Holiday Bazaar TOMORROW
One More Autumn Break from Painting
That flowering pear tree!!
A friend and I took a walk around her neighborhood. It is the only traditionally laid out group of homes in Three Rivers, often referred to as “the suburbs” for its resemblance to typical neighborhoods in the non-foothill towns of our county. (Yeppers, we are special here.)
Check out this house! That is a wooden tree, made in four custom panels to fit each window.
Blossom Peak is visible from the ‘burbs, and it looks so different depending on where you stand. (See? special!)
Because this blog is supposed to be promoting my art, here is a painting of the most common view of Blossom Peak, which is actually 3 peaks. One friend has corrected me on the moniker “Blossom Peak” as the name of all three; apparently one is Blossom, one is Britten, and one is a why bother.
And here is a view from the ‘burbs looking up North Fork. It took us a minute to discern that we were actually seeing up the canyon of the North Fork of the Kaweah River, and then I remembered that when one is standing on the Airport Bridge (there used to be an airstrip near the North Fork), Blossom Peak is visible.
Let’s have another visual aid, another oil painting, of course.
Finally, since the point was to enjoy autumn in Three Rivers, here is a final photo of splendid color, Virginia creeper this time.
P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SHIRLEY GOODNESS!
A Break From Painting to Enjoy Autumn
I had a job about 100 years ago at a vocational school. It was a terrible job, because one of my duties was to collect on unpaid student loans. One of my few good memories of working there was meeting a student named “Autumn Eve”. I didn’t get to know her very well (fraternization was discouraged between students and hired help), but I never forgot her name.
But I digress.
Let’s take a look at some autumn pictures in Three Rivers.
The flowering pear tree outside my studio is The Champion. (Not interested in hearing about native and non-native trees during Autumn, but thank you for your concern.) Chinese Pistache trees are also stunning this time of year. So there.
That was fun. Let’s do this again in a couple of days.
More Walking in Three Rivers
I painted that view with that tree about 15 years ago.
There is a yard that we can count on to have wonderful fall colors each year.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JB! (IF YOU ARE STILL ONE OF MY TENS OF READERS AND EVEN IF YOU AREN’T)
Walking in Three Rivers
I have become (and am becoming) friends with a group of bloggers from all over. Elisabeth in Nova Scotia puts together something called “Cool Bloggers Walking Club” each October, and the participating folks send her photos of their walks each week. Her idea is to get us all moving our bodies for a minimum of 10 minutes a day. I am the only blogger I know in real life, and it helps me to get to know other folks who blog regularly. It is good to have other people to learn from (and occasionally help, but they usually know much more than me.)
Today and tomorrow I’ll show you some photos from recent walks. (Yes, I am still working. . . but there isn’t anything bloggable about it at the moment.)
That’ll do for now. Sorry it isn’t about Mineral King. That’s a seasonal topic, and that season is over for this year.
Driving Through the Valley After my Show
Golly tamale, that Central California Artist must have run out of things to write.
Nope. Rarely does that happen.
I drove to Tulare to retrieve my art. It was very serendipitous to pass many vineyards at a time when I need photos of them for the current pencil commission. I like using my own photos, especially when a customer doesn’t have what is needed. It’s better than taking them from The Google (although I use The Duck—AKA Duckduckgo.)
After filling the back of the pick-em-up truck with all the unsold art and securing my spinning card rack in the passenger seat with the seat belt, I headed off to visit a friend in a rehab hospital. On the way, I passed the very fabulous Tulare library, which is not only a county library, but it is administrated through the City of Tulare.
I love our library system—with my card, I can check out books from Manteca in the north all the way to Bakersfield in the south. It is possible that the Three Rivers library is one of the smallest in the system, so while I can order books (but not on their malfunctioning website with my laptop anymore), there is nothing quite as thrilling as seeing a zillion more books all in one building.
Look at the entry to this library:
After the library, I had a nice visit with my friend, then headed to Visalia because Aldi (a simple grocery store for frugal folks) is sort of on the way home. Then a stop at the Post Office, and finally, almost home.
Always. Mineral King road, Three Rivers, Highway 198 farther down, everywhere. I didn’t mind. The pick-em-up truck is a 5-speed, not an automatic.
Custom Art Job—A Map
The owners of a ranch used a hand drawn map to show visitors (for various reasons) how to find the right pastures, and they decided that a pretty map would better serve their purposes. They brought the hand drawn map along with a county map showing property lines and buildings.
Think, think, think. How do I do this? I started by tracing the country map and transferring it to a large sheet of drawing paper. Then we went over it together to determine property lines, fence lines, troughs, internal roads, gates, and to list what else would be helpful to add.
When all those things were figured out, the lanes were named, the pastures were numbered, and all the gates and water troughs were located, I walked the property a second time for a sense of what belonged in the margins to prettify the map.
When all the drawings were in place, I scanned it in 2 parts, because OF COURSE it was too big for my flatbed scanner. Then hours and hours using Photoshop began. (I seriously underbid this job. . . so what’s new?) When it seemed finished, I emailed the owners to see how it would print for them, since they often need to hand one to a visitor. (Duh. That’s why they had me do this job.)
The owners thought it was great, but needed to make a few corrections and changes
We decided that the heron looked weird, the word “faucet” on the legend needed to be replaced with “trough”, a fence line was missing, the map and words needed to be darker without changing the drawings, and, get this, I drew the wrong horse at the bottom left corner.
What?? Seen one, seen ‘em all (and I think most yellow flowers and most babies look alike too.)
So with coaching from these horse experts, I turned Mr. White Nose into Hopper, a black horse (yes, I can tell the difference in horse colors, just not features).
There were many layers of tissue paper, sketches to figure out what might fit where, copies to correct, piles and piles of papers when the job was finished.
Here is the final map of the Bar-O Ranch. Really challenging job, very satisfying results, lots of new experience in problem solving and design that I probably won’t get another chance to use. However, if you know of anyone who wants a pretty map, I’m the one to call.
New Notecards Coming Soon
Notecards have been a mainstay of my art business since 1987 (maybe you weren’t born yet). There used to be many stores throughout Tulare County that sold these steadily, and I spent copious amounts of time packaging cards, sometimes with the help of my parents or my friend Gnat.
The packages had two each of five designs and retailed for $5.00. It was possible to make a profit because I worked at a print shop and received a discount, but had to order large quantities to make this work. “Large” means 1000 or more of each design, instead of the 100 or so I now order. Since this was before email, most of polite society used cards. (Impolite society didn’t send thank you notes.)
Now notecards can be ordered online, and if I wait for a discount sale from the company who prints the cards, I can make a small profit selling four cards (all same design in a package) for $10.
Have you picked yourself back up off the floor? Okey dokey, let’s see the new designs coming soon. These were chosen to please my higher selling stores’ customers, many of whom are visitors to the area in the summer. The pencil drawings aren’t new; the paintings were completed recently (within the last year).
These are all scenes drawn or painted from my* photos, sometimes embellished and made up from several photos and my memory, all specific to eastern Tulare County: Three Rivers, Sequoia National Park, and Mineral King.
The notecards will be available at Kaweah Arts in Three Rivers and on this page of my website.
*Except Lake Kaweah, generously supplied by my friend Rachel.
Too Busy to Paint
In the mornings I meet my friend and her cat so we can power up a steep road in the neighborhood.
Some mornings there are turkeys yelling in the middle of the road.
None of this keeps me too busy to paint. I just wanted you to see these pictures.
There is a large project at my church right now. It has been occupying a lot of space in my mind, figuring out what to do and how to do it.
This needs plants, many many many plants. How many? I don’t know.
Fortunately, I know someone who knows. Melanie Keeley has a native plant nursery in Three Rivers and she is a genius expert botanist. (Her nursery is Alta Vista—call or email for an appointment.)
First I had to make gopher baskets. It wasn’t easy, but I had help. We only bled a little bit.
Six or seven friends met Melanie at church one morning. She chose and brought 35 plants, placed them, and instructed us in the planting requirements. Some didn’t need gopher baskets, and some that did needed a hole snipped in the center of the bottom. Weird. Maybe gophers don’t bite tap roots.
After we finished planting and hand watering, we returned in the afternoon to cover it all with mulch. There wasn’t enough, but whatever got spread was an improvement.
Then two guys set up a watering system. Seeing them (lower right side of the landscaped area) in this poorly photoshopped shot gives you an idea of the scale of the project.
In addition to working on the planting project, I repainted a cabin sign.
Then I started on a design for embroidered caps for my friend to sell at her store, Stem & Stone in Three Rivers. (The link is a Facebook page, so I can’t open it, but maybe you can.)
There are two versions here because the embroiderer charges by the stitch count, and we don’t know what the different prices might turn out to be, so we want options.
After she approved these two arrangements, I used colored pencils and Photoshop to turn these into useful designs. (The one on the left isn’t showing completely here.)
She’s not in a big rush. That’s good, because I need to design a ranch map and get some paintings finished.
I love the variety in my job and life!
Well, I WAS Going to Work…
On a recent weekend, I said to Trail Guy, “I MUST paint on Monday! Do not distract me, and please, please, if you see me messing around in the yard or the house, remind me that I must paint because I messed around all week, postponing painting!”
On Monday, he said, “Want to drive up South Fork? I haven’t been there in a long time and I want to see how the repairs from the ’23 flood and the fires look.”
NO! NONONO!
Then I gave it another thought and remembered that spring does not last forever. (Yes, thank you Gnat, I know it is always spring somewhere in the world, but I am only here, not anywhere else.)
So I said yes.
He said it would only be an hour; I said it would probably be three hours.
It was very green but nothing looked photo-worthy until we saw Homer’s Nose.
This is looking back at the new bridge, built in 2021.
The road ended about 1/4 to 1/2 mile below the campground. About a dozen cars were parked along the road. I wondered where all the people went, and Trail Guy wondered how they would get turned around on such a narrow road. (We turned around with about a 5-point turn.)
There were three women walking along the road, and Trail Guy stopped to talk to them. Two are sisters from LA who have owned a home near the South Fork Campground since 1974 (well, the property—I don’t know what year the house was built). They were very interesting and told us to stop by to view the lupine from their deck. They were convinced that lupine seeds were scattered during fire fighting operations, when “ping-pongs” were dropped from the air to start back-fires. (Scary!)
They had great wildflowers in their yard.
One last photo as we headed down the road. If I hadn’t felt the need to do some painting, if my camera battery hadn’t croaked, if we had brought lunch, I would have taken another 2 hours or so for photography. Doesn’t matter, it clouded up, and we headed home.
I painted all afternoon. I’ll show you tomorrow.
P.S. We were gone 3 hours.