BUSY WEEKEND

We drove over to a Cincinnati suburb for the family birthday bash/brunch.  My task was making the fruit salad and I might have gone overboard a bit!  It was most appreciated, along with the breakfast casserole, coffee cakes and cupcakes for the birthday celebration.

The beautiful flowers were provided for the table by Ginny to brighten the day for A.A., who's suffering with back problems major enough to require a visit to the Cincinnati Spine Institute.

 And the birthday girls and boys:  four of them celebrating for July and August.  It was a spur-of-the-moment photo and, of course, Jerry's camera was in the bag in the other room so I quickly got it, turned it on and snapped a couple of photos - while everyone was breaking up!!  Oh, well...




After the get-together, home again, relaxing until we had to change into something different and drive to Aurora, Indiana for the Southeastern Indiana Artist Guild show.  We got there about 15 minutes before the award ceremony, so got to walk around and see all the paintings.  There were 57 paintings in the show, varying from Watercolor, Water Media, Mixed Media, Acrylic, Oil, to PastelCharcoal, Colored Pencil, and Photography. In order to encourage kids in art, they even had a special section for childrens' art and they received awards, too.  

My painting, The Littlest Bird Sings the Prettiest Song, was mistitled on the handout and on the title card next to the painting.  I figured it would be.  Guess I should have just called it The Littlest Bird because that would have made more sense than what they had:  The Littlest Bird Sings the Song.  Oh, well...

I did win an award - which I think is what an Honorable Mention would be in any other show but the SIAG has odd-named awards like Memorial Award and Award of Distinction in xxx, etc.  Anyway, I won Award of Distinction in Watercolor and got a nice check, too.

They had announced all of the awards in Watercolor and Water Media (or so I thought), and I was just about ready to leave when they said my name, so it was a surprise for me.  I am glad I got an award, because I think it is a good painting and different enough to show artistic thought.  Sweetie said, "Your painting could be seen well across the room because of the values and color."

Thanks, SIAG!!  I think Sweetie is planning to compete in the Photography section next year :) 

And after seeing the photos of myself, I really really really need to lose ten pounds and do something with my hair!!!  I did have on my lucky Carol Carter scarf, though, and I think that made all the difference! ha ha  I was carrying my Ravens tote from Flashbags. com, too :)  It was made from a painted collage by Elizabeth St. Hilaire Nelson of Florida.  They made it special for me because they didn't have a run of these - and they are very reasonable in price and I've gotten a lot of compliments (and looks) when I carry it.



Sunday, as part of the grandgirls' birthday presents, we drove them up to Monroe, Ohio to the North Face Outlet for some back-to-school things.  Spent a long long time in that store, only to find nothing so began the long walk into each possible store without luck.  I was getting discouraged when we were told about a Columbia store in the same outdoor mall - went there and both girls picked jackets almost immediately.  YAY!   Success!  And because the Columbia fleece jackets were less than 1/2 what the North Face jackets were, they were allowed to get a few extra things - mostly tops to wear layered from Aeropostale (a store where I could not have fitted into anything).  

Diet begins Monday!