Happy New Years

Just a quick wish but with a sincere desire that the coming year finds everyone with what they want and need - and hopefully those two are pretty close...Happy New Years

me and van

I set off this morning with some parking meter change, a Van Morrison tape, my camera and my sketchbook. I headed downtown

I was starting to take some pictures


I went to the Army Navy store and found some map bags that will be great art bags and an ammo bag to carry my pencils in - loaded them up...parked the car, took a few more pictures and my camera died....dammit....so I walked across the street to the State House, sketched a little and then realized my ass was frozen from sitting on cold bronze that wasn't designed to be a seat and that I had to pee so back home I am...(sounds like Yoda)....but I am psyched to have my bag, I got J one too and I know she'll love it.....functional, slightly dykey...and her favorite color - khaki - oh wait that's me:)

don't tell J

but I had to use our bathroom/toothbrushing cup to color this in this morning...in my defense she used our brush cup to stick a leaky fountain pen in so it made sense to me....

IF - Holiday

one of the mountains of garbage left from holiday festivities ;)

my favorite holiday picture

my 3 yo nephew playing his guitar dobro style (where did he pick that up??) and singing some bizarre song about batman destroying bad guys....we didn't encourage him at all, LOL

times a wastin'

and I'm still not ready for work...at least my clothes are ironed....it's only a 3 day week, but I just don't want to go in....blah

Tommy's presents

This is a very quick watercolor I did for my brother, he wanted something of his guitar and I'll do that eventually, but I waited until today when gift exchange was tonite....and it gave me a chance to play with the watercolor pencils

The little guitar is about 4 or 5 inches long...cut, carved and painted....he's a musician on the side, LOL

ghost stories and things unrelated to holidays

I think one of the best things about today is not having to be immersed in lots of holiday stuff so here are a couple of things completely unrelated to Christmas....

The first I meant to bring up at Halloween and just forgot, but I thought about it again the other day and wanted to post before I forget again...ghosts...personally, I'm not sure they really exist and the older I get the more I believe they don't, but as a kid I had an extreme fear of all things paranormal (which just lead to an extreme interest as an adult)...especially ghosts...I didn't like cemetaries or the dark or anything the least bit spooky...so anyway the street we lived on from the time I was 3 until I was 18 had a really old, civil war era farm house sort of in the middle of it (it was actually a big circle that made up the street), there were acres and acres of small garden plots people would rent and then some woods and dirt trails behind that....the old house was rickety and falling apart...wooden plank built on brick pillars with a wrap around porch that covered most of the front and a big walk out porch on the back side that faced into the gardens - definately the stereotypical southern farm in decay...the whole area was a huge draw for the neighborhood kids, we could ride our bikes on the paths, play in the woods, and dare each other to go into or under the house....now of course we were sure it was haunted and one day a friend and were up there messing around and happened to look up at the same time to see an older looking woman in an old timey looking dress and apron out on the back porch staring at us...needless to say, we ran or biked our little asses right on home and didn't do too much more fooling around up there...years later when I was in high school and had been over at friends trick or treating (okay drinking beer)....I came home to lots of commotion on our street and the ghost house was completely and totally on fire....big orange flames just covering the house...the next morning after all was said and done the house was gone....now I don't know if we saw a ghost or if we convinced ourselves we saw a ghost and since moving back here, I've learned that the area (though redeveloped with expensive patio homes) did contain a number of unmarked graves belonging to mill workers that lived in the mill villages that sprung up along the river after the civil war....so who knows, maybe - maybe not, I will say the experience still kinda give me goosebumps even now....anybody else got a ghost story?

the other thing I was going to talk about is how our tremendous dachshund, Lucy, is the biggest drama queen I've ever seen....but the ghost story is alot longer than I intended so I'll save that for later ;)
[ghosts]

IF - Imagine

Ok - so I actually had something for this week's topic afterall, LOL...this is what I imagine goes on in the crepe myrtle in our front yard when we're not looking....

shopping and baking

really not so much baking...just sugared pecans....but we did finish most all of our shopping with the exception of something for my dad and stepmom....I had the great idea of a gift certificate to a really cool restaurant in Tampa (they'll be spending Jan. and Feb. in St. Pete) but I emailed them to see if they'd do it and if they'd be able to email me something showing the certificate and I haven't heard back from them soooo...time to rethink again...they're living in their RV right now (entirely different story) which makes it even more difficult to shop for them....we'll think of something I guess

but the most ironic thing we got was a gift for my cop brother (whose name I drew for the big family gathering on xmas morning)...an outdoorsman's knife set...I'm guessing the clan will miss the nuance of the vegetarian, liberal giving a an outdoorsan's knife set as a gift, but that kinda makes it even better ;)

drawings and other visual type stuff will resume here shortly - time off coming up and I miss it so....soon hopefully...as well as some sprucing up here....this layout is kinda boring

btw - Happy Solstice...I really dig the idea that the days are only gonna get longer from here till June...that's good stuff

Baking - nite 2

so tonite it's Meringue cookies - they actually are more puffs than cookies in my estimation....

easy recipe - which scares me because it seems too damn easy, they've only been in the oven for about 14 minutes and have 16 to go...I'm scared to go look...hold on though because I probably should...okay, nice and fluffy...maybe a little too big, but we can adjust size for the next batch...

Meringue

4 egg whites
1 cup sugar
1/2 tspn vanilla
1/2 cup chopped pecans

beat egg whites until frothy, add sugar 1 TBSN at a time, continue beating until glossy and stiff peaks form, beat in vanilla, fold in nuts....place on greased cookie sheet (or parchment paper) by rounded tspns, bake at 300 for 30 minutes or light brown, cool completely before removing from pan.

we'll see

Baking

we finally commenced with the baking...I enjoy baking - it's a precise, results-oriented task...just what I do best, LOL...and every year depending on disposable income and mood we bake stuff for the holidays...so this year having a little of both on the positive side - we started planning our cookie menu about a month or so ago...we bought supplies, we chose recipes and finally after a week of putting it off - we baked the first batch of cookies tonite....J's choice

Chewy Chocolate Cookies I
Submitted by: Linda Whittaker

Photo by: THEKIDCOOK "These are GREAT chocolate chocolate chip cookies. Always a request at Christmas from friends and family!"
Original recipe yield: 4 dozen.
Prep Time:15 MinutesCook Time:10 MinutesReady In:55 MinutesServings:48 (change)

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INGREDIENTS:
1 1/4 cups butter, softened
2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

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DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then stir in the vanilla. Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt; stir into the creamed mixture. Mix in the chocolate chips. Drop dough by teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.
Bake 8 to 9 minutes in the preheated oven. Cookies will be soft. Cool slightly on cookie sheet; remove from sheet onto wire rack to cool completely.

we actually used the swirl chips and added about a half cup of pecans....we also got about 7 dozen out of this batch...good filler cookies, but now we have the more difficult stuff...divinity and meringue...I miss not being able to do cut sugar cookies, but we just have so little kitchen space and those take up lots of room for prep...hmm, good thing I'm off Friday, we still have to figure out presentation...

mentholatum

my grandmother swore by this stuff....I distinctly remember the smell b/c she would cover her hands in it every night before bed....after putting the pink foam curlers in her hair of course..why in the world am I thinking of mentholatum, you may ask?...I'm stuffed up with what is most likely the office cold...or bird flu...and I took a shower last night with one of those fizzy shower soother tablets and it struck me how much it smelled like mentholatum...I'm not sure it helped me breathe but I enjoyed the flashback ;)

new computer

very excited :)....fast, fast, fast

weekend

found time to mess with Scout while messing with the ornaments...added pics to flickr if anyone wants to see what we've been doing the last few days.

stepping away

I've been working on the gourd ornaments on and off for a while...frankly I've gotten very little accomplished and the family may just not get the yearly offering...which is probably not a big deal anyway...it's annoying when I can't get something to look the way I think it should....and that's where I am with these...so now I'm letting the paint dry on the one I started yesterday and trying to decide what next...J found a big baby block box yesterday that will be a cool holder for the set of blocks I haven't started yet for one of the nieces babies due this spring...the underwater wall hanging is still only partially painted with no back piece done and I should really get the stake part for MIL's wolf I started in April for her birthday....dammit Lee, focus...

a little thinking

something has happened since August when I started trying the blog thing that I hadn't really expected and I've been thinking about it lately and figured what better place than here...

I wasn't sure what I expected - if anything - when I set this up...maybe a place to vent (not so much me)...maybe a place to talk about stuff (sometimes - but I'm not so talkative mostly)....but what it has become is a place where I've rediscovered how much I like the creative part of me...finding so many people sharing their thoughts and experiences through visual expression was just kinda significant...sketches, illustrations, crafts....and respect for each other's work...how cool...and slowly I've realized that those visual images are a great way of communicating how I see the world or want it to be....

I am really grateful for the outlet this has turned into...and the encouragement I've received from so many people...my head is clearer than it's been in a long time and it occurred to me last week that maybe one of the reasons has been having this place to communicate in such a comfortable way....

IF - Blue

Blue....bluegrass....simple music for a simpler time

IF - Small

better late than never I suppose, the week just got away from me....another attempt with water color...this is our small xmas tree this year...at least one of them, LOL...instead of a big tree, we went with a few little ones and used specific groups of ornaments....this one is decorated with my favorites - a series of folk art that Hallmark did in the late 80's and 90's - neat stuff....
in addition, I uploaded some pictures of little things I've made over the years....take a look....small