new granddaughter

Under the heading..a time for every purpose, I have suddenly (considering the span of my life)developed a passion for knitting. Given the opportunity in the past to learn from my sister in law who was an accomplished knitter I had declared it was too boring to sit an do a repetitive project like that. 30 years later I see the charm of it. But no sister in law to guide me. She passed away too soon in life. There are fab web sites now with instructive videos. Actually a sister in law on my husband's side encouraged me to tackle a complicated sweater pattern for my daughter last July and I finally finished it for Christmas. I feel good about the accomplishment but it doesn't look like the picture. My daughter is politely appreciative. So then, when I heard about a pending granddaughter I hunted and found a neat, looks complicated but isn't, baby sweater called a five hour baby sweater,qv. online. knitted all one piece looks like a gerrymandered map of Massachusetts. So now Little Granddaughter has arrived and the sweater will rest quietly for 6 months for her to grow in to it. Blessings upon thee small one.
If you have time on you hands while waiting in a Drs' office, an airport, on a plane, consider knitting...it is calming on the nerves, you have a sense of accomplishment and you actually don't get aggravated at delays. So beguiled by beautiful yarns made from a variety of materials and combinations like alpaca/acrylic and a paintbox of colors I am thinking of my next project and the victim on the receiving end. I even knit a dishcloth yesterday to test if it will perform better than store bought. Onward and upward.

Marketing UP IN SMOKE

Larry has been making email list and sending out emails promoting UP IN SMOKE. I think he is going to burn out on me.

Texas Art Colony

A conundrum exists with the artist who needs to be alone to think and create but needs the company of other artists as mentors and sounding boards. Personally I like solitude to think straight but I get very excited when I see an art colony and I saw one yesterday in the next town to where I am staying for the next three months. In Ingram Texas, a place has been restored, refurbished, what have you, for arts-sculptors, print-makers, watercolorists, oil painters to work, show their works, have workshops with visiting artists etc. The complex includes galleries, studios, an indoor and an outdoor live theatre and a place for gala events which used to be an old roller skating rink. It is called The Hill Country Arts Foundation. www.hcaf.com. It is right on the Guadalupe River. What a view! You don't have to go far for inspiration. Funny, right across the road is a replica of Stonehenge. I don't know if it is full size but it is BIG. Next to this art complex is the old route 27 before the bypass. It is a loop with the old stores and shops and houses when the town was built in the 1850s. Nothing like New England 1850s, I mean old Texan style. You could easily imagine a passel of Santa Gertrudis galloping down main street followed by yippin' cowboys or a lone rider moseying up to the rail to tie up his hoss. It's neat. They sell antiques there interspersed with art galleries now. If I lived here I would definitely get involved but there is an annual fee and I won't be here long enough to take full advantage of it.
I don't know if it is an actual fact but I've heard that if an old slum needs to be revitalized the city planners encourage artists to move in to set up studios and calm the area down. That is while it is still affordable. Then the people with two good incomes buy in to it and redo the old places and then they are out of reach of the artists. This has happened in Boston in the South End and is happening in Worcester, MA. AH, The fickle finger of Fate. Opinion?

Driving in our motor home from Minnesota to south central Texas, we stopped a few times along the way. I watched the landscape slowly go from tan colored dried corn and brown soy beans to still green corn and soy beans as we went south thru Iowa, Missouri and Kansas and the very flat country to the rolling midlands of Oklahoma and cattle grazing land into Texas and then quite hilly area south of Austin to Kerrville, the heart of the hill country. Grassland turned into earth-green live oaks and cedar, tall river grasses and rocky outcroppings. Pale buff sandstone telling of the ancient inland sea. Homes and buildings made of that pastel color blends softly into the landscape with an almost ethereal atmosphere. From my palette I would choose Naples and yellow ochre and raw sienna with titanium white.
One stop that was particularly interesting to me was the museum in Kansas City that houses the remains of the White Arabia, the steam boat paddle wheeler that went down in the Missouri River in the 1850s. The river changed course and the remains were covered up by silt. It was found in a farmers field. The story of the reclamation is worth a read and the items recovered and preserved deserves a look see. After a short film at the museum we were delighted to have a talk by one of the treasure hunters who added personal notes. The thing or things that amazed me was 1. the treasure was in beautiful shape due to it's newness at the time of burial and the pristine job of preservation which was tricky. Everything had been under water for 100 years and had to be kept wet while it was permeated with a preservative and then dried which took months. 2. I was curious to see what was needed by frontier people to eke out a living such as shovels, axes,carpentry equipment, brass pins,leather and rubber boots and also some small joys such as Wedgwood china, fabric, jewelry, pretty calico buttons and perfume! They also dug up over 2 million tiny beads for trading with the native Americans which had spilled out when their string holders rotted away into the mud and had to be individually picked out and washed off. No government money was involved in the reclamation or the museum.
Now we are settled here in Kerrville,TX next to the lovely Guadalupe River. A walking tour of the immediate area proves to be an interesting source of wildflowers and there is a large list of bird sightings in the office. Bird feeders abound with instructions to fill them daily. The park owners are birders. Looking forward to the next three months here.

Municipal campgrounds and Chautauqua

In Worthington Minnesota, right on Lake Okebena, is the Olson municipal park and campground. It is lovely in Late September. Maybe because we had it almost to ourselves. Only hookup is electric but it was park-like--lawn and big trees, pretty quiet and close to downtown. The first afternoon we cruised the downtown. I like to drive down "Main Street" as it tells a lot about how the people feel about their town and it is an indicator of the commerce climate. Surrounding the lake are nice well kept homes of assorted vintage including some quite interesting architecture. Amidst these home are several parks one of which caught my eye. The Chautauqua Park. Seeing a large sign I hopped out of the car and went to read it. It tells of the history of Chautauqua in this area. Briefly Chautauqua was started in the mid 1800s by 2 Sunday school teachers in Chautauqua, NY as a summer camp for families featuring lectures and musical performances by traveling orators and artists. These 'camps meetings were located near a railroad line and hotels and B&B's sprang up to accommodate the attendees. It caught on like wildfire bringing culture to the rural areas in all the states and territories of the U.S. It continued for nearly 100 years! Some areas have revived these meetings. I have been to the one in De Funiak Springs FL, in the Panhandle. They have recently built an auditorium for meetings and publish a weeks program of diverse interest from quilting to musical performances and prominent lecturers. In Worthington I see they have a shell stage and seating for performances.
Moving on to Adrian, Minnesota, about 14 miles west on Rte 90 is another little municipal campground with similar lawn and trees style. There were quite a few RV and trailer rigs for so late in the season. I was told it is frequented by area folks who want to 'get away'. We stayed one night at one in the apple region of Monitor, Washington near Cashmere (where they make Aplets and Cotlets). It was on the Wenatchee River. It was very lovely. It certainly would be nice for us full timers to find more municipal parks for short term stays as we travel the country. They seem to be well cared for and reasonably priced.

Worthington Daily Globe Interview

Couple to host book signing Thursday
Julie Buntjer - 09/27/2010


ELLSWORTH — In the 10 years they’ve been married, Ellsworth native Larry Boomgaarden and his bride — Massachusetts native Susan Kallander — had long talked about writing a children’s book detailing the Boomgaarden family threshing tradition. It never really came to fruition, however, until one day about three years ago, when Larry handed Susan a rough draft — actually it was more of an outline — detailing the annual gatherings around their steam-powered engines. Their finished product, “Up in Smoke,” was self-published in May, and the couple will now host a book signing in Larry’s hometown of Ellsworth on Thursday. Books will be available for purchase at the signing, which begins at 5 p.m. at the Ellsworth High School library. The event coincides with an Ellsworth High School volleyball match that night. Much of Larry’s family remains in southwest Minnesota, with an aunt and cousins living in the Ellsworth area. “My grandfather was the 19th person in Minnesota with a steam engineer’s license,” explained Larry. “He started the family in the steam tractor business.” Over the years, the knowledge was passed on to the second, third and now fourth generations of Boomgaardens. Their last steam-powered threshing event was a few years back on Larry’s brother’s farm near Kenyon. Still, they had the family’s original steam threshing machine, a half-scale version built by Larry’s father and uncle, and a quarter-scale version that the kids can operate “under guidance.” “After they’re done threshing, then his sister-in-law Mona throws a bag of candy into the blower and it blows into the straw pile,” Susan said. “The kids have a great time hunting for this wrapped candy.” That scene is included in the book, which details a Boomgaarden family harvest weekend in which nearly 200 people gather on the farm to thresh the oats, eat and enjoy an evening of music. “Music is a very big feature in the Boomgaarden family,” said Susan. Larry’s father was the founding member of the George Boomgaarden Orchestra in southwest Minnesota, and his brother performs in a regional band, Iron Horse. In addition to telling the story of the threshing tradition, Susan did all of the watercolor illustrations for the book. All of the people painted into the scenes represent family members — from Larry and his brother, Dwight, to Susan’s brother, Peter, and one of her grandsons. Susan refers to Larry as the technical advisor for the book, although it has long been her dream to write, or at the very least illustrate, a children’s book. During library visits with her grandchildren, she realized the selections lacked tales of family togetherness. “I wrote this about a loving, happy family that gets together — multi-generational — to play and work together,” she said. Susan hopes the book is the first of many, but she is working now to find both a publisher and an agent. “This got me started and now I’m off and running,” she said. “I’ve got so many books in my head now.” Susan is working on a series of travel-related children’s books, including one about community supported agriculture. She will do the illustrations for those books as well. Susan earned a bachelor of fine arts degree in illustrating from the Massachusetts College of Art prior to raising a family and, most recently, operating a bed and breakfast in Massachusetts with her husband. Larry and Susan sold the B&B three years ago. “The longer we did it, the more people we had, and the more people we had, the more work it was,” Susan said. “They came from all over the world, they were having a wonderful time and we were doing laundry and cleaning toilets. “We sold it, we got out of Dodge and we’ve been on the road ever since,” she added. “It’s been three years and we’re still learning how to (live without having an actual home address).” They will spend this winter in Texas, and by next September they will be in Massachusetts for Susan’s one-woman art show, featuring her paintings from across the country, and her book. For those who can’t make it to Thursday’s book signing, Larry and Susan’s book, “Up in Smoke,” is available for purchase online at amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com.

On the Net: kallanderartgallery.com susankallander.blogspot.com

Collecting material

Went with my daughter on her CSA deliveries and took lots of photos for my series of books for which I am constantly collecting material. CSA means Community Supported Agriculture where a subscriber pays up front in Winter for a weekly supply of what ever veggies are available in the summer. This is a way for the farmer to have an income in the winter when the earth is asleep - up North. Much like a subscription to anything...come June the subscriber gets a box or 1/2 box of assorted vegetables and fruits of what ever is ripe at the moment in the fields. In New England in early June that might be peas,lettuces, strawberries,radishes,and so on. As the summer progresses the varieties widen. It is a great idea and is done nationally.
So my children's book will incorporate that concept. Kids are involved as they accompany the parent at pick up or go to the farm and see where things grow. At a farm machine museum near Sacramento, the curator told me that many kids that come in to the museum are unaware of the source of their food and a book about it would be a good thing.