and so it ends...

Eight weeks.  Eight weeks!  It makes me tired just thinking about it!  Eight solid weeks of festivals and here we are at the end of the tunnel.  At least, we're hoping that's the case.  Technically, we were supposed to have 9 festivals in a row, but Daddy is considering dropping the last one.  He hasn't made the final decision yet, but the rest of us have our fingers crossed!

It would be interesting to know, how many potatoes we washed during the past eight weeks.  We didn't have them every week and each festical requires a different amount.  Just for this past weekend, Mama, Sarah, and I washed 450 pounds of potatoes.  That amounts to approximately 700 potatoes.  Believe it or not, it only took us about 3 hours to wash them all!  And yes, we sold every last one of them.

Sarah, hard at work washing potatoes.

And so, it is time to relax, get caught up on house work, reading, and everything else that has fallen by the wayside these past eight weeks.

the nillie bipper

This past weekend we were at the Nillie Bipper Festival in Cleveland.  Yes, I know it's a strange name.  It's named ofter Mrs. Billie Nipper, a local artist.  I have a hard time remembering that her name really isn't Nillie Bipper.  Why they chose to mix it up, I don't know.  Anyway, it's one of the best art festivals in the area, topped only by Prater's Mill.  My Grandmother came down and brought my aunt's Canon (yay!), so I was able to take a few pictures in my spare time.

 There were so many jewelry makers that it was hard to decide which one was my favorite.

This booth was across from us.  I was so distracted by all of the colors that I finally had to get a picture!



This gentleman was selling these one-string instruments.  I don't really know what he called them, but he could play just about anything on them.  You can just barely see it, but the string is attached to a Spam can tucked under his arm.  Now that's what I call creative!

This booth smelled sooooooo good!  These candles were amazing!

This man was also set up across from us.  He had these really cool wooden lid-openers.  Mama bought quite a few of them for Christmas gifts.

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On our end, we had a really good time.  We weren't as busy as we would have liked to have been, but we still had fun together. 

 Me trying to stay warm on the way to the Exhibition Center.  Notice the fuzzy scarf!

 Sarah gets a little silly when she's cold...

 The 3 youngest.  Jimmy, me, and Sarah.

My favorite little sister! <3

 Samantha (Jimmy's wife) brought Mackenzie, Mollie, and Carter to see us.  I had a lot of fun taking pictures of them.

 Kenzie

 Mollie Grace

 Carter Reid

(Aren't they adorable?)

 Talking with Mimi.

 Amusing themselves with paper plates. :)

I absolutely LOVE this picture! His expression is priceless!

Anyway, that's my weekend in a nutshell.  A big thank you to my aunt who is letting me borrow her camera.  I'm absolutely loving it!

happy fall, ya'll!

It's here!  My absolute favorite time of the year!  If allergies would permit me I would just pitch a tent and live outside in the lovely cool weather.  Of course, by cool I mean, high 70s to low 80s.  After weeks of enduring ridiculous amounts of humidity and 100 degree weather, even the 90s are a breath of fresh air.  It's amazing how much the weather can affect the mood.  I usually become something of a hermit throughout the summer months.  I detest hot weather, so I lose all motivation to do anything that involves going outside, even if it's just to get in the car, because it means that I'm going to get hot and sticky and extremely uncomfortable.  Yes, I know it's pathetic, but it's true.  Summer and I have a difficult relationship. 

And then, there's fall, or autumn, whichever you prefer to call it.  After a miserable, swealtering summer, fall breezes in, clears away some of the humidity, and refreshes the spirit.  Colors change into beautiful red and yellow hues.  Candles scented with holiday spices are placed on store shelves.  We suddenly remember things like apple cider and pumpkin spice lattes.  (Oh that sounds good!)  Fashion changes as we start layering on the clothes, shaking the dust from our sweaters, and pulling on those thick stockings.  We start decorating the house to give it a more festive and homie (or is it homy?) atmosphere.  At my house, we're already making Christmas lists.  I spent most of this morning browsing through store coupons trying to find the best deals on fabric, floral stems, etc.  We get excited about the holidays!

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Anyway.  This weekend we were working in Chattanooga.  (For those of you who are wondering, yes, it is the Chattanooga from the song "Chattanooga Choo Choo", and yes, there is such a thing as the Chattanooga Choo Choo.)  It really was a great weekend.  Our cousin Heather came out and helped us on Saturday.  We really had a lot of fun with her.  She laughs at absolutely everything!  At one point we were all having a little competition to see who could get her to laugh the loudest.  It was a lot of fun. 

The past several years that we have worked this particular event there has either been a threat of rain, or it actually rained.  Being in a tent, makes rain, well, not fun.  Also, the crowd was reduced because people were afraid of being caught in it.  But this year, the weather was perfect.  (Of course it was!  It's fall!)  The people were coming in by the bus loads.  On Saturday, Sarah and I left the tent to go scout out some lunch and we were slightly terrified by the mob of people!  You couldn't even see the vendor's tents for the people.  Oh, and don't even think about walking against the crowd unless you want some kind of bodily harm to come to you!  It was craziness!  People think that all southerners are polite and friendly.  Not these people!  They all had the matador look that said, "I will plow you down if you get in my way."  I guess they were all hungry.

As a whole, the weekend was a success.  We had the trailer loaded by 8:30 and I was actually in bed at a decent hour!  Happiness!  Now I just have to finish chiseling all of the grease off my glasses...



time flies...

Three months.  Yes, it has been three months.  I would love to offer an excuse, but really, I've just been lazy.  That and the fact that I managed to forget that I even had a blog.  Oops!  Anyway, I'm back now.  I'm not promising that I'll post regularly (although, I like to imagine that I shall), but I am back.

It would be impossible for me to fill in a three month blank, so I'll abbreviate:
-  As of July, I have officially emerged from "teenagehood".  I made it!  It was a long, tumultuous, and hormonal journey, but I am a survivor. 
-  My days as a nanny came to an end at the beginning of August.  I am grateful for the experience.  It certainly gave me the opportunity to learn some things about myself, some of which I would have liked to have done without!  But, as I said, I'm grateful for the opportunity.  However, I don't think I'll be doing it again.  You really miss out on a lot when you're on the other side of the county 10 hours a day.
-  Piano lessons are now in session.  It's nice to be back on my normal schedule again.
-  With my nanny job, I wasn't able to get to the art studio all summer.  However, I was able to complete one painting at home:



Would you believe that the hardest part was the mane?  I couldn't believe it!  I thought that would be the easy part!  I'm still not completely happy with it.  The hairs aren't as crisp as I would like them to be, but I was able to capture the general effect.  If you don't stand to close it doesn't look quite as fuzzy.
I also recently finished the one that I started in the shop back in the spring:

This one was a bit of a beast.  Of course, I only worked on it for a couple of hours at a time, one day a week.  So, everytime I came back to it I would always find something that needed to be fixed.  I finally had to just throw the brushes down and decide once and for all that I was done.  Now that it's been sprayed down with a finishing coat and there's nothing more I can do, I'm really pleased with how it turned out.  I started another one in the shop last week.  I'm looking forward to posting pictures of it!
-  I have been officially introduced to Contra Dancing.  I love it!!!!  It's so easy and loads of fun!  It's even more fun when you get a partner who actually knows what he's doing!  I'm hoping to get some pictures next time.
-  Fair season is under way.  We spent a very long weekend here in Cleveland at the Foothills Fair.  It was the busiest event we've ever had.  This of course is good for business, but very bad for stamina.  Sunday, I think we were all working on auto pilot.  When we finally got home, I was so tired that I just collapsed on the couch.  Dragging myself up the stairs and getting ready for bed was out of the question.  I think we are finally starting to catch up on sleep and the aches and pains are beginning to lessen.  By the time we are fully recovered, it'll be time to get at it again.  This past weekend was the first of a 6 week run.  One down, 5 to go!  Here's a couple of pictures that Sarah took when she had a few minutes free:

 My big brother, Jimmy.

 Me taking a break from the chaos. :)

Every day we managed to miscalculate how many boxes of potatoes we would need.  This was after one of Mom's mad dashes to the store.  Thankfully, Grammy and Uncle Gene dropped by just in time to help us wash approximately 150 potatoes!

-  A lady from our church had a small booth set up across from us.  She was selling crocheted hats.  At one point she brought over a huge bag full of yarn that she didn't want and just gave it to me.  I love it when people do that!  There were all kinds of cute yarns in there.

 So far, the only things I've managed to create with them are a couple of dishcloths, but I'm trying to find some cute crochet patterns.

Anyway, these are just the highlights of what's been going on around here while I've been away from the blogging world.  Stay tuned!