May

2

May mulching

Filed Under Judy Wood | Leave a Comment


Well, we’ve put April behind us, and despite what Environment Canada claims, I thought it was colder and wetter and greyer than usual. But now it’s May, and today was a lovely day. Warm enough to be out without a jacket, but not yet too warm. It’s a fine line for me. I don’t deal well with heat so on days when other people are joyously basking like lizards, I’ll be crabbing about the heat. Guess some of us are just hard to please. I do try not to complain about the cold in winter, since I don’t think you’re entitled to complain about the weather year-round.

I’m of the school that believes if you’re a bit on the cool side, you can hustle around and warm yourself up, or put on another layer, but if it’s too hot out, there’s not much you can do but be totally indolent (I don’t do indolence well for the most part) or hide inside with the air conditioner on. Since I’m trapped in the house for a large part of the year anyway with our five month winters, I hate to have to stay indoors too much in the summer as well.

Today featured another first for this spring since I got to ride outside for the first time since last October. In theory there’s nothing stopping me from riding outside in the winter, but I’m not that into freezing and deep snow when there’s a warmish indoor ring to school in. That said, the first time outside is always a treat. Might not be too much of a treat for the Pony Clubbers tomorrow for their first outdoors jumping of the season at the cross-country clinic this weekend. There are usually a few horses that are a bit *too* excited about the whole thing, so it can be a bit of a circus. I’ll be there with my camera to record at least some of it.

However, as I said, today was lovely. My friend Sharon and I headed off way too early this morning on a mission to pick up some mulch for our gardens. The camper will be going on the back of her truck this weekend and will likely be there the rest of the summer, so it pretty much had to be today for pickup. She discovered an interesting local product last year and we liked the look of it so will try it out as well. It’s a byproduct of flax, and is called “flax shives”. Kind of a pale beige colour with a fine needlelike texture. Sharon says the shives she laid in her yard last year didn’t move an inch (unlike the bark mulches that seem to wander rather freely) and also it isn’t prone to blowing even in a high wind. It seems to interlock into a sturdy but “breatheable” cover over the dirt. Not very costly either. Our main concern was that it was only available by the bag, and each bag weighs 400 lbs.

You have to a bit careful when you mention projects to Sharon. She is a woman of boundless energy and enthusiasm, with a (to me) regrettable desire to do things “right now”. I tend to be of the “there’s nothing so urgent today that it won’t be more urgent tomorrow” school. She has a lot of useful and practical skills (unlike me) so is a good resource for such things as sewing projects (as in making dog coats for the boys) and horse blanket repair. She rides at Ebon in the winter, and one time Alpac had torn his blanket and ripped a strap off, so I asked Sharon if she would be willing to fix it for me. No big rush on my part as I have back-up blankets for Alpac. She took the blanket home with her and had it repaired and waiting on my front step when I got back from the barn that same day. Talk about service.

We were thwarted with our first pick-up attempt this morning due to the fork-lift driver being ill, so we retreated to our various houses to await further developments. Shortly before one we got the call that there was a driver available to load our bags, so back we went. Two bags pretty well filled the cargo space on Sharon’s truck, and we were on our own at the other end. We dumped my bag first in the driveway, then down the street to offload Sharon’s. We managed to shift the 400 lb loads by dint of a great deal of hard pushing and sheer willpower, mostly Sharon’s. Once she sets her mind on something, it’s going to happen so you might as well accept it.

Luckily mine landed in a fairly good position for me to be able to open one end and get access to it. So far I’ve shovelled and hauled seven wheelbarrow loads into the backyard beds and haven’t made much of an impression on the bag. I’ve given up for the day and will get back to it tomorrow. It’s a nice product and so far I’m very happy with the project. I really hope this will give us the edge we need to stay ahead of the weeds, also will be good for water conservation.

Sharon is, like me, a dog and horse owner, so todays’ shots showcase a couple of her animals. The horse eye is of her Arab mare, Faith. Faith is a small girl but with a ton of grit, which she needs for the long-distance endurance rides in which she and Sharon compete. Arabs excel at this sort of endeavor, and Sharon is a successful competitor with Faith and with her gelding.

The dog shot is of Sharon’s German Shepherd, Tenner. Sharon seems stuck on German Shepherds the way I am stuck on Boxers. We seem to have found our soulmates in these breeds, and we stick with them for the long haul, having lived with and loved several generations over the course of our dog-owning lives.

©Copyright 2008 by Judy Wood. See original post here.

May

2

Merry Christmas!

Filed Under Bethany Caskey | Leave a Comment

Today I took down the Christmas tree. Well, not really down. I put a huge garbage bag over the entire thing, decorations and all, and wrestled it up the stairs to storage.

The middle part of the building where we celebrated Christmas last year has been pretty much shut off to help save on heating this huge barn of a building. We pass through to do other things and get to the garage, and walk past the Christmas tree. Like ignoring the elephant in the room. “What Christmas tree?”

The stairs in this building were constructed when people were smaller and not expected to live as long. One of the reasons they did not live as long was from climbing stairs at that pitch. Alternatively, if the stairs do not kill you going up, they have an even better chance to take you out going down. I can attribute some of my reluctance to store the Christmas tree to a survival instinct to see another Christmas.

There is something about a Christmas tree in May, that even with all the decorations still intact, looses a huge part of looking festive or even attractive. Hard to explain.

I left a yuletide Hansel and Gretel trail of ornaments as the tree, garbage bag and I battled the stairs.

A handy tip for anyone taking their tree upstairs: Unplug the extension cord before you head up the stairway.

©Copyright 2008 by Bethany Caskey. See original post here.

May

2

Katie Part 3

Filed Under Carrie Lewis | Leave a Comment

Okay.

I confess.

As neat as it was to draw on the canvas and have a likeness appear quickly, that method did not work for me. Or for Katie.

It has now been a couple of weeks since I last worked on Katie and the canvas (and that original portrait) did not survive very long. In fact, shortly after the last post regarding Katie, I painted over the entire canvas and put it up to dry, waiting for the next attempt.

The next attempt began today.

I brought the repainted canvas back to the studio, transferred the loose drawing I had made in the mean time to the canvas and outlined it with Burnt Umber M. Graham Oils. I did that this morning (between 6 and 6:30…it’s not easy learning to paint at that hour!), thinking that I would do more work this evening if time allowed.

But once the drawing was fixed in paint, I went ahead and roughed in a white area for the chest, then decided to paint the eyes, too. Just to give the painting some life.

Naturally, that led to blocking in some of the basic color in the head and around the eyes and by the time I put my brushes aside, I’d worked on the portrait for about 20 minutes and gotten this far.

Not too bad, considering the unorthodox (for me) painting hour!

Something I will be doing differently with this portrait is focusing on the subject, then the background. With Duncan, which was finished yesterday, I worked both subject and background at the same time and ended up losing some painting time because I couldn’t work on the subject due to wet background.

If I make a mistake and learn from it, that’s good.

If I make a mistake, then turn right around and do the same thing on the next painting, that’s bad!

I’m being good with this portrait. No telling how long that will last, though. I seem to learn better from experience than example!

©Copyright 2008 by Carrie Lewis. See original post here.

May

2

Storm Chaser - My part in the Le Cadeau Du Cheval - The Horse Gift” Mural Mosaic

Filed Under Sheri Gordon | Leave a Comment

I am honored to be a participating artist in the upcoming “Le Cadeau Du Cheval - The Horse Gift” Mural Mosaic. To quote from their website: “Mural Mosaic is thrilled to have assembled some of the world’s finest equine artists together for this stunning mural project. Many of these artists have dedicated their artistic career to passionately focusing on the theme of equine art. The Mural Mosaic project is a very organic process. As each painting is completed the mural slowly comes to life. We encourage you to continually revisit the mural page and watch as the mural develops leading up to the unveiling in September of 2008.”

Be sure to keep an eye on their site for updates! MuralMosaic.com/Cadeau.html

For my part, I chose panel #164 - a one-tone purkle panel. (Yeah, that’s not a typo, I like to be goofy and say PURKLE for purple. hehehe) I envision a magnificent black stallion galloping headlong against a stormy backdrop sky. It will be titled “Storm Chaser”, after a personal passion of mine for storms and horses. Yep!

Here is the panel as it came to me:
Panel #164 before

Stay tuned as I post a work in progress as I begin painting on it!

©Copyright 2008 by Sheri Gordon. See original post here.