Freshly picked bright and early this morning. I think tomatoes are the only things that's really going to grow well for us this year. We'll do more expeiments next year.

p.s. i've always wanted to do one of those little vegetable faced pictures. Check out Geninne's radishes.

Above is my journal "entry" from the weekend on the farm. We took it easy because of the intense heat and didn't really do too much. The above pretty much sums up our time there. You can see the Woog's entry here (as you can see, we worked on the lighting bug page at the same time!).

Labels: on the farm

Personalized Father's Day gifts from the Woog: Etched "frosty" mugs. She wrote their names and I copied them onto the glass with etching cream.

Another weekend at the farm yielded carpet removal from the dining area, living room and den (reveling beautiful red oak wood floors) so I didn't get a chance to write in my journal over the weekend but the Woog did. We also hung up a swing in the front yard for it. She wants to paint it pink but I think she's going to have to settle for red or brown.


We re-arranged some furniture and brought my great-aunt's cedar chest into the living room to use as a coffee table. There were just a few of her things in there. She had no children so I think my grandparents ended up with a lot of her things. Below is a picture of her I found in the chest (I've always thought she had the coolest middle name):



She was born in 1900 and died in 1995. The only thing I really remember about her was that my granddaddy would pick her up and take her to church every Sunday. I used to always wonder if my brother would take me to church when I was older. I didn't think so then and I still don't think he would :)

In keeping with the historic theme of the summer I signed up for ancestry.com to document some things. I haven't really found out anything I didn't know, but it will be a good place to have everything documented.

This weekend I plan on taking it easy, exploring some of the old barns, more photography and catching fireflies with the Woog. I saw some old Ball canning jars in the garage so we'll catch them with those. One good thing about your grandparent's living through the depression is things you played with and used when you were a kid, can now be used and played with by your kids because they saved EVERYTHING!

Labels: on the farm

This summer we have decided to spend the weekends without cable tv, internet access or air conditioning. We'll be spending time at my grandparent's farm about 30 miles from our house. The farm has been in my family since around 1918 and is where my grandparents lived up until 4 years ago when they had to move to assisted living. My grandfather passed away a couple of years ago and now my grandmother (who will be 93 this week!) lives with my mom just down the street from us.

In the last couple of months my husband and I had a realization on how we spend our family time and on the long drive to Surtex a few weeks ago it became clear to me on what we needed to do. My grandparents' house has been vacant for a while but has been pretty well maintained for such an old house. We're stepping in and cleaning some things up, making repairs and restoring some woodwork so it will become a place where family can come and enjoy it again.

The above picture is of the porch swing that has been in place all these years. I remember being around four or five and swinging on it. The Woog and I got some pretty good time on it this past weekend. Still had the same old feel and same old creeks.

The Woog and I have brought along our new Moleskin journals to document our summer while still being creative on the weekends. I packed up a little journaling kit for us to use with paint and color pencils.



I did a few pages (which will later include some photographs I've taken) and here are a couple:






The Woog also did a few pages and they can be seen here.

I'll try and blog once a week on our weekend "adventures." Stay tuned!

Labels: on the farm

Still in Sutex catch-up mode but wanted to post this. Candi commissioned this piece for her daughter's graduation Saturday. Her initials are "AND" so her artwork signature is an ampersand (pretty cool huh?). The Dilhoffs now have 3 original Junk A Dooldles™ in their home. Thanks Candi!

Labels: junk-a-doodles

Above is the completed booth. It wasn't all on the floor like I expected so that was good. I had a great first day and got to meet a lot of familiar bloggers like:

Carol Eldridge
Tara Reed
Cindy Ann Ganaden
Liz Goulet Dubois
Laura Fry
Mary Beth Cryan

Plus several others that I can't think of right now (sorry guys - my brains pretty much mush right now), but hopefully I will later.

I made a few good contacts and one really great one about 15 minutes before the show closed. I've heard that tomorrow (Monday) will have the most people and Tuesday's crowd will start to dwindle as the day goes, but it could only take one good contact to make the show successful and so far I have several!

I'll try and blog again tomorrow night!

Labels: surtex, surtex planning

I'm here! After months and months of working on things for Surtex, it's finally here and I'm ready for it! Today was the set-up day and it was pretty rough. There was no air conditioning on, my booth was by the huge open dock doors and with all the humidity and heat, my tape wasn't sticking to the walls and my things kept peel and pop off. So, we went and bought scotch tape and that was working but only a little, so I'm heading back bright and early in the morning to see all my work on the floor and tacking everything up with command poster strips (I boughts all they had at the CVS by our hotel). Hopefully with the air on tomorrow everything will stay stuck. I'll try and post an image of the complete booth set up tomorrow.

I finally got to "meet" my fellow Illustration For Kids member Jannie Ho. We didn't get to talk long but am sure we'll make up for it in the next few days. My booth is next to Monica Lee, Barbara Johansen Newman, Caleb Gray (the only exhibiting artist, I think, who is from my neck of the woods), and Nancy Woolf (who's work is super cute!).






After set-up we walked back to the hotel (our hotel is in a perfect location!) and then headed out to eat at the Bread Factory and then to Time Square. Since I've never been to New York, the crowds and sights were pretty insane. I'm already tired of all the honking :)

Labels: surtex, surtex planning

We left yesterday for Surtex and since we drove from Nashville, we went through Virginia and Pennsylvania (both of which I have never been to). It was an amazing drive and although I'm from the country, I've never seen so much countryside. I did not expect to see so much and am kicking myself for not bringing my professional camera (I didn't want to lug it all over NYC). All I brought was my little Samsung pocket camera. I'm going to have to come back and go on a barn "photo safari." We made great time yesterday and spent the day today in Intercourse, Bird-in-hand & Strasburg, PA (which is Amish country) before heading up to Bordentown, NJ which is where we're spending the night tonight. Tomorrow we'll head into the city and set-up the booth at Surtex. I'll try my best to post about it all tomorrow night.

Below are some doors from Strasburg today (love doors!):

Labels: surtex

Here's my tree display from yesterday's ornaments. All my painting & gluing is done so tonight I get a manicure and I'll be set!

Labels: surtex, surtex planning