"What's For Dinner" Is A Hit in Houston!

Jamie and I were so thrilled that everyone loved the "What's For Dinner" exhibit in Houston.

A reporter and photographer from the Houston Chronicle interviewed us on Sunday during Quilt Market and took numerous photos, several of which I will share here along with the link:

Here I am, posing with my piece, "Nourishment and Tradition"

Jamie poses with her "Four Food Groups"

I love this photo of us...

And, of course, we started cracking up!

The photos are the property of the Houston Chronicle. Click here for the article.

I have loads of photos from the exhibit but have not had time to add them to my computer.  I will add to this post very soon, but wanted everyone to see the article.  We were so thrilled!  Thanks to the Houston Chronicle for featuring this beautiful, fun exhibit.  No one enjoyed it more than we did!

Come See "What's For Dinner?"!

My friend and partner-in-crime, Jamie Fingal, and I have a long-running conversation about what we are cooking for dinner.  This lead to a cooking (and restaurant-appreciation) blog, and eventually Jamie began asking her Facebook followers, "What's For Dinner?".  Last fall, we discussed the idea of creating a unique quilt exhibition with this title.

This amazing pan was hand-painted by Desiree Habicht

and given to Jamie for her 60th birthday!

Each piece was created inside a 15"L by 24" W format, something about the size of a placemat (or a cafeteria tray).
We are very excited to debut this exhibit at the International Quilt Festival in Houston.  Jamie and I had a difficult challenge because there were so many wonderful submissions.  Please stop by and take a peek at this fun and creative exhibit at the festival, and I hope you will stop by the blog and let me know you saw it!
I gave my curator's piece a great deal of thought.  I like the idea that we eat for sustenance, but we also have a lot of traditions surrounding food that are handed down in families.  I have a ritual of making my grandmother's English Date Pudding and my late sister's recipe for Southwestern style dressing each year during the holidays.  There is something comforting about the creation of these dishes and remembering the women who taught me how to make them.
It was with these thoughts that I created my piece, called "Nourishment and Tradition".

I started out by making color laser copies of some of my mother and sister's old recipes.

I like that they have splatters on them.

I laminated the papers to a piece of silk organza with matte medium.

Once dry, the excess paper on the back of the recipes was removed.

Since my husband and I eat a great deal of fish it seems 

appropriate that I would have one on the plate.

And...I never pass up the chance to use a googly eye or two! 

We generally eat a lot of salad or some other type of greens.

I wanted them to be dimensional.

To make the flatware I used my own stainless and made drawings on gray silk

and thread painted the reflections.

The napkin is held in place with a few stitches.

The plate fabric, a piece of lovely Kaffe Fassett cloth, strongly resembles 

my Tracy Porter dishware.  It works!

Mona Lisa!

I keep finding things in my photo archives of the Houston Quilt Festival that I want to share with you.
In one of the exhibits there was an inverted likeness of the Mona Lisa created from spools of thread.
If you will recall, I posted images (twice, I think!) of the "Mondrian" likeness behind the front desk of the Hilton in the Fashion District, NYC.  This is similar, but with a twist:  when the viewer gazes at the image through the lens it is suddenly right-side-up and properly oriented to the original.
Check it out: