QUILTER | TEACHER | AUTHOR | FOUNDER
The induction of Fons & Porter this summer into the Quilters Hall of Fame prompted the Iowa Quilt Museum (IQM) in Winterset, Iowa—the little burg where our brand was born—to mount a retrospective of our work. Almost thirty pieces (all … Read More
I had not discovered Luis Alberto Urrea’s work until members of the Washington Island Literary Festival selection committee began looking at potential authors for last year’s event. Urrea’s collection of short stories, THE WATER MUSEUM, knocked my socks off, but … Read More
I’ve been a member of—and a fan of—the Quilt Alliance for a long time. QA is a nonprofit established in 1993 to collect stories about quilts from living quiltmakers so information about them is not lost to time. Some of … Read More
Even if I weren’t a member of the Washington Island Literary Festival planning committee (and therefore extremely proud), I’d be super pumped about the lineup of authors for this year’s event, September 20-22. Rebecca Makkai is returning, the first author … Read More
For several years, now, as I’ve pursued my love of fiction—as a writer rather than a reader—I’ve taken lots of classes, most of them at the Iowa Summer Writing Festival in Iowa City, a production of the University of Iowa, … Read More
My writer-friend Liza Wiemer gifted me THE GREAT ALONE after spending time last month at our cottage in Wisconsin completing final edits on her next-to-be-published YA novel, THE ASSIGNMENT. She found the solitude of Washington Island perfect for hours of … Read More
I was attracted to the strong cover design of Tara Westover’s memoir Educated when I first saw it in bookstores last year, but with an already tall to-read pile, I intended to wait for the softcover. Instead, when I stopped … Read More
One day last month, Iowa Public Radio’s Jacqueline Halbloom, host of IPR’s Iowa Arts Showcase, popped over to Winterset. She sat down with me at the docent desk inside the Iowa Quilt Museum and asked me all sorts of cool … Read More
When Liz Porter and I joined forces in the late 1970s to team-teach beginning quilting classes in Winterset, Iowa, we didn’t have fame in mind. We had no idea we were part of a revival of interest in quiltmaking that … Read More
Because I pay attention to what’s displayed prominently on the fiction tables at book stores these days, I instantly recognized the turquoise jacket of Tayari’s Jones’ An American Marriage when I was helping sort books for the Winterset Public Library’s … Read More