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!

Okay, so he veered off the path a little. . .

There's a wonderful old church building in downtown Bastrop that lends a nostalgic bend to the view from across the Colorado. There really was an old iron bridge but it never was a covered affair.

When Mike studied old photos of the old bridge and saw how New Englandy the church looked, he must have decided to take some artistic license and create the cozy village he saw in his head.

It must be nice to take oneself to any place one chooses . . . with a few paints and a little canvas.

So no, this isn't honestly one of the downtown historical series of paintings but it does look quite lovely and I sure wouldn't mind visiting there.

Mike's new Historic Downtown Series

Mike has always enjoyed doing historic paintings of buildings, downtown areas, ranches - even people. In 1990, he did a really neat painting of downtown Meeteetse, Wyoming. We lived there at the time and to be honest, a part of us still lives there.

Last November, Mike did a series of paintings of historical downtown Bastrop and donated one of them to a charity auction for the Women's Shelter in this area. He was really entranced with Bastrop's downtown so he ended up doing two more paintings from different angles. This is one of them. One of the buildings in this painting is now Baxters - one of the finest dining experiences in East Texas!

He enjoyed it so much, we decided to initiate a special series of paintings depicting historical downtown scenes, starting with some of the more notable Texas squares. If you've ever driven the rural routes of Texas, you know what we're talking about. Some of the courthouse squares in the small towns of Texas are amazing. LaGrange - Nacadoches - Waxahachie - just to name a few. Should be a fun project!

This painting is called "A Texas Skiff." A modified version of this painting will be published as a greeting card by Leanin' Tree this year. It's one of Mike's favorite pieces.

ALL THINGS NEW

After years of talking about it, today we finally laid out most of the material for our first book. Every year since, oh, I don't know - 1995 or so, we start the year out with "let's work on the book for real this year!" only to have other more pressing issues squelch our efforts.

This year, however, we've actually done the research and decided on a publisher to pitch it to, though we're fully prepared to shop it around if they're not interested. Mike even came up with a working title (I'll share that when we're more confident about it being the right one). Now the next step is to get the query letter hammered out and in the mail by Monday. That's the goal.

It's been a productive week for both of us. This time of year usually is since it's cold and rainy outside so we stay hunkered down in our studios. Mike finished three small paintings, has two more in progress; I met my deadline for the next article in Living Cowboy Ethics magazine - yeah! - and finished all but one small project for my Phoenix client. So, we're off to a running start for the New Year at the Y-ME.