First Frost - October 31, 2023

Cold weather has arrived in southwest Tennessee.  We woke up to frost and 30 degrees this morning.

BOOOOOO!

Yesterday I officially moved my back porch workstation into the sewing/craft room.  

Double BOOOOOO!

Leaves - October 29, 2023

Yesterday morning as I was admiring the beautiful, colorful leaves carpeting the yard, I said to myself, "I need to rake those up and shred them for compost."  The weatherman said it would rain, and I wanted to grind the leaves while they were dry.  I went inside and put on my yard boots.  When I told The Husband what I was going to do, he asked if I wanted him to get the leaf blower and blow the leaves into piles.  Of course I did!

Our leaf grinder has been in the back yard since spring, as there is no room for it in the shed.  The same goes for the limb chipper, and not only has it been exposed to the weather all this time, but its cover had blown away during a storm.  I figured that before I did much raking, I ought to drag those machines out and see if they even still worked.  I was a bit afraid to do it, fearing wasps and snakes.  Thankfully, nothing attacked me, and the leaf grinder still worked.  I parked it right in front of the compost bin and spewed the leaf bits right into it.  

While I was doing this, The Husband was working on the leaf blower.  It would crank but not continue to run.  After a while, he gave up, got the wheelbarrow and a rake, and joined me in the yard.  The gas line had split, he said.  I dropped my rake and went to a cabinet on the back porch where I'd stored an extra carburetor for the tiller, thinking it might have come with a gas line.  Sure enough, there was a gas line in the package, but it was not the right size.  

The Husband went to the hardware store for a gas line.  I went back to raking and grinding.  I'd finished about a quarter of the yard by the time he got back.  He installed the gas line and the leaf blower cranked, and he went to work.  For a little bit, I thought we might actually finish most of the yard, but soon it began to sprinkle.  The leaf shredder does not like wet leaves, so we hurried to grind what we'd already raked up. 

It rained for the rest of the day, effectively stalling the yard work until next weekend.

Saturday, October 28, 2023

Yesterday was a busy day from the get-go.  Daughter-in-law had asked me to drive her to a 7:30 a.m. medical appointment.  I'd need to be at her house by 7.  I woke up early and got up, showered, dressed, and was ready to go by a little after 5.  

We arrived at the appointment on time, but the office wasn't open.  When my daughter-in-law re-checked her notes, she discovered that the appointment wasn't until 8.  We drove to a nearby convenience store for some breakfast and ate in the car while we waited for the office to open.  It was close to 11:00 by the time we finished at the doctor's office.  

Meanwhile, The Husband was texting me about picking him up from an appointment he'd made to have his truck tuned up.  And the daughter-in-law had asked if I would drive her to a store in town to pick up a t-shirt, and if she could come back home with us so that she could use my t-shirt press.  So when we left the doctor's office, we picked up The Husband, went to the t-shirt store, and came home to do the t-shirt pressing.  I had to straighten up the sewing/craft/office room before she could start, as all of the surfaces were littered with my half-finished paintings.  It was about 3:30 by the time I took the daughter-in-law home.

A few minutes after I got back home, The Sister-in-Law texted to see if we wanted to go to the Mexican restaurant with her and her husband.  We did, as we do nearly every Friday night.  And since everyone was already off work for the day, we were able to get there a little earlier than usual.  Our waitress was new to the restaurant and had a little trouble getting our order correct.  She brought me a margarita on the rocks instead of the frozen margarita I'd ordered, and when she brought the food, there was no dinner for my sister-in-law.  We cut her some slack, knowing that she was new to the job.  We did notice that our margaritas were not as strong as usual (our "regular" waiters usually hook us up with stiff drinks), but that was okay with me, as last week's margarita had nearly laid me out.

We were home by 7 p.m., which is about the time we usually sit down to eat.  I would have gone straight to bed if it hadn't been so early.  I managed to hold out until 9, when I crawled in bed with my book.

I am reading the newly-published book about Mitt Romney, am about halfway through it.  Most of my reading occurs at bedtime and usually last about 10 minutes before the Kindle hits me in the face or falls to the floor, so getting to the end of any book is slow going.  This one is pretty interesting, though, and might even get a little daytime attention.

Plans - October 24, 2023

In case you've been wondering how the greeting card project is coming along, it isn't.

I had all the ingredients but never baked the cake, metamorphically speaking.  

The event happened this past weekend.  In all honesty, until Monday of last week, I thought the thing was to happen THIS COMING weekend, and I had an "oh shit" moment.  But, really, all I had to do was print out 24 cards, put them in the envelope rack (which is still in a box in my entry hall), and deliver them.  I could've done that in a couple of hours, barring a power failure, or something.  I put off printing the cards for so long that, by the final day, I'd talked myself out of doing it, altogether.  I had not promised anybody anything, so there was nobody to disappoint but myself.  And I was okay with that at the time.

Can you believe it?

Part of the truth is that I let myself get distracted by the brother/daddy painting.  Part of the truth is that I was afraid my cards would not sell and I would be embarrassed.   

I am mad at myself about it now.  Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

This is painting class day.  On my kitchen table is a piece of stretched watercolor paper, taped to a sewing room cutting mat.  On the paper is a very light pencil sketch of the brother/daddy painting (minus the faces).  It's going to class with me.

Monday - October 23, 2023

The little town near us held its annual community celebration Saturday.  The Husband and I drove over there Saturday around noon, looking for something sinfully good for lunch.  We had heard that the local FFA chapter would be selling shredded roast beef sandwiches, and after shopping all of the food trucks, we went for the roast beef.  They were also selling lamb sausages from sheep that the FFA kids had raised.  We tasted a sample and came home with two packages of brats and two fried pies - pecan and chocolate - from a local church group.  We were a little disappointed with the chocolate.  Our childhood memories of chocolate fried pie filling did not involve pudding.  Instead, our mothers filled our pies with dry cocoa, table sugar, and butter.  

A couple of hours after we got home, The Husband discovered that his wedding ring was missing from his hand.  It has been loose ever since we lost some weight.  We looked for it all over the house, in his truck, in the yard.  We feared he might have lost it at the community festival.  I emailed a friend who was involved in organizing the festival and asked her to let us know if someone turned in the ring.  Yesterday we did another search, digging down to the improbable places.  He could not remember the last time he saw the ring.  I remembered that earlier in the week, he had dug through the cedar chest looking for something, so I went through the cedar chest contents piece by piece.  It wasn't there, but digging through the other keepsakes was kind of fun.  

Friday, my niece texted me to ask if I would help her turn up a hem on a dress she'd bought.  Her proposal was that she and my sister would come over with breakfast ingredients Sunday morning, and we'd have breakfast together and then mark the hem.  I told her not to bother bringing anything, as I had Sunday morning breakfast ingredients on hand.  I woke up early Sunday morning and had already fried the bacon by the time they arrived.  My sister disobeyed my instruction and brought a loaf of delicious pumpkin bread to add to the meal.  We made her take it back home with her (after shaving off two thin slices to keep).  I think she was planning to stop by our brother's house and pawn the rest of the loaf off on him.  

The dress that needed hemming was a floor-length black & white striped knit gown.  She intends to wear it as a costume at some Beetlejuice event at Halloween.  I didn't ask any questions.  We cut 6" off the hem.  She said she would hem it by hand, but that was ridiculous when it was only a costume and there was a sewing machine set up in the room.  I ran a straight-stitch hem around the bottom, and she was good to go.  

Not long after they left, a cousin texted to ask if she could come over.  She is the daughter of Uncle B (age 93) who lives across the road from us.  She lives in Texas and makes monthly trips here to see him, usually staying 3 or 4 days at a time.  Almost every time she visits, she will come over to see us, partly for a change of scenery while Uncle B naps.  We enjoy her visits.  She has had an interesting life and tells good stories.

(I'm on the porch.  It's chilly.  The birds just woke up.  There's one in a tree outside the porch, chirping its head off.  I don't recognize the call.  Its friend is chirping back in the distance.  Maybe they're strangers, just passing through.)

I don't know what I am going to do today.  Unfinished drafts of the brother/daddy portrait are laying all over the porch and the sewing room/craft room/office.  They look like a two dozen different people.  Not one of them is a keeper, and I would throw them all away except that I can practice or swatch on their unpainted backsides.  They leer at me as I walk by them.  By Saturday, my frustration with the faces had reached its breaking point, and I decided to turn my attention to the background and foreground to figure out colors and procedures.  The practice was a good idea.  I did not expect the background and foreground to present any serious challenges, but my practice washes revealed some pitfalls that I might avoid in the final version.  If there ever is a final version.  If I ever get the faces right).

Addendum:  While I was writing the above blabber, The Husband came out to the porch and showed me his hand, with his wedding ring on it.  The ring was in the shower.  

Those faces! - October 19, 2023

It is lovely on the back porch today.  Sun is shining.  75 degrees.  Slight breeze.  I have been out here since 7:00 this morning trying to put faces on my brother and my daddy, and it just ain't happening.

There must be a dozen drawing variations, plus another dozen disembodied faces all over the backs of discarded paper, and none of them look like my subjects.  My reference photo is blurry, but I have other photographs of them that are clear enough for me to see the construction of their faces and have come up with acceptable head shapes.  But their smiles in these other pictures are different from their smiles in my reference photo, and it is the reference photo expressions that I want to capture - the ones I can't clearly see.  

The faces on the paper will be about an inch tall, crown to chin.  That's not much space to work in.  At that scale, one pencil stroke too many will change the whole expression. 

After several hours and several hundred sets of ears, eyes, and lips, I suited up for yard work and went outside.  The phlox bed is kaput for this year.  I've been leaving the fading blooms for the bees and butterflies, but they're not interested anymore, so I cut the phlox down today.  Almost chopped down two of my new hydrangeas but managed to rein myself in before doing much damage.  

The hydrangea limb that I stuck in the ground amongst the phlox has rooted and has sent up a shoot about 6" tall.  It is spindly and pale from having been shaded by the phlox all summer.  Maybe, now that it's uncovered, these last few weeks of sunshine will beef it up a little bit before the leaves fall on it for the winter.

  

Family Portraits - Saturday, October 14, 2023

I woke up at 4 o'clock this morning and finally got up and turned on the coffee pot about a quarter to five.  My brain is fidgety today.  I over-worked it, and frustrated myself, yesterday and the day before, and the day before that.  And maybe even the day before that.

Monday, I decided to start a new drawing/painting that I've been pondering.  Back in the summer, when all the kids and grandkids were here, we had an impromptu concert on the back porch.  One of the daughters-in-law snapped a picture of me, The Husband, and our two sons playing our instruments, and from the moment I saw the picture, I wanted to paint it.  So I decided to give it a go.  

I did a #2 pencil drawing on an 11" x 14" sheet of mixed media paper.  The plan was to ink over the pencil lines and then paint with watercolors.  By the end of the day, the sketch was mostly finished, but I wasn't quite satisfied with it.  The reference picture did not show our legs and feet, so I'd had to imagine them, and something about them in the drawing was "off."  Also, Son #1's face (mostly in shadow and harder to see in the reference picture) would not cooperate.  

This was supposed to be a preliminary study that I would re-do on watercolor paper.  After spending so much time on the sketch, though, I dreaded re-drawing the whole thing.  Watercolor paper has a lot more texture, which is harder to draw on than the smoother mixed media paper.  I thought I might just paint the sketch, but I was worried that the mixed media paper would buckle when wet.  It seemed like a good idea to scan the sketch, print it on mixed media paper, and test-paint the copy to see how the paper held up.  

Well, guess what?  My scanner/printer isn't large enough to scan an 11 x 14 picture.  

The Husband said he believed the copy machine at his office would scan and print something that large, so Tuesday morning, I sent him to work with my original drawing and two sheets of mixed media paper.  I spent the rest of the day trying to fix the faces on the sketch I drew some time ago of my brother and father.  

The Husband had issues with copying the other sketch.  He used all 4 sides of those two sheets of paper and did not end up with one complete copy.  I took the sketch and two sheets of mixed media paper to work on Wednesday and managed to come home with one decent copy.  

Thursday, I discovered that the mixed media paper isn't ideal for the large, wet background washes I'd planned to do.  The painting either needs to be done on watercolor paper, or I need to use another medium.  I got out the light box and traced the sketch on watercolor paper.  Son #1's face still wasn't quite right.  I tried to amend it as I traced it, but it didn't work.  By Thursday night, I'd re-traced it again, but still wasn't quite happy with the faces.  And I'd decided there needed to be a dancing baby in an empty spot in the foreground.  (There was one running around here when the reference picture was taken.)  And perhaps something on the wall behind us instead of the tacky cabinet that actually sits there.  I did these experiments on the tracings to keep from ruining the original.

I ended up with a sketch and four unusable copies.  On one of the watercolor tracings, I tried to fix faces and ended up rubbing the surface off the paper.  And with each revision, I aged myself 10 years.  By the time I looked 90, I thought I'd better quit before I turned myself into a corpse.

The faces are still not right.  I got frustrated with the back porch pickers and set them aside and went back to work on Daddy and my brother.  Still haven't gotten them right.

MEANWHILE, next weekend is the charity event that inspired me to do animal drawings for greeting cards.  As of today, I do not have ONE usable card ready to go (though I do have some ready to print).  If I am to follow through with my plan, I will have to spend next week in high gear. 

If I had not already ordered a card rack, I might just ditch the card project.

I might ditch it, anyway.