Yesterday was an amazing day...
...we decided to go out to sketch for National Drawing Day (OK, who am I kidding, every day is national drawing day for me, we went because I wanted to SKETCH!), and I felt the need for a broad vista--like the Missouri River.
We had stopped by the cabin and then took the old highway down to the River...we didn't have coffee, so thought we'd stop in Orrick, where we found a bake sale benefiting their Boy Scout troop. A hot dog each and a peanut butter cookie later, we decided to explore the backroads. Orrick is a river town, and we were SURE we'd find access back in there.
NOT.
We wandered and wandered, seeing old farmsteads, ponds, creeks, great blue herons, red-wing blackbirds and much more...it was a gorgeous day! We looked for access to Sunshine Lake and couldn't find it. We tried to go the backroads to Henrietta, another tiny river town, and got within 2 blocks of it and found the highway closed. Eventually we made our way back to Highway 13 and across the river (no access there either) and through historic Lexington, Missouri. A bit of wandering later, and I decided it was serendipity--I'd photographed the tiny stone house months ago and kicked myself for not sketching it THEN. We were going to pass right by it, so J. pulled over, got comfortable, and just let me paint to my heart's content!
This was how it looked in April--a lot easier to see, then!
It's hard to photograph art and subject together on a sunny day! Either one or the other was blurry or overexposed, but this more or less works...
You can tell I edited out the little tree in the foreground and put in the smokestack/chimney, which you could barely see now, that's it's green, leafy June...and tweaked the image a bit more once I got home. We were booked for the evening and getting hungry again by the time I finished, and I knew I could remember what I wanted to add.
And OH yes, that evening committment! We got to go hear middle godchild Molly Hammer at a benefit concert for the Good Samaritan Center's food pantry. Of course I got to see Ann and Nora, too, as well as Molly's parents and lots of old friends, and hear our good friend Kevin Morgan play flute accompaniment to a couple of songs, so I was in music heaven! A bit teary here and there--Molly has an incredible voice and can absolutely OWN any song she does. "My Funny Valentine" gets to me...and so did "Smile," which she did as a tribute to her courageous friend Laura, who lost her own battle with breast cancer in December. I don't think there was a dry eye in the house...
I'd love to send you a link to her music, but I'm having a bit of trouble hooking up with Taltopia, where some of it is...