Art is Everywhere...

"Sam's Art For Sale...$5"

 It's been a busy Fall. The window frames inside Blam! and the trees outside are strung with lines to hang all sorts of artwork, marbled papers, paste papers... Students have been busy learning all sorts of book arts...

Romanesque Binding books...

Nag Hammadi Books...

Carousel Books...

Stiff Leaf books...with windows and pockets..

Coptic Books...and Belgian Binding books..

Books with weaving warps in the pages...

One page.. what should I weave in it???

Traditional Cord-bound and Sewn on Tapes books...

Marbling...Marbling... Marbling!

     At home, the family came together from near and far on a warm sunny day in mid October. As we cooked a Brunswick Stew in a big black iron pot over an open fire in the backyard we played flag football, roasted oysters on the extra coals, played dolls in the treehouse, sat in the fall sunshine and reminisced of the old folks who started the tradition 70 years ago... Here is an excerpt from the 'zine' I wrote that includes that story...and the recipe my mom gave me in 1977 for our family's version of Brunswick Stew.

The Brunswick Stew

Back in the 60’s my parents didn’t have a lot of extra money to entertain their many friends, so Mom & Dad began making a yearly Brunswick stew using the free vegetables Mom got from her parents’ farm in Caswell County. Mom would spend days doing the prep work for the stew: shelling butterbeans, steaming & pealing tomatoes, shucking and cutting corn off the cob, and precooking the beef & chicken. Then, in the early hours of the day of the party, Dad would start a fire in the backyard to have hot coals for cooking the stew. He’d dig a pit beside the wood fire and build a simple brick structure to set the big black iron pot and the charcoals he'd made in the big wood fire. As the day passed, he’d take turns feeding the charcoal fire under the pot with small sticks while stirring the stew simmering in the big black pot. This would take about 5 or 6 hours. Below is the recipe that Mom wrote for me in 1977. It has been changed over the years to reflect the tastes of the eaters or the availability of ingredients... as it also was done was during those early years. For me, this thick, tasty stew is full of the love of family and friends...

Bob Carver’s Brunswick Stew

Precook Meat: Boil, and skin, debone, & discard fat and gristle. 5-6 pounds chuck roast
5-6 pounds chicken
Vegetables:

15 pounds white potatoes: pealed (or not) and cubed 1 1/2 bushel butter beans (or 14 pounds): shelled
18-24 ears corn, cut off ear (or 4 qt. cans)
5 pounds onions, chopped

1/2 bushel tomatoes, chopped (or ten 32 oz cans)
5 pods hot pepper (remove before eating)
1 can pork & beans; 1 pound okra (optional)
*Add corn in the last hour. Use 3 parts tomatoes/potatoes to 1 part corn,butter beans,

Seasoning: 1 cup sugar
3/4 cup salt (too salty! reduce to 1/2 cup)

black pepper to taste (Taste for additional)

Cook in 10-12 gallon iron pot on charcoals until thick and done. Will take 4-6 hours cooking on VERY LOW fire with CONSTANT watching and stirring. Cool before eating (or not!)

Sammy stirs the stew.. almost done!

Lily says, "No Georgia, no oysters for you"