I save maps, journals, documents and photographs from my trips to the lakes and mountains, and transfer the images or text to tactile fabrics such as silk, satin, velvet and brocade. The pieces are stitched together in layers using large, irregular primitive stitches. I embroider words from my diary using large cursive writing in thick rayon and wool threads. The work looks old and intricate, as an early twentieth century Victorian crazy quilt. The surfaces are rough and meaningful with relief ...

This wall hanging depicts the story of the Raspberry Island Lighthouse keeper Francis Jacker in the late 19th century.
Francis Jacker, my great grand uncle, followed his brother to the Upper peninsula of Michigan from their birthplace in Germany during the last half of the 1800's. He lived in the Keweenaw Peninsula near Houghton, Michigan during the winters and was a lighthouse keeper at several lighthouses in Lake Superior during the shipping season. He married a Chippewa woman, learned some of the language and wrote down some of her family's stories. He made several 3 foot diameter globes of plaster, in  wooden stands, lettering and drawing the paper himself. He engraved portraits on shelf mushrooms. I acquired a copy of his lighthouse journal from the historian of the Apostle Island National Lakeshore while on a kayak camping trip. The journal tells of an adventure in which he was washed ashore on a neighboring island during a storm and that story is recounted in this piece.