Falling Leaves

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I have some old (very old) 300 lb. paper, and decided to try a painting on it. One side looked like it was damaged, when I applied a wash, there were lines across it, like something had rubbed on it. So I used the other side. I had a really hard time with it - seemed like it didn't want to take the color, and I think I reworked the sky three times! I have some more of this paper, and will try again.

I just found the slide I took of this painting, which I did years ago. I think this old cabin was on the road up to Fort William. I didn't even try to paint snow last winter! Guess that will be one goal this winter.

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I have a song running through my mind - "The autumn leaves fall by my window . . ." I have so many trees around my house, the leaves have all turned, and when there is a breeze, the leaves float down. It makes it hard to concentrate on anything else, because I just watch the leaves come down. Well, some of us are easily entertained, I guess.

I have a crockpot full of kielbasa, cabbage, onions, and apples, with brown sugar. I don't know how it will be, but it sure smells good. And I have enough to last me two weeks! I bought a food

dehydrator some time ago, and dried some Granny Smith apples. I soaked them in hot water for a while today, and put them in the crockpot. I have no idea how they will be, because I have never used dehydrated apples before.

My freezer is so full of "stuff" - and every time I take one thing out and cook, I end up putting twice as much back in as leftovers.

Saturday November 20

The Blockhead

I brought up the old old wooden alphabet blocks from the basement today, and Kasey had a good time with them

This is another photo of the old house I posted before. From the position of Mt. Moran, it may not be on Mormon Row, but further to the north. Maybe I'll see it again some day.

I don't know if I took this picture on the feedground on the Upper Green, or the National Elk Refuge. I like it because it doesn't look like is on a feedground.

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Scanning Slides

I started scanning the slides in the plastic pages this morning. I think they are in better shape than the ones I had stored in the storage cases. I haven't seen any flares on the corners yet. So maybe the plastic is better than I thought it was. Archival, is that the word I want?

Each page has 20 slides, and I only got one page done this morning. I find that I was somewhat organized way back when I put the slides in the pages. One page has all flowers, another page old buildings, another page kids, etc.

I also find that I don't have very many pictures of Tracy. When she was small, I didn't have a good camera, just a little Instamatic. Then she grew up and went away to college and a job, and wasn't here for me to photograph. I do have some of her high school years, though.

I have some new albums with archival pages, and want to move my prints from the old albums to new ones. There are more pictures of her in the albums.

Here are a few slides I scanned this morning:

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One spring we drove up Skyline Drive, and found this "Snow Family", a very buxom mom, a baby, and a bearded father. What fun the people must have had building these!

The last several years I taught kindergarten, Cris Paravicini brought me a setting hen for the classroom. This is one brood that hatched. They were so much fun, and the kindergartners will probably remember it all their lives. We were usually successful, but one year we had a hateful old hen who broke up her nest just before the chicks were ready to hatch. Not a pretty sight., and I'm sure the kids in that class will remember it forever too.

Another old building, (outhouse) in the Daisy Pass area north of Cook City, Montana. This was old mining country, and there were lots of old buildings left. I'm not sure, but I think maybe most of them were destroyed by the big Yellowstone Park fire.

I found another picture of the old house I posted before that I wasn't sure of the location. This picture was taken from a different angle, and the Tetons are in the background. So now I know for sure where it was. I haven't yet seen any pictures of the often-photographed old barns on Mormon Row, and wonder why I didn't take any pictures of them?

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Judi wondered if the toy in the toilet was one she had given Kasey. Yes, Judi, I'm afraid it is good old Buzz Lightyear. I'm not sure what to do with him. I doubt that he would go through the washing machine very well. Right now he's laying in the bottom of the bath tub. And after seeing the picture I took of the toilet stool, I decided I needed to clean it today!

Thursday

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Barrie Reading to Kasey

I'm so happy that Kasey likes books. She doesn't sit still for long, but makes it through a short book. I ordered some more books for my house this afternoon - things like the board books "Brown Bear" and "The Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly".

Today Kasey learned to lift the lid on the toilet stool. At first she shut it on her fingers, but this is what greeted me when I went to the bathroom after she left.

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I finished scanning the slides in the storage cases today. Now I have to start on the ones in plastic sleeves. I'm not sure I will do all of them, but need to go through them anyway. I hope they haven't deteriorated more than the ones in boxes. "I'm pretty sure the plastic sleeves are not the right material to safely store slides.

Barrie and Kasey were here most of the afternoon. I got out "Nester", Barrie's old stuffed horse that went everywhere with her when she was little, but I never got a picture of Kasey with it. We talked about the toys I have on shelves and in boxes in the basement, and we will probably bring them up, one or two at a time. Most of them are ones Barrie or Tracy had when they were a little older.

Wednesday Sept 17

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A face wash

I think this is kind of like learning to walk and chew gum at the same time. Kasey has mastered wearing these glasses and walking at the same time. She has been concentrating so hard on tilting her head back to keep the glasses on that she couldn't move her feet. She makes us laugh.

Photo by Clint Gilchrest

Barrie, smoking' the other teams in the six dog race up the Green last winter.

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Enjoyed meeting with the art group this morning. Nancy S, Nancy J, Vicky, Barbara, Pam and Conley were there. Caroline S. stopped in for a while - it was good to see her. And Hope stopped in to show us the completed poster. She finds interesting posters, then adds to them with acrylics. This one had several afghan hounds, a woman, and other animals. They are really interesting.

We discussed viewing our paintings - looking at them upside down, from across the room, squinting, in a mirror, etc. and how it helps us to see it more clearly. For me, it is scanning or photographing it and seeing it on a computer monitor. There's something about seeing a painting or drawing on the computer screen that I quickly see where I have made mistakes or where I need to do more work.

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I am reading the book "Royals". It is about the Royal Family in Great Britain, something I've never thought I would find interesting. It is written more like a gossip column about the family, and totally believable. The family members are hard to follow, as they changed their names when it suited them, especially those with German ties during WWII. Then they became Earl of --, or whatever, and didn't even use last names. The Monarchy was certainly revered in Great Britain, and it seemed they could do no wrong in the public eye. All their actions were defended by the people. But of course they had a staff of about two dozen to make sure only the best about them reached the press. I think this has changed somewhat now, but I never hear any news about them.

Tuesday September 16

I have scanned a few slides this morning, but feel like I should do something else for a while.

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This one was a pleasant surprise. I am going to print it out, and maybe paint it. Love this old house! But I don't know where I took the picture. I think it was around the Tetons, maybe Mormom Row? But I just can't recall. Does anyone recognize it?

There was a fox den on the road going into Murdock's ranch, and I photographed the fox several days. I got some good photos.

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I logged onto my Ameritrade Account last night, and sold all my stock. I am certainly not a large investor, but have had fun through the years dabbling in the stock market. With the economy the way it is, it's not fun any more. I have made a little money through the years, not much, but enough to keep me interested. I took a loss on two of the three firms I sold last night - now I can just quit worrying about it. Of course, all the politicians and Wall Street guys say we should just hang on and not sell. I haven't looked yet to see how to request a check, because I don't want to leave the cash in my Ameritrade account.

I never had any ripe chokecherries this year. It looks like they all froze before they ripened. So all the robins left without their usual fall feast at my place.

Monday - Scanning slides

I made some progress with scanning my slides today, but still have a long ways to go! Some of my slides did not look good, some of them I was able to edit with Photoshop, and some I just deleted. I think maybe they are starting to deteriorate. Some of them had little rainbow like flares in the corners, and some had a cloudy film over the image.

It's an interesting job, as I have not looked through my slides in years, and it's alwys fun to look at old pictures.

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Chuck was spawning fish at a creek at Flaming Gorge, and Barrie and I drove down there for a weekend. We rode the motorcycle up on a hill and watched a rainstorm across the canyon. When the rainbow came out, I started taking pictures - and then there was a double rainbow. What a treat!

Rainy Day in Yellowstone

We were planning a trip to Yellowstone - pickup camper and take the motorcycle along. Everything was packed, and loaded to go. I was photographing a wedding at Boulder Lake, and as soon as the wedding was over, I came home, jumped in the pickup, and we were off. It wasn't until we got there that I discovered I had forgotten to pack coats for Barrie and me. This picture may not show it, but Barrie really did have a good time!!

Sunday

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My neice's son. I sure need to work on his mouth more. It kind of looks like it is pasted on his face.

Mare and foal

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As I look at the more recent pencil drawings I am doing, I realize why my old ones are better. My old drawings have some good strong darks in them, and I'm not getting that in my newer work. My new ones look kind of flat and anemic.

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Barrie and Kasey walked in a walk/run benefit in Jackson yesterday. Kasey got a new shirt, which hangs down below her knees. She had a "bed head" after riding in her car seat from Jackson.

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I didn't even get up until 10:00 today. Stayed up late because I just HAD to finish the book I was reading. I scanned a couple of dozen slides while I was drinking my morning coffee. Then I came upstairs and finished resizing some dog pictures for Barrie.

I have a new movie - "The Bucket List". I have heard both Judi and Lynn mention it, so I ordered it. I may watch it this afternoon. I also have some art videos I checked out from the art room at the senior center. One is on watercolor portraits, one is called "Developing your Watercolours" and the other is "The Watercolorist's Essential Notebook, Landscapes". That's a lot of video watching!

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Saturday September 13

The New Scanner

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Here is a photo of the new scanner set up with four slides to be scanned. It's not as fast as I was hoping it would be, but does a nice job. One thing I really like about it is that it will immediately open all four scans in Photoshop so I can edit, crop, etc. It saves the files somewhere else too, in some folder it created itself. I will try to keep that folder cleaned out to save room on the hard drive. I scanned a couple dozen slides of old art work yesterday. Now I will have to go through all the slides and see what I want to scan. Lots of pictures of my girls, dogs, cats, etc.

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An elephant I did in pencil - after visiting the Hogle Zoo. I remember how much fun it was to draw the textures and wrinkles in his skin.

Another of my "Indians of the Past" drawings. The slide said "sold" on it, but I have no idea who bought it.

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I may have solved the problem of reducing the file size of a photo to under 30 KB and still keeping the image large enough to see. I will have to practice some more before I could even explain how I did it. For one thing, when you resize it to about 450 pixels on one side (and change the resolution to 72 dpi), and save it -- the "save" dialog has a little slider you can adjust for image quality. This affects the file size. So if you slide it far to the left, you are reducing the image quality along with the size of the file. But if the photo is going to be published on the web, the low quality looks OK.

There is also a "Save for Web" menu in Photoshop, and you can make ajustments there that will affect file size.

I thought the information I found on the internet was pretty sketchy on how to do this. I have books on Photoshop, and maybe I will see if there is more information in the books.

Beautiful fall day

Snarly Face

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Having fun making faces

Here are two pen and inks I did about a year ago. I did five of these, and they are even in frames. I intended to hang them in one of the downstairs bedrooms, but they are still leaning against the wall in the living room. I need to put the hanging wires on them.

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The new scanner is here. It is always so much work to set new things up!! Just moving the file and cart out from the wall enough to get to the electrical outlet was hard work. It is now plugged in and the cable is plugged in to the computer. I suppose this is the time to take out the manual and read it. I used the old USB cable from the old scanner, as the new one wasn't long enough to reach the computer. I'm sure it will be OK.

It came with the program "Photoshop Elements", but as I have the full blown Photoshop CS2, I won't install that. I think I used "Photoshop Elements" once - it came with one of my cameras. It was a nice program, and you can really do quite a bit with it. Maybe someone else can use it.

It's a sure sign of fall when the propane truck shows up to fill your tank. I really wonder how much it is going to cost me to stay warm this winter! It was $1.87 a gallon last winter, and was $2.53 today. I hope they keep me on a regular delivery schedule. I ran out of propane once last winter, 11:00 at night, and 20 below zero. They did get a truck out to fill my tank in a couple hours that night, but it's frustrating when I am supposed to be on auto-delivery, and they didn't do it. When the snow gets deep in the winter, I can't even get to my tank to read the gauge.

The town has finally approved the building permit for the old Z's inn down the street from me. The guy wanted to put 24 log cabins in there, but the town wouldn't approve that because of the fact that Canal Street and Haystack Street would have to be paved. The guy brought in new plans, and they are now going to put in a two story motel instead of the cabins, and the builder and the town will share the cost of chip sealing the street. I suppose they will chip seal Canal Street just in back of the motel, not the whole street. I was surprised to see a grader on the street last summer. It was the first time in four years that my street had been graded.