So Much Happening!

Life just seems to be full of chores, events, activities, opportunities and surprises.

The chores, of course, are house and yard work which never seem to end when you have a home in the country. Here are some pictures taken from inside the house.

front yard

back yard

I have all my flowers planted and am just waiting for some heat to make them pop. We are surrounded by forest here so we have lots of quiet and privacy with occasional visits from various wildlife.

Deer - April 2018

Turkeys - June 2018

There are a few new ventures in my area that are designed to promote tourism and art sales so I am hoping that this summer will be better for my home gallery. I hope you will have a look at this web site and let me know what you think. And, if you share the link with your friends that would be even better.
Creston Valley Kootenay Lake route

The local Arts Council has worked with the Chamber of Commerce and we once again have a public gallery space in the Chamber building. There is also a small Gift Shop although it is only open a few days a week and is manned by volunteers (like me).

Every week they get more art brought in and from what I have heard they are running out of space; we have so many artists here it doesn't take long to fill up a small space!

I have a Watercolour Painting Party planned for this coming Saturday and the following week I will be painting in a garden during the local Garden Tour. For the garden tour I have made up a few of my Cool Ties some with new designs using stamps from Art Foamies

art foamies

for the man in your life

for everyone!

I will also display some cards, my quilling and some small paintings - I might get lucky and actually sell something!

This summer I will have a few pieces of art in two different shows at Centre 64 in Kimberley BC. This entails a four hour round trip drive to deliver the art, another trip to see the display and then a third trip to retrieve the art - this for each show. I will be going up tomorrow with a friend to see the current display which is called Artrageous and I hope to take lots of photos to share.

And, finally, the surprise! We bought a new car! Bob saw a review for this vehicle and wanted to check it out and we ended up the proud new owners of a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV (Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle). Talk about a surprise!

It looks like the summer will continue to be interesting and busy - I am just hoping for time for art!

Thanks for stopping by!

A Short but Sweet Visit

This morning we had a charming visitor who had so much fun bouncing around the yard that I wished for a video camera. No such luck and besides there was a bit too much shade. I had to be happy with a few photos taken from inside the house.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed my sweet visitor!

The photos aren't great because this little guy kept moving too much - so much fun! Mom was either just behind or just ahead of this little one and seemed  very calm about the gallivanting.

I was taking some photos of my yard and flowers to send to my daughter and it made me think about the comparison between my yard this past winter and my yard today.

the courtyard in winter

the courtyard today

I know which I prefer - in spite of the heat!

Birdbrain

We have a robin that epitomizes that term! First, she started a nest on the support beam of the roof of the outside deck - she abandoned that. Next, she started a couple of nests under the deck roof - she abandoned these too.

We waited a few days to make sure that the robin wasn't coming back, then we swept and blew away the half-built nests.

We figured that was the end of the problem - we don't really like robins above the deck as they make a terrible mess. However, I looked out this morning and there was a robin perched in the same area where one of the nests had been. She was twitching and fidgeting around and had us wondering what she was doing.  I went about my normal morning routine and put her out of my mind. Bob called me sometime later and told me there was now an egg on the beam - but no robin.

We watched for quite some time but the robin didn't come back. I don't know how she expects the egg to hatch but I figure it is just another example of how bird-brained this bird really is!

Plant Inspector

We had a surprise visitor this morning; one who insisted on checking out my plants. I followed him around the house and took some photos.

from the kitchen window

 Of course, I stayed in the house to take the photos. Although I thought briefly about opening the door to scare him off, I decided he wasn't hurting anything.

from my studio

another from my studio

by my front door

This one is hard to see but he is up on his hind legs again checking out the hanging basket by the living room.

He actually took a taste of the Rhododendron but moved before I could get that picture.

walking past the front porch

and back to my studio

He had a nice walk around the place but didn't do any damage and then he quietly continued on his way into the forest. The joys of living in the country!

Waiting for Warmth

It may be Spring but we sure haven't had much warm weather. My bedding plants have grown nicely and I am chomping at the bit wanting to get them planted. But, there is still snow on the mountains, way too much rain lower down and it is still too d... cold.

The plants are happy in the greenhouse but the heater is still coming on at night and I don't think they would do well if I planted them out. Most of my flowers go in pots around the house. I find that pots don't get weeds like flowerbeds do and I don't have to bend as far - lol.

All the pots ready for flowers; there are about 50 of them but they have a lot of space to fill. Here are some photos of the yard when the pots are full and in bloom.

backyard coutryard

front yard flowerbed

While we are waiting and hoping for warm weather, we have been doing some work around the yard - between rain showers. One thing just completed today was a new gallery Open sign at the end of the driveway. I am lucky enough to have a very handy husband who can do so many things and is also willing to do them.

And here are a few pictures of what visitors to the gallery see as they come down my driveway.

Oh, wait, Bob is not usually standing in the middle of the drive - lol. Anyway, there are still a few turns before reaching the house and people are often concerned about what they will find at the end. They needn't worry as there is lots of space to turn a car around.

Anyway, that is what Spring has been like so far this year; we go out wearing winter jackets or stay in the house waiting for warmth.

Promotion and Snow

This is a long one - lol.

It seems that this year a number of my artist friends are thinking about promoting their art as well as creating.

Last week a friend asked me about having a Facebook art page or a web page. Another friend is finally sharing some of her paintings on Google+. One of my blogging friends has started a web page with FASO and is also trying out Canva.com for design stuff.  Then on February 1st, Leslie Saeta wrote a blog about blogging.

All of these things got me thinking (again) about how to promote my art and how to get my name out there. How do we go from being artists to being business people AND how to we do it cheaply? Lets face it, most of us do not make enough at our art to spend big bucks on promotion: neither do we have the skills to do the work ourselves. Plus, do we want to spend a lot of our time on promotion?

Is social media the answer? Here is an excerpt from Leslie's blog on blogging,

"Another big difference is that social media has made it a lot easier for bloggers to build a following. Create a blog and then share your message on Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest. Find followers and entice them to follow your blog. Ask your followers to share your message and the next thing you know your blog has thousands of followers. With some work you may end up with tens of thousands of followers. For the hard working bloggers you may end up with over a million followers."

I think the key word above is "entice" which is not easy to accomplish.

Out of curiosity I decided to do a Google search of my name. Then I did a search for Mellowood Studio which is the name of most of my social media pages and my home gallery. I found my name 11 times in the first 5 pages and the Mellowood name over 10 times in the first 2 pages. BUT, the questions remain: how do people know what name to search for? and, how do you get them to follow you, once they do find you?

These are a few of the links where people can find me and my art. BTW, my Etsy shop is empty but is still getting new followers which I find amusing.

Link2Creston, My Handmade at Amazon store, my GoBC entry, my Facebook Art Page, my Blog,  my Pinterest page, my Web page, an entry in artsillistrated on-line magazine, my Esty shop, my Google+ page, my Creston Arts Council profile

I could probably spend many hours a week on promotion but I think I would rather paint!

On another note, I haven't been doing any painting lately as my time has been used shovelling snow or recuperating from the shovelling. Here are some pictures of my yard.

the courtyard last week

the front walk 3 days ago

icicles hanging from the snow above the courtyard

the courtyard from the kitchen window 2 days ago

the view from Bob's office 2 days ago

the front walk today after the snow came off the roof

the view from Bob's office today after the snow came off the roof

the courtyard today

 This past week has been a real challenge; trying to keep the 200 metre long driveway through the forest clear has been the hardest part. Here is a picture of part of the driveway from a few years ago.

heading to the road

And, a couple from the same spot today.

heading to the road today

Heading to the house today

I am so looking forward to spring!

More Summer Color

I don't just get my summer color from painting, I get it from the world around me. My home in the country is surrounded by forest so every day I see the bright greens and the dark shadows of the forest as the sun moves across the sky and the patterns change.

my front yard

In contrast to the forest, my yard is filled with flowers in pots and gardens giving me a show of vibrant colors and offering birds, bees and butterflies natural nectar.

the view from my kitchen window

I start most of my flowers from seed I harvest every fall or purchase from seed catalogues.  Once summer hits I spend about 2 hours every day watering, deadheading and weeding. I try to get all the gardening done before the weather gets too hot.

self-seeded poppy

This style of poppy has been in my garden so long that I don't know where it came from. It seeds itself every year but when I harvest the seeds they never seem to 'take'.

a salvia

I will harvest seeds from everywhere; friends gardens or flower pots I pass in the town of Creston. The small pink flower in the above photo was harvested from one of the town's pots. I don't know what it is called but I think it is a salvia. I have it in red too and the hummingbirds love them.

In my courtyard

 From spring to late fall my gardens are a constantly changing delight - lots of work but worth it to me.