Month: February 2025

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One-of-kind artwork turns Akron kitchen into a personal museum

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Last summer, my home received a one-of-a-kind installation. When I was traveling out West for my son Hugo’s wedding, and the house was empty of all creatures save for two cats, an artist set up shop in my kitchen.

I’ve written many times how home projects can morph from a singular improvement to a full-scale remodel, as was the case with my kitchen. But even after the stovetop necessitated a new backsplash, which itself necessitated a new countertop — all of which I shared here previously — the “Farmer and the Dell” saga continued.

As can happen, the paint I chose for my kitchen cabinets and soffits did not look as I expected. The color’s name is “light blue” and it is supposed to coordinate with the deep, bluish-purple of the kitchen walls. The only window in my kitchen, however, is on the north side of the house, which means the sunlight entering the room is indirect and dim. The 18″ soffits looked like the vast sides of a battleship.

Holly Christensen's old kitchen chandelier is getting a new home within her Akron house.

Because repainting was too costly, I felt something off-the-charts fun was needed to break up all that drab grey. Off I went to Facebook Marketplace where I found the perfect item — a white porcelain Capodimonte chandelier with flying cherubs and dangling rosettes.

Full disclosure: I had never heard of Capodimonte Italian porcelain art, which I’ve come to learn is famous, like Hummel figurines, but Capodimonte items come in greater variety, scale and imagination. Once the chandelier was hung, friends raved about it while my eldest son, Claude, told me I have developed old-lady taste. Whatever. I soon found a Capodimonte clock to hang over the kitchen sink.

“You know what those soffits need?” my friend Jim asked as he admired the chandelier. He was over for dinner one evening while his husband was off in Europe painting plein air landscapes. I took the bait and asked what, to which he replied, “A Stebner original.”

And that’s how Bruce Stebner came to work in my kitchen while I traveled out West. He showed me photos of foliage he’d painted on the ceilings of a mansion. I loved it and told him to do as he saw fit. Just before he began, Bruce texted me to see if I wanted anything specific. I told him to take full artistic license.

The results could not be more personalized, nor fabulous. Like the Palace of Versailles outside Paris, stylized dauphins (dolphins) and plants frame portraits of my three dogs and my son Claude’s two white cats (who’ve been waiting over two years to be retrieved by their owner). The painting of the female cat fondly reminds me of the Disney animated film “The Aristocats,” which I first saw in the theater with my daycare provider when I was four.

The Capodimonte clock, with its central location above the sink, is now flanked not by one, but two images of my Yorkipoo, Henry (the only thing that could be better than my Henry would be two of my Henrys). My Sheltie, Angus, sits attentively over the stovetop while my German shepherd, Otto, does the same over the refrigerator. 

Custom artwork makes Holly Christensen's kitchen her own personal museum.

When I first entered the kitchen after my trip, I couldn’t believe my good fortune. I now cook in a room fit for a museum. Where my soffits had been dull, they became actively whimsical and the Capodimonte clock fits right in. However, the chandelier did not. While others disagreed, I felt its frolicking busyness didn’t complement the artwork. 

Back to Facebook Marketplace I went with something specific in mind. I wanted another chandelier, but one in darker colors that evoke the design of the Stebner paintings. Clearance for my tall boys’ noggins eliminated multiple options that fit my visual goal, but were too large.

Five months after I started looking, I found the perfect fixture. Even friends who thought the cheeky cherubs looked splendid agree the new chandelier is better. The metal is reddish brown and rather than dangle, crystals are held upright around the fixture’s arms in a manner that resembles the foliage of the Stebner paintings. Once the new chandelier was installed, it felt like putting the final pieces of a difficult jigsaw puzzle into place. Sublime.

A new chandelier is a perfect match for the custom artwork in Holly Christensen's kitchen.

As for the Capodimonte chandelier? It is currently resting on a cushion under my Buddhist shrine. I vaguely see it each morning when I meditate. It’s hinged arms are stacked three on each side of the base, not unlike a beautiful octopus minus two arms. It is waiting to hang in my office, which has dusky pink walls and a golden floor, where it will look heavenly.

This column first appeared in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, February 16, 2025.

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Responses to my columns are appreciated

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After years of writing for the ABJ, I remain unable to predict which pieces will elicit readers to reach out (except for columns about local politics, which trigger a barrage of responses). When I expect to spend my Sunday afternoon responding to emails, I receive only a handful. Other times, such as after my last column on the joys of a cold and snowy January, unanticipated messages fill my inbox. In that case, all in agreement on the splendor of a hearty winter in Summit County.

I was first surprised when, in 2017, I wrote about whether or not to replace the manual transmission on my 2003 Toyota Matrix 5-speed. The car had over 200k miles and was like Frankenstein’s monster — a hodgepodge of aftermarket and salvaged parts. The hubcaps frequently flew off and after a few years I stopped replacing them. A beloved jalopy, it was the childhood car of my eldest sons, then the one in which they had learned to drive and their high school ride.

The response to that column could not have been greater had the Matrix itself hired a PR firm to lobby for repairs. I enjoyed readers’ stories of cars kept well beyond what most people would consider practical and was strongly encouraged to do the same. I did and the Matrix provided reliable transportation for three more years.

To give my mind a reprieve from local, national and global events, this past year I have kept my nose in one novel after another. That said, good fiction is never all pleasantries, nor is it always entirely fictive. I’m currently enjoying “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” by Junot Díaz, a story of three generations of one family that doubles as a primer on the brutal 20th-century history of the Dominican Republic.

Last summer, I shared my novel recipe for reducing the consumption of stress-inducing news and readers exploded my inbox with book recommendations. Several underscored the praise for Barbara Kingsolver’s “Demon Copperhead,” which I had mentioned was on my list. A reader who lives nearby insisted I have her copy and I had the pleasure of visiting with her and her dog, Annie, at their home. “Demon Copperhead” is on deck (i.e., my bedside table), waiting for me to finish the Díaz novel.

In November, I wrote of my son Hugo’s love of Norman Rockwell’s art and how I enjoy finding Rockwell collectibles for him in thrift stores. Among the many responses to that column, a 90-year-old man named Joe wrote to share that he and his wife, Sue, also loved Rockwell’s art and had two exquisite books purchased at the Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. He wanted to give them to Hugo. 

As luck would have it, only a couple of weeks after I heard from Joe, Hugo flew home to spend a long weekend with me. He and I brought holiday cookies from the Westside Bakery to Joe at his condo on a December afternoon. A beautiful Frazier fir, bedecked in a lifetime of collected ornaments, filled the window at the end of Joe’s sunny living room where he shared stories of his life with Sue, who recently died. The couple first dated when undergraduates at Cornell.

As so often happens in Akron, Hugo and I quickly learned that our host was not a truly a stranger. Until shortly before the pandemic, Joe and Sue had lived for decades on the same cul-de-sac in West Akron where a good friend of mine once lived and whom I frequently visited. My friend’s eldest son and Hugo were buddies from preschool through the first grade. Joe and Sue undoubtedly saw wee Hugo playing outside their home more than 20 years ago. 

The three of us reminisced about the colorful neighbors on that cul-de-sac, including a retired Firestone High School English teacher who could talk to anyone. Thin as the side of a yard stick with skin deeply tanned 12 months of the year, I don’t believe I ever saw the woman without a lit cigarette in her hand. She died in her 90s. 

Joe and Sue also happened to be active members of Westminster Presbyterian Church where my dear friend Jim Mismas was the music director and organist for over 20 years. A month after Hugo and I visited Joe, I returned to his condo with Jim and Jim’s husband, Bruce Stebner, for a lunch that my dear reader/new friend had prepared for the four of us. 

It is a privilege to write a column in my local newspaper for many reasons. At the top of the list, however, is the pleasure of hearing from those of you who take the time to write to me.

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, February 9, 2025.

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This blustery winter is living up to my expectations

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I recently read a description of the month of January that conjured to mind a long forced march in a notoriously cruel POW camp — a horrid event one must endure to the bitter end because there is no other choice. Perhaps if I lived in New York City, as does the author of the piece I read, I’d feel the same about the most wintery month, but I doubt it. For one thing, driving is pretty much optional in NYC. But, also, I simply love January.

Compared to other months, January in northern climes supports contemplative thinking like a monastery abbot. The fun and (oh, so much) work of the holidays are over. Social demands all but vanish. The kids are back in school. Winter settles in like a chicken getting cozy on her nest, deeply hushing everything under her feathery body. If we are lucky enough to have snow, even the sounds of busy streets are muted. 

This January — unlike the past two when local ski slopes had to postpone the start of ski clubs due to un-wintery weather — is living up to my ideal. Throughout December, the weather was cold, but not cold enough to freeze. The ground remained muddy and so did my dogs. It was warm enough for me to hose down my large German shepherd and mid-sized Sheltie with admittedly frigid water. 

Then there’s my 9-pound, close to the ground, Yorkie Poo, Henry. His fine, curly hair secures remarkable quantities of dirt to his skin, released only by a vigorous shampooing in the kitchen sink, which he had everyday for the better part of two weeks. Then, on the first weekend of 2025, an Arctic freeze came to stay, eliminating Henry’s daily baths, thus making him another fan of January.

The longer the temperature remains well below freezing, the better for our environment. Warm winters encourage invasive plant and animal species to thrive and overtake native ones. Another benefit of the current extended cold is the death of more fleas and ticks than we had in the past two years — a demise most people, and certainly every dog owner, can celebrate.

The word apricity means “the warmth of the winter sun.” Those of us who love going outdoors in the winter well know that a calm, sunny day when the temperature is between 20 to 25 degrees feels warmer than when it’s 35 degrees but blustery and overcast. But even on those days, winter activities will keep anyone toasty.

With the right clothing (snow pants, warm coat, gloves, socks and boots), outdoor play is endlessly fun in Summit County. A full-length down coat I bought on clearance one spring keeps me perfectly comfortable on my daily 2-mile dog walk even when the temperatures drop into the single digits.

One Christmas I bought my now-adult sons hockey skates, sticks and pucks. They spent the next several winters knocking the pucks around the 2-acre skating rink at Big Bend Metropark. Citing climate change (read: too many winters where it was too warm to freeze the water in earthen basins rangers flooded to create the rinks), today the Metroparks have just one outdoor rink at Furnace Run.

Of the county’s many sledding hills, our favorite is at the end of North Hawkins Avenue. Steep enough for a lengthy and fast ride, the hill is not too steep for little kids to walk back up repeatedly. Last weekend, I had to promise my 12-year-old daughter, Lyra, hot cocoa and cookies if she’d stop sledding. We’d been there for two hours, the sun had set and it was time to make dinner. But Lyra wanted to keep flying down and trudging up that hill.

Lyra and her 14-year-old brother, Leif, participate in a school ski club at Boston Mills, as did their three older brothers. When my first two sons turned 18, I bought each of them a set of downhill skis and boots. Now ages 31 and 28, those sons ski at resorts around the country, often together, in their birthday skis. Next year, the big boys plan to take Leif on his first ski trip to New York’s Holiday Valley. Learning to ski as a child is the gift of a lifetime we are fortunate to have available in Northeast Ohio.

Hugo & Claude on a ski trip in Wisconsin in 2024.

But whether you love being outdoors in winter or not, I can think of little else as cozy as sitting inside on a snowy January day with a warm beverage, a fire in the fireplace, a pot of stew, chili or soup on the stove while curled up on the couch under a blanket reading a book or visiting with friends and family. The Danish have a term for this quiet coziness of deep winter: hygge (pronounced “hue-guh”).

Happy hygge!

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, January 19, 2025.