I got the fever to make xmas crafts right after Thanksgiving as usual. As there is now an empty nest and no little hands to engage in the work, it had to be something that did not require an assembly line or extensive cleanup and could be done after work as part of my relax mode. This ruled out projects involving glitter and clay. Since I like the feel of wool in my hands, I settled on pom-poms. You can make pom-poms very easily using cut-out circles of cardboard, which was what I was planning to do. However, when I walked into Downtown Yarns, my local yarn store in the City of Alphabet (otherwise known as Loisaida), they showed me the Lamborghini of pom-pom makers made by Clover. “Ok”, I said, “I’ll take that too” and I was in the 21st century of pom-pom making. It was a relaxing and satisfying project that I engaged in mindlessly, twirling the soft yarn, as I was riveted to the TV watching the last episodes of “24” on Netflix.
Clover pom-pom maker
Since I’m an xmas ornament hoarder, and have plenty of decorations, I decided to make this as a gift. My dear friend Maria Victoria has a lovely house in the country where she spends the holidays that she needs to fill up. Some red and green pom-poms strung around will look nice there.
the view from Maria Victoria’s deck
I used Lamb’s Pride yarn. 2 skeins yielded about 50 pom-poms
You can walk down a street in New York for years and be familiar with every bump in the sidewalk, when all of the sudden, you will glance up and spot an elaborate cornice on a building that you pass by every day. A little piece of something that you’ve never ever seen before and you will be enchanted by its beauty.
I’ve been taking photos with my phone of doorways in Loisaida and this will be the first post of an ongoing series because the doorways change. Graffiti comes and graffiti goes. People are big on the embelishment of doorways in this neighborhood. Like the storefront gate murals, many doorways are a canvas.
One week and one day after Hurricane Sandy, I opened the door to my neighborhood health food store. The smell of tea, herbal things and good salt hits my nose like a balmy punch. As I look over the newly delivered vegetables, a small elfin woman next to me looks up with her eyes bright and exclaims “Isn’t it exciting? FOOD!”
My pantry was pretty bare after the storm. I was not affected compared to the suffering endured by fellow New Yorkers. But a few days of darkness and silence in Manhattan has an effect nonetheless. One of them was the necessity of throwing out everything that was left in the fridge and freezer that had not been consumed. The now fermented unfrozen berries for smoothies that could not be made during the blackout and the packages of overlooked baby peas. We had foraged deep into the freezer and the pantry since food was scarce in our part of town. I used the rapidly defrosting bags of mushy and watery pearl onions from Trader Joes as seasoning. Now, when I see a pearl onion, from the pickled pearl onions for martinis in my bar cupboard to the fresh pearl onions at the Greenmarket, I feel a little bit of revulsion.
The cleaning fervor hit me the minute the lights, heat and hot water came back. First, the fridge and freezer got attacked. I moved on to the cupboard and threw out a slew of dried up and flavorless crap. The only survivors from the purge were the condiment jars whose contents had spoiled. These got soaked to remove the labels. Holiday entertaining would require a well-stocked pantry. My little notebook in hand, I made myself a list.
Then I rode my bike over to Kalustyans Spices and Sweets. I’d never been there before despite it being a famous place in New York visited by tourists and natives alike. When you walk in, the first grouping of provisions you see are for cocktails and my first thought was “Holy shit, they have dirty martini brine”. I had never seen that outside of an olive farmer’s stand at the Santa Monica farmer’s market. They have everything from everywhere. It was hard to keep to my shopping list.
I’m now all set for the start of holiday cooking. My freezer and fridge are pristine, having been scrubbed with detergent and baking soda. Ancient bottles of green goddess dressing and cocktail sauce have been jettisoned and I will not set eyes on a pearl onion for a long time.
Here is my list for a well-stocked spice cabinet for holiday cooking:
– Cinammon sticks & ground
– Vanilla bean – slice down the middle and put in a dark glass bottle filled with vodka. cure for a month for vanilla extract. Keep adding vodka to replenish
– Peppermint extract
– Cream of Tartar
– Baking Soda & Powder (without aluminum)
– Ground clove
– Nutmeg
– Allspice
– Cumin
– Coriander
– Thyme
– Tarragon
– Cilantro
– Savory
– Sage
– Basil
– Oregano (Mexican or Dominican)
– Curry
– Black Peppercorns
– Crushed Red Pepper
– Cayenne Pepper
– Ancho Chile Powder
– Dirty Martini brine
I have known Marlis since I started working on the homestead. Her building which is across the street from ours, was the first homestead building to be completed and occupied on our block. They were all moved in when we were just getting started pulling out the burnt beams. Their building was the proof that it could be done and it shone like a beacon for us. They gave us electricity and smiles of encouragement. I watched Marlis’s son grow up and she saw my daughters born and raised. It is unusual in New York to be so rooted to a place, to a particular block and also to be surrounded by people who are just as rooted. Long-time neighbors. Most New Yorkers move around. It is as though we are living the small village life even though we are in the middle of a giant metropolis – the so-called concrete jungle.
Marlis was born in the bombed out city of Berlin WWII so when she came to Loisaida in the 1970’s this was a familiar landscape. Marlis Momber’s photographs are full of soul. Yes, they have good composition and are well-crafted and her prints are exquisite. But aside from being an artful photograph, they reek of the soul. She is not a mere documentarian or onlooker – Marlis captures her subjects down to the essence. We are hers and Marlis is ours.
Below is a 10 minute clip of her 1978 film Viva Loisaida. To purchase the full DVD or prints contact her via her photography website, to see more photos go to www.vivaloisaida.org.
I have been very lucky that Marlis has photographed my family for many years.
November 1 – we are still without power and so we are at a friend’s house in Brooklyn to take a hot shower, charge all our gadgets, buy food & ice and communicate with friends and family. Below is what I wrote on October 30th that I am able to post now because I’m finally connected (for the afternoon at least).
October 30
The day after Hurricane Sandy and I’m sitting at the marble dining room table writing by the light of two candles. All I’m going to do is describe the scene. This morning I heard from neighbors that we could be a week without power. A black-out in New York City is a big deal because there are so many people so close to each other and anything can happen.
Outside, I can hear sirens from different city departments, one was a fire truck and one something else. I hear no voices outside at all which is very unusual as it is only 8pm and a warm dry night. It feels very dark without the street lights on, but it’s really not. The sky is a milky grey color. Maybe the clouds are reflecting lights from parts of the city to the north and the south that have power still. Or maybe it is the full moon. In the building across the street some of the windows are illuminated with candlelight, others with the silver light of a camping lantern. Sometimes you can see the swishing of light from a flashlight as the inhabitants walk from room to room.
There are many trees down in the neighborhood. Loisaida Avenue (Avenue C) flooded last night during the storm. The water came in from the lowest point at 14th St. They said it reached 6th Street and was thigh high. This morning all along the avenue, I saw people pumping out water from their basements with generators that somehow miraculously appeared. I mean, who thinks they need a gas generator in Manhattan?
Massive weeping willow down 6B garden
Old majestic street tree down on East 7th St
Video of the flooding on Loisaida Ave the night of the hurricane uploaded by Daniel Scott
Loisaida Ave & 8th St. Photo by S.F. Bizarro
Loisaida Ave after the flood
Loisaida Ave after the flood water
One of many flooded basements on Loisaida Ave
Weeping Willow broken Jardin del Paraiso. A pair of squirrels lost their nest and spent the day running up and down the tree very confused.
fallen old poplar tree in El Jardin del Paraiso
I take out the dogs and it is a little scary because the building’s hallway emergency lights that were so reassuring last night have run out of juice now and the stairs are pitch dark and the hallway out to the street is dark and so is the view to the street which is the most unsettling of all. The sidewalks are covered in wet matted weeping willow branches. The male dog Lolo is delighted with the plethora of fallen branches to mark while the little blind dog Millie is surprised at feeling greenery under her paws instead of the concrete sidewalk that she has mapped out so well.
Communication is bad. Those of us trying to conserve our battery power while trying to get information, must listen to radio stations reporting human interest stories and broadcasting commercials. I actually heard a story about a woman in New Jersey who drove around for 2 hours looking for a gas station. Really? The city’s twitter feeds are full of back patting and political pandering and obvious information such as the fact that the schools are closed. Wake up NYC and take a lesson from the towns upstate who brought their affected people portable power for charging their phones, wifi and dry ice.
This past weekend was a momentous occasion. We were asked to help with the fixing up of the oldest daughter’s first grown-up apartment. The request was simple, “Help me make it look not like a dorm room”. She asked for advice with picking out paint colors, and then we went one better and went to help her paint. I started by taking some photos of the small apartment and used my Color Capture app to illustrate my ideas.
The entryway was the jumping off point to the color scheme because the most striking feature of the apartment is there – beautiful tall windows that are edged with yellow and green stained glass squares. I thought she should put most saturated color there because the apartment has very low ceilings, and though it is sunny in the living room, the windows are rather small. A saturated color in the entryway would be an interesting highlight and would not be oppressive in the small space. A green for the entryway would bring in the outdoor foliage and the colors of the stained glass in the windows.
A stepfather with an eye for detail is a good thing
I suggested a un-babyish blue for the living room so that the room would feel expansive and sophisticated. The kitchen counter is yellow and the backsplash is grey tile. The existing color for the cabinets was a yellow that made them the focal point of the room when they shouldn’t have been. I thought a light color would make the cabinets recede and make the kitchen look clean and neat. I sent Camelia some samples I made with the Color Capture app and some paint chips look at in the light of the apartment.
the kitchen before. the yellow cabinets dominate and the beige walls were dull
Using my general direction but making her own choices, Camelia picked beautiful colors. She picked Benjamin Moore’s Silver Cloud for the living room/kitchen. It is a luminescent greyish blue color that changes with the light and made the room look soothing and fresh. In the late afternoon sun, a wall might look white one place, a soft grey or blue in another – an interesting chameleon-like color. The white trim of the windows looked crisp against it even though they had not been repainted.
painting the living room in Silver Cloud
the grown-up with very good taste in paint color choices
work-in-progress, benjamin moore’s bavarian cream on the cabinets
For the entryway, she chose a mossy green, Benjamin Moore’s Dark Celery. The kitchen cabinets were painted in a luscious creamy color. It was beautiful to see the paint brushstrokes of the color that is so aptly named Bavarian Cream.
We painted together and laughed and went out to dinner and watched a late movie and then slept over in our daughter’s first grown-up apartment.
Loisaida’s community gardens were abuzz this past weekend as the first Harvest Arts Festival kicked off. Twenty-four of the forty community gardens in Loisaida participated with music, poetry, theater, films and workshops on art, health, fun and environmental concerns.
El Sol Brillante Garden on East 12th St. Harvest Arts Festival.
Loisaida has more community gardens than anywhere else in the city. The gardens are like little kingdoms unto themselves, so different are they from one another. Some are tiny verdant jewels tucked in between narrow tenements with gravel paths and tranquil shade gardens. Others are sprawling meadows with chickens and rabbits roaming free. Some have stages for performance, outdoor film screenings, and yoga. Others have children’s play equipment, tree houses and sandboxes. There are those with individual garden plots – some sprouting flowers and others growing food. From vacant rubble-filled lots, the gardens were created by people who banded together and occupied the discarded land – seizing the opportunity that the abandonment had created. Today, they are still cared for and grown by dedicated volunteers.
The 1st Harvest Arts Festival was organized by Loisaida United Neighborhood Gardens (LUNGS). Here is an excerpt from the program notes written by organizer Charles Krezell: “If you want to study democracy in action, don’t go to Washington, join a garden in Loisaida. These gardens are the purest form of democracy we have in this city. We are groups of people who come together for mutual purpose and try to sort out our differences. Each garden a mini-experiment in government, we come up with our own rules. Some work through consensus, some compromise, some are dictatorships, some oligarchies. They are frustrating and fascinating, dysfunctional and utilitarian all at once. There is social unrest and class warfare over where to plant the dahlias…”
The festival was so rich with activity that I actually covered only a sliver of what took place. Every garden I made it to had lots of food. A celebration of the harvest in the ancient way, with food and friends and community.
Art Rumble outside of Orchard Alley Garden
I went to a workshop on the Bokashi Method of recycling food waste for fertilizer at a beautiful corner garden on 12th St. They have a slot in the fence where folks drop off their food waste and they turn it into good soil with this method. They are now recycling tons more food waste than with the basic composting method and their garden’s soil is rich, black and teeming with earth worms.
Seed saving envelopes workshop and buttons for sale at 6th & B Garden
Grilling at El Sol Brillante Garden
The Campos Garden was full of whimsical “Litterbugs” made from plastic waste. They also had a really good spread of food there.
The cold snap and rain on Sunday made things fluid and performers moved to gardens with shelters. 9th and C Community Garden was one of those.
It was great to hear the honeyed voice of Odetta Hartman, a Loisaida girl accompanied by Billy Aukstik
Finally, I was lucky enough to encounter the renowned jazz musician Giuseppe Logan sitting in El Jardin del Paraiso playing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” in the soft October rain.
Oona made this pendant lamp for my bedroom. It is all the right good things – cheap, beautiful, and easy to do.
Oona created the lamp in a marathon of TV watching of Law & Order or Hell’s Kitchen late into the night. It is a dramatic light fixture for very little money. I saw a tutorial on Design Sponge – click here for her post with more how-to photos.
So simple to make, it requires only a few materials:
– a round paper lamp shade purchased at Ikea
– paper
– wood glue
– a cool to the touch LED lightbulb. I bought a dimmable one.
Loisaida Nest 