Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas, dear blog readers. I will be silent for awhile. Nothing to worry about – I’ll be back, and hope you will join me.

Meanwhile, have a lovely week of holidays!

P.S. I have been and will continue to busy through December 24. See?

Three Rivers First Baptist Church, Christmas musical, 2015 (I took the photo from my perch up in the sound booth, where I quietly sang along with the bass line like the dork that I am.) This year’s musical will be Dec. 22 and 23 at 6 p.m. and again on Sunday, Dec. 24 at 10:30 a.m. 

Things I Learned in November

  1. The fall time change is so much easier than the spring one, but it still makes me tired to have my internal chronometer jerked around.
  2. There are more ways to measure the success of a show than by the $ I earn. Reconnecting with old friends, meeting other artisans, talking to people who might become drawing students–all very rewarding. (I already knew this but it was reinforced in November.)
  3. I found a new podcast that really holds my attention. Its tagline is “for the curious mind with a short attention span”. It is by Mike Rowe, the “Dirty Jobs” guy with a fabulous voice. My favorite episode so far is “It is good to be the king”, which he published in July of 2017.
  4. In reading The Pencil Perfect by Caroline Weaver of C. W. Pencil Enterprise, I am learning all sorts of history about pencils. Did you know that Henry David Thoreau’s family had a pencil manufacturing business? 
  5. Did you know it takes 7 yards of upholstery fabric to cover an armchair? I learned this; next I hope to learn how to choose and buy fabric without actually going to town.
  6. By being an organ donor, one life can save eight lives. Remember, souls go to heaven; organs don’t. (My friend is waiting for a pair of new lungs.)
  7. Almost no one gets married in churches anymore. Almost every wedding, reunion, and public event has an audio system and a DJ that is deafening. I keep earplugs with me, but when I forget, it is stunning to me that no one else seems to mind the noise level. Are people not supposed to converse? Is this because so many people just communicate by texting that it doesn’t matter? 

Fall Fun

Say what? “Fall fun”. . . don’t you have work to do?

Yes. I do. There is another show coming this weekend. I’ll tell you about it tomorrow.

Poultry Paintings

The poultry paintings are inching along. They might be a little bit too hard for me, so I am taking my time. Productive procrastination is a good way to get through some difficult tasks. I take breaks to rehab frames, blog, touch up old paintings, answer emails, make a new schedule for drawing lessons, sweep, or water plants. All those things need to be done. I’m the boss of me. There is no deadline on the poultry paintings. They aren’t commissions. I have a commission to work on but it is a secret, and the recipient of the project might be a reader of this blog. So, poultry paintings in increments are what you get to see.

Have I convinced myself that it is okay to procrastinate yet?

This is the latest iteration of the rooster named Dinnerbone and the flock, with the appropriate and clever name of “Flock”. (And the rooster painting title is “Dinnerbone”, because I am creative that way.)

Samson discovered my friend’s car, which is named Hot Wheels. She is clever that way. (My car is named Fernando – thank you for being interested in such important personal details.)

List of Unrelated Items

A generous friend’s orchard where Trail Guy and I gleaned walnuts.

Unrelated except the items relate to my life and work. I hope you can relate.

When did “relate” become such a common word? Reminds me of the way the word “issue” is so overworked. But, this topic is not on today’s list.

  1. The Visalia Electric Railroad: Stories of the Early Years by Louise A. Jackson is headed to the printer. We have been working on this together since last October, and began the rewriting, editing, photo editing, book design and formatting in June. What? You thought someone just wrote a book and BOOM! there it is? Nope. Three of my pencil drawings will be in the book, ones I completed in the past for other purposes but fit the book to a tee!
  2. I’ve started several new paintings, one just because, one to donate, and one for a gift.
  3. We hung an old screen door in the herb garden as the next step to discouraging deer. One of them bit the top off a new broccoli plant, so this is our response. Trail Guy is quite handy, and unlike me, he likes to keep lots of stuff on hand for projects like this.
  4. First Saturday Three Rivers has changed its formula for 2018. They will feature an artist each month, along with having a theme. I get to be the featured artist in April and the theme is wildflowers! That’s why I repainted the mural on the studio door.
  5. A sure sign that I am middle-aged is that I think it is a privilege and a pleasure to glean walnuts. It felt like punishment when I was a kid, even though I was paid 25¢ a bucket.
The top one was begun almost a year ago; the 6×6″ will be donated to Exeter’s Courthouse Gallery; the 10×10″ is a gift for a friend who is getting married soon. Two more layers should do the trick on the Sawtooth paintings; a minimum of 8 more hours will be needed on the lanterns.
I drew this in 1992. Who knew it would be just right for a book published 25 years later??
Whoa, this is in the ugly stage. I am painting it Just Because.
To keep the deer out completely is beyond my ability. This door is on hinges and actually swings open. Does it look silly or cool? Don’t answer that, because my vote for cool has been cast.

 

Six Things I Learned in October

And a few of these things may be hold-overs from September or perhaps even August (slow learner?)

  1. Propane: a. If a tank is full when it is hot out, the propane expands and blows off the pressure relief valve; b. Propane’s bad smell attracts flies
  2. The sharper your knife, the less you cry (when slicing onions). This is the title of a book (minus the part about onions) that I read, a memoir by Kathleen Flinn, about her time a Le Cordon Bleu cooking school in Paris. I don’t cook much, don’t like onions and don’t use them very often, but I will be sure to sharpen my knife next time.
  3. The Pencil Lady was interviewed on my favorite podcast What Should I Read Next. She runs a store in New York City that sells everything pencil related. WOW! It is called CW Pencil Enterprise.
  4. When defrosting the frig at the cabin, it goes fast if I put a warm burner plate off the woodstove inside the freezer (on a piece of foil). Amazing idea – why did it take 31 years to figure this out??
  5. VRBO (Vacation Rental By Owner) charges a whole mess of fees; the next time I rent a place to stay, I will skip this giant greedy conglomerate and find a local rental agency. Ha ha to VRBO.
  6. Drawing lesson for me: drawing a portrait of someone I can’t see and don’t know is just as difficult as drawing a portrait of someone I don’t know from a photo that is blurry. The difference is that when the unknown subject looks similar enough, I get to quit messing with it.

Final Mineral King Weekend

This will be a long post with lots of photos, and then I might run out of things to post about Mineral King for awhile.It didn’t have to be the final Mineral King weekend, because the Park gates stay unlocked until October 25. But, life down the hill beckons, fall is very full of events for us, and we need to close things up when the weather is still good during a season of unpredictable weather.

We have taken on the responsibility of closing the Honeymoon Cabin for the past several years. This is a little cabin left after Disney destroyed the resort in advance of building their ski resort, which never happened. The cabin is now a mini museum of Mineral King history, open all summer to anyone who wanders in. It is at the beginning of the Eagle/Mosquito/White Chief trail.

This is the interior. It is about 10×10′.

After our chores, we had time for a final walk.

Sorry to disappoint you, but this is a juniper tree, not a redwood. Mineral King is too high for redwoods.
The yellow tunnel isn’t very bright this fall.
This deer reminds me of Samson
Cowboy Bert listens to an animated Trail Guy explain something important.
It was a smoky smoky smoky day. There was a wildfire south of us.
My favorite ranger of all time!
These are cottonwoods.
These are juniper berries

And then we made time for one final pass down the Nature Trail. It goes through so many changes in such a short season. . . in July it was packed with all variety of wildflowers. Now, just look at this:

Sawtooth

The Captain

Three weeks ago these were goldenrods.

This was an unusual summer in Mineral King for several reasons. Perhaps I’ll make a list for you next Friday.

The Real Columbus Day

Today, October 12, is the real Columbus Day. In fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. Ferdinand and Isabella paid for the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria. It’s a fine holiday, but it has fallen out of favor.

Fake Columbus Day has also fallen into obscurity. It changes every year, just chasing the 3 day weekend. Only federal and bank employees are aware of it. Postal employees, too.

Who cares?

Careen, Nicole, Kim and I. Happy birthday to us. 

Fall in Mineral King

Warm sunny fall days in Mineral King . . . a transitional time, torn between 2 places. I could be gardening at home, but I can still be hiking in Mineral King. I’ve been gone much of the summer, I miss home, but the cabin is still open and it is nice up there. 

Choices and consequences, decisions, saying yes to one thing means saying no to a whole bunch of others.

We were up the hill last weekend and these are some fall sights.

Lots of wood, but not enough is split. We have more fires in the stove in the fall and sugar pine burns up quickly.Fortunately, it splits easily.Alrighty, then, let’s go for a walk. (Not a hike – used too much energy swinging an ax? Nah, just lazy.)

I helped Trail Guy close up a neighbor’s cabin – such solid shutters.
The water in the east fork of the Kaweah seems just as low as it did in the falls of drought years.
Very heavy currant crop this year
A neighboring cabin isn’t quite closed for the season, but has that “almost over” look.
Tall grasses and a more yellowish coloring on things say “Fall”.
The cottonwoods are turning.
I love this tunnel of yellow.
Very low flow of water at Soda Springs, tall grasses, that golden look over all. . .
Pink?? What is this? Dried out something-or-others. Definitely not golden.
Just three months ago it was too scary to cross this stream (Crystal Creek).
A stock party lost a bag of grain along the trail.
A hiker lost his group, and Sierra the Trailhead Ranger is on her way to escort him back while Trail Guy demonstrates the path that we saw the search helicopter take. You can tell it is fall because he is wearing long sleeves.