Artful Dreamer

We went to the apple farm a couple of days ago.  I love this time of year - apple pies and apple donuts and apple cider, oh my!  Everything tastes so good.  Their caramel apples are fabulous, too.  I get hungry just thinking about it.

I'm cleaning out my fish tanks again.  Just can't seem to make myself get rid of the goldfish.  Guess I'll give it another year. They really are beautiful.

I'm going to Massachusetts in a couple of weeks to visit my daughter.  She said it is absolutely beautiful right now.  Hope at least some of the leaves stay on the trees a little longer.  I'd like to take a lot of pictures.

We had a tiny little frog on one of the plants in the garden.  He was so cute.

This is another favorite of mine in my book - the fox, Reynard, playing the flute.

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

We just went to such a good movie.  It was "You Again" with Betty White, etc.  What a good time.  Just think - no swearing, no sex, no violence!  Guess it can be done.

The sun is out again.  Hurray!!!  I just went out and picked some lavender from my garden.  It smells so good.  I'll have to dry some.  I added some to the encaustic I'm working on and it smells great - hot beeswax and lavender.  Good combination.

Tomorrow's supposed to really beautiful so I'll have to plan to spend the day out there.  Hate to miss the good weather.  I have plenty of projects to keep my busy once the snow flies.  Now it's time to clean out the fish tanks.  I'm having a hard time letting my goldfish go so may keep them for another year.

I had such fun drawing this old time parson.  I love crows and I thought he did a magnificent job.

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

The spiders are busy weaving webs this time of year in the house and everywhere.  Guess they know it's Fall, too.  The way it's raining outside, I suppose everything wants to come in.  I can't believe how much rain there is - Hwy 52 closed - sandbagging at Pine Island.  Getting kind of serious.  I hope the farmers will be able to get their crops in this year.  It was too wet for a lot of the corn, etc, last year.

I think we'll have to pick our squash before the garden gets too wet and everything rots.  We had a great garden this year so we were very lucky.

I'm going to have to do some housecleaning.  I just bought another book on photography.  I'm totally hooked on buying books right now.  Have to quit!!!  There are just so many wonderful ideas out there and I want to try them all.

I've started on my Paris "Froggie and Mousie".  I'm using the rainy street scene from our trip to France.  We were running from the subway to catch the train and I snapped a great market scene in the rain.  

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

I'm finally back again.  Went for an all night and all day sleep study at Abbott Hospital.  They confirmed what I told them all along - I can't sleep.  Didn't need to go there for that!

It's really looking like Fall now.  Guess tomorrow's the first day of Autumn so I guess summer's over.  Our garden is almost finished producing.  Time to bring the squash in.  The buttercup ones are awesome.  Nothing like fresh produce.

I've been trying more things with encaustic.  Now I want to buy my own personal blow torch.  I've got equipment for almost every type of project, but there's always something new to buy. 

This is the drawing I did of the band that played at Froggie and Mousie's wedding.  It's one of my favorites.

This is a photo I found on the internet.  It's from the floods in India.  Even there, Froggie is a gentleman. I thought it was an amazing photo - from a very terrible disaster.

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

Our big garage sale is over so now I can hopefully concentrate on doing some fun stuff.  I really want to get at encaustic painting.  This means I'll have to gather up some equipment like tuna cans, etc.  I went to the grocery store today and bought some tuna.  I guess I remembered it as being much better.  Hope I can make do with just one tin for melting wax.

The weather in Rochester was very cold for a garage sale.  We were surprised that it was so cold in September.  Maybe if we do it again, we might have to try July.  We almost froze in October last year - maybe we should just forget the garage sale and go shopping instead.

I still have to decide what I want to do with my goldfish.  Hopefully I'll be able to part with them, but I'm weakening.  I've had them for several years.

I'm hoping to get started on Froggie and Mousie in France this week.  I have some ideas I am anxious to try out.  I took lots of pictures when I went to France, so they'll be great to work from.  Here they are still getting ready for their big wedding.

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

I went to a very interesting workshop yesterday- encaustic painting.  So of course I've already invested in books and material so I can try it again.  I seem to keep the art stores in business.  Oh well, someone has to keep the economy going.  It brought up a lot of other fun, new ideas so it'll be worth it.

The weather has been great!  Our garden is still producing but I can see it's winding down for Fall.  We'll have to pick our squash pretty soon and hope that they're ripe enough.

We had a lot of woodchucks this summer and I thought they'd be perfect for making the black-eyed peas for the wedding supper.  So, they are the proud owners of Chuck's Woodfire Grill.  The hole in the background is the way their den actually looks (minus the ladder).

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

The tree that I used for this drawing is our old boxelder tree in the back yard.  Unfortunately, the name of the tree is also exactly what it does.  In the summer the tree is completely red with baby boxelders bugs.

It is really fall-like today.  I have gotten in a cleanup mode and am trying to ready a few things outside for winter.  I discovered the more I think I have to have in my yard, the more work there is to do.

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

I have been having a lot of fun learning new techniques with my camera and Photoshop.  I think I know a lot of the tricks, and then I discover a lot more.  It's amazing what the new technology can do.  I don't think I'll ever give up the physical aspect of painting and drawing, though.  I really am enjoying combining all these things.  Now I have the urge to go out and take some more photos.

I went to Spring Brook Nature Center and had a healthy stroll and good photo ops.

Here is another addition to my "Froggie and Mousie ..."

Sharyn

Artful Dreamer

It looks like Fall is really here.  Leaves are changing, it's getting cooler at night, days are getting a little shorter.  Pretty soon it will be time to finish things up outside for the summer and let the plants rest.  I had a thought today; would this be my last week this year to wear my white capris?  That used to be the rule - no white after Labor Day.  Or have we moved on?

Seeing Uncle Rat standing by his fireplace reminded me that pretty soon we'll be lighting fires again and that awesome wood smell will be in the air.  School will be starting in a few days.  I used to love that time of year - school supplies, the smell of new books, seeing all the kids again.  I went to a country school for the first 6 grades (my class had 5 pupils).  It was great!  We had a "furnace" in the corner.   We would put our potatoes on the furnace when we came in the morning.  By noon our potatoes were baked and the schoolroom smelled awesome.  We had little school plays and an actual "rhythmn band" and little uniforms.

I hope you enjoy this drawing of Uncle Rat.  (Does Miss Mousie really need his permission?)