Muffins and more

I learned over the summer that my sister Jan had fallen into the apple sauce muffin trap. First, on a trip to Amish country last summer, she wound up with a lot of apples. In her amble in an apple orchard, she picked up a peck of apples. When she returned to the car, or more accurately, when Tom returned to the car, too, it turned out they had three pecks of apples. Or maybe four, I don't remember.

At home, she made apple sauce. And apple pie and apple crisp. And more apple sauce. Then she heaved a great sigh, bought a supply of half pint jars, and began canning applesauce. I heard Tom enjoyed the apple sauce and occasionally had a jar for lunch. She gave me a little jar, and it was darn good. (I must return the little jar!)

Then she told me Tom asked again for apple sauce muffins. Talk of nostalgia. When Mom was still alive, up to 1989, she made me a dozen apple sauce muffins to take to a show. They were my breakfast, and supplemented cheese sandwiches for lunch.

The muffins are made with apple sauce, oatmeal, raisins, some cinnamon. Fortunately Jan knows the recipe; I don't. However, I think that is the basic recipe. No flour, no sugar, no shortening. Or as an exhibitor friend who took one for breakfast said, "women always know how to put a days worth of essentials down your throat by breakfast!"

One day I came in from an appointment and found a dozen muffins on my counter. I also found a message on the phone:  "I left muffins on your counter!" I called at once to thank her. I had one for lunch every day. The day I ate the last muffin I also called her because I hadn't had a word with her since the day the muffins appeared. 

We caught up the news and then she said "How are your muffins doing?" and I had to confess the last one was gone. "Well, you're muffin-worthy," she said. And today I had a text, "I'm on the way over with more muffins." Since I seldom read my texts, I had no idea until there was a knock on the door, and Jan with a dozen muffins.

I'm down to one table mate at dinner this week, Rose Marie. Rose is a tiny little lady with snow white hair, who uses a bright red Rolator style walker. In good weather she tries to take a daily walk and generally goes around the building. Two sides of that walk involve public sidewalk. Yesterday Rose told me that as she came up along the side road a car pulled off the road beside her and asked "What are you doing here?"

"I live here," from Rose. "But what are you doing outside?" "Taking a walk!" said Rose and proceeded on her very slow way. The woman exited her car and confronted Rose. "Should you be outside?"  Rose realized she thought she was a Memory Care or Assisted Living resident, and told her the very large building behind her was the  Independent Living facility, where she lived. Rose isn't sure she convinced the woman, who thankfully left. Probably to go around the corner and call The Atrium.

Long ago, in a chat about my weaving days, I published this picture. In the olden days we applied to shows with slides of our work. Here is my photographer's model wearing one of the shirts in a size too large. Sigh. Anyway, this was "cool" in the '80's and '90's. There is no describing the "feel" of the cotton fabric. It had great hand.

I know the work of many artist friends from thirty, forty, fifty years ago routinely comes up for sale on EBay, but I never considered Jan's and my work to be that sort of stuff. It was way more "feel good" than artistic. 

Imagine my surprise when my daughter texted me this:

This seller knows nothing about presentation! Grrrrr. This is a lovely jacket, and looks nice hanging, without the wrinkles. The hem hangs even; I know, I pulled every thread for the straight of grain. I even painted the blue wooden buttons. Forty years ago we sold this jacket for about $125. Beth found it on EBay for $225, down from $250. I'll keep an eye on it and let you know.