Live Preview: Potlucks & Family Storytelling with Cynthia Nims

I’m deeply grateful to the near twenty of you who were able to join me live during my live conversation with Cynthia Nims of Seafood Savvy and Long Live the Recipe Box. Without the means to grab your names as they floated by, I’m afraid I cannot thank you all directly. We both appreciated your participation, even as we struggled with the video hiccups. Thankfully, the good people at Substack were able to share the full live stream video with me this morning, and after a few edits, you’ll find it updated above and easier to watch with those gaps removed. I’m also very grateful to the team at The Getty Center for their inspiring collection. If you can visit, make a reservation, and find a way to make it happen. I am also incredibly grateful for their warm welcome to my live stream initiative.Now, to the topic at hand: Food and family storytelling! You already know that food brings people to the table and will invariably get people telling stories. Today’s conversation was a lead-up to Cynthia’s program for Projectkin on Thursday, “Using a Potluck to Spark Family Storytelling with Cynthia Nims.” Cynthia is a professional food writer, teacher, and cookbook author, so the crossover to family storytelling wasn’t far behind. This all came together when Lori Olson White tipped me off to Cynthia’s post, “Consider a Beloved-Recipes Potluck.”During our conversation, we talked a little about her storytelling potluck with her Tai Chi group, then what it takes to engineer a gathering so that everyone is in the right state of mind to share stories. During the second glitch in the recording, I mentioned Priya Parker’s “The Art of the Gathering,” which is a wonderful resource to put you in the right frame of mind. Unlike storytelling alone, planning an event can be complicated by expectations and mechanics. One key idea we discussed was how much of this is new. We talked about a “progressive” recipe box we can all add to and draw from with best practices. I’m not quite sure how we’ll do that, but join us on Thursday to discuss it! We’re thrilled to have Cynthia join our family history community by participating in our Projectkin events. Please join me in welcoming her. If Projectkin is new to you, why not subscribe and get these and other event recordings directly in your inbox — free. Get full access to Projectkin at projectkin.substack.com/subscribe