes Finny, your grandparents are very happy to have spent Halloween with you and your brother and your cousins and your friends. We love being a part of Howell Halloween.

 

Copyright 2012

Wanda Hayes Eichler