That one BIG comparison - religion

Source

I'll be the first to admit to being liberal and maybe because of that I've never really "got" religion. Nor can I understand people living word by word by it and I find many religions and some religious people to be very hypocritical. In moving from a pretty secular country to somewhere where religion is very much everywhere has been a huge eye opener. And while I write this post and publish it out into the big wide world, I don't mean to cause offence if religion is your thing. [I'm all for religion - but it's not for me, don't peach at me about you're religion and don't get brainwashed about how it's the only way to lead your life, to me religion has caused far too many of the world's problems, killed too many people and claimed too many lands, but that's my own belief].

So .... RELIGION - perhaps it was how I was raised but I believe my case could well apply to many people in the UK. We're brought up with either religion meaning tradition or the religious fanaticism that leads to terrorism. Being British our religion [if you have one] is something that is personal - to broadcast or shout out about it is bad form, you keep it to yourself and you get on with your life. Or, we're just indifferent to it.

In America religion is everywhere - churches are everywhere, people talk about their religion very openly, attend church weekly and in gardens you'll find statues and shrines to the virgin Mary. I've married into a religious family - although Joe himself is rather carefree, the rest of the family seems very much by the word of the book and their praying before meals made me rather uncomfortable. The difference between our two countries is clearly quantitative, a survey in 2008 disclosed only 15% of Americans describe themselves as being of "no religion" in comparison to the 43% in the UK. Furthermore only 3% of Americans would state not believing in God to 18% of the UK population.

Source

It even extends to the differences within blogs. Religion creeps into more American based bloggers [maybe I'm just exposed to more of them] and to me, it's a little unnerving especially with regards to how they so openly criticise other people's lives and constantly make biblical quotations, that they are sinners and Jesus saved them. There are fanatics in many religions but for a country that's meant to be so forward in the world it's amazing that religion has such a big place. I've read a comparison that religion in the USA is where religion was in the UK back in the 1500s and this I could well believe.

More so religion is in bed with politics, so much that the Republican party are often renamed as the Religious Right. From the right/church come the pro life cries [anti pill/abortion] tend to be against this on going debate for increased women's health provision. The church even continues the call for evolution to be taught in schools [although no prayers can be said at any school due to laws under the American constitution], porn is one of the biggest evils and we all know their attitudes towards gay marriage or even gay relationships. In contrast religion and politics in the UK don't mix that very often - the church will mouth off about something they disagree with but that seems to be that.

Source

Religion seems to be a huge element for social cohesion here in the USA and it strongly seems to define many living here and being "American". But whatever your religion is, whether you have one or not shouldn't define who you and the bible shouldn't dictate what you're rights as human should be.

Just saying.

Strawberry Jam - a how to

I grew up with the women on my mums side of the family making jam in the summer months. My gran would come around and the kitchen would air that smell of stewing fruit. This has been a tradition that I've wanted to continue - nothing tastes better then home-made jam and making it yourself is pretty easy once you have the know how. This recipe is partly what I remember from my family way of making and random recipes found via google. 

INGREDIENTS

2 lbs of strawberries - the fresher the better

4 cups of granulated sugar

Juice of 2 lemons

You should have plenty of glass jars at the ready [the above amount makes just short of three jars] - loads of people buy brand new ones but I'm all for recycling old jars we've come across, just make sure they are nice and clean.

How you cut up your strawberries depends upon how lumpy you like your jam. While some people opt to blend the life out of them in a blender, I love knowing that my jam has real strawberries in it, so I love mine nice and lumpy - therefore I don't cut up the strawberries into tiny pieces. You should bare in mind that the boiling process does melt them down anyway. 

After all your strawberries are cut up, add everything into a large pan and set the temperature on low. At first you only need a low heat to slowly start boiling the mixture. Keep boiling until all the sugar has dissolved.

Once all the sugar's dissolved the strawberries will start strewing and you'll start getting a lovely strawberry juice mixture going. Whack the pan up to high so you start to get a roaring boil - you have to be careful because sometimes it can spit, but you need to keep the heat up. Keep stirring so you can tell when it starts to thicken.

Sometimes this can take 5 mins sometimes a lot longer - that's the luck of the game when it comes to making strawberry jam and the more you make it the more likely you are to know when it's looking good enough to start thinking about checking if it's set. At this point I always put a saucer into the fridge - it's an important piece in checking to see if you're jams ready. 

Taking a dribble of your jam mixture, drop it onto your saucer and leave by an open window for a couple of minutes. If you can then tilt the saucer and the jam doesn't run off, and or it has a crust forming over it [say like lava would] then you're ready. There's no magic way of  pouring from the pan into the jars and this point is one of the muckiest and somewhat dangerous part of jam making. What I've been taught to do it use a glass jug and scoop up the jam from the pan and then pour it into the jars.

 
Leave to cool and you're all done. It's best to keep the jam once you've reopened it in the fridge and they can last stored for months and months.

Have you ever made jam?

Duck Lane

In his job Joe drives around a lot and see's random places he'll remember and drive me out to see whenever we get the chance. On a fitting road called Duck Lane out in the countryside he'd spotted these bird houses on wooden poles in the middle of an allege covered pond - apparently in someone's back yard. How the bird houses stand up is a mystery to me but it was a great sight to see and there were a few birds rustling around in the marsh grasses close by. Further along the same road came another couple of ponds and a careful eye spotted these amazingly coloured birds which we later found out to be wild Sandhill Cranes. Wildlife in America does seem to be a lot tamer or maybe they should be seen as more adventurous?

Row row row your boat

On Saturday we took a trip back to Kensington Metropark to hire a rowing boat to get out onto Kent Lake. After my panics of getting into the boat [hate how it wobbles and moves and slides when you're stepping in] so much so that I clung onto the sides for dear life for the first couple of minutes it was rather a lot of fun. Joe rowed us out for an hour and a half across to one of the quiet bays, around an island and back into the dock. With it being another bright sunny day here in south east Michigan the reflections on the waters surface were amazing and luckily my camera was playing game in letting me capture some of it.

Bloggers who collect - vintage rings

I'm starting a new blogging week with a late, but very much welcome addition to the former bloggers who collect series. To today I'm welcoming Hazel and her lovely collection of vintage rings - all with a gorgeous story behind them;

Hi, I’m Hazel from Tales of alittle Hazzelnut and I’m going to share my collection of vintage rings with you today. At the minute I have about thirteen in my possession, so it is rather small but is growing rapidly. As soon as Rachael mentioned her Collection posts I knew I had to get involved; firstly I’m nosey and love to know what other people collect, and secondly, I thought it would be nice to share my collection and to find out if anyone does the same.

So onto the collection…

I’ve never without a ring, and I seem to rotate between all the rings in my vintage collection. I started collecting vintage jewellery (necklaces, bracelets, rings) when I was sixteen and currently have a rather large collection. However, I’m only going to show you my collection of rings.

My love of vintage rings started quite early. From about the age of five every Friday my Nana would come over for the afternoon and every time without fail I would insist she let me wear this ring;

It’s a 1920s cameo ring which my Papa bought her while on holiday in Dublin, and after she passed it was left to me in her will. It is probably my one of my favourites. However, I don’t wear it often for two reasons; one, I’m terrified of something happening to it, and secondly, it doesn’t fit on any of my fingers, apart from the little one! 

Here is my other ring from the 1920s. Surprisingly this is the only silver ring in my vintage collection, and it is probably the most worn. I obtained it for £3 (bargain!) at the vintage fair I attended last summer. 

Similarly, this is probably my most worn gold vintage ring (1940s). I just find it absolutely stunning and it goes which basically everything I own. 

The final ring I’m going to share with you has quite a sweet story behind it. During the second world war my Papa was stationed with the RAF in India and because my Nana loved to shop but was restricted by rationing he would send over jewellery and clothes he commissioned to be made for her, this is one of those pieces;

I absolutely adore it and the story behind it.

I personally find the best places to find vintage rings are in antiques shops and at vintage fairs, sometimes they can be quite pricey but I usually attempt to haggle it down. 

So that’s my collection, hope you liked it. Does anyone else collect vintage rings? Or even vintage accessories?

Navy Pier, Chicago

So after walking around downtown Chicago, soaking up the shops and then wandered back to dump everything at the hotel, we took the bus out eastwards towards Lake Michigan and the Navy Pier. The pier which was constructed in 1916, turned away from it's original intentions of being a cargo facility and into a docking place for passenger steamers alongside entertainment. Today it stands as Chicago's number one tourist attention. 

While we might have visited on a cold, windy Saturday night in December there was still plenty to see and do. Inside are the commercial tourist shops, there's a cinema, to restaurants and bars. There's even a fair. We took to drinking cocktails [I had a honey and whiskey one which was insanely good], ate some seafood and had a walk outside along the pier for as long as we could stand in the cold night air. 

I'd love to go back in the summer months and be able to spend longer there and have a proper play on the fair attractions - particularly the Ferris Wheel and see the sights over the city!

Previous chapter in this series. 

This may be the last in the Chicago posts - they don't seem to be read much.

Stratton Butterfly Vintage Compact

I will be the first in admitting I'm not a big collector of Stratton compacts [I'm picky, I know]. To me their popularity and the ability to be able to find them easy is a little off putting. In turn I love my small brands. But I love butterflies - they have to be one of my favourite things to photograph, I love butterfly houses in zoos and Joe is always amazed at how well I can name any we come across on a walk. So much that I'm currently reading a book all about the life of a butterfly - knowing they only live a couple of months makes you remember just how fragile their beauty is. The book - Wings in the Meadow documents the tale of one butterfly through words and brilliant illustrations [last image]. So being the big butterfly fan that I am, how could I turn this compact down especially when I come to think about it how I'm adding to my collection of powder compacts featuring butterflies in their designs [now up to three!] alongside this Marhill and another Stratton double mirrored compact.

The pale blue background of the compacts top really sets the butterfly colours off, although it's probably rather abstract the butterfly is rather reminiscent of the Monarch butterfly. The compact itself is unused - it's even compete with it's original "inspected by" little slip of paper and instructions. It is suffering a lot with regards to it's mirror - you can just see in the image that the mirrors gone a bit green and blotchy but I can see pass that too. 

I always wonder how English compacts made their way over to the USA.

When we both played with my camera

With the fireworks on Saturday we stuck by the advice on the poster and got there two hours early, which meant two hours to kill with a camera. Or at least Joe using mine for giggles. We eyed up the rowing boats for a return trip there next weekend [if the weather holds out] planning a trip around some of the little islands in the lake and got a little snap happy. My feet touched the first American sand since moving and we watched the geese swimming on the lake and the swallows swooping around. Having Joe to share all this with is the best regardless of who takes the photographs.

Dragonfly cross stitch

There's a new addition to the embroidery hoop wall after completing my cross stitch dragonfly [the pattern for which came out of the Cross Stitch Magazine]. This project was something I really got into but with only just one colour it started to drag out a little, and it became something I'd pick up every now and again. But being only four lines of the wing away from the end got me on a sudden drive last week to finally finish it off and hang it up. It's sewed completely in metallic DMC thread which in itself can be a bit of a nightmare - I had one lot of thread that tangled itself up every other stitch and another thread that was a dream. That's just the luck of the draw. I love it's size - which makes it such a statement piece [the sewing is ten and a half inches at its widest and its framed in a 12 inch frame].

Now just need some more ideas for more embroidery hooped pieces!

Fireworks

Saturday night the Kensington Metropark held their Salute to America fireworks display. Being English I've grown up with firework displays although more often on a freezing cold November night [until like many bonfire nights they decreased in size or stopped all together because of councils refusing to shell out on something for Guy Fawkes night]. This display was their early July 4th celebration and masses turned out. We parked at Maple Beach and like many others, waited the two hours till 10PM and the display began taking our positions by the beach. These were like the fireworks you'd see on your TV that London put on on at New Years. They were insane, the colours were amazing, and was just non stop for a good 25 minutes. As the display was being launched from one end of the lake, the fireworks created amazing reflections over the water - that really added something. While we both took our cameras [I totally forgot my tripod] fireworks weren't the easiest thing to catch photographically but here's some to try and capture the event. In the end I took to videoing it with my camera to share with you the finale of the display.

And yes, American's even clap at the end of fireworks!