The Nostalgia Bug

I'm on the road again; in Abilene for a couple of nights on family business.

Since Mike decided to do a series of paintings depicting some of the historic downtowns around the state, I've taken more notice as I pass through.

I passed through Santa Ana on my way here. It was dusk so the sun was setting and the skies were brilliant with yellows and purples. It was amazing. Anyway, what a cute, cute little town! It's only about 2 blocks long but what a neat bunch of buildings! It's one of the handful of historic towns that's still on a major route from somewhere to somewhere. So many of these places have been lost or abandoned when interstates re-routed traffic around them. I hope to head home early enough on Tuesday to stop and take photos.

Take these old gas pumps for instance. I go to the post office in Red Rock at least 5 times a week and park across the street from these. It wasn't until we started looking into the histories of these little towns that I stopped to look at them. I just wonder what they might have looked like in their hey day...

I think I'm going to have to do some serious digging to find out - but it will be worth it.

The fleeting joy of Indian Summer

The days are getting longer and we took full advantage of the extra daylight over the weekend. It was good to get away from the easel and the computer and trim some trees, haul brush and rake the algae off the top of the pond. It's funny how much energy you have for that kind of work after weeks of winter weather!

It was great fun but our backs and shoulders ached the next morning; a not so subtle reminder that we're getting lax about exercise. Thank goodness for Advil! Winter is making a comeback this weekend so we'll have ample time to heal up.

Mike has several paintings in progress and is going through photos for the book in between letting coats of paint dry. I'm working our his website, updating it with the new originals, new posters and the new Historic Downtown project information. I'm launching our new online store, Cow Creek Mercantile, this week as well.

I'm also giving some thought to restructuring my Artpro Marketing clinics. The one thing artists always complain about is the huge amount of information we cover in an all day clinic. So, I'm thinking of breaking agenda items down into 2 and 3 hour sections and offering them individually. That would give artists more freedom to take just the workshops offering the topics they're most interested in I also think it would be more effective than the all day clinics, which were almost an information overload. Those workshops will start in mid-March so I'm busy getting my handouts revised and reprinted.

"The" book is coming along but man, it's a chore! Just going through the photos, making notes and outlines, checking names and dates - well, it's a task, that's for sure. If we're lucky, we should have the first chapter done in the next couple of weeks. Once we get one done, the others should be easier.

Sometimes, I can hardly believe we've lived so many places and met so many funny, fascinating people. And the adventures we've had - my, oh my, it's a wonder we made it this far!