It's been quite a while since I've posted..a lot has happened in the past years from 2010 to 2013...just letting you all know I'm alive and well and will be posting as soon as I get my notes together...xoxo
Saturday, April 6, 2013
Saturday, June 19, 2010
IT'S SATURDAY AGAIN...
this week was a whirlwind...just don't remember where everyday has gone...went to the Dr. on Monday...have to go back in a month....I've been recovering from knee surgery, resting,etc...kids were here this week....they had a great party which included a lot of their friends and of course the dogs....seems like the dogs had the best time...grabbing hot dogs and doing other fun things like going into the pond, chasing the zip line and so forth..Moe was so tired the next day that he couldn't wag his tail...just gave it a short flip to say hello...he slept the whole day...Mocha was probably the same..she is a little older but she loves the pond...it's the first place she goes when she comes here...even in the winter....they had tents and even one of Aaron's friends brought his camper...with drinking, they just camped out overnight instead of driving home...at least some of them did....Me..???... I kinda slept thru the whole thing...watched the basketball game and saw the Lakers win, in between, Pat came up to my room to say "Hello" and Liz showed up a few times to see if I was sleeping and ask if they were bothering me...I just turned up the tv and went to sleep...heard nothing from the outside except for the bongo drums going at intervals and lots of laughing...all in all I guess the party was a success and they will be doing it over again sometime later this summer...
I had to pass on my trip to Chicago to see grandson Joel graduate...my knee just would not support all the walking that would have been involved, so I got a credit on my airline ticket...not that I will use it...would cost me another $150.00 to change things, so I guess I'll just say bye bye to it for now...have until next April to make up my mind..my tempory handicap placard didn't arrive either...that would have saved some walking...we could have parked closer to the stadium...
Judy called me last night from the stadium....it poured down rain and they handed out plastic ponchos to everyone...she didn't talk to me too long though..Joel gave up his robe to another student who got soaked and since he was in the program, all he wore was his hat and of course his street clothes... could hear some music when Judy called...I'm really thinking it was a good decision on my part to stay home...now to get a card out to him, means I have to get dressed, go to town and find one, or maybe just do one of my own...I usually do that, not to save money, but to let my kids know that I took the time to do the card in the first place and then get it off to them...will do that next week....
I'm trying to find my muse...she is around here somewhere..I just do not have any ambition to do much creatively although I received a long awaited reference book that I ordered on Amazon...it was a used book and it took a long time to arrive..thought it was lost in the mail, but it came yesterday (Friday) and I saw that it was shipped from England...took almost a month...
it's really supposed to get hot today...
"Arts on the River" is going on today and tomorrow...I had to pass on this show because of my trip to Chicago, but I probably wouldn't have been able to do it anyway because of the knee surgery...It is a really good show for me..Liz really wanted to do it but "sorry Liz" I just had to pass...hopefully we can do it next year...I did send in a cd to Mountainfest ...in Nov....it's down at the Mountainlair at the University in Morgantown...Nov. 4-6...will know the first of July if I got accepted...
in the meantime, gotta look for my muse...I know she is here somewhere....here musey, here musey..of course if someone called me musey, I would hide too......
I had to pass on my trip to Chicago to see grandson Joel graduate...my knee just would not support all the walking that would have been involved, so I got a credit on my airline ticket...not that I will use it...would cost me another $150.00 to change things, so I guess I'll just say bye bye to it for now...have until next April to make up my mind..my tempory handicap placard didn't arrive either...that would have saved some walking...we could have parked closer to the stadium...
Judy called me last night from the stadium....it poured down rain and they handed out plastic ponchos to everyone...she didn't talk to me too long though..Joel gave up his robe to another student who got soaked and since he was in the program, all he wore was his hat and of course his street clothes... could hear some music when Judy called...I'm really thinking it was a good decision on my part to stay home...now to get a card out to him, means I have to get dressed, go to town and find one, or maybe just do one of my own...I usually do that, not to save money, but to let my kids know that I took the time to do the card in the first place and then get it off to them...will do that next week....
I'm trying to find my muse...she is around here somewhere..I just do not have any ambition to do much creatively although I received a long awaited reference book that I ordered on Amazon...it was a used book and it took a long time to arrive..thought it was lost in the mail, but it came yesterday (Friday) and I saw that it was shipped from England...took almost a month...
it's really supposed to get hot today...
"Arts on the River" is going on today and tomorrow...I had to pass on this show because of my trip to Chicago, but I probably wouldn't have been able to do it anyway because of the knee surgery...It is a really good show for me..Liz really wanted to do it but "sorry Liz" I just had to pass...hopefully we can do it next year...I did send in a cd to Mountainfest ...in Nov....it's down at the Mountainlair at the University in Morgantown...Nov. 4-6...will know the first of July if I got accepted...
in the meantime, gotta look for my muse...I know she is here somewhere....here musey, here musey..of course if someone called me musey, I would hide too......
Saturday, June 12, 2010
ANOTHER DAY...
It's Saturday afternoon , June 12...had the knee surgery on Tuesday around 8:30 am...was ok on Tuesday until the numbing wore off, then it was kinda really a bad rest of the week. Today I am up, going to take a bubble bath later ..no pain killers today for once..although I didn't have to take any yesterday, only before I went to bed...I'm feeling good today...Kids have called me everyday, and Liz , Leah and Ace were here checking on me on and off all day on Wed. or Thursday, I think ..lost track of the days...just sleeping them away and resting....
Had a little urge to do some art work yesterday, but it left me almost as soon as it arrived...went back to bed and watched the tube, or I should say, slept thru some programs on the tube...read my e-mail, etc...I am really low on energy, ....
will be seeing the Dr. on Monday...took off the pressure bandage because my knee was itching..is that a good sign...it is numb right in the middle of the kneecap. lets hope for better news on Monday...the stitches will come out then....I'm thinking the syn-vest injections may be put on hold...we will see....
I am taking care of some retreat business while I am up...we may keep the registrations open a few more days...this retreat is going to be a sweet one..have lots of things lined up thanks to Mona, Syd and Heidi ...I'm sure as the days go by, my knee will be feeling better...tty all later..A
Had a little urge to do some art work yesterday, but it left me almost as soon as it arrived...went back to bed and watched the tube, or I should say, slept thru some programs on the tube...read my e-mail, etc...I am really low on energy, ....
will be seeing the Dr. on Monday...took off the pressure bandage because my knee was itching..is that a good sign...it is numb right in the middle of the kneecap. lets hope for better news on Monday...the stitches will come out then....I'm thinking the syn-vest injections may be put on hold...we will see....
I am taking care of some retreat business while I am up...we may keep the registrations open a few more days...this retreat is going to be a sweet one..have lots of things lined up thanks to Mona, Syd and Heidi ...I'm sure as the days go by, my knee will be feeling better...tty all later..A
Sunday, June 6, 2010
IT'S A RAINY SUNDAY AFTERNOON
Here it is, Sunday June 6 ,,,I can't believe I was away the whole month of May, or was I...????
Been busy down here in Mt. Morris...Grand daughter Liz asked Pappy if she could do some "potting" out in the barn and once we explained things further, he said ok and started to do some preliminary cleaning and pitching of junk out of the bottom of the barn....
Since I was a potter, a long while ago, I kept ALL my Stuff, hoping that one of the grandkids just may want to play in the mud sometime. I did offer to sell my stuff to a woman down in Fairmont, but didn't hear any response from her, so I just let sleeping dogs lie regarding selling the STUFF. Then along came Liz...some say she is a version of me, and I do see some resemblence at times, but she is her own person and right now she is definitely into the mud...
We continued to clean out the barn and got the pottery reasonably set up...looks pretty good...we have shelves that we brought in from out under the pine trees, Pap did some wiring and got us the proper plugs for the kilns...(we have 2)...we set up the wedgeing table with the plaster surface (to wedge the clay)..shoveled out tons of crap from the floor of the workroom, and I mean shoveled out tons, moved the clay bats onto a shelf within reach , washed off everything that had STUFF on it, found the shimpo potters wheel under a pile of STUFF, ..if I keep saying STUFF, it's because there was an accumulation of it everywhere.....as we plowed thru it, I found things that I thought were gone forever. ...tons of tools, pottery, drawings.....I'm not going to go into that for now, but anyway it was fun having the grand daughter really pumped up about mud. We found a box of clay..50# of it that was still soft and in working condition after laying on the bottom of things for about 30 years....yesssss, it's been that long since I had mud on my hands. Liz did some wedging and we were in business...she happily turned out some pretty neat mugs. One of her friends came down and they played a bit with the mud and so did Leah, who didn't seem to do too bad. Her pieces are still out there on the bats..they are dried by now, so she will have to work a little to trim them, but it can be done.
Liz and I went on a road trip to Standard Ceramics down in Carnegie and picked up more clay,
had breakfast at Pineras and lunch at a neat little restaurant in a building under "Before and More"...a shop that sells used clothing...had a great time there also...(got some Chicos) ....while we were at the ceramics store, we also picked up some neat glazes that we both are anxious to use. We had previously ordered a splash pan for the potters wheel, I worked all those years w/o one, and the woman that managed the store found one in the back that was probably as old as my wheel and she gave it to us to see if it would fit...IT FITS!!!! and works perfectly....so our heartfelt thanks go out to her...I sat down at the wheel on Wed. and played a bit...it was as though I had never left throwing pottery...we both had a lot of fun as I explained a few things to Liz...showed her how to make handles for her mugs, and a few of my techniques that just came flooding back to me as the wheel turned ...I always did like to play in the mud.....
more news....
about 7 or 8 weeks ago I was giving our small horse of a pup a bath and he decided he didn't want to get into the tub, and as I lifted his front legs to get him into the tub, he reared back and knocked me off balance and I twisted my right knee...DAMN!!!!..the pain almost knocked me over and when he saw I was kinda pissed with him, he jumped into the tub and I proceeded to bathe him...he does like the water and stood there while I soaped him down and rinsed him off, then he jumped out of the tub, dripping wet and shook...yeah...the bathroom was flooded as he stood still for a second while I toweled him off...he has lots of fur, so he was really dripping wet....anyway, he finally went out into the house and let me dry him further and then he laid down while I finally got to take care of the knee....I thought I had just pulled a muscle, and took some motrin for a couple of days, but it didn't get any better...not being a wuss, I just tried to ignore it for several weeks, Syd and I went to Artiscape and then to a workshop with Dayle Doroshow and thanks to Aleve, (no motrin )I plodded my way thru things...also I went to work down at the gallery in Morgantown during this time.....finally I realized the pain wasn't going away, only was getting worse, and so I made an appointment with my doctor...another 10 days went by and when I finally had my appointment, he thought I had done more damage to my knee than twisting it....to make a long story short and avoid elaborating on my experience with the could care less office staff at my physicians office, I finally had an MRI...diagnosis...torn miniscus...what a blow....so after another 7 days of waiting, I finally got in to see the specialist and he took exrays of my beautiful knees and found them riddled with arthritis....trying to avoid surgery, he suggested that we do the Syn-vest treatment...injecting this gluton thick like viscous solution made from Rooster and chicken combs into my knee...3 treatments in all...supposed to really help,( I did run the risk of crowing at dawn though).... so, after an injection of cortozone into the knee, I was to come back in 3 weeks and begin the treatment....HOWEVER, my knee had different plans...while going up the stairs, (very carefully) something gave out in my knee and I had PAIN...like never before...oh wait..!!!!...I did have that pain ..back in 2001 when I had my other knee scoped ...this was on a Sat. night, so I lasted thru Sunday, & Monday..(Memorial Day) thanks to drugs and using crutches the whole time...I got in to see the Dr. on Tues...after looking at the swollen knee, he decided that we would have to have surgery after all...so on the 8th, I will be in the OR. at S.W. Regional Center having the deed done on the knee...KNEEDLESS to say, I missed Nathan's graduation and may miss Joel's also if I don't behave and heal ...so for now, thanks to vicodin, I'm dealing with things...not looking forward to the surgery, but to the end of all this misery of not being able to walk...what a shame, I won't be able to play soccor, run any marathons, bike in any races, etc...too bad Annie, just stay off the knee for now....and get better, ...we have our PCCMMRetreat in July that You have to go to.....something to look forward to.....so you better behave yourself.....
Been busy down here in Mt. Morris...Grand daughter Liz asked Pappy if she could do some "potting" out in the barn and once we explained things further, he said ok and started to do some preliminary cleaning and pitching of junk out of the bottom of the barn....
Since I was a potter, a long while ago, I kept ALL my Stuff, hoping that one of the grandkids just may want to play in the mud sometime. I did offer to sell my stuff to a woman down in Fairmont, but didn't hear any response from her, so I just let sleeping dogs lie regarding selling the STUFF. Then along came Liz...some say she is a version of me, and I do see some resemblence at times, but she is her own person and right now she is definitely into the mud...
We continued to clean out the barn and got the pottery reasonably set up...looks pretty good...we have shelves that we brought in from out under the pine trees, Pap did some wiring and got us the proper plugs for the kilns...(we have 2)...we set up the wedgeing table with the plaster surface (to wedge the clay)..shoveled out tons of crap from the floor of the workroom, and I mean shoveled out tons, moved the clay bats onto a shelf within reach , washed off everything that had STUFF on it, found the shimpo potters wheel under a pile of STUFF, ..if I keep saying STUFF, it's because there was an accumulation of it everywhere.....as we plowed thru it, I found things that I thought were gone forever. ...tons of tools, pottery, drawings.....I'm not going to go into that for now, but anyway it was fun having the grand daughter really pumped up about mud. We found a box of clay..50# of it that was still soft and in working condition after laying on the bottom of things for about 30 years....yesssss, it's been that long since I had mud on my hands. Liz did some wedging and we were in business...she happily turned out some pretty neat mugs. One of her friends came down and they played a bit with the mud and so did Leah, who didn't seem to do too bad. Her pieces are still out there on the bats..they are dried by now, so she will have to work a little to trim them, but it can be done.
Liz and I went on a road trip to Standard Ceramics down in Carnegie and picked up more clay,
had breakfast at Pineras and lunch at a neat little restaurant in a building under "Before and More"...a shop that sells used clothing...had a great time there also...(got some Chicos) ....while we were at the ceramics store, we also picked up some neat glazes that we both are anxious to use. We had previously ordered a splash pan for the potters wheel, I worked all those years w/o one, and the woman that managed the store found one in the back that was probably as old as my wheel and she gave it to us to see if it would fit...IT FITS!!!! and works perfectly....so our heartfelt thanks go out to her...I sat down at the wheel on Wed. and played a bit...it was as though I had never left throwing pottery...we both had a lot of fun as I explained a few things to Liz...showed her how to make handles for her mugs, and a few of my techniques that just came flooding back to me as the wheel turned ...I always did like to play in the mud.....
more news....
about 7 or 8 weeks ago I was giving our small horse of a pup a bath and he decided he didn't want to get into the tub, and as I lifted his front legs to get him into the tub, he reared back and knocked me off balance and I twisted my right knee...DAMN!!!!..the pain almost knocked me over and when he saw I was kinda pissed with him, he jumped into the tub and I proceeded to bathe him...he does like the water and stood there while I soaped him down and rinsed him off, then he jumped out of the tub, dripping wet and shook...yeah...the bathroom was flooded as he stood still for a second while I toweled him off...he has lots of fur, so he was really dripping wet....anyway, he finally went out into the house and let me dry him further and then he laid down while I finally got to take care of the knee....I thought I had just pulled a muscle, and took some motrin for a couple of days, but it didn't get any better...not being a wuss, I just tried to ignore it for several weeks, Syd and I went to Artiscape and then to a workshop with Dayle Doroshow and thanks to Aleve, (no motrin )I plodded my way thru things...also I went to work down at the gallery in Morgantown during this time.....finally I realized the pain wasn't going away, only was getting worse, and so I made an appointment with my doctor...another 10 days went by and when I finally had my appointment, he thought I had done more damage to my knee than twisting it....to make a long story short and avoid elaborating on my experience with the could care less office staff at my physicians office, I finally had an MRI...diagnosis...torn miniscus...what a blow....so after another 7 days of waiting, I finally got in to see the specialist and he took exrays of my beautiful knees and found them riddled with arthritis....trying to avoid surgery, he suggested that we do the Syn-vest treatment...injecting this gluton thick like viscous solution made from Rooster and chicken combs into my knee...3 treatments in all...supposed to really help,( I did run the risk of crowing at dawn though).... so, after an injection of cortozone into the knee, I was to come back in 3 weeks and begin the treatment....HOWEVER, my knee had different plans...while going up the stairs, (very carefully) something gave out in my knee and I had PAIN...like never before...oh wait..!!!!...I did have that pain ..back in 2001 when I had my other knee scoped ...this was on a Sat. night, so I lasted thru Sunday, & Monday..(Memorial Day) thanks to drugs and using crutches the whole time...I got in to see the Dr. on Tues...after looking at the swollen knee, he decided that we would have to have surgery after all...so on the 8th, I will be in the OR. at S.W. Regional Center having the deed done on the knee...KNEEDLESS to say, I missed Nathan's graduation and may miss Joel's also if I don't behave and heal ...so for now, thanks to vicodin, I'm dealing with things...not looking forward to the surgery, but to the end of all this misery of not being able to walk...what a shame, I won't be able to play soccor, run any marathons, bike in any races, etc...too bad Annie, just stay off the knee for now....and get better, ...we have our PCCMMRetreat in July that You have to go to.....something to look forward to.....so you better behave yourself.....
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
MORE ON ARTISCAPE
Here I am , back again...now to continue my comments on ARTISCAPE..
.Saturday
My third class, MAKING A LEATHER JOURNAL.. was held at European Papers...A neat little shop owned by Lisa Ohmer..the retreat director. I really looked forward to this class and I wasn't dissapointed....
To start off with, she had very good handouts, very explicit...one could go home and make a journal if they had the supplies...and speaking of supplies, she had great leather for us to use and everything was cut and ready to assemble...she showed us how to lay out the leather to get the most and best pieces out of the hide, she had the pages ready and then explained the proper way to fold the different segments...she also had beads and waxed twine in attractive colors for us to use. I chose a tan leather journal cover and turquiose thread as the binding. The end result was a beautiful leather journal..I placed a couple of beads in the outside binding thread and cut a piece off one end of the folded journal and made a book mark out of it..I thought the inner cover was a bit long. I also followed one woman's actions and rounded off my corners...it really helped enhance the cover....
Now for the bad part...I didn't expect the class to be out of the hotel since it wasn't stated in the initial application. Also it was really uncomfortable in the classroom because we were all jammed in there like cattle..one couldn't get up to go to the bathroom if one had to. For anyone that has visited European papers, you know that the workroom is upstairs...which is neatly laid out, but the work area was too small to accomodate the number of people that were there..some were late and the class was delayed a bit. It was poorly lighted...we couldn't move our chairs without interrupting the person behind us..good thing I wasn't claustrophobic, or I would have had to leave...I was lucky that there were people at my worktable that knew what had to be done, because it was difficult for Lisa to get around to all of us....she did her best though, so I compliment her on that...another bad thing is that the store is not handicap accessible..unheard of in this day and age.....the stairs going up to the classroom are extremely steep and since I had a bad knee, it was most difficult for me to get up to the classroom..there was another woman who had the same problem, so we left as soon as we could in order to avoid the rush out of the building...I'm sure that there are handicapped people who would have loved to take this class..I saw one woman in a scooter type wheel chair.....the shuttle was used to get us there and back. the class was timed right , so we only had to wait 15 minutes for the transportation to get there. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give this class a 5, mostly due to it's location, and lack of informing people upon registration of this and the crampted quarters.
the next class I took that day was "FLORAL JOURNALS"...
It was held on the 11th floor if I remember correctly. Even though I am an accomplished watercolorist, I always like to learn new techniques from other painters. This woman was an accomplished calligrapher..her journals were spectacular and well made...turns out that she is or was an associate editor for lettering for Somerset Magazine. She encouraged us to look through them, which I did and she was most pleasant to work with. Her techniques seemed to be impressionistic, and her demos were very informative...she demoed each page that she was teaching and then we went back to our workstations and tried to do as we were instructed. She also had handouts for us with calligraphy suggestions. This lady really went all out for us, she had paper, and paint boxes for people to use..I brought my own sketchbook and paints, because I really wanted things to be easy for me to get to when I got home....she even made us each a hand made little sketch book to do our flower painting in...the cover was handmade paper and had dried botanicals imbeded into it and was really quite beautiful ...I brought it back and showed my watercolor students what we did..now they can hardly wait to do the same things...in a scale from 1 to 10, I would give this class a 10..loved it...
Saturday evening was the big dinner that a lot of people went to....Syd and I chose to not attend and we were really glad that we didn't ...We ordered in a Pizza from Donatos...the shop around the corner and it was delicious...I did the dinner last year and decided it just wasn't worth the extra charge this year. After we ate, we took our pepsies and went and sat in the lounge and waited for some friends to meet us after dinner...Seems like there were a bunch of disgruntled people that came out of the dining room...turns out that they ran out of food due to the fact that the retreat director failed to give the proper count of attendees for the meal and they ran out of some food....Hey...when you don't give a bunch of women dessert, you could have a big uprising on your hands...there was a lot of bitching about the food or lack of it...in fact the hotel manager heard a lot of complaining and came over to our group and told us to take the problem up with the retreat director since she didn't give him the proper count and there were more attendees than they had planned for. In fact when we were eating our pizza in the lobbly, we noticed and heard Lisa comment to the employees at the front desk that people only got 1/2 cup of soup and she paid $3500 for the dinner....we were really happy with our pizza that night and glad that we made the right decision.....service at the hotel went downhill from the start of the retreat....one would think that they would have bent over backward for all the attendees, opened the restaurant early , had breakfast at an early hour and lunch at the proper time, dinner to accomodate the classes and made everyone happy...We could only imagine how much revenue they lost due to this....we left the lounge around 11..I had an early class on Sunday.
Sunday morning...I got up early, Syd slept in and I went downstairs to find out what room my class would be held in...AGHHHHHH...I found out that it was held out of the hotel and that also was not noted upon registration..Damn....good thing I was early, but the shuttle had just left for the airport...lucky for me another driver was available to take us to the studio ???? where our class was to be held. The studio was in a bay at a discontinued garage. Wow..!!! it was at least on one floor....they had breakfast food for us, muffins and coffee and tea if we wanted it, also water and soft drinks for anyone that wanted them...unfortunately the damned place was really cold, and not too clean...there were only 6 students in this class , so there was plenty of space....the instructor was very knowledgeable and talented...sad part was that some people were late, and she took too much time talking about sketching and drawing, which I assume each person would know anyway. Unfortunately the flowers that we were promised to use for the class were purchased on Thursday and by Sunday they were kinda wimpy, so we had to go outside and raid the flower pots for live flowers to paint...needless to say, we didn't have enough time (2 1/2 hours) to complete a painting as was promised. the handouts that one would assume would have some directions or suggestions, consisted of a list of books by flowers painters that one could purchase. This class would have a lot of potential if it were held for a longer period of time. It could also have been held in the hotel for the convience of the attendees.
Sunday afternoon...syd and I had a class together.."Journaling With Wax"...We saw this teacher demoing downstairs the evening before and we were enthralled with her work and happy that we chose this class. What a teacher!!!!!..she was great..!!!..she had enough supplies for everyone was very informative, had enough equipment to work with, had plenty of handouts and materials to use in our pieces, but we could have used more workspace to create in...For the life of me, I couldn't understand how the pieces we made would fit in a journal but it turns out that this type of journaling was meant to be displayed on easles or perhaps hung on a wall...her work was exceptional and we really loved it and the class...she has a DVD out and I hope to buy it at some time in the near future...the class was timed perfectly and we had plenty of time to work and create...we invited this teacher to come to our retreat next year and are really looking forward to seeing her again.....
That evening we went out to dinner at Lindy's ..the food was perfect, the atmosphere was great and we were happy to be together one last time before we left for home... all in all , with good friends, we had a fine time and a safe trip home on Monday morning...My dog was really happy to see me....
.Saturday
My third class, MAKING A LEATHER JOURNAL.. was held at European Papers...A neat little shop owned by Lisa Ohmer..the retreat director. I really looked forward to this class and I wasn't dissapointed....
To start off with, she had very good handouts, very explicit...one could go home and make a journal if they had the supplies...and speaking of supplies, she had great leather for us to use and everything was cut and ready to assemble...she showed us how to lay out the leather to get the most and best pieces out of the hide, she had the pages ready and then explained the proper way to fold the different segments...she also had beads and waxed twine in attractive colors for us to use. I chose a tan leather journal cover and turquiose thread as the binding. The end result was a beautiful leather journal..I placed a couple of beads in the outside binding thread and cut a piece off one end of the folded journal and made a book mark out of it..I thought the inner cover was a bit long. I also followed one woman's actions and rounded off my corners...it really helped enhance the cover....
Now for the bad part...I didn't expect the class to be out of the hotel since it wasn't stated in the initial application. Also it was really uncomfortable in the classroom because we were all jammed in there like cattle..one couldn't get up to go to the bathroom if one had to. For anyone that has visited European papers, you know that the workroom is upstairs...which is neatly laid out, but the work area was too small to accomodate the number of people that were there..some were late and the class was delayed a bit. It was poorly lighted...we couldn't move our chairs without interrupting the person behind us..good thing I wasn't claustrophobic, or I would have had to leave...I was lucky that there were people at my worktable that knew what had to be done, because it was difficult for Lisa to get around to all of us....she did her best though, so I compliment her on that...another bad thing is that the store is not handicap accessible..unheard of in this day and age.....the stairs going up to the classroom are extremely steep and since I had a bad knee, it was most difficult for me to get up to the classroom..there was another woman who had the same problem, so we left as soon as we could in order to avoid the rush out of the building...I'm sure that there are handicapped people who would have loved to take this class..I saw one woman in a scooter type wheel chair.....the shuttle was used to get us there and back. the class was timed right , so we only had to wait 15 minutes for the transportation to get there. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give this class a 5, mostly due to it's location, and lack of informing people upon registration of this and the crampted quarters.
the next class I took that day was "FLORAL JOURNALS"...
It was held on the 11th floor if I remember correctly. Even though I am an accomplished watercolorist, I always like to learn new techniques from other painters. This woman was an accomplished calligrapher..her journals were spectacular and well made...turns out that she is or was an associate editor for lettering for Somerset Magazine. She encouraged us to look through them, which I did and she was most pleasant to work with. Her techniques seemed to be impressionistic, and her demos were very informative...she demoed each page that she was teaching and then we went back to our workstations and tried to do as we were instructed. She also had handouts for us with calligraphy suggestions. This lady really went all out for us, she had paper, and paint boxes for people to use..I brought my own sketchbook and paints, because I really wanted things to be easy for me to get to when I got home....she even made us each a hand made little sketch book to do our flower painting in...the cover was handmade paper and had dried botanicals imbeded into it and was really quite beautiful ...I brought it back and showed my watercolor students what we did..now they can hardly wait to do the same things...in a scale from 1 to 10, I would give this class a 10..loved it...
Saturday evening was the big dinner that a lot of people went to....Syd and I chose to not attend and we were really glad that we didn't ...We ordered in a Pizza from Donatos...the shop around the corner and it was delicious...I did the dinner last year and decided it just wasn't worth the extra charge this year. After we ate, we took our pepsies and went and sat in the lounge and waited for some friends to meet us after dinner...Seems like there were a bunch of disgruntled people that came out of the dining room...turns out that they ran out of food due to the fact that the retreat director failed to give the proper count of attendees for the meal and they ran out of some food....Hey...when you don't give a bunch of women dessert, you could have a big uprising on your hands...there was a lot of bitching about the food or lack of it...in fact the hotel manager heard a lot of complaining and came over to our group and told us to take the problem up with the retreat director since she didn't give him the proper count and there were more attendees than they had planned for. In fact when we were eating our pizza in the lobbly, we noticed and heard Lisa comment to the employees at the front desk that people only got 1/2 cup of soup and she paid $3500 for the dinner....we were really happy with our pizza that night and glad that we made the right decision.....service at the hotel went downhill from the start of the retreat....one would think that they would have bent over backward for all the attendees, opened the restaurant early , had breakfast at an early hour and lunch at the proper time, dinner to accomodate the classes and made everyone happy...We could only imagine how much revenue they lost due to this....we left the lounge around 11..I had an early class on Sunday.
Sunday morning...I got up early, Syd slept in and I went downstairs to find out what room my class would be held in...AGHHHHHH...I found out that it was held out of the hotel and that also was not noted upon registration..Damn....good thing I was early, but the shuttle had just left for the airport...lucky for me another driver was available to take us to the studio ???? where our class was to be held. The studio was in a bay at a discontinued garage. Wow..!!! it was at least on one floor....they had breakfast food for us, muffins and coffee and tea if we wanted it, also water and soft drinks for anyone that wanted them...unfortunately the damned place was really cold, and not too clean...there were only 6 students in this class , so there was plenty of space....the instructor was very knowledgeable and talented...sad part was that some people were late, and she took too much time talking about sketching and drawing, which I assume each person would know anyway. Unfortunately the flowers that we were promised to use for the class were purchased on Thursday and by Sunday they were kinda wimpy, so we had to go outside and raid the flower pots for live flowers to paint...needless to say, we didn't have enough time (2 1/2 hours) to complete a painting as was promised. the handouts that one would assume would have some directions or suggestions, consisted of a list of books by flowers painters that one could purchase. This class would have a lot of potential if it were held for a longer period of time. It could also have been held in the hotel for the convience of the attendees.
Sunday afternoon...syd and I had a class together.."Journaling With Wax"...We saw this teacher demoing downstairs the evening before and we were enthralled with her work and happy that we chose this class. What a teacher!!!!!..she was great..!!!..she had enough supplies for everyone was very informative, had enough equipment to work with, had plenty of handouts and materials to use in our pieces, but we could have used more workspace to create in...For the life of me, I couldn't understand how the pieces we made would fit in a journal but it turns out that this type of journaling was meant to be displayed on easles or perhaps hung on a wall...her work was exceptional and we really loved it and the class...she has a DVD out and I hope to buy it at some time in the near future...the class was timed perfectly and we had plenty of time to work and create...we invited this teacher to come to our retreat next year and are really looking forward to seeing her again.....
That evening we went out to dinner at Lindy's ..the food was perfect, the atmosphere was great and we were happy to be together one last time before we left for home... all in all , with good friends, we had a fine time and a safe trip home on Monday morning...My dog was really happy to see me....
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
AFTER ARTISCAPE...
It is now a week since we came home from ARTISCAPE...
We arrived early as we usually do, registered into the hotel, unpacked a few of our things, and then went downstairs to the restaurant to find that it didn't open until 5 PM. We should have remembered this from last year, but we were optomistically thinking that since there were things buzzing with the retreat, that things would change. Not so....we were lucky that we stopped on the way and had a bite to eat, so that held us until 5.....since we had a class at 6, we ordered salads and talked with a new friend that came in from Denver. We also noted that at the table next to us Pat Osbourne, the teacher that was teaching the class was also ordering her Dinner, so we felt that we would leave when she did...
The class was terrific...Pat was well prepared, had lots of supplies, had a great and explicit handout, and timed each segment down to the minute...I haven't completed my pages yet, but the basic book and box that holds it was completed in class....it ended up a beautiful piece of Art....I will try to complete it in the next week or so and post it on this blog. I have lots of photos from our trip to Italy to put into this book.
After the class, we went to the lounge and met some more friends, talked, had a drink and were in bed before eleven...
The next day I had the morning off and in the afternoon, Syd and I had a class together...it was Collage With Moxie....the teacher was a good one except that she loaded us up with too much information ...I'm guessing that she wanted to inform us of this technique and give us as much information as possible...she also had a handout that was very easy to understand and very informative...she seemed annoyed that myself and a few others took pictures of her demos, but I felt that it was the easiest way to remember things...she seemed very guarded about some aspects of her work and didn't seem to want to give out any secrets, not that she really had to. As I worked with the waxed colors and did some encaustic works on the paper she provided, I thought it was a lot of fun and the results were also unique...the only part that confused me was the fact that we then used the small iron that she provided and did what she called a mono-print onto newsprint....I wish I had brought some acid free watercolor paper to use instead...perhaps 90#....I was looking for the things that I created in this class and for some reason or other, they must have gotten lost in the shuffel...can't find them, so I will have to look some more...maybe someone picked them up by mistake...she then led us into another segment of her presentation and I was totally lost...I have a lot of trouble doing collage, but I tried and after the second one, she complimented me and said I had a breakthru...beats the hell out of me , since I really didn't understand what I did and can't find myself doing very much in the way of collage, but I thought I would try it, and for the most part, I enjoyed the class.....I noticed that some people must have thought they were on overload , because they left the class early mumbling and confused. Myself, I did learn a few new things and that made it worthwhile for me....I love to learn new techniques and want to do it all.
That evening we went to Max and Erma's for dinner...great food...the shuttle took us and picked us up...very convienent. We came back and met up with some friends in the lounge again...it was a relaxing evening.
I will write more about our classes tomorrow...some were great and some were just ok....I am teaching a watercolor class this evening and have to gather all my things...we will be painting some tulips and bleeding hearts from my garden and I'm hoping my students all made their color charts so that we can paint tonight....
.STAY TUNED FOR MORE NOTES FROM THE LILY POND...
We arrived early as we usually do, registered into the hotel, unpacked a few of our things, and then went downstairs to the restaurant to find that it didn't open until 5 PM. We should have remembered this from last year, but we were optomistically thinking that since there were things buzzing with the retreat, that things would change. Not so....we were lucky that we stopped on the way and had a bite to eat, so that held us until 5.....since we had a class at 6, we ordered salads and talked with a new friend that came in from Denver. We also noted that at the table next to us Pat Osbourne, the teacher that was teaching the class was also ordering her Dinner, so we felt that we would leave when she did...
The class was terrific...Pat was well prepared, had lots of supplies, had a great and explicit handout, and timed each segment down to the minute...I haven't completed my pages yet, but the basic book and box that holds it was completed in class....it ended up a beautiful piece of Art....I will try to complete it in the next week or so and post it on this blog. I have lots of photos from our trip to Italy to put into this book.
After the class, we went to the lounge and met some more friends, talked, had a drink and were in bed before eleven...
The next day I had the morning off and in the afternoon, Syd and I had a class together...it was Collage With Moxie....the teacher was a good one except that she loaded us up with too much information ...I'm guessing that she wanted to inform us of this technique and give us as much information as possible...she also had a handout that was very easy to understand and very informative...she seemed annoyed that myself and a few others took pictures of her demos, but I felt that it was the easiest way to remember things...she seemed very guarded about some aspects of her work and didn't seem to want to give out any secrets, not that she really had to. As I worked with the waxed colors and did some encaustic works on the paper she provided, I thought it was a lot of fun and the results were also unique...the only part that confused me was the fact that we then used the small iron that she provided and did what she called a mono-print onto newsprint....I wish I had brought some acid free watercolor paper to use instead...perhaps 90#....I was looking for the things that I created in this class and for some reason or other, they must have gotten lost in the shuffel...can't find them, so I will have to look some more...maybe someone picked them up by mistake...she then led us into another segment of her presentation and I was totally lost...I have a lot of trouble doing collage, but I tried and after the second one, she complimented me and said I had a breakthru...beats the hell out of me , since I really didn't understand what I did and can't find myself doing very much in the way of collage, but I thought I would try it, and for the most part, I enjoyed the class.....I noticed that some people must have thought they were on overload , because they left the class early mumbling and confused. Myself, I did learn a few new things and that made it worthwhile for me....I love to learn new techniques and want to do it all.
That evening we went to Max and Erma's for dinner...great food...the shuttle took us and picked us up...very convienent. We came back and met up with some friends in the lounge again...it was a relaxing evening.
I will write more about our classes tomorrow...some were great and some were just ok....I am teaching a watercolor class this evening and have to gather all my things...we will be painting some tulips and bleeding hearts from my garden and I'm hoping my students all made their color charts so that we can paint tonight....
.STAY TUNED FOR MORE NOTES FROM THE LILY POND...
Sunday, April 11, 2010
MORE FROM THE LILY POND
BACK AGAIN...I've been busy today doing all these posts and trying to catch up on my writing....earlier today I coaxed my big dog Moe into my van for the second time...the first time was when we brought him home from the animal shelter 9 months ago and he puked all over the place....He had his bath yesterday and I administered some flea and tick meds to his back at the shoulders and at this tail as the directions advised...the ticks are really bad out here in the country....I picked 7 off him in the last 2 days.......for the most part, he likes his bath, it's trying to get him in the tub that is hardest of all...once he is in there and the warm water sprays all over him, he loves it....
He loves to go down to the pond and get a drink and just jumps in at the muddiest places and thinks nothing of trying to get into the house with the mud all over his legs and belly....
anyway to get back to the ride...he hesitated getting into the back, but with a little coaxing, he finally decided to jump in...as I closed the back gate of the van, he looked like he was going to bolt as soon as I opened the driver's side door, but I talked nice to him and he came up to me for a scratch on the head and a pat on his back...as I backed the van out of the parking place, he came up under my arm and I had to soothe him some more by telling him what a nice dog he was...finally as I got to the main road, he squirmed up into the passenger seat and decided that was where he belonged....as he looked out of the window that I lowered a bit, I could see how excited he was to know that he was moving and didn't have to work at it. I'm imagining him with his head out of the window and goggles on his face and the wind blowing his big ears back...he may also need a scarf to go along with the goggles..... He drooled all over the seat and I had to stop and clean things up a bit, but he loved that seat...as we went down the road, he decided to go to the back of the van and watch things go by from the back window, then he decided to come back up to the front...I took him on a short ride for about 20 minutes,didn't want to stress him out any more, talking to him all the time and he seemed to enjoy the excursion....he was also really glad to get home and out of the van.....as soon as I opened the back gate, he headed for the house and looked back to see if I was following him....after a while, he came back to me just to see what I was doing....
After I moved some things out to the barn, I decided to try to get him to get into the van again, but no dice...he took off, hell bent for election and went to the door on the porch side of the house...He is really a gentle dog, and I hated to try to get him to come back into the van, but I figured I should do it again and see if indeed he would get up into the back on his own again...so I put the leash on him and he walked nicely and calmly out to the van again...as I opened the gate, he sat down and just looked at me as if to say " what ????are we going to do this all over again...damn"!!!!.. I scratched his ears and talked nice to him, coaxed him a little and low and behold he just jumped up into the van and sat down as though he owned the place...I had him jump out and then jump back in and he did it with enthusiasm as though to say..."ON THE ROAD AGAIN"..his next trip will be to the vet's for his second round of shots.....good dog, good dog....
He loves to go down to the pond and get a drink and just jumps in at the muddiest places and thinks nothing of trying to get into the house with the mud all over his legs and belly....
anyway to get back to the ride...he hesitated getting into the back, but with a little coaxing, he finally decided to jump in...as I closed the back gate of the van, he looked like he was going to bolt as soon as I opened the driver's side door, but I talked nice to him and he came up to me for a scratch on the head and a pat on his back...as I backed the van out of the parking place, he came up under my arm and I had to soothe him some more by telling him what a nice dog he was...finally as I got to the main road, he squirmed up into the passenger seat and decided that was where he belonged....as he looked out of the window that I lowered a bit, I could see how excited he was to know that he was moving and didn't have to work at it. I'm imagining him with his head out of the window and goggles on his face and the wind blowing his big ears back...he may also need a scarf to go along with the goggles..... He drooled all over the seat and I had to stop and clean things up a bit, but he loved that seat...as we went down the road, he decided to go to the back of the van and watch things go by from the back window, then he decided to come back up to the front...I took him on a short ride for about 20 minutes,didn't want to stress him out any more, talking to him all the time and he seemed to enjoy the excursion....he was also really glad to get home and out of the van.....as soon as I opened the back gate, he headed for the house and looked back to see if I was following him....after a while, he came back to me just to see what I was doing....
After I moved some things out to the barn, I decided to try to get him to get into the van again, but no dice...he took off, hell bent for election and went to the door on the porch side of the house...He is really a gentle dog, and I hated to try to get him to come back into the van, but I figured I should do it again and see if indeed he would get up into the back on his own again...so I put the leash on him and he walked nicely and calmly out to the van again...as I opened the gate, he sat down and just looked at me as if to say " what ????are we going to do this all over again...damn"!!!!.. I scratched his ears and talked nice to him, coaxed him a little and low and behold he just jumped up into the van and sat down as though he owned the place...I had him jump out and then jump back in and he did it with enthusiasm as though to say..."ON THE ROAD AGAIN"..his next trip will be to the vet's for his second round of shots.....good dog, good dog....
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