Beth Durham's Blog, page 11

Repair Chronicle Week 3 New Week New Problems

Appliqued Cat quilt hiding behind simple Nine Patch Top

When I undertook to blog on the process of repairing a vintage quilt, I forgot how SLOWLY I quilt!  Still I stitch on.

Right now it’s all about quilting this new top onto the existing top, batting (with some repl...

Repair Chronicle Week 3: New Week New Challenges

Appliqued Cat quilt hiding behind simple Nine Patch Top

When I undertook to blog on the process of repairing a vintage quilt, I forgot how SLOWLY I quilt!  Still I stitch on.

Right now it’s all about quilting this new top onto the existing top, batting (with some repl...

Quilt Repair Chronicle Week 2 Patches On

I’m slow.  Summer is a bad time to make a quilt.  There are lots of distractions… Okay there are LOTS OF EXCUSES!  I’m thinking my Grandma could’ve had this quilt repaired in a day, maybe two if there was other stuff going on.  And here I am wrapping up week two and I’ve not made much of a showing on it. 

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Quilt Repair Chronicle Week 2: Patches On

I’m slow.  Summer is a bad time to make a quilt.  There are lots of distractions… Okay there are LOTS OF EXCUSES!  I’m thinking my Grandma could’ve had this quilt repaired in a day, maybe two if there was other stuff going on.  And here I am wrapping up week two and I’ve...

Quilt Repair Chronicle Week 1

Please recall from last week’s article that I’m undertaking to repair a nearly 70 year old quilt.  As with most of my projects, I have WAY underestimated the scope of this repair.  I find myself wondering what my grandmothers would’ve done if faced with this.  I doubt the...

New Life for Old Covers

A couple of times I’ve written a little about quilts and quilting.  While I learned to quilt at my grandmothers’ knees, I make no claim of expertise.  In fact, I have a dear friend who is in fact an expert at the craft and she’d probably tell you I know nothing about real quilting.  I wouldn’t argue with her.

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The Rural Poor Always Manage - Somehow

A few years ago I heard a news interview with a lady from Alabama who had taken a job in Washington, D.C.  She secured lodging outside the city and talked about the poverty she saw as she drove in each morning.  One comment she made really stuck with me, and came to mind as Ive been preparing my next book.  I cant exactly quote her (and dont remember her name to site that quotation anyway) but she said out in the country, poor people always find a way to survive.

On the mountain, we often...

Thinkin’ About the old Lands

Way back in 2013 I shared a little poem here that I wrote about the land, the old home places, and the mountain ghost towns.  Now, as I sit here trying to pull together a myriad of thoughts about land on the Cumberland Plateau, those words come back to me.

There is a place I love to go, where mountains roll and wildflowers grow

              This land is but my living dream, of the past to which I cling

Its stories told, a history wrote

              Tis a balm to the soul where none is old and...

Close to the Land

This week the nation of Israel commemorated 72 years of independence.  They declared their independence on May 14, 1948 according to our 12-month Gregorian calendar; however Israel schedules on the 13-month Hebrew calendar.

So maybe youre thinking, Israel is a long, long way from Tennessees Cumberland Plateau and what would a mountain girl know about it anyway.  Well, youre right of course, but Ive got friends and more importantly, Ive got a Bible.

Really, Ive been thinking about land and...

A Good Place for Green Beans

Its spring and Im wanting to plant things, loving seeing the green trees and getting ambitious.  This often happens to me in the spring and I sometimes bite off more than I can chew.

Weve been working hard to clean up a field we let get to close to overgrown and now with some dead trees down and scrub brush cut back, I suggested to my husband, We could do something with this.  Why, we could grow a crop of green beans here!

Of course for a girl raised in the bean field, thats the first thing...