Cook Something Bold Day

Cook something Bold Day?  Sound’s interesting, doesn’t it?  This year Cook Something Bold Day is November 8^th. 

Now cooking something bold is really in the eye of the beholder or should I say the tastebuds of the beholder.  What is bold to one person might not be bold to another.  And what one would consider bold might be bland to someone else.

So what would you cook if you wanted to be bold?   Something spicy?  Something pungent?   Now it doesn’t necessary mean that you create something with disgusting ingredients intended to make people sick to their stomach.  Actually one description of the holiday suggested an original dish with new uses of herbs and garlic and maybe some hot pepper.

You want to make something that is edible but with a taste you have never tried before.  How about some Indian food or Mexican with lots of jalapenos?  If you are not one to do spicy food, how about using some vegetables you have never tried before like asparagus or an artichoke?  Or maybe trying cooking some fish, if you have never done that before.  Or just trying a new twist with an old recipe.

The fun part of this day is to use your creativity to determine what you consider bold.  So get out your cookbooks and look for something bold and tasty.

© 2018 Cheryl Fillion

Buying at a Market or Craft sale

 As I get ready to sell some of my creations at a local craft show, I thought about this post I published last year.  I thought I’d post it again for those of you getting ready to shop at local craft or holiday sales.

If the craft sale is big and you will be doing a lot of walking, forget fashion.  Dress comfortably.  And if the sale is in the summer, dress cool.  Remember to wear shoes meant for walking.

If you are going to be there a while especially in the summer, bring something to drink.  Make sure it has a cover on it, so it doesn’t spill on anyone.  And ask before you put a drink on a vendor table.  The last thing you want to do is have your sticky sweet drink spill all over a vendor’s product, especially product that cannot easily be cleaned like fiber or fabric. Remember this product is the livelihood of the artist.

Know that not all vendors will have credit card capacity, so if you are planning on buying something expensive or a lot of items, bring enough cash and maybe your checkbook (many vendors will accept checks if they cannot do credit or debit cards.). And remember to bring small bills.  Most vendors will have enough cash on hand to make change but if you hand them a $100 bill and you are purchasing something for $5 or $10 that could wipe out their available cash.

If you have children with you, watch out for little fingers.  Lots of things craft vendors sell are bright, shiny and colorful; so tempting for little eyes to see and little fingers to grab.  And this is too where you want to watch for sticky fingers.  One little boy at my craft booth thought the fleece fish toys (for cats) were nice.  So nice, he took every one of them out of the basket they were displayed in.  When his mother asked what he was doing, his answer: “Going fishing”.  His response was cute, even to me the vendor,  but not if he had chocolate ice cream all over his fishing fingers.

The same idea goes if you bring your dog to the market, watch them as well.  Small shiny colorful items can look like food to them.  One gulp and you are on your way to the emergency vet. And don’t blame the vendor; it is not their fault they are selling something attractive to your pet.  Also remember that not everyone loves your pet as much as you do.  You will find people, including vendors, who will avoid your dog’s friendliness.  Maybe they have had a bad encounter with a dog so they are afraid or maybe, and most importantly, they are allergic.  I like dogs and cats but get me near one and I start sneezing and wheezing.

Remember if buying at a craft market that you are not just buying the material in the craft or art work but the labor as well.  Yes, artists and craftspeople enjoy, even love, what they do but they are also trying to pay the bills.  You might be able to buy a similar item in a store but it will be machine manufactured not hand crafted.  I will admit I am biased when I say; hand crafted is much more valuable.

If you know how to do a particular craft, know that not all people do things the same way. Don’t consider a knitted shawl, for example, is inferior just because an artist uses a different stitch or yarn than what you would use. So in other words, don’t criticize the artist’s work.

Selling at a market isn’t easy for the vendor but it makes it worth it when you, the buyer, want something hand crafted and one of a kind. So if you get a chance, go shop at a market. And thank them for the work they do.

 

©2017 , 2018 Cheryl Fillion

 

What Would You Do If You Could Not Fail

There is a quote attributed to Dr. Robert Schuller (the late pastor and motivational speaker) that I have always loved: “What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?”  What would you do?  Well recently I decided to stretch a little and I took an art quilt class. 

I would not consider myself an abstract quilt or art type person.  I like quilts to look like a picture or a quilt block.  I have trouble with mixed media projects.  I do collages but there still seems to be a theme to my collages. With a lot of abstract art, I don’t see an image or a theme.

So when a quilt artist came to our quilt guild and taught a class, I decided to try it. What I really liked about her quilts is the use of embroidery in them.  Embroidery is what started my needle work history with a crewel embroidery kit of a squirrel at the age of 9 and embroidery seems to be where I am returning now some years later. 

I bought her book ahead of the class and was reading it for the third time by the time of the class took place.  Well the book and the class showed me there was no way to fail.  She gives you guidelines, not rules, not shoulds or shouldn’ts, not a step by step process.  And what she would ask us as she went around the room was: What is your thought here and Do YOU like it?  She would make suggestions and it was OK if you didn’t accept them.  It was your art quilt. 

She also started out small.  We worked on 6 inch art quilts not a big wall hanging.  So if you didn’t like what you were doing, you could easily start over. Or if you didn’t like the whole process, you didn’t feel like you were wasting a lot of fabric or money or time (always a concern for me).  And it was easier to envision the guidelines she gave on a smaller scale.

Sometimes you have to take a chance and try something new.  It is easier in a class and I think after this, easier if you start out small.  I wrote in my first blog to begin small.  You want to paint, paint one color.  You don’t have to start with a mural.  When I taught quilting, I started with a table matt.  I had a design that gave all the parts of a big quilt (a block, lattice strips, border, quilting and binding) but it was only 18 inches square. This way if you decided you didn’t like quilting, you weren’t committed to a king size quilt.

And while my opening quote asks “What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?”, it is OK  to try something and not like it afterward.  I tried embroidery on paper recently.  I love embroidery but to do it on card stock, you have to poke a lot of holes to prepare the cardstock for the embroidery.  That I decided was not for me.   But I don’t think of it as a failure, I tried something new and learned a little about me (I don’t like poking holes in card stock).  You have to try something to know if you like it and that in itself is a success.  You can’t succeed or learn something new if you don’t try.

So ask yourself this “What would YOU attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?” 

©2018 Cheryl E. Fillion