Sheep Incognito Blog

Vacation is a wonderful thing, when it happens - it recharges your batteries of energy and creativity, depletes your cash stash, and gives your kids a good chance to learn debating skills on the 10 hour drive home from Florida. Not to mention the way it boosts the economy by making you buy ear plugs, chill pills and snacks to fill kids' mouths to keep them from talking for 10 hours.

It's soooo nice to be home again.

 We spent two weeks on the road - first stop was the Outer Banks in NC, where we attended the Under the Oaks Art Festival at the Whalehead Club in Corolla. On the way there, our van broke down with a ruined transmission again (the second time within the past year - it seems to have been a defective one they installed, so the manufacturer replaced it free of charge this time), meaning Peter "the art pimp" had to unload the van, rent a truck, load the truck and drive that to Florida instead of the van. While we were dealing with that on the phone, I go pulled over for speeding - supposedly going 76 in a 55mph zone (which I really don't think is what the speed was I was going - but of course, I can't prove that...they probably can't either, but they're the ones with the badge, which gives certain leeway in the way of doing things that other people can't without being called cheats...), so now we need to factor in those costs as well. Ah, the life of a carefree artist is maaaahvelous indeed...

But, on the upside, even though the journey there was not perfect, the show was great - super organizers, beautiful, beautiful setting, perfect artist hospitality, great artist dinner, free tour of the Whalehead Club House (which, btw is quite stunning, if you are in any way into architecture), and best of all, the sheep were awarded 2nd place!

So, yes, some journeys are worth the effort, even though the road be bumpy ahead.

After leaving Corolla, we headed down towards Tampa to participate in the HGA Convergence 2008 conference. Setup was a bit of a pain, since they did not have the a/c running in the conference hall - not a good thing if you are in Florida in the summer...but at least it was indoors, no rush, and plenty of space.

After having such a great turnout at the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival in the spring, we figured we can't go wrong joining the Handweaver's Guild of America for their conference (after all, the organizers told me that they had 2000 registrations for the event, possibly more...decent numbers if you add daily visitors to that). As it turned out though, there were less than 500 registered perticipants, and almost no daily visitors - that spread the shoppers quite thin indeed. And, we found that people that are weavers generally are more interested in purchasing ten thousand dollar looms than buying prints with sheep for less than $100. In the end we came out o.k, at least we covered the outrageous booth fees and part of the gas money.

We also managed to take the kids to Disney World a few times - part of their payoff of having to bear with us while we are at art shows, or gone or whatever. They had a great time, and are now officially thrill ride junkies. The place was crampacked to the gills with people, and it was quite warm (actually, hot and very humid in true Florida manner). That put a BIG damper on my experience, since dodging people and standing in line is one of my least favorite parts of being a tourist. But nonetheless: Disney still does an outstanding job of raking in the money and providing entertainment for folks. Too bad the days of "living the Disney dream" in their parks have been eliminated - one used to be able to find indian food, in a jungle restaurant there - now it's all just fast food, preferrably deep fried. And all of it VERY expensive (think: $2.70 for a small coke...almost $6 for a kid's meal of chicken nuggets and fries). IMO not worth the money anymore - so as far as I'm concerned, that was my last trip with kids to the kingdom of Disney.  There is only so much motivational speak I can give myself to justify spending that kind of money on standing in line in the heat of a Florida summer...

The good part: there is still free good life to be found. We spent two afternoons at the perfectly white beaches of the Gulf of Mexico - our favorite every time is Siesta Key. The kids seem to come from a different generation though - sand is their enemy, and after an hour or two, they all decided that beach is wayyy overrated, and that a clean hotel pool is much more to their liking. So we spent more time at the pool than at the beach - giving me time to start knitting my first sock.

It's turning out quite nice - mainly because I had to rip it open about 6 times to get the heel just right. But learning by doing teaches better than reading about it - so I am now a professional "Sock Heel Instruction Interpreter".

The easel is currently empty - I'm waiting on a shipment of large canvas to add some bigger pieces to the flock of Sheep Incognito.  The bigger pieces just make a much bolder statement than the small fry, and are also less frustrating to transport, pack, paint, handle, etc.

Methinks the next piece will be a reference to the current credit crunch, stock market, real estate market, economy situation. Somehow all that needs a bit of a lighter observation, than just the doomsday messages we've been getting lately.  I figure if I can't repair the world, at least I can paint it a nicer shade of fun colors and sheepish views - nothing like a good laugh to put things in perspective.

 Ah, yes: yesterday I continued writing on the book we are trying to get published before the fall shopping season begins. We decided to add some input from the Sheep Incognito fan base: If you have a question you would like to have answered, we would love to hear from you - we will be including several select questions in the book, just to loosen things up a bit (and we've already received quite a few good ones...so keep them coming!).

I will also be including a bit about my creative processes, some sketches, some work-in-progress photos, and all those kind of goodies.

Anything else you would think might be a good thing to include? Throw it my way, and we'll take that into consideration as well.

 And now, it's time for me to go put some effort into all things creative - gotta finish a sock, paint a sheep, and feed some kids...

thanks for visiting!