Paintings passed the test

Two of the three paintings I submitted for the art show got juried in. This one "Hope Unfolding".

And this one: "Mr. Mantis Praying"

And this one "Looking For Answers" didn't make it in. I wonder if it was because of its religious connotations or because the palette is more muted.

They will show in early August at the Roswell Museum. Thanks for all the well wishes. I was pleased to get two in this year. I'll let you know about the final results.

Next week is when I take Ken Hosmer's class. Can't wait to bring some new stuff home.

Anxiety Attacks

I've been playing with Modigliani images again. When I can't seem to create, he is always available to inspire me.

It seems everywhere I turn someone else has fallen into anxiety attacks. Nearly every friend I know is on Prozac or some other anti-anxiety medication. I keep waiting for it to hit me like you would a bad flu that's going around. What is happening? Even little kids are having problems now. It makes me so sad. Is it our diet? Our environment? Our relationships? I wish we could figure out what is going on because I know that people are suffering with this and it seems epidemic. Out of a group of 10 close friends or family - are you seeing most of them on anti-depressants or anti-anxiety drugs? I'm just curious. Maybe it's just my locale or the friends I'm attracted to...... Why is it so much more prevalent than it use to be, like 10 years ago?

I refuse to be anxious about anything. I hate the feeling and refuse to let it dock in the harbour of my mind. My mantra is: if you can do something about it - you don't have to worry. If you can't do something about it - you don't have to worry. But apparently mind over matter is not enough because I know others hate being anxious and would avoid it if possible. I would love to hear your comments about this subject.

A Little Red Sports Car?????

I drive a big old honkin suburban and I've dreamed of having a little red sports car to zip around in. Well, Sweet Farmer has been bored. It has rained a lot, you see, and when it rains on a hay farmer, there's not much he can do but wait. Waiting is hard during farming season. So the man just needed a diversion. So he bought a little red sports car. He spent $400.

He had to work on it an hour to get it to start.

Not exactly what I had pictured.

But I hear it is getting a make-over in the shop as we speak. All it needed was a new fuse to run like new. They are cutting the top off, putting new tires on, recovering the seats, a lift-kit possibly, a hydraulic system that will raise the bed in the back. What bed? Oh, yeah, they will fashion a bed to go on the back. And WALL-AH!! A fancy little farm vehicle that will haul things and zip around. A perfect car to teach my grandsons to drive. A fun wagon that Sweet Farmer will run by and pick me up to check on pecan orchards and turn our pivots off and on, and check our crops, and take Sunday snoop drives around other's farms..... A car I can spit sunflower seeds out the window and prop my feet on the dash.

Funny, I guess it was exactly what I pictured after all.

Peaceful and Painting

Things are very peaceful around here. It has rained several inches on our beautiful corn fields, and our pecan orchards look like state parks. God is good. Sometimes I feel like my heart will burst for all the blessings that surround me.

It's that time of year when we have our yearly art show at the museum in Roswell. I have submitted 3 paintings to be juried. Keep your fingers crossed for me. Last year, I submitted one painting very timidly, and got in. I didn't win anything but my goal was only to get in. Now, I want to win something so I submitted more chances. I should know something next week.

I also will soon be going to an art class in Cloudcroft and the instructor will be Ken Hosmer. I am really excited. If anyone knows anything about this artist, good or bad, I would be interested in hearing your comments.

Art is that consistent companion that adds icing to my strawberry cake of life.

This is my journal entry. The above is what happened after I played with it in Flickr.

Back from Blogging Vacation

I took a vacation from blogging in case you didn't notice to spend some time with Sweet Farmer, to care for my Mom after an emergency operation and.... just because.... well, I got out of the habit and I'm a creature of habit. I've missed my blogging friends and staying in touch. I hope you all haven't dropped me from your blogging roles and that I can hear from you again.

We lost our other little Australian Shepherd, Allie at the end of June to cancer.

She was really Sweet Farmer's dog, and Annie was mine but now we have no inside dogs for the first time since we were married. I painted this little sketch of Sweet Farmer and Scottie, a starving stray we nurtured back to health because I know that I mustn't take their friendship for granted. We must enjoy them while we can because they are each one a very unique creature and a gift and privilege to know and care for.

Just as caring for my Mom after an emergency surgery on a perforated bowel was my pleasure and a unique time to share with her. I will always treasure the time we spent together during her recovery.

So that's what I did through the month of June, basically.

I have missed you and hope I haven't been away too long and that you'll come back to visit me as I get myself back into the habit of blogging again.

I Get By With a LIttle Help From My Friends.

Well, it's not really true that I've been neglected (see previous post). But it is true that we've been working really hard with no days off - grateful, truly, for the work in this economy. I'm also grateful for the work in how it strengthens the team-building aspect of our marriage and how I learn something new everyday. Work is a gift and as I get older, I'm learning it is a gift we can easily take for granted.

This was a large mixed-media piece I did before the heavy work began. It is on watercolor paper, with another watercolor torn up and collaged on top. It still looks like background to me and I feel I must add something over the top - maybe some large black silhouetted calligraphy- spiritual words.... Or not. I would be very grateful for your comments and ideas because I'm a little dry on creative stuff right now. Someone just needs to light my flame again.

Sweet Farmer doesn't love me....

I'm not sure Sweet Farmer loves me anymore.
No kiddin. I haven't seen him in days. Last night I came in from cutting a large triticale (it's a grain crop) circle at 3:30 a.m. and he only opened one eye and said, "glad you made it in". That's it.....nada. nothin. zippo. I saw him briefly when he came in the night before at 4:00 a.m. from baling hay when I got up to pee, but before I laid back down, he was sound asleep!!
The other day I made him kiss me for 10 seconds. After a bemused grin, he went after the task with gusto, but couldn't finish because he burst out laughing when he realized I was actually counting down with my fingers. Yeah, he couldn't even make out 10 seconds.
He personally showed up to fill my swather machine with diesel the other day (i knew it - he was missing me, he usually sends the "pit crew")but when he finished, he just jumped in his pick-up and drove off with a wave. I called him, and said I .... WAS .... going to give him a big, juicy kiss and offered him other lewd things over the phone- but he just laughed and said it was hot and he was too sweaty and then mocked me with my own line that's he's heard many times before, "i don't feel very pretty right now".
He did bring me a fake bouquet for Mother's Day that he found when driving through our itsy-bitsy town that a sweet Mexican woman had put together and needed the money AND A HOSTESS chocolate cupcake that I instantly tried to eat the whole thing in one bite and ended up with all the cream on the end of my nose. He knows I'm a sucker for stories of how a busy farmer tries to find the perfect gift for his wife when he lives in a town with an only a convenient store and a bar -and he waited until Sunday.
We talk of date nights and down time. He promises me sweet, beautiful, long romantic dinners. I know it must be true. And when he does take me out, us both "feeling pretty" again , he'll look across the table like only he can at me and say so sweetly, "you know what? you're the prettiest girl in the room".
And I'll have his undivided attention once again.

Tea Party Tuesday

I'm so glad that Kimmie at Art in Red Wagons invited me to her tea party. I know she would love for you to come on Tuesdays also. Today, I had Chamomile and Citrus Tea from Mighty Leaf and dreamed my whole house was clean. I'm glad to have the afternoon off.

I love blogland for this very reason - friends that remind you to slow down and share your day with someone.

This is what I would share if I sat down with you for a cuppa-

Yesterday, I got a call from an older friend of mine who is a real hooooot. In fact, she's the best birder woman I know. She has 421 birds on her life list!! She called to give me a tip about Orioles. She says add a drop of orange flavoring to your regular hummingbird recipe and you'll have the colorful sweet things come home to your house. She, in that instant, reminded me of a passion I had let fall to sleep, and immediately I was awake and alive and ready to begin again my journey to really seeing and knowing the birds of the air. So I'm heading to our wildlife refuge (Bitterlake Wildlife Refuge) to get a closer look at my long-lost passion. I'll pick some other friends up a long the way - would you like to go??

Birds for Church Members

Today I was cutting a hayfield- first one this season. I know God wants us to take a day of rest, but it won't be this day. But I did have a small church family join me, a red-tailed hawk, a bald buzzard and some large crows (not pictured). They were there for the church picnic I provided after my chopper uncovered small rodents that ran out from under the canopy of green hay, or minced those unseen and less fortunate. They would play and pluck and carry their new prey off like some scary animated movie above my head. They remind me of the seagulls that follow a fisherman's wharf, these large birds always show up to strut around and defend their small piece of raggedy game on the fresh shorn turf. I was glad for the company and entertainment. I was listening to Family Life Radio with its modern inspirational hymns and heard songs like: "Life is Good, Life is Sweet like the earth beneath my feet" and I had to agree. And I would change it to my public radio station and listen to classical music. It can feel very surreal to float over a Windsor green hayfield to Bach's "What Joy is Mine, O Friend of Mortals". I ate my carrots and my unroasted nuts because I'm determined to watch my nutrition - it helps so much for stable blood sugar and not feeling sleepy and groggy when I work in a machine 10 or more hours a day. It's a good tired at the end of the day, and even though I missed going to church, I had many sacred moments just alone with my thoughts and silent prayers for sick friends and my son who is at loose ends these days. I miss my drawing and painting but I had hours to dream of new compositions. So, it wasn't a day of rest but yet I feel regenerated. This must be what the Psalmist meant when he prayed that God would bless the work of his hands. I hope you had a blessed day also.

A Day In the Life of a Farming Couple

I'm back in the fields again which I am very happy about. Today saw me cutting triticale in my windrower with a chopper and trucks waiting right behind me. I listened to an audiobook on my ipod about Frank Lloyd Wright and the women in his life -fascinating stuff while I went round and round. Later, I went to see what Sweet Farmer was up to.

Many people think farming is just large scale gardening - that any unskilled person with a strong back and a green thumb can make a farm grow. But profitable farming practices are not for the unskilled, and you don't necessarily need a strong back- just a smart head on your shoulders. Sweet Farmer has worked very hard this year preparing his planter to be more accurate and successful in its drops to increase his yield.

This year we have added GPS systems to his tractors. Now his John Deere is full of monitors and beeping and manuals on the subject.


To get the most yield on a modern farm, tractors have to plant exactly parallel to the previous row that was seeded. And while modern farmers may be experienced at driving a straight line, technology does it significantly better. This guidance system actually steers his tractor once he get it turned toward the field and corrects any error within an inch or two. So he reads his manual and his monitors with his hands in his lap.


He watches another monitor that reads sensors on each planter box to inform him as to exactly how much seed he's dropping per box per acre so that if one fowls up for whatever reason, he won't have blank spots in the field.


He also added seed disc that actually improved his flow of seed to the field and doesn't double up seed in some spots and no seed in others. And we didn't stop there, we have even upgraded the machine that flows seed into the planter boxes that doesn't split or damage the seed. With the costs of fuel, fertilizer, and seed -every seed matters and the accuracy of planting has become extremely important.


Farming, just like other industries, has moved toward technology to improve its profitability. It is a challenge to stay up and maintain the balance of profit while you upgrade. I thought you might be interested in the day of the life of a couple of happy farmers.