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The Lost Art of Handwritten Notes and Letters

February 15, 2016 By Kara Kennedy

 

handwritten notes Nowadays we are so preoccupied by our smart phones and computers that we are losing the art of the handwritten note and letter.  I can’t tell you the last time I received anything handwritten.  Sure it’s quicker to type out a message or text, but sending something handwritten to someone means that you took time to write out a message specifically for that person.  I often try to slow down and remember to send a handwritten ‘thank you’ note to someone.  Admittedly though, I have to make the time to do this.

My grandmother Kennedy was very meticulous about handwritten messages, notes and letters.  I remember receiving a high school graduation gift from her cousin (my second or third cousin). After I opened package, she immediately went to her secretary (desk) and pulled out her note cards and made me write a ‘thank you’ note to my cousin and mail it.  My grandmother believed that a handwritten note was the ultimate way to showed our gratitude.  She also believed in sending greeting cards for every occasion.  Each card had a special handwritten message especially for me.   She knew me so well I wished I had kept those cards.  I loved reading and re-reading them.  At times she would include a letter in the card because she couldn’t say all that she wanted to in that little area on a the card.

I still have a book she gave me for Christmas one year with a special handwritten message on the inside cover.  She signed it from her and my grandfather.  As far back as I can remember, Southern etiquette meant Southern women sent and answered correspondence for themselves and their husbands, so my grandmother would always sign her messages love ‘Granddaddy and Grandmother Kennedy.’

After my grandmother passed away, my cousin, the one who sent me that graduation gift, and I began writing back and forth. She would include longer letters in her cards.  I still have some of her letters.  Her style of writing, even her handwriting, reminds me so much of how my grandmother wrote.

How is it that we have gotten away from handwritten messages, notes and letters? 

Handwriting is an art form. A note, letter or message handwritten means the words come closer from the heart.  Handwritten letters show that the author put a lot of thought into the words written on the page.  It’s lovely how the thoughts flow from the brain to the pen to the page.

I have personally gotten into the habit of trying to emulate my grandmother’s practice of including special handwritten messages in the greeting cards I send.  However, I am far from making it a practice of handwriting letters.  Sometimes the closest I come to handwriting anything is when I jot things down in a journal.  CBS Sunday Morning did a story on the “Lost Art of the Love Letter” and the play Love Letters with Ryan O’Neal and Ali McGraw. It also examined the lost art of handwritten letters in today’s digital world.  In this news story, a man is interviewed about the 119 love letters he found in a box after his wife died.  He said “seeing the letters in her handwriting for a moment brought her back to me.”

I can honestly say that I see where he was coming from. Just opening the book from my grandmother and seeing her inscription takes me back to the day I opened it, which is a beautiful memory.

 

Filed Under: Family, Life Tagged With: handwritten letters, handwritten messages

Serve Smoked Gouda in a Pastry at your Super Bowl Party

February 7, 2016 By Kara Kennedy

Gouda Cheese bake
Photo Courtesy of Savory Simple

The Super Bowl game provides a perfect excuse for me to splurge on yummy tailgate party food. One of my go-to appetizers is Baked Smoked Gouda in a Pastry because it’s easy to prepare and has always been well received at parties I have taken it to.  A friend of mine gave me this recipe many years ago when I was looking for something new to serve at a party.

I have always served this appetizer with crackers and a Pinot Noir.   I haven’t tried serving mixed nuts as this recipe suggests, but I am sure they would add to the flavor of the appetizer.

Here’s the recipe courtesy of the Dallas Morning News: 

1 (10- to 12-ounce) round chunk of smoked Gouda, measuring about 1 to 1 1/2 inches thick and 3 1/2 inches in diameter, brown rind removed.

2/3 sheet of Pepperidge Farm brand frozen puff pastry, defrosted according to package directions

1 egg, beaten with 1 tablespoon water

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Place 2/3 sheet of puff pastry on a lightly floured surface. If it is stiff, let sit for 5 minutes or so. Roll out the pastry into a 12- to 12 1/2-inch square. Cut off corners to make a circle of pastry (reserve some scraps for decoration). Place the smoked Gouda round in the center of the pastry. Brush the edge of the circle with some of the egg mixture. Fold the pastry up over the cheese to cover. Trim the excess pastry and press to seal. Brush the seam with egg mixture. Place seam-side down onto the baking sheet.

Decorate the top with pastry scraps cut into shapes, adhering them with egg mixture. Brush top and side of the wrapped cheese with the egg mixture.

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until pastry is browned and puffed. Serve with nuts and crackers.

Makes 8 to 9 servings.

Filed Under: Food, Football Tagged With: Food, SuperBowl50, Tailgating

Good Friends and Good Music at the Local Color Cafe

January 24, 2016 By Kara Kennedy

Chambless and Muse at Local Color
Chambless and Muse

It’s no secret that I love all kinds of music and I take the opportunity often to see as many perform as possible.  Some friends and I went to Local Color, a quaint music hall and café in Springville, Alabama off of Highway 11 about 30 minutes north of Birmingham.  Local Color Café is owned by Merle Dollar, who is a vocalist and a visual artist, and whose art is displayed throughout the café.  The doors of the venue open at 6 pm, which is dinnertime according to the café’s Facebook Page.  There are no menus, only a white board listing the evening’s entrées with the qualifier, “as long as they are available.”   Each entrée is served with homemade cornbread.   Around 7:00 or 7:30 pm Merle comes out of the kitchen for the pre-show, with her distant cousins, Sylvia and Peggy, known as the Something Else! Trio. The cousins grew up singing in choirs in church and Merle sang with rock n roll bands and then in theatre performances such as Oklahoma.  The main musical act comes on around 8pm and those acts are usually well-known bands from around Alabama and the music can range from gospel, to bluegrass, to folk and rock ‘n’ roll.

The Celtic Band, Chambless & Muse, performed last night.  Scooter Muse is the Muse part of the band and often plays with my friends, The Wildwood Ruminators in Muscle Shoals, Alabama.  It was a real treat to see them last night.  I tried something new with the ‘live’ streaming app Periscope as part of my blog which allowed me to ‘live’ stream a couple of Chambless & Muse’s songs.  Don’t worry, I asked permission of the musicians first.

One of the more valuable things you get from listening to live music around the state is that you get to meet some incredibly talented musicians and their fans who follow them.  In June 2014, I had the opportunity to get to know one of my now closest friends, Dorothy Bloom Little while attending the Helen Keller Festival in Tuscumbia, Alabama.  Dorothy and her friend Nancy are huge followers and friends of The Wildwood Ruminators.  Dorothy is far from Southern (she is from Cleveland, Ohio by way of New York City), but I’ve had a great time introducing her to various parts of the state, that if one, is not from here, wouldn’t know existed.  Dorothy and I like to banter back and forth on various topics such as Southern cooking, as noted in the video below. I am grateful that music has given me the opportunity to meet people who have similar interests as mine.

Filed Under: Entertainment, Music Tagged With: Alabama, Celtic Music, Live Music

Birmingham: A True Southern City That Has Embraced a Heartbreaking Past So It Can Thrive in the Future

January 18, 2016 By Kara Kennedy

Birmingham BenchThis fall will be exactly 10 years since I moved home to Birmingham from Washington, D.C.  I spent most of the early 2000’s living there including 9/11.   I don’t regret the decision of moving home for the most part, but I would not be telling the truth, if I didn’t say I miss living in D.C. sometimes.  The main reason for the move home was to be closer to my parents, and especially my mom who was faced with and now managing an illness.

My life in Birmingham before moving was a lot like my life now, I volunteered for several community organizations.  Operation New Birmingham was one organization that worked I with on a regular basis.  The mission of Operation New Birmingham was to promote commercial activity in Birmingham’s city center and interracial cooperation in public affairs. The organization also had a master plan for the revitalization of downtown Birmingham.  I recall sitting in a number of meetings that discussed the plan for transforming downtown.  Something that I believed was desperately needed if we were going to be a competitive Southern city.  This plan in my view was just a lot of discussion and no real action at the time.  Admittedly I was just a volunteer and not in the inner circle of those who would ultimately make this plan a reality.   I felt like many people probably felt at the time that these were just dreams that would never come true.

To my surprise since I have moved back I see Birmingham is undergoing a Renaissance.  Some of the things we discussed in our meetings at ONB are now becoming a reality.   I have always been a cheerleader of Birmingham.  Always.  Growing up here, you know that the images of the dogs and water hoses that are constantly portrayed in the national news media are not what this city is all about in today’s world.  In my opinion, we are a true Southern city with a past that is making a remarkable transformation into a city of the future. Everyone is working together for the most part to make this city a great place.

Just this last week, we saw the reopening of the Lyric Theatre, a landmark that was almost lost to decay and threatened at one time to be destroyed.  We have a number of businesses opening in the north area of downtown.  We have the beautiful Railroad Park to the south of town that with along the recent announcement of the movement forward of the 750 Mile Trail around Birmingham will make us one of the cities with the most parks and greenspace in the southeast.  Regions Field has sparked a wealth of development also in that area of downtown. The Avondale neighborhood’s economic development plan has placed the city on the map for new and hip restaurants, coffee shops and music venues that have been written up in national publications and blogs.  And then there will be opportunity for Birmingham to shine on the world stage in 2021 when we host the World Games.

From what I see we are a city that has learned to embrace our heartbreaking past so we can thrive in the future.   I’d say we are thriving in big way and I am happy to say that it is much more than I thought we ever would when I volunteered all of those years ago.

 

 

Filed Under: Life, Southern Cities, Southern History, Travel Tagged With: Alabama, Birmingham, Economic Development

Southern Treasures in My Own Backyard: Decatur, Alabama

January 10, 2016 By Kara Kennedy

Joe Wheeler ParkI don’t make New Year’s Resolutions, but I do have goals each year that I attempt to reach.  One goal for 2016 is to be more adventurous to travel and explore different parts of the Southeast Region.  It is liberating to get a deeper understanding of the region where I spent my childhood.

A friend and I took an adventure yesterday to Decatur, Alabama, which is about 85 miles north of Birmingham and 25 miles southwest of Huntsville.  Decatur is known as the River City because it is located on Joe Wheeler Lake and the Tennessee River.  My friend had never been to Decatur, but wanted to go because it was the last day of her friend and world -renowned artist Tim Stevenson’s exhibit at the Carnegie Visual Arts Center located on Church Street. The Center has a unique history in that it was a library for about 70 years.  From the Center’s Website:  completed in September of 1904, the Carnegie Library of Decatur was one of the 2,509 libraries built by the millionaire philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. At the turn of the century, Carnegie began donating money to non-profit, educational organizations. Starting with a large library system in Pittsburgh, with a donation of $1 million, Carnegie began to fund libraries throughout the nation. The Decatur Library was housed in this facility for more than 70 years before being transformed eventually into the Visual Arts Center in 2003. Tim’s artwork was beautifully displayed throughout the Center’s main floor and included my favorites, his landscapes, along with his still life pieces.

After going through the exhibit we decided to go for lunch. While driving we were sidetracked by a stray dog walking along a busy road. We tried to catch him so that we could take him to the animal shelter.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t, he was too timid, so we had to put our super hero capes away and hope that someone else may have more success in catching him.

While on the way to lunch a boutique caught my eye. This, of course, is not a surprise because I love boutiques in small Southern towns.   Cricket by the Creek is the name of this boutique and It just so happened that today they had a sale in their upstairs room; clothes were $15 and shoes were $20!  Believe it or not, I scored a pair of Donald Pliner sport wedges for $20.  I thank God I wear a small size and I love a good bargain. The ladies who helped us were pleasant and helpful.  This boutique is definitely on my list for a return visit.

After this other detour we ended up at Big Bob Gibson BBQ for lunch.  I am ashamed to say I have never been to the restaurant and was grateful that my friend indulged me.   The restaurant was built from Big Bob Gibson’s pit barbecue where he cooked in his backyard. The restaurant has lasted 75 years and four generations.  His barbecue has won many awards and has  been featured in several magazines including, Southern Living, Garden and Gun Magazine and was also featured on the Food Network.   I had the BBQ pork plate, which is listed as a 10- time World Champion for pulled pork plate, with mac and cheese and green beans.  My friend had the same except with baked beans.  Everything was homemade and fresh.  I especially liked the world famous white sauce. Of course, we couldn’t leave without splitting a delicious homemade pecan pie. Oh my, you definitely don’t go hungry at Big Bob Gibson’s so be sure to bring along your appetite.

Joe Wheeler Refuge On the way out of town we stopped at the Joe Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge because it was the Whooping Crane Festival.  My friend and I braved the chilly temps to catch a glimpse of these beautiful birds and take a short stroll through the wooded area. Once again the beauty of nature was amazing.

I am guilty of this like most of us, sometimes we never really know or appreciate the wealth of beauty and history in our own backyard. It was an interesting day of exploration of the River City.  Yesterday was the start of my 2016 goal to  be more adventurous   It was a great day!  What could be better than seeing great art, getting super deals and eating awesome food.

 

Filed Under: Life, Travel Tagged With: Alabama, Alabama travel, Big Bob Gibson, Joe Wheeler National Refuge

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We tell real stories about the south. ~Kara Kennedy, Publisher

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