Favorite finds include tasty barbecue sauce and sweet prints from North Carolina, plus a smart line of glass jewelry made in Atlanta.
Branch out
Several years ago, Liz Stiglets quit her nursing job and turned a passion for arts and crafts into a full-time business. The benefits have been priceless. Stiglets’ work allows her to spend more time with her two young children and musician hubby at their cozy blue house in Asheville, N.C. The self-taught crafter makes frame-ready prints, pillows and embroidery patterns, which she sells in her Etsy store (cozyblue.etsy.com). With a true family business, Stiglets and her husband handle the screen printing, stitching and sewing in their home studio. One of Cozy Blue’s best-sellers is a custom “family tree” print, a modern version of the classic. The tree stump image is hand-screened -- from Stiglets’ original line drawing -- onto heavyweight watercolor paper. The leaves are hand-carved rubber stamps. Leaves and names are hand-stamped and personalized with first names or initials. An 11-inch-by-14-inch print is $30. Visit www.etsy.com/shop/cozyblue.
Finger-licking sauce
For Southerners, the debate over barbecue never ends. For some, the best barbecue focuses on the meat, and the way it is cooked. For others, it’s about the sauce. A top choice for many is Bone Suckin’ Sauce, made in Raleigh. The Carolina-style, tomato-based sauce is sweetened with honey and molasses, plus spices. The all-natural sauce was officially bottled in 1992, though Phil Ford had been making it for family and friends since 1987. While the gluten-free sauce is a best-seller, there are other favorites, including the mustards, yaki (teriyaki style) and habanero sauces. A 16-ounce jar of original or hot Bone Suckin’ Sauce is $6.79. But to keep you grilling all through the tailgate season, buy the sauce by the gallon ($42.99) at www.buybonesuckin.com. Also check Atlanta-area stores, including the Fresh Market, New York Butcher Shoppe and Harry’s Farmers Market.
Broken and beautiful
After a car break-in two years ago, Corinne Adams discovered the beauty in broken glass. Instead of trashing the scattered glass from her car window, Adams scooped up the sea-glass nuggets and took them home. Before long, the longtime Atlanta photographer and passionate recycler came up with an idea to incorporate the aqua-blue glass into jewelry. That is when she started C Glass jewelry. Since then, friends and others show up with bags of broken glass or make gifts of oven and French glass doors, which Adams uses in her bold jewelry line, which includes belt buckles, rings, necklaces, crosses and cuff bracelets. Prices range from $10 to $30. See and shop at www.cglassjewelry.com. Or stop by the three-day trunk show (which will include Adams’ jewelry and art) at her Wing & a Prayer Studio, behind the historic Sardis United Methodist Church, 3725 Powers Ferry Road, Atlanta. The show is 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Oct. 20 and 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Oct. 21-22.
Best of the South
Do you have favorite finds from around the South that you give as gifts, buy for your home or rave about to friends? If so, please share them with us. Please send your suggestions to: ljerkins@bellsouth.net. In the subject line, please write: Southern made.
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