Sunday afternoon fun

The hubby and I took off yesterday afternoon to attend the 2010 Ozark Mountain Artists Studio Tour. The tour was spread out over a "Lot" of road in Boone and Newton Counties in Arkansas. The organizers of this studio tour went through a lot of effort to put this tour together. Anyway you pick up a map along with the names of the artists and their particular medium or mediums that they work in and off you go! There were artists who work in silver jewelry, egg tempura, acrylics, batik, woodturning, photography, ceramics, fabric, pen & ink, pencils, mixed media and mosaics. We started out in Harrison, AR and headed down Hwy. 7 to our first stop and after seeing the sign for the artists on the Hwy. we traveled down a dirt road for 3 miles until we came to the first studio. Some of the artists had their tours in their studios and some in their homes. We traveled approximately 180 miles round trip and had a wonderful time meeting a lot of artists and enjoying their art work. We didn't get to see and meet all the artists listed on the map but now we've got other places to visit next year. We'll have to see some of the ones we saw this year again. I'm such a bad person, as I didn't take any pictures. Everything was so much fun that I totally forgot to take any pictures anyway. It was such an amazing tour and we met some really nice people who were sooo hospitable. They were just as interested in my art as I was in theirs. It was a beautiful sunny day and a great thing to do on a Sunday afternoon. Wish you could all have been there!

Hugs XX
Barbara

Gourd Art and more Gourd Art!

Before I get started on this post, I first want to thank every one of my blogging friends and not blogging friends who come to this blogsite and read my posts and make comments. You've all been so uplifting and encouraging in your words. You really have given me the courage to take that first step out there in marketing my artwork. I really love creating with gourds and I'm so happy to have pieces already in one Gallery! I owe a good deal of that happening to my friends who have told me to "go for it", "your work is awesome" etc. I've prayed about this a great deal and I'm hoping that this is truly what the Lord has in mind for me to do. I've asked him to give me the talent and to help me express my talent thru my work in Gourd Art. Here are pictures of my latest work. If you see something that you would love to have just contact me and I'll get you a price list.

I've got to say, I'm terrible about uploading and posting pictures but here's seven of the newest pieces that I've made. I hope you like these also.

It looks like all prayers have been answered in regard to the weather around here. We got rain all day long yesterday and today it has been raining and sprinkling all day also. God does answer prayer, our ground has been so dry that it's cracking open all over, except for the places we've been watering. So far the gourds that we have planted are doing alright but the garden is a wreck. We're still getting just a few tomatoes and peppers but that's about all. Our Stevia plants are doing very well and we'll be harvesting them soon. Stevia is not hard to grow once you get the plant established but getting them established is another story. The root system is very close to the surface. They like to be kept damp but not wet and they definitely don't like to dry out. Once they're out in well fertilized ground though they do very well as long as they have water. The bugs leave them alone altogether. Yippee! We had a terrible time with bugs in the garden this year. We've tried organic methods of insect control but they didn't work very well and I'm not going to put insecticide on something that's going in my mouth! I hope everyone else has had better luck in gardening this year. We've got a very dear friend named John who let us come pick tomatoes from his garden (He's got a very green thumb) and we made 42 jars of Salsa from the tomatoes we picked! He's also growing some gourds for me and I can't wait to see how they turn out! I think I've done enough talking for one post. I know, I should post more often. I will try.

God Bless you all!