Glowing Gemstones by Dale Chihuly

This is another Dale Chihuly sculpture called Glowing Gemstones Polyvitro Chandelier. It is a blown polyvinyl sort of material that was created in the Chihuly studio. This one hangs opposite the glass blown one called Inside & Out (photos below). Both are at the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, Nebraska. You can visit the Chihuly website to see more information on him as well as some gorgeous pictures of his other work. www.chihuly.com

Dale Chihuly at Joslyn Art Museum

When I went to Omaha I visited the Josyln Art Museum where they had these two really beautiful gigantic Dale Chihuly sculptures. Dale Chihuly creates eye candy! Really I just wanted to lick it but I fear I would have been arrested. This sculpture is nearly 30 feet high and is made of 100's of pieces of blown glass attached to a giant steel trellis.

Macaroni Salad - musings and a recipe

See these guys in this picture? They are frowning because they bit down on something crunchy in their otherwise soft macaroni salad. Either that or they forgot you are supposed to refrigerate things with eggs and mayonnaise and they all got belly aches.

I always loved my mom's macaroni salad. Well that is except I seem to remember that she put in chopped celery which created a horrible dissonance in my mouth. There I would be chewing along on some soft macaroni and hard boiled eggs with a creamy sauce and then out of nowhere CRUNCH.

"What was that?!" my mind would scream to my mouth. "Was that a bug?!"

"I know it was a bug! Yuck spit it out spit it out! Wait - not a bug...maybe it was a VEGETABLE!!!! "

Well I have outgrown that reaction to some degree but I still have it when I bite into a chewy raisin in an otherwise crunchy cookie. (but I digress)

Here is my mom's basic recipe but with my modifications. I know my sisters have all modified it to their own tastes as well.

Mix together the basic three ingredients

• 16oz box of elbow macaroni cooked and drained according to package directions


• 1 qt Miracle Whip


• 1 doz. hardboiled eggs peel and chop all but 3 or 4 which will be for slicing and placing decoratively on the top

The rest is up to you but here is what I put in mine

• Onion minced very fine


• Peeled and chopped cucumber


• Lawry's Seasoned Pepper

Some people like to put these things in their macaroni salad as well

• Olives


• Pimentos


• Celery


• Red and Green Bell Peppers


• Vinegar


• Sugar

I like to stick pretty much to the basics. Sometimes I use a different kind of macaroni such as bowtie macaroni or twisted macaroni or sometimes the little straight tubular shape and sometimes I even get really crazy and go for the tricolor macaroni product that is made with spinach or tomato in the dough.

Check out my Spaghetti Squash recipe.