We had a lot of excitement out here on Lanam Ridge Road today!  Day Two of the Memorial Day Weekend Open House and Exhibition started with a large, oak tree out front collapsing at 8:00 a.m. into the road bringing down power and phone lines and totally blocking the road and my neighbor's driveway.  His wife had just left for church a minute before the tree fell!  I am so thankful no one was hurt and that the tree fell away from my house.  The day was clear and calm - no reason for the tree to fall except that it was it's time.

County workers didn't get the road open for another four hours and the power was restored around 3:30 p.m.  The phones lines probably won't be fixed for awhile since AT&T isn't too interested in maintaining landlines.  But one of the guys said they would probably fix this cable because it was affecting so many people.  My cell phone only gets 0-1 bars out here so it is useless.  

But I am here and ready for Day Three of the Open House and Exhibition tomorrow on Monday!

Tree across Lanam Ridge Road.

View from my front yard.

REMC arrives on the scene to assess what needs to be done.

Shredded phone cable.

REMC working on restoring the power lines.

I am back in the studio after another adventure to Texas.  I traveled to Richardson, on the north side of Dallas, this past weekend to exhibit my paintings in the Cottonwood Art Festival, a truly delightful show.  Good art, good patron base, and perfect weather all in a lovely park setting next to a lake.  The organizers had a Hospitality tent with water and snacks for the artists and threw a buffet dinner party on Friday night after set up.  Sunday was sunny and hot but it was a dry heat and felt comfortable to me.  I was surprised that night, back at the hotel, when the news reported a high of 96 degrees!  I thought it was in the low eighties.  

I remembered to take my camera this time and got a few shots at the show. 

Check out this lovely little ballerina:

Wildflowers that welcomed us to the entrance of the park:

Here is the booth with the show tee shirts and lovely flowers and a glass sculpture out front.  The show gave all the exhibitors a voucher for a free tee shirt!  Thanks!  Not many shows do that anymore.

What a perfect spot to showcase one's art!

Good crowds all weekend.  Looks like someone found a painting to take home.

This is my booth at the show.  I adjusted the picture to possibly use as a booth shot in show applications and, since the jury requires anonymity, I covered my name in the sign.

All in all, a most pleasant and fun show to do.  One measure of "pleasant" for me is the level of cigarette smoke and this show had none!  The visitors simply did not smoke.  The only frog in the soup was another exhibitor who was smoking e-cigarettes during set up which would have been fine except that she was using some flavoring or fragrance in it that was a bit nauseating.  Luckily, I didn't smell it during the show and was very relieved.

Well, back to work catching up around the farm and getting ready for the next show!