The summer of me painting like a madwoman continues!
A couple of months ago
I saw a set of fishing lures in a store and thought they would fit right in with
the things I usually paint: small, colorful, shiny. My dad used to
fish, so I asked him if I could use some of his lures for a painting. I
remember being absolutely fascinated by my dad's tackle box when I was a
kid. Everything in there looked like adorable little toys. DANGEROUS
toys! Dad
warned me that his lures were very old but I was welcome to them,
and he gave me a box. A couple were too ugly to use, but I was charmed
by the others, and I especially liked their cracked paint jobs. I added
some of my most feminine jewelry, and I like how they resemble bubbles
and underwater plants.
I started painting the red one because I am in love with red. Then I tackled the lure in the lower right corner. It was similarly
cracked and had silver glitter on its side. I painted that one square at
a time and am pleased with the way it turned out.
Elsewhere:
the beginning of a "Tiny Torpedo" is in the top-left and some blue
beads in the bottom-left. I still needed to paint two more big, difficult-looking lures. At that point I already had a title figured out: "Allure."
I
added some more blue jewelry and a red bead in the lower left corner, a
string of pearls with many tiresome little connecty things, and one
of the tough lures. It's underneath the red and white one and is the
size of my forearm. Lots of texture and color changes are happening in
this one, and I spent an entire day working on it. Fun fact: I listened to a lot of episodes of Harmontown, a favorite, hilarious podcast from Community creator Dan Harmon, while I worked on this painting.
Over
the next couple of days I added the lipsticked, yellow-eyed lure. Its
body was incredibly difficult because it was covered with tiny, raised
diamond shapes that got smaller as I moved down its multicolored length.
Such a hassle, and it also took an entire day to finish. The next day I took care of everything in the top-left
quadrant. Most of those colors are dark and required at least two coats
of paint. But I was nearing the home stretch and was eager to finish the fancy, fancy top-right corner.
After
a couple of intense, poppy-painting days, "Allure" was finished! That is
my favorite pin, and I wanted it to look very glossy and almost wet. I
had a blast with this painting. Please check out my prints, available
here.
I've also started to put Allure on items in my merchandise store! Click here to visit the store, and just click on whatever category you're interested in. I plan to add more products over the next day or two!
In other news, yesterday Jeff and I drove up to Chicago to visit Mel, one of its newest citizens. She lives in an apartment in Logan Square, and we brought her a bed frame, rolled-up mattress, and air conditioner. Let's hear it for Mazda 6's incredible trunk space! Those items were installed within an hour, and after that we spent the day together, eating lots of great food and shooting the breeze. She's been there for a month now and found a job as a prep cook at a restaurant/bar called Rootstock. We really miss her. But Mel's adjusting to the big city with astonishing ease--this is because she actually knows how to talk to people, imagine that!--and we admire her adaptability so much. Brave girl!
Here are Jeff and Mel about one microsecond before Mel rushed the camera. Aren't they adorable? So much love for these two.
Oh hi! The past month has been so busy, and I've been painting overtime in order to produce as much new work as I can for my one-person show coming up in about five weeks, including the above painting. I'll talk about it in a minute.
Earlier in June Jeff and I traveled to west-central Illinois for the Quincy Art Center's Quad-State Biennial, where two paintings of mine--The Graduates and Abandoned Knowledge--are currently on display. This is a tough show to get into--my work was rejected in 2011, so I had zero confidence when I entered this year. But I was accepted and even won a couple of prizes! Abandoned Knowledge received the Merit Award (which is fourth place out of something like 240 entries) and The Graduates won the People's Choice Award (which was decided by popuar vote during the opening reception). The Biennial was loaded with amazing artwork in a wide variety of media, not just watercolor. You can watch some local news reports about the Biennial here!
I also
reconnected with former Western Illinois University drawing professor Don Crouch. He taught me drawing fundamentals that I
use constantly and gave me confidence as an artist from my first day of
college. (That day he had us draw a charcoal still life with plants. I had never
used compressed charcoal in my life, but he hung my drawing up that day and said
that I could "see well." I took drawing classes with Don for two years.)
Also at the show: Patti Hutinger, another WIU art department fixture
who sat in on Don's classes and created beautiful pastel drawings. Both Patti and Don
had work in the show. They were surprised and delighted to see me and admired my paintings, so that was a
thrill.
Best of all, my parents, Jeff, Emily, Tyler, and my brother
Ryan were there with me. We had a GREAT time together with lots of
laughs. Please check out the show if you're in the area! It will be at the Quincy Art Center until August.
Back to this new painting of mine!
Before You is a
close-up of a small selection of my jewelry. I painted this on an 18"x24"
piece of paper, which is kind of medium-sized for me, and this time I
wanted to show fewer items but make them a lot larger than usual. This
is the beginning of a floral charm on a necklace. The stones are kind of
dusky-green, and I liked their shapes and the way they reflected lots
of muted colors.
I
spent day two painting the glass bead in the center. I've painted beads
from this necklace before, but the way they take on
neighboring colors means they're always different. I painted it in the
morning and worked on the dark purple beads in the afternoon. I left them unfinished and softened the hard white edges inside them later on. I also added the pink bead near the top and some soft background colors.
Next I painted the big pink bead on the right. It's about 8 inches in
diameter, and I really got into its facets. Then I took care of some
odds and ends stuff, including a small greenish bead near the
center and part of a crystal in the top left corner.
Sorry
for the giant leap between the last photo and this one. My studio gets hot in the afternoon, and when I finished painting for the day, the last thing on my mind was documentation.
I was more like I need a cold drink. Anyway, here is the rest of the jewelry. I kind of like the diagonal
movement that separates the cool side from the warm side. New
developments include a sparkly black and blue pendant at the bottom. My
favorite parts of this painting are the fancy golden spheres that connect
the orange glass beads. You can only see one of those whole (next to the
giant pink bead); the rest are cropped along the left side and top edge.
And here's why I decided to title this painting Before You. I wore all
of this jewelry before I met Jeff. I purchased most of it during my
mid-to-late thirties when I was very lonely and required frivolous
costume jewelry pick-me-ups every once in a while. You ladies know how that is. And the fact that all of these things are in a chaotic jumble
definitely reflects that time in my life as well. While I don't
particularly enjoy thinking about those years, I'm a stronger person for
having endured them, and they make me value my happiness all the more
now.
And I've put Before You on all kinds of affordable, fun products at my little merchandise store! Please go here to see them. Note: just click on the category of whatever it is you'd like (drinkware, women's t-shirts, bags, etc.), and you'll find these items (and more) along with dozens of things with my other paintings on them.
Thanks as always for your kind support. It allows me to continue to do what I love!
Good things are happening in my art world! Last week UGallery took me under their massive, cuddly wing, and that is where you can buy my original paintings now (not prints, not merchandise--I'm talking about the actual piece of paper with the actual paint on it).
UGallery is an online art gallery that's received positive reviews from CNN, The Economist, InStyle, USAToday and others. If you search for "buy art" on Google, it's right up there near the top if not the very top. I had to apply to be accepted, and I waited and wondered for over a week before I received a happy email and phone call. They accepted all of the paintings I offered, and the gallery manager answered all of my questions in a friendly, welcome-to-the-family kind of way. I'm currently being featured on the site's front page along with other artists with new work ("A Forest of New Art") and on the UGallery blog in a short article introducing artists new to the site. You can also view my art and profile here.
Unlike my art website, UGallery receives lots of traffic from people who are serious about buying art, and I want those eyes on my work. UGallery is currently--like, it ends today--having a 20% off sale, their biggest event of the year, so please check them out.
Anyway, I'm happy to have my work up at UGallery--wish me luck there!
I also have a couple of paintings at Cureeo, including Planets and Foil, above. Cureeo is smaller and more boutique-y than UGallery. They said no to everything I offered up for sale except for Planets and that second portrait I painted of Mabel with the little-kid background. So I don't really understand Cureeo's selection process other than the fact that the work they seem to go for is a bit more avant garde than mine, but it's nice to be included there in some way.
We'll see how things go at both of these online art galleries! I can continue to sell my paintings independently, so feel free to contact me personally if you want an original. Last week my friend and former colleague Dave bought Apple Blossoms for his wife Sandra (don't worry; she was in on this) from me on the day before it was about to appear on UGallery--thanks Dave! Nothing makes my day like a sale.
In other good art news, The Graduates(above) won an Award of Excellence at the Illinois Watercolor Society's annual members' show. After Best of Show, three Excellence awards are up for grabs, followed by some honorable mentions and merchandise awards.
People who won awards included (l-r) Carmelo Schifano, me!, Sylvia Aruffo, Sally Konley, Bret Steinhaus, Tom Herzberg, Robert Krajecki, and Rochelle Weiner.
So this was huge for me, and Jeff and I were very happy that we made the long drive up to Oak Brook for the Thursday night opening earlier this month. I provided a boatload of cookies for the opening. If you'd like to see my painting along with forty or so other watercolors, please stop by the beautiful Mayslake Peabody Estate in Oak Brook before the show closes on December 5.
Finally, please *like* my art page on Facebook--I'm currently 8 likes away from 500. I regularly post in-progress photos of my paintings and let you know about print/merchandise sales. Thank you!
Sorry for the long wait between posts! Among other things, Jeff and I were busy with a flooring project during the past couple of weeks, and it ate up my afternoons. But it's finished, it looks amazing, and it is one of something like five blogs I need to write.
So! Back to New York City with Jeff, Mel, and me. As you can tell from the photo above, we spent our last vacation day at the Museum of Modern Art, where Mel caught me interacting with a man painted on a mirror. My expression probably explains why I had to wait until age 39 to get married.
But first we needed to try the best bagels in New York at a place called Ess-A-Bagel. So much time has passed since we ate these, but boy did my brain imprint a taste-memory that will make every bagel I eat in the future seem inferior. Because they will be inferior. These were perfection: not rubbery at all, but yielding and warm with a perfectly crisp exterior. Once again we ate them while standing on the sidewalk like a buncha hobos.
I also discovered that several years of walking on Dr. Scholl's gel insoles will cause them to disintegrate, so I bought some more and, and to be even more of a hobo, I did this whole boot-takeoff-insole-switcheroo bit while squatting in the entrance of a drugstore.
It was an unseasonably warm and humid morning, and as we walked toward MoMA, I took off my jacket. The dress I wore came in a fuzzy mystery fabric that seemed to promote active sweating. My ponytail became its usual awful black frizz pom-pom. So I was miserable but attempted to take on the devil-may-care attitude of the female sculptures we saw frolicking in the middle of a busy intersection.
Once we arrived at MoMA, we were disappointed to discover a giant line of people waiting to enter. We joined their ranks and prepared ourselves for boredom. Museum workers patrolled the line and said that some of the blockbuster paintings were not on display, and also people who downloaded the MoMA app and used it to pay online would get to skip the line and go inside. Jeff didn't have to be told twice--he got to work downloading and paying, and whoooooosh, we swooped inside like a trio of VIPs.
That museum worker was right about some of the museum's pieces being unavailable. It seemed like 75% of the things I wanted to see (1900-1950) were gone, but their gallery tags were still in place as if to mock me. This was a shame because those paintings are in my art teacher wheelhouse, and I was all set to bombard young Mel with interesting painting tidbits all morning long. Unfortunately we were treated to a mere handful of masterpieces (such as the fantastic Rousseau and Starry Night, above) followed by a dollop of Pop, a whole lot of Minimalism, and some Abstract Expressionism. I bemoaned this, but Mel had a grand time anyway.
I told Mel about Rodin's portrait of Balzac--she said it was one of her favorite things in the museum. And I love the photo she took of a Jackson Pollock painting viewed from the side.
We had lunch at Tina's Cuban Cuisine, which was relatively nearby, and Jeff took this photo of the straightest leg in the city.
The place was packed, and we sat in a kind of so-what dining room with what seemed like fluorescent lighting--it made me feel like I was back in a school cafeteria (PTSD!). We shared everything, including a Cuban sandwich and some ham croquettes. Jeff and I were hoping that these would match the ones we had in Spain, and while they were crispy-creamy-tasty...yeah, sorry.
These little guys were fun: empanadas with chicken filling, a Twinkie-looking item that I can't remember, and a red ball of mashed potatoes surrounding some kind of ground beef situation. I'm pretty sure I had a mango (?) shake. Sorry so vague--it's been over a month!
After lunch we headed to the Hirschl and Adler gallery on 5th Avenue. Sara, a friend of mine from grad school, told me that her husband Peter had a small show there, and I was curious to study his exquisite oil paintings in person--I'd only seen them online. The above photo doesn't do them justice--here's an example of his work.
Gorgeous and Hopperesque! Peter is my age, and I couldn't help feeling like I was so far behind him in terms of art production. He was fortunate to have been born into an artistic family and has painted professionally for his entire adult life, whereas I've only been at it for two and a half years. But this is nothing new: I feel insecure pretty much every time I walk into any gallery at all. I'm such a newbie!
And then in an adjoining room: enormous watercolors by Alexander Creswell. This artist counts among his patrons THE QUEEN OF FREAKING ENGLAND. He is so good, you guys! Included in his show was a series of giant (4 feet across, maybe?) paintings of Venice at night with fireworks, and they were color-drenched and masterful, with a sort of effortlessness that only supremely confident painters can pull off.
I was in awe, intimidated, and in love with these, and I wanted to go home and paint paint paint. I walked back into Pete's room, and yes, please just let me go home and paint. I start to feel not right if I go too long without painting. It's kind of like my need for chocolate. Speaking of...
We bought some fancy-ass desserts and hot chocolate at the Francois Payard Bakery (ground floor of The Plaza hotel).
We were feeling glamorous (at least I was) as we sat at a tall table and savored macarons and other gorgeous creations. A woman of a certain age stopped by as Jeff and I were digging into that shiny chocolate dome, and she exclaimed, "What is THAT?" We told her where she could find one. It was almost as fabulous as it looks--there was something hazelnutty going on inside, if I remember correctly.
And then Jeff's phone buzzed. A text from Southwest Airlines told us that our flight home had been canceled. Whut.
Jeff was a hero as per usual and got on the phone with the airline, and after about a half hour, we were booked on a new, slightly earlier flight. GO JEFF. He said that Southwest did everything right and were actually surprisingly soothing about the whole thing.
We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around, working our way back to the hotel. Along the way Mel took some photos of Bergdorf Goodman's windows--they were a purple tribute to fashion over the past 111 years.
Above and beyond, Bergdorf Goodman!
Our last meal in New York was at a Cambodian sandwich shop called Num Pang. It was close to our hotel and, like all of the restaurants we visited on our trip, vetted by Jeff weeks in advance. Mel and I shared a meatball sandwich while Jeff abstained, claiming he was still full from lunch. Num Pang was decorated with fun graffiti, and we stood at a little bar and inhaled the sandwich and a couple of refreshing tea concoctions.
Soon enough we were on our way back to Laguardia, where the Southwest chaos meant that we had nowhere to sit once we reached our gate. Actually I found one seat, which Jeff and Mel insisted I take while they sat on the floor, during which time Mel took the above self-portrait. As you can see, she was still full of energy and happiness.
I'll spare you the description of the flight home, our hotel shuttle that decided to not pick us up because our flight was cancelled but then after an angry call from Jeff and an hour of waiting, they came to get us after all, and then the two-hour drive home through the absolute middle of nowhere and the bag of Tato Skins I ate to stay awake and didn't exactly share.
If you wanted Tato Skins so much maybe you should have bought some for yourself, Jeffray.
We dropped Mel off and were reunited with our confused cats at around 1:30 a.m. Everyone was fed, watered, and adored. Cat boxes were cleaned out, and my wonderful husband and I fell into deep, dark comas for the rest of the night.
In conclusion, New York is awesome. You should go.
Jeff and I took Melissa (his daughter) to New York a few weeks ago. This was Mel's first visit, but Jeff and I had been there multiple times. Mel had been putting in untold hours cooking at a restaurant in downtown Champaign--one of those deals where people keep quitting but no one gets hired to replace them, so the remaining crew has to work nightmare shifts for weeks on end. Mel was seriously exhausted, but you can't tell it in the photo above because (a) she is beautiful at all times, and (b) she was positively joyous at the prospect of escaping her restaurant captors for almost a whole week.
We took a late Saturday afternoon drive up to Chicago to our hotel near Midway. Our flight was at 6:00 the next morning. The sun set on an congregation of windmills--they really are a sight to behold in such a flat landscape--and a full moon rose in the east.
Near our hotel was a Five Guys. Mel had never tried one of their burgers and was duly impressed (just look at that cheese oozage). We were all starving, so that made the food even better. Back at the hotel, Mel and I laughed at the lobby's truly awful Helpful Waiter sculpture, whose bulbous ass greeted all parking lot visitors. We slept for a few hours before our phone alarms sounded at 3:15. We were out the door by 4:00, shuttled to the airport by 4:30, and hustled through security at 5:00.
We decided to get some breakfast before finding our gate. Our only food options at that hour were Gold Coast Dogs and something called Pegasus, where Mel had a breakfast sandwich that she does not recommend. But as for the hot dogs, I will never not want one of them. Breakfast of champions. We flew on Southwest for the first time (loved it) and watched the sun rise extra quickly as we headed east. We were in NYC by 9:00 and had a full Sunday itinerary ahead of us.
Happily, we were able to check in early at our hotel (the Westin on 42nd Street). Jeff and I are crazy about their yummy beds. I also happen to like the way all Westin lobbies smell great. And outside our window: the beautiful Chrysler Building!
Jeff, who managed to pay for our hotel and flights with points, wanted to introduce Mel to New York via walks to various landmarks and restaurants. We only hit a couple of museums on this trip. I thought this was wise because the first time I went to NYC it was one nonstop museum slog, something like six in two days, and while I loved them all, I came home with only a cursory feel for the city itself.
That morning Mel took photos of Grand Central Terminal, the New York Public Library, St. Patrick's Cathedral (very much under construction), and Rockefeller Center, among others. She was wowed by the windows at THE Sax Fifth Avenue and Louis Vuitton.
The Louis Vuitton windows featured an eye-popping installation by dot-obsessed Japanese artist Yaioi Kusama.
The weather couldn't have been more beautiful--this was the first time I'd been there in the fall. Perfect jacket weather! Mel and Jeff took the bulk of the photos you'll see in these New York posts. "If I have to write about this, you guys have to take the pictures," I told them. If you're a fan of the show, it's impossible not to hum the 30 Rock theme song while standing in front of it.
That Sunday morning's walk made me particularly happy because every half hour or so we ate something sweet. Near 30 Rock: the Bouchon Bakery, home of the incredible macarons I enjoyed with Poof when we were in New York last year.
I swear I have not stopped thinking about those macarons, and I will be so bold as to say that they were better than any I had in Paris. I tried a summer berry macaron (the big purplish one in the middle), the same flavor I'd lost my mind over last year, and it was just as amazing as I'd remembered. I gave Jeff and Mel little--little!! mine!! grr!!--bites and we shared a very good baguette while doing some people-watching.
One advantage of having a third person with us: for the first time ever, we now have vacation photos of the two of us together, and they're not the usual self-portraits-holding-camera-at-arm's-length, either. Thank you, Mel, and I apologize in advance for any unappetizing mushiness you readers may see. Above: Jeff is telling me about the good old days of vaudeville, probably.
Ack!! The mushiness! Make it stop!
Next up: Momofuku's Milk Bar, home of the Crack Pie, the Compost Cookie, and the cereal milk milkshake. This place has a cookbook I've had on my Amazon wish list for over a year, but no one will buy it for me, and that's probably for the best.
There's something disturbing--and I have to think it's intentionally disturbing--about this place. We got a subversive, druggy vibe from it. It's the kind of bakery Lou Reed and Andy Warhol would come up with.
SONG TIME
The treats came prepackaged in a way that reminded me of the McDonald's fried cherry pies of yesteryear. There was no seating at the Milk Bar, so we sat on a window ledge and tore into our treats like a bunch of junkies. Pictured: the cereal milk milkshake, which tasted exactly like cereal milk because that's what it's made of. Jeff's holding the candy bar pie, and I've got the crack pie. Not pictured: the compost cookie, which we saved for later. The crack pie is like a pecan pie without the pecans, and it has an oatmeal cookie crust. Very sweet and delicious. If that was the crack pie, the candy bar pie ought to be called the meth pie. It has a chocolate cookie crust, housemade nougat, a thick, gooey layer of toffee, and a pretzel smothered in chocolate ganache. We talked about it for days. Somebody had better get me that cookbook; that's all I'm saying.
Shiny building, historic building, building from some movie...hey, how about some pizza?
Jeff led us to Angelo's Coal Oven Pizzeria, where we shared a small margherita pizza. I was swooning over the sauce. Gah, I want some so badly right now! Why do I have to go all the way to New York for this, why? I can't write about this pizza. It was perfect in every way and it's making me sad.
After lunch we explored Central Park. Jeff and Mel gamboled up an impressive rock overlooking a pond while I rested my feet. Conservative estimate: we walked at least 40,000 steps that day, no joke, and my boots were feeling gravity's pull. Did you enjoy my use of the word gamboled up there, by the way? Because here's exactly what I thought when they scampered up that rock: Look at those two, gamboling like a couple of goats. Then they strutted back down like Richard Pryor in Stir Crazy.
At some point Jeff checked his phone to see how much the Frick (one of my favorites: a mansion turned into an all-killer-no-filler art museum) cost, and he learned that, amazingly, the Frick was free on Sundays from 11:00 to 1:00. It was 12:45. We RAN to the Frick as Mel and I shrieked, "Frick! What the Frick!" etc. We got in by the skin of our teeth and saved 54 dollars. Was it crowded? You bet.
But we still managed to enjoy such hard-hitters as Holbein's Sir Thomas More, Bellini's St. Francis in Ecstasy, a late Rembrandt self-portrait, and many more, but not too many more. This is a nice, bite-sized museum that won't monopolize your entire afternoon.
It was raining when we left, but it was only a passing shower. We took shelter under an arbor in Central Park and ate the compost cookie, which was a "kitchen sink" kind of thing that included potato chips. Unfortunately, the chips didn't have as much of a presence as I thought they might, so that was a little anticlimactic.
We explored the park some more. If you click on this photo and look closely, you'll notice a cluster of frat boys in Speedos beneath the green banner on the right. In what must have been a hazing ritual, they came up to people and sang a capella choruses of pop songs at passersby. "You don't know-oh-oh! You don't know you're beautiful!" and so on. We got out of there...
...but not before I got a shot of Melissa at Strawberry Fields. This photo was taken during the nanosecond that Baby Boomers were not swarming around it.
More walking, more buildings, more photos, and eventually we approached Columbus Circle. Jeff had a lead on a Belgian waffle food truck. I've mentioned this before, but four years ago Jeff went to Belgium on business, and while he was there he had the best frites of his life and street-food waffles topped with Nutella, ice cream, and so on. He can't get over those, either. And I like waffles as much as the next guy, but I never understood what the big deal was...until we hit that food truck and it showed me what's what.
Unbelievable. That thing you see above is a liege waffle, which means it has a thin crust of caramelized sugar. These are tricky to make, apparently, but so special. Warm, gooey, slightly crunchy, complex--an absolute winner. I saw the shot on the right as I was sifting through these photos the other day, and it knocked the wind out of me.
But wait, there's more! We shared a single serving-sized cup of gelato at Grom (which Jeff and I had enjoyed in Florence and Paris). I demonstrated the unique stretchiness of gelato for Mel. Achingly good. The fact that we had shared everything that day made us a lot less bloated than we would have been otherwise, I'm telling you.
We walked down Broadway as late afternoon approached--remember, we had been up since 3:00--and prepared to hit our final food stop of the day, Don Antonio, whose claim to fame is a pizza with a crust that is deep fried before it is topped and baked in a smoky wood oven. We ordered one of those along with a fresh mozzarella and prosciutto appetizer. Mel very sweetly said that dinner was on her. How fabulous of her!
The pizza's crust was indeed incredible, with a crunchy-chewy texture, but I've never had a smokier pizza, except maybe that time when Dad put a frozen pizza on the grill to see what it would do. This felt like I was eating bacon, not pizza, and bacon is terrific but I wanted pizza more. So this place took a back seat to Angelo's from earlier in the day, but needless to say, we ate the hell out of that pizza anyway.
After supper we waddled back toward our hotel, and the Empire State Building came into view for the first time. Jeff created the above self-portrait in an homage to the final episode of this season's Louie, where SPOILER ALERT he flips off the Ed Sullivan theater and yells "F--- you, David Letterman!" I have loved Dave for thirty years, so I do not approve of this photo at all, but that was one stellar Louie episode, and I'm sure Dave got a kick out of it, too. Finally, we passed Grand Central Terminal en route to our yummy, yummy beds.
Heh, I told myself that I was going to keep this short, as several weeks have passed since our trip. Fail! The rest of these will be shorter. Probably. I hope.
The new cookbook from Baked (I've writtenaboutthoseguysbefore) is here, and it is tremendous. It arrived at my doorstep on Friday, filled with a stupefying number of recipes that demanded to be tried. Baked Elements is organized into ten chapters, each starring one of Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito's favorite ingredients, such as banana, malted milk powder, chocolate, booze, and so on. Chapter one is peanut butter. I've already made two of its recipes, with another one in the works for later today. The peanut butter chapter is so compelling that I haven't even read the rest of the book beyond a quick breeze-through.
Why oatmeal peanut butter chocolate chip scones first? Number five in the book, this was the first recipe for which I had all of the ingredients on hand. Any suppertime plans I had went out the window. "Do you mind if we just have these tonight?" I asked Jeff, who had no problem whatsoever with this idea, and he helped me make them.
As you can see from the photo above, this is only kind of a scone. It's more like a cookie. Scookie? YES IT'S THAT. The oatmeal gives the scookie a nice chewiness and provides a speed bump for those of us who might be inclined to inhale it otherwise. The peanut butter has a definite presence, and the beyond-generous amount of chocolate chips will have you muttering things at it like, "Oh you son of a bitch."
And they're easy to make and not all that messy! Reportedly good with coffee! Less butter than you might expect! Buttermilk binder instead of cream so whoop-de-doo!
Make them and then buy the book. Matt and Renato deserve your love.
1 cup semisweet or milk chocolate chips <--we cobbled together some chunks and regular chips
2 tablespoons raw sugar <--we used granulated sugar instead
DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 400 and position the rack in the center. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and oats. Add the butter and use your fingertips or a pastry cutter to rub or cut the butter into the four mixture until the butter is pea-size and the mixure looks like chunky, coarse sand.
In a glass measuring cup or small bowl, whisk together the buttermilk and egg yolk until combined.
Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour the buttermilk mixture into the center of the well. Add the peanut butter. Using clean, dry, lightly floured hands, gently mix and knead the dough in the bowl until it starts to come together. Add the chocolate chips until just incorporated. Do not overwork the dough.
Turn the dough out directly onto the prepared baking sheet and shape it into a disk 8 inches in diameter and about 1.5 inches high. Beat the egg white slighty, brush the top of the dough with the egg white, and sprinkle with the raw sugar, if you wish.
Cut the dough into 8 wedges--but do not seprate the wedges--and bake for 18-22 minutes (mine took 22), or until the scones start to brown, rotating the baking sheet halfway through. Alternatively, check for doneness by inserting a toothpick into the center of the scone. If the toothpick comes out clean or with just a few crumbs clinging to it, the scones are done.
Remove from the oven, let cool for 5 minutes, and re-slice and separate the scones. Serve slightly warm or transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Scones taste best when consumed within 24 hours of baking, but you could store these scones in an airtight container for up to 2 days.
Did you notice my fancy new plate up there in the top photo? I bought it for $1.50 at a garage sale in Jeff's tiny hometown last week. Jeff grew up about 35 miles south of our house, and 95% of the drive looks like the photo above.
When I taught my beginning art students about perspective, that was the scene I described when introducing the concept of vanshing points. "You know how when you're driving *basically anywhere in Champaign county* and you look at the road in front of you, and it seems like the sides of the road come together at a point on the horizon? And it looks like the road just disappears?" [nods all around] "That's an example of a vanishing point." [Huh! That thing has a name.]
Anyway, the harvest is happening, and the corn looks particularly sad this year thanks to the summer's drought. Some farmers were hit so hard that they didn't even bother to harvest--they just plowed everything under. But most are in the fields now, getting what they can from the stunted corn with its sad little ears.
Someone with happy big ears is Hypatia. Very Renee Zellweger on the pose there, Pache.
And Bun would like to thank everyone who had nice things to say about her supervised walkabout post a while back. She came into my life almost 11 years ago, and her ability to pose with maximum cuteness at all times and in any situation continues to stun all who encounter her, even in the dark.
On Friday Jeff and I drove about 2.5 hours north to Chicago (specifically the Oak Park Art League) for the opening of the Illinois Watercolor Society's Small Waters show. My Mushrooms painting was accepted for this national juried exhibition of small-scale watercolors.
Earlier in the week IWS director Tony Armendariz called me and asked if I was planning to attend the opening. Jeff and I hadn't really given the matter much thought, as we were still wiped out from Los Angeles (it takes us a while to recover from travel). But when Tony calls to ask this question, it's usually followed with, "...because you won an honorable mention" or something like that. At least that's happened to me once before, and calling winning artists has become Tony's standard operating procedure.
So I looked over at a nodding Jeff and said, "Yeah! I think we'll come!" before Tony could tell me why he wanted us there: he needed somebody to help out with the treats. I said sure--I love making cookies for art shows and was happy to lend a hand. Tony added that the show's juror hadn't picked out the show's award winners yet, but if I'd won anything, he'd give me a call Thursday night. Cool. I started planning to make a double batch of sugar cookies while Jeff searched for hotels.
The last-minute hotel possibilities were not good. Oak Park is a pricey area, and public transportation was going to be sketchy, especially if we decided to stay in one of the more affordable but distant hotels. Driving up there would mean a $50 gas (and major time) commitment. Add the cost of food and whatever else to an overnight stay, and we were looking at a $200 price tag to see one of my small paintings surrounded by 39 other small paintings, all of which we were already able to view here. So we decided to tell Tony that we wouldn't be coming, which I felt bad about doing, but that's the way it goes when you're a downstate painter in an upstate art world.
Then Wednesday morning we had a change of heart, and Jeff was feeling bad about me missing a show. What if we drove up to Chicago early Friday afternoon, did some low-key activities, attended the opening, and drove back home that night? Let's do that! I contacted Tony again, told him we were coming to the show after all, and that he could once again count on me to make cookies.
On Thursday I rocked out a double batch of cookies (various animals and fruits). It's a stupidly long process, but I worked as fast as I could in a hazy, assembly-line blur. I didn't even bother to photograph them. I figured that I had produced maybe 50 or 60 cookies, but I had in fact made over 100.
Thursday night came and went without a "you won something" call from Tony. This was not a big surprise, but it would have been an awesome way to end the day, given all the cookie-fueled good karma I thought I might have been attracting.
We took off for Chicago at around lunchtime yesterday, just as a severe thunderstorm rolled through the area. I was entranced by the big shelf cloud you see rolling across the horizon; for about ten minutes, it looked like we lived in a state with mountains. This storm produced downpours and lots of spectacular cloud-to-ground lightning, but it was out of our hair once we exited Champaign County.
Once in Chicago, Jeff wanted to try the Belgian fries at the French Market, which is an indoor marketplace featuring gorgeous produce and artisanal foods. I thought the fries were great, and talk about a generous portion (this was the smaller size!), but as usual they did not match the legendary fries Jeff had when he was in Actual Belgium: not thick enough, and not creamy inside, apparently. We tried two other European specialties while we were at the French Market. The gelato was too firm and the macarons were too dry. Ain't no pleasing us! We ate the hell out of everything we bought, of course.
While in Oak Park we toured Frank Lloyd Wright's home and studio. Our charming guide provided exactly the right amount of information, if you know what I mean. Sometimes tours like this are exhausting academicfests. This was just a breezy little tour. The home and studio were quirky, strange, and beautiful.
After that we had some time to kill, so we found a Five Guys and shared the same kind of burger we had in L.A. It was terrifyingly great. Thus fortified, we drove to the show.
Also arriving early to the show were Tony (above), his lovely wife Virginia, IWS assistant director Carole Hennessy, artist Irma Pocius, and Oak Park Art League member Ted Strandt (also above--he called someone to let us in the building). We set up the treats and looked at the paintings.
Irma (center) was adorable, and she and I talked about art for quite a while. Carole (above, in blue), Jeff, and I had a wonderful conversation about some of the TV shows we love: Friday Night Lights, Boardwalk Empire, Deadwood, and, incredibly, Justified. Carole is the first person we've met who even knows about this show. We recently convinced my parents to watch Justified, and they flipped over it. You people who are getting over Breaking Bad's cliffhanger last week: give Justified a try.
My mushrooms were in the center of a long wall devoted primarily to plants. The space eventually became crowded with a surprising number of people, so I was glad I took a few photos early.
Within minutes of meeting him, Irma told Jeff he looked like George Clooney, and there was much swooning over the cuteness of Jeff, much to his embarrassment.
I was forced to pose with my painting, which was flanked by two intimidatingly exquisite floral paintings by Janet Doll and Cherie Hauptman. I can't get used to taking photos like this--they remind me of school pictures for some reason, and I always look uncomfortable.
My painting's frame was something we had been storing, unused, in our guest bedroom--it just happened to be the right size for the mushrooms. Jeff thinks the frame may be valuable, but the back was kind of beat up, and it looked like a kid had written his name on it. I loved the warm color and the tiny dark holes in the wood because they mimicked the speckles on the mushrooms.
But knowing that my painting was not one of the ten winners made me feel sorry for it. It was a good painting, but looking around I saw five, then ten, then over two dozen other paintings seemed like winners. Loose, painterly watercolors made me question why I had to be so damned tight. Abstract expressionist pieces made me miss that imaginative way of working. En plein air landscapes seemed to ooze an integrity that made my mushrooms appear twee and overworked. And yet I thought I hadn't worked hard enough when I studied paintings that were more realistic than mine. I felt like such a novice when I saw work by well-established art professors and painters much older than me who had been working their entire lives.
Jeff saw me gazing at my painting with an "oh you poor thing" expression on my face and asked me what I thought. It was hard to put into words, and I'm not a mother so I really have no idea if this is a fair comparison, but I felt like I was watching a beloved child doing his best in a competition where he was clearly outclassed. And I felt proud of my child for trying, but I knew we were going to leave disappointed and had a long ride home ahead of us.
This is just the way it goes when it comes to art competitions. I'm used to it now, believe me. But the straight-A student in me can't help feeling frustrated sometimes. It's also hard when loved ones travel long distances to see shows like this, and you don't want them to be disappointed in any way. Humble me is honored to simply be included, but awful Tracy Flick me also wants to win at least occasionally.
And then you have to remember that this is art, and the judges' decisions are their own and completely subjective, blah blah blah. In conclusion, art shows are emotional roller coasters, and they're not for sensitive people, i.e. artists.
At least the cookies were a hit. People were taking photos of them and telling me how cute they were.
The evening wore on, and shy Jeff and I actually mingled with people, even strangers. About an hour into the show, Tony and Carole got ready to present ten awards. Judge Suzanne Hetzel made a few remarks, saying that she tried to pick winners who attempted to take watercolor as far as it could go. "Some of the artists are here, and they don't know they've won," Tony mentioned. Argh! A twist! Another fun chance for my hopes to be dashed!
Irma won an honorable mention, and a few other artists in attendance were named after her. Finally Tony reached the top awards (third, second, and first place), and HOLY SMOKES I WON THIRD PLACE YOU GUYS.
*my mind exploded*
People clapped, I got a certificate and prize money (!), and Jeff gave me a kiss.
After the awards presentation, I shook a lot of hands and thanked Sue very much for choosing my painting, and she said something about loving the composition and colors, and Jeff thinks she said "it was obvious," but I don't remember that because my mind had exploded and I think Jeff's had too, a little.
Eager to get home before midnight, we said goodbye to Tony and Virginia, who were happy for me. We took an empty cookie container and left the rest of the cookies behind before leaping and skipping into the night air and out to the car. What a great night.
Thanks as always for reading! If you would like to purchase a print of Mushrooms, please click here, and you can always find prints of everything else here. I love receiving compliments about my work, but it means so much to me when people put some money in my tip jar. :)
Friday was Jeff's birthday and our final day in Los Angeles, and we had decided to play it by ear. Still wiped out by the previous two days, we slept in and felt content to lounge in our room, eating cookie butter and waiting for our 5 p.m. appointment with Brian at the frame shop. We thought about visiting the Getty, but as far as Jeff could tell, it was pretty far-flung and unreachable by bus. This seemed elitist and cruel of the Getty, and as I began to settle in for a delicious day of resentful sloth, Jeff discovered that no, wait, we could get there by a combination of long bus rides after all. Okay, The Getty, this had better be worth it.
Our bus lumbered slowly north along the interminable Sepulveda Boulevard, stopping every fifteen yards or so. After about an hour of that, we switched buses at UCLA and continued north. The route took us on a hilly, serpentine tour of Bel Air, where we saw many gates, dense hedges, lush vegetation/shade, and other signs of extreme wealth including glimpses of mansions. This was lots of fun to see, but the bus ride was so profoundly bumpy that I was forced to clutch my breasts with both hands to keep them in my dress. "Be still, my wee ones!" I said to them as an amused (Jazzy) Jeff looked on. So ladies, here's a travel tip you won't find anywhere else: wear a sports bra if you have to take a bus through Bel Air. Once we left Bel Air, the bus unceremoniously deposited us in the midst of a construction site. We could see the Getty's gleaming white edifice at the top of a hill about a mile away.
"I think we're gonna have to walk up there," Jeff said, and I emitted a heartbroken cry of betrayal. We trudged through one of those covered walkways common to urban construction areas, and when we emerged--hooray! A TRAM!
Let's all go up on the tram together, thanks to this video I just found!
We had been told that the Getty would be an oasis, and it certainly was. The cars, the noise, the buses, and the sprawl were replaced with mondernistic architecture, Zen gardens, panoramic views, and oh yeah, some art.
Herb Ritts photography (yay) and Gustave Klimt drawings (double yay) were that day's special exhibits along with the museum's permanent collection, and, unbelievably, everything was free.
This garden was a zig-zaggy maze of beautiful flowers, trees, succulents, and water features. I could imagine plenty of people coming to the Getty solely to escape the rest of Los Angeles and enjoy the architecture and gardens.
Above is part of the Getty as seen from that garden.
We thought these gigantic planters were ingenius and wondered how many years it took the plants to grow up through the centers before spilling out the tops.
It a treat to see Klimt's drawings. I wrote an independent study honors art history paper about him when I was in college--like many post-adolescent art girls, I was dazzled by his glamourous, richly-patterend paintings from the early 20th century. Many of those paintings are in Vienna, and I've only seen reproductions.
Above is one of his very fine academic studies from early in his career. His lines were razor sharp and frighteningly confident. (That black-and-white-on-toned-paper technique is one of my favorite ways to draw.)
Drawings that would inspire his dreamlike later work were also featured.
I was especially touched to view drawings that found their way into finished paintings, such as the above study for Klimt's Medicine. I left with a better understanding of his process and the way his mind worked.
"I'm not familiar with Herb Ritts," Jeff told me.
"Oh yes you are," I said as we entered his "L.A. Style" exhibit.
Photographer of supermodels, celebrities, athletes, and beyond-perfect anonymous male and female bodies, Herb Ritts is responsible for many iconic images of the 1980s and 90s. Skin is rarely photographed this lovingly. I remember seeing his above cluster of women in Vogue when I was in grad school. Unlike the overly-photoshopped pictures of models you see today, Herb Ritts' women never made me feel inadequate. They made me happy that creatures like that were walking the earth.
And then, perhaps in an attempt to remind us that art is more than just naked bodies, the permanent collection included THIS.
"Oh Jeff..." I said, tears in my eyes.
I've written about Vincent Van Gogh's Irises before, but this item bears repeating:
The Getty was such a lovely experience, and if you're going to be in Los Angeles, I urge you to do whatever it takes to get there, even if that means riding multiple breast-jangling buses. For a couple of hours, we felt like we could breathe again.
And then it was back to our construction zone bus stop. We arrived about 30 seconds before a bus arrived, but for whatever reason the bus driver blew right by us and a handful of other people. We fumed for half an hour.
Somebody had tagged the curb by my feet with "STATE," and this reminded me of Coach Taylor's whiteboard on Friday Night Lights, S05 E02, an episode to which I cannot link easily. But you people who watched that show: you know what I'm talking about, and I took it as a vote of confidence.
Does it go without saying that the ride back to the hotel was soul-destroying, and that once we were there it was nearly mid-afternoon, and after we'd had just enough time to freshen up and attempt to print boarding passes using the hotel's Pliocene-era computer, we had to turn around and get on two more buses to return to the frame shop, and that was also lousy? And before we hit the frame shop, we walked pretty far out of our way to try Beligian fries (Jeff's holy grail) that were, as usual, not everything they should have been?
It does go without saying any of that? Good. Let's consider ourselves at the frame shop. It's 5:15.
I was flustered and sweaty from our mile of sprint-walking in the afternoon heat. Luckily Brian wasn't there yet. I positioned myself beneath the Sherman Gallery's ceiling air conditioning outlet and fanned myself like crazy with a pamphlet. I was happy to meet Mike, my gallery worker and email pen pal for over a month, who came out with the painting, beautifully framed and wrapped in plastic. He had done such a speedy, great job with it, and again this cost me hundreds of dollars less than if I'd gone to the shop's many competitors. Check out these guys if you need to frame something in L.A. I took a photo and enjoyed a few final moments with my--soon to be Brian's--painting.
Brian appeared at around 5:30 in his SUV. I'd made sure that he had a vehicle big enough to transport the painting. It was wonderful to finally meet the man with whom I had exchanged nearly 300 emails (no joke) during the course of this project.
Brian took us out to dinner at Fig restaurant in Santa Monica. Fig is a young, hip place that--let's all say it together (especially you, Caroline)--Jeff had researched on the internet. Birthday boy had the beet risotto...
...which he loved, and our pal Brian...
(hi Brian)
...enjoyed a nice-looking plate of fish (halibut?).
The gentlemen did not take any photos of me, probably because I was a blur of tornado-like eating action. That was the best chopped salad of all time.
Unfortunately, Fig was packed and very loud, so we almost had to shout our conversation. But we still had fun talking with Brian about his upcoming wedding, the house he and Katherine had recently purchased in Colorado Springs, and our misadventures on Match.com, where we had all eventually found love.
Brian was supportive and enthusiastic as I completed this painting--I couldn't have asked for a better client. I'm lucky that he had discovered my work while searching online for portrait artists last year. He is also a true romantic and obviously in love with Katherine. I wished I could have met her in person, too, because she sounds amazing! Brian told me my painting was phenomenal, and he knew she would love it. He dropped us off at our hotel--what luxury to be in an actual car for a change!--and we wished him a happy wedding and marriage. Brian said, "I hope we'll be even half as happy as you two." D'awww. See what I mean? Great guy.
Mission accomplished, we went to bed early in anticipation of our 4:00 a.m. wake-up time.
That wake-up time came about as quickly as this new paragraph did. We took a speedy cab ride to the airport at 5:00 and were waiting at our gate at 5:20, a new record for us. Repeat: from hotel to gate in 20 minutes. Most of that time was spent curbside where we checked the gun case. This time it contained Jeff's extra shoes, cookie butter, and a bottle of Belgian beer he had purchased at Trader Joe's.
Baggage check man: I'm going to have to open that. What's inside the case?
Jeff: Alcohol, shoes, and peanut butter [It was just easier to call it that.--K].
BCM: [quizzical, smiling look] You don't need to open it. [waves us through]
Jeff: [a minute or two later, to me] It's like they want us to get out!
Me: It's like an apology.
(I will never stop loving the Pac Man-shaped fields Texas. I'm guessing that was Texas, anyway.)
We flew from LAX to Dallas/Ft.Worth to Chicago to Champaign. Nothing much happened on our flights, except for a Dallas passenger whose eye-watering halitosis had a radius of about six feet. As the day wore on, Jeff and I became slap-happy, laughing our heads off over signs like this one.
Jeff: "Caution! Do not trip over tiny hat!"
Me: "Beware of smashed sombrero!" "Extra dangerous if you have no hands or feet!"
Each layover lasted at least a few hours, so by the time we were back home, it was 9:00 p.m. A very long day of travel!
Three joyous cats met us at the door. Each had many needs to meet and many things to tell us. Bun walked around nervously for about an hour before finally settling down, satisfied that we weren't going anywhere else for a while.
That was pretty mean of me to show the painting wrapped in plastic up there, wasn't it? All will be revealed in my next post! Please *like* the heck out of my Facebook watercolor page, and I'll see you soon. :)
"Remember the time I made this for you?" I asked Jeff as he licked the spatula. This was unfair of me. How can anyone be expected to remember the taste of a baked good he had eaten four and a half years ago, based on the raw batter alone?
Jeff had no idea.
"I had known you for twelve days. On the morning of January 3 [first day back at school after winter break, a.k.a. the most depressing day of the year--K], my car wouldn't start and needed lots of repairs. You volunteered to drive me to and from work for as long as it took, and to say thank you I made you coconut bread."
Jeff didn't remember that either. He also didn't remember it after tasting the finished product.
OH WELL!
I guess it's that kind of baked good. But I'm telling you, he loved my coconut bread then, and he loved it when I made it again this week. Please note the torn-into nature of the top photo: this is clear evidence of greed. Why the long gap between loaf 1 and loaf 2? I don't know. It's near the front of a cookbook I keep around for a handful of stellar recipes, but it's older and I don't browse through it all that much. Tyler Florence's Real Kitchen, I guess you're that kind of cookbook.
Easy stuff, people. Mix dry things into wet things, pour into loaf pan, bake. And when you bake it, you'll see deep valleys form in its crust, and you will think to yourself, Why yes: I certainly am an accomplished baker. And the loaf is dense--a little goes a long way. We ate about half of it over the course of a couple of days, and then I cut the rest into manageable chunks and froze it.
Tyler Florence recommends that you top this with pineapple butter (8 oz can of drained, crushed pineapple plus two sticks of soft butter), and that's such a Tyler thing to do, isn't it? We didn't have enough butter, and anyway, we don't want to clog our arteries any--well, much--further. We did top it with T.F.'s peach and rosemary spoon fruit from the same book. I'll probably blog about that next.
INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted, plus more for greasing the pan
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup brown sugar, packed
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Zest of 1 lemon, finely grated <--I kind of prefer this without the zest, but give it a try if you enjoy lemon in everything
1 1/2 cups unsweetened coconut milk <--Light coconut milk is fine
1 1/2 cups shredded coconut, toasted <--I was lazy and didn't bother toasting it. In fact, I have never toasted it for this recipe. But go for it if you're feeling ambitious and want to impress that adorable man who's driving you to and from work everyday. I'm just saying that he will still ask you to marry him even if it's not toasted.
DIRECTIONS
Preheat the oven to 375°F.
Grease the bottom and sides of a 9×5-inch loaf pan with butter. In a large bowl, mix the flour with the baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.
In another large bowl, whisk together the melted butter with the brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, and lemon zest. Pour in the coconut milk and whisk together.
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and fold everything together with a spatula until you have a smooth batter. Gently fold in the shredded coconut until evenly distributed. Pour into the prepared loaf pan and set it on a cookie sheet. Bake for 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes, or until a wooden toothpick comes out clean when inserted into the center of the bread. Rotate the pan periodically to ensure even browning.
Note from K: I always take this out at around 50-55 minutes because it totally smells and looks done to me, but the center-top comes out a little raw. But I don't really mind that. We like slightly underbaked goods in this house.
Cool the bread in the pan for 20 minutes or so; then when cool enough to handle, remove the coconut bread to a cutting board and let it cool completely before slicing.
PS: It's good toasted and good with powdered sugar on top!
This spring has been crazy. International travel, one-person show, looming medical test, backbreaking commission, exciting deck project--no wonder I've neglected my blog! So in an attempt to catch up and maybe not have to write a hundred thousand words in doing so, here's a little photo essay. While you read and look at the photos, I urge you to listen to Steal Away by Robbie Dupree, a song that has been on a constant loop in my head for two weeks, no foolin'.
(I can't get on board with the illustration here. I just can't. I don't like the way nearly all Japanese manga illustrators draw faces.)
Anyway, that song's been driving me up the wall, and I'm sorry if it's in your head too, now. There's no getting it out, like those Star Trek bugs.
GAH I CAN'T EVEN WATCH THAT!
Off to a bad start, sorry. Here's my update. Bun will make it better.
Last month, completely out of nowhere, a tornado warning hit while Jeff was taking a nap and I was reading. Jeff has a new app on his phone that alerts us to severe weather with a variety of sounds, a different one for every type of warning. The phone was making some noise, but sleeping Jeff and I ignored it because honestly Jeff has about 15 other phone alarms that indicate who-knows-what every afternoon (various calendar reminders and work stuff).
We eventually decided to see what was going on--the weather gave us no indication of impending doom, just some clouds, but indeed a tornado warning had been issued. Jeff scooped up Bun, I grabbed Pache and Q, and we headed to the bathroom. During the scooping process, my phone rang, and it was Melissa calling to tell us about the storm. She was in Champaign, some ten miles west of our house, and apparently actual funnel clouds were happening and headed our way. Here's one of the many photos I saw on Facebook almost immediately, most of them taken by former students who probably should not have been out chasing storms.
We rode out the brief storm with our big-eyed cats. It didn't last long and, as usual, seemed to skip right over us.
I keep meaning to write about my show in Jacksonville! I displayed my wares at the David Strawn Art Gallery during the month of April. This involved three long, 266-mile round trips in the Mazda: one to deliver the paintings, one for the opening, and one to take the paintings home. On the day of my opening, Jeff and I were up before sunrise and drove to the gallery. I gave a 6-hour workshop (watercolor still life) in the Strawn's basement classroom. I changed and put on my makeup in a gas station bathroom, and then we had an early supper with Mom, Dad, Poof, and Tyler before my two-hour opening. After it was over, we drove all the way back home, so that made for a very long but ultimately enjoyable Saturday. I've never had so many people attend one of my art shows and even managed to sell a fair number of paintings. Who knew that Jacksonville was such an artsy town?
Thanks to all of my friends and family who came to see the show. I was thrilled to see Kendra, Rob, Melinda, Kate, Mabel, Lars, Michelle, Grace, Jay & TA, and even Karen Icenogle, my high school art teacher! I hadn't seen her in a very long time, and she looked at me and said, "I love you." It was all I could do to keep from bursting into tears.
In other art news, I've finally begun work on a commissioned painting that's going to take a couple of months to complete at least. It's a wedding present from a top secret groom to his top secret bride. The wedding is in September, so I won't be able to show it to you until then, which is a shame because this painting is, in a word, bonkers. I can tell you that it includes eleven people and eleven statues, and it takes place in a gold and red art deco theater lobby. The painting is huge at nearly three feet by three feet. That was too big for my studio table, so I've moved my whole production downstairs to our bedroom where we have a large desk. I blurred the reference image on my computer there, but I think I can show you a five-inch chunk that is in fact .8 percent of the final picture.
So it's mostly that kind of thing.
Bun loves the new setup because while I work she gets to sleep on the bed and do cute things like this.
I've been in IWS's last three national shows. That means I'm a signature member of the Illinois Watercolor Society and can now add "IWS" to my signature on future paintings!
Jeff, who appears to be throwing down a gang sign, and my parents came to the show with me and made the day very special.
Artist and judge Donna Jill Witty presented a terrific and dramatic watercolor demonstration during the show. I am the giant black shape on the left that seems to be absorbing all light in the room--I am almost as dark as those aliens from Attack the Block.
That was such a good movie.
In case you've never seen our house, here's what it looks like. It's a American Craftsman house with big boxes added to each end and is delighfully weird. The steps in the center lead to a massive, 760 square-foot deck that we never use and is a bit warped and dated.
About a month and a half ago, we began taking the deck out. Parts of it were so rotten and poorly constructed that it was almost a simply-lift-with-hands-to-remove kind of situation. Soon it was gone, and now we're dealing with the fun part: figuring out what to do with all of that new space.
We're going to have a table and chairs sitting atop flagstones on the right, a fire pit on the left, dark rock filling in, and a line of lighter rock dividing the space horizontally.
Here's a shot of the Adirondack chairs and fire pit (which I spotted at Menard's, majorly on sale). We put a ring of bricks around the pit and love the way it looks.
Below that will be a rock garden that mimics a dry stream with a bird bath.
Jeff arranged a lot of that on Sunday afternoon as I was taking a shower, and when I looked at it from the living room it instantly reminded me of a brain, which was unintentionally awesome.
We'll have some black mulch and new plants down there, including a rose-of-sharon and a dwarf burning bush, along with vines, grasses, and other flowers.
Here's what it looks like so far (sorry about the bleached-out lighting situation). You can kind of see the flagstones under the table.
Jeff and I often find ourselves staring out the window at this scene multiple times per day, contemplating our next move.
I'm nuts about moss roses and have been planting lots of them. Hopefully no woodland creatures plan to eat them, such as...
Two years ago, we hosted a family of woodchucks. Last year we had foxes. This year our house has become a chipmunk sanctuary. I like to put seeds out for them, and as many as four chipmunks are eating seeds at any given time. The cats enjoy watching these little guys, especially Quixote, who gets incredibly worked up.
We also have some adorable juvie Canadian geese in the neighborhood!
On the food front, I've been trying various experiments in low-cal food that are pretty good but not great enough to merit blogging, such as:
and
And oh, my colposcopy? I'll spare you the details, but suffice it to say that it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. To amuse myself during the procedure, which is essentially a super-pap, I altered Paul Simon's Kodachrome and sang it to myself with altered lyrics as Kolposcope.
Kolposco-o-ope! It gives us those nice bright colors, it gives us the--
You get the idea.
It was essentially no big thing and took maybe five minutes. My area of concern was miniscule, and my doctor told me everything that was happening as I looked up at the ceiling, silently humming my tune. I didn't even faint, and evidently they get a lot of fainters. The doctor told me that based on what she saw, I had nothing to worry about. Unfortunately I was instructed to have zero marital fun with Jeff for ten days afterward so I could heal properly, so that was was a complete drag.
After a few tense days, I called for my results and it turns out I'm basically in the clear. But anyone who gets any kind of abnormal pap test and has a colposcopy/biopsy at my hospital is sentenced to three additional paps during the next year, so I've got that to look forward to. But I have been assured that my test results look very good. The paps are just a precaution, and the hospital presumably has lots of big shiny equipment and snazzy waiting room furniture they need to pay for.
Let's end this on a cute note. Here's Hypatia, one of three cats who piled up on me after the colposcopy. I was recovering under the "wookiee blanket," and Pache showed a certain amount of bravery in climbing aboard, as she is afraid of the wookiee blanket.
