sarah in nyc

 My 1930s sewing books will often talk about wash dresses, that is, dresses that are easy to launder and iron up without too much fuss. A garment that can be ironed flat without worrying about pesky ruffles or pleats is to be praised. recently, I made two skirts that one might think of as wash skirts. A friend just gave me a treasure stove of fabric that had belonged to a seamstress. in the huge plastic bins there are some uncut lengths of both home dec and garment making fabrics as well as a few offcuts left over from sewing project.  One of these gems was a strip of fabric that was about 20 inches wide and just under two yards long and made out a a lovely dark indigo blue cotton. I thought it would make a good wrap skirt. The fabric wrapped one and a half times around my hips. I added a few darts along the top edge.(Those are the triangles at the top of the drawing above.) I placed the darts where I thought would be on either side of the CF and CB.I added two ties made out o...

 It's another challah baking week. I got this dough going interspersed with having my morning coffee and eating breakfast. Here are the challot a few hours later just before I covered them with tea towels and put them in the dining room to rise. I started my chicken cooking adventure thinking that I would make what I think of as red chicken, that is chicken rubbed with smoked paprika, sweet paprika, sumac and a bit of cayenne. It reminds my husband of the chicken his mother used to buy at the Queens store called Mauzone. The word means food in Hebrew, and the taste of my approximation of their rotisserie chicken always makes my husband feel loved.  I ended up taking something of a left turn  and added a bit of turmeric, some Sri Lankan curry and some Bell's Seasoning to the mix. Sometimes my spice mixtures for chicken remind me of the story of how the lyrics for this song were composed. Apparently someone bet the Poet Natan Alterman that he couldn't write a poem where no ...

 I voted today because I have plans on Tuesday. I voted in a school a few blocks from my house that is within the campus of several blocks of housing projects and city services. I know that might sound bleak except that the area is planted with masses of the most wonderful trees.. The line was relatively short. Once we got into the school gym where we were all voting the room was filled with joyful noise. As I was waiting, the room erupted into cheers because an elderly man was voting for the first time. Each poll worker I encountered thanked me for voting. I thanked each one for making it possible for me to vote. On my walk to the polling place I was struck by how some of the worst buildings in the neighborhood wither cast beautiful shadows or recieve shadows particularly well. Some of the trees along Broadway are looking especially pretty today.   I was inspired by this video which shows how to make a wrap skirt out of a rectangle of fabric. I made a skirt out of some pretty...