So the Jester King pop-up art event turned out far better than expected. The first people that bought something were an apparent mother/daughter pair. The daughter was quiet, maybe early teen. After the mom had a look around, the daughter pointed out one of my “emo” embroidery pieces involving a bloody doll and I believe she was holding a bat on a leash…and that’s the one they bought!
I liked the pic this person took and it was nice of her to mention me in her social media post.
I had good sales during the whole day, and one lady from South Africa paid in cash ($175) for one of my botanical prints! The Grahams came and it was super nice of them to show up!
Of course, Rob setup the entire grid thingy and helped me hang all the art. And of course he did all the same in reverse at the end!
I actually sold over $1,000 of my art so I was shocked! I do plan to do one again, but not for a while as I don’t actually like doing it that much and it takes a lot of effort. I’m aware that I’ll likely NEVER sell that much stuff again LOL.
But the whole effort was thanks to the encouragement of the Dripping Springs Art League (DSAL), so I’m now doing a lot of volunteering for them and I’m Membership Co-Chair or something like that. I do admin on-line things but also show up to live stuff too.
After meeting some of the DSAL members I ended up also being invited into a “crochet circle” which is pretty much like it sounds but I figured I should give it a go just so I know some people. Also it is right across 290 so really close. So I occasionally go and bring some kind of art thing to do as I no longer crochet.
Meanwhile, at some point I got a UTI and went across town to see doc (it was on weekend as always) and they said it wasn’t a UTI so I came home disappointed. Over night of course it got worse, and on way from one of many bathroom trips I hit my toe on the dresser and apparently broke it. So then the next day I went again across town to see doctor (not for the toe because I knew there’s nothing that can be done for that) and this time they said well yes, you do have a UTI. Ugh, those things are the worst! So anyway it took a few weeks for the toe to heal.
I’m still doing rust marks art with embroidery and botanical prints but also I got a book which explains some paper folding and crumpling things which is very cool but not sure how to use it. See 3 pics below.
Also for some reason I started making more handmade books, usually with sewn binding and putting gelli print or rust marks stuff on the cover.
DSAL has a monthly artist of the month and I think they have trouble finding willing participants so they asked me to do it and so I did last month. You get featured in the newsletter and they trumpet your name in social media. Oh and last night I was gifted a DSAL mug LOL.
So we were in the perfect location for the eclipse and we were excited that the Weinshels came along with friends to view it! It all turned out so well as they stayed downtown and got to do stuff there, but the day of the eclipse they picked me up and we went west of here to a winery for lunch and eclipse viewing! Although there were clouds we could still see it pretty well. Meanwhile, Rob was home (also a terrific view of the eclipse) and prepared our dinner which was his amazing gumbo! It was fun showing everyone around our place and also we visited the botanical gardens with them! What blew me away is that Kathy made me a handmade CHICKEN!! It is so cool and VERY huggable!! See two pics below.
Rob and I did an outing with the naturalists earlier in the spring to learn about trees, and we also volunteered for a Driftwood Festival which involved kid activities. I’ve also made a couple of videos for social media.
This spring has been wetter and cooler than all our previous ones here. Which is good as we need the rain and we don’t need it like 110 degrees all the time. But it wasn’t the best kind of weather for a road trip, and it sounds like Rob endured lots of storms during his road trip to Tulsa where he met friends and enjoyed live music. At least he got home safe!
Occasionally we get a nice pic of the dogs and I realized recently that they could be becoming minor league stars in the Austin subreddit as they had a great picture in the bluebonnets (everyone here always takes pics of their pooches in the bluebonnets) and then recently they were looking quite concerned during a thunderstorm and it is fun to see their exact same expressions! See these 3 pics below.
The situation with Zsa Zsa is very sad. Without her Hashbrown pal, she just sits in a roost in the coop all day until I pull her out and set her out by the water dish. If the other chickens are around, they will chase her back inside. The only possible remedy, recommended by the Broody Bunch group, is to put Zsa Zsa and one of our other hens into a separate area for a like a week. Supposedly then the other hen will bond or something with Zsa Zsa and she will no longer be the total outcast. We haven’t done this because it would involve reviving the chicken tractor and basically be a lot of work and we have our doubts that even this would actually work.
We are getting hopeful about our fruit trees this year as the peach trees are loaded with young fruits, the Mexican Plum has quite a few too, and we already harvested several loquats which were quite nice! We’re sure the pomegranate will fruit nicely too as it is full of flowers and we had fruit last year.
I had just about given up but we finally got some baby bluebirds at the feeder, like last year! See below 1 pic.
I’m sure there’s more but anyhow I’m putting some more pictures in gallery below.
