JUNE AND JULY

I hope, dear readers and lookers, that you haven't given up on me. I've been away from home quite a bit this summer, away from the computer, but am now settled back into being home and I got a new ibook laptop in the mail this week (my birthday present to myself) and so now I can task more comfortably at home (I'm now on the recliner in the living room) and do things much faster at the library where there is a wi-fi connection.

So.... back to June. Without my hand written journal, I'd have no idea when I did anything. My journal is also where most of my sketches and paintings are this year. On Friday, June 8, I flew to Juneau and spent the day there, lunch with Michelle and the afternoon with my grand-daughter, Alyssa. We went to the Chicken Yard playground on Star Hill and the other one down by the Orthodox Church. A beautiful sunny day.





Alyssa picked bouquets of buttercups and dandelions which were profuse on Star Hill. The playground there is on land that use to be a chicken yard. I drew and painted a piece of art.... a nun and some chickens made out of rusty iron. The playground use to be a chicken yard for some Catholic Church institution that was once located there.

That evening, I flew to Sitka, spent a couple of days with Van on the boat and then he took my friend Judy and me across to Mud Bay where we hiked across Kruzof to Shelikof cabin..... a repeat of our trip of last year, but thankfully, we knew the way this time and spent all 3 nights in the cabin. We managed once again to avoid seeing any bears, but people on bikes that passed us and walked in from the Iris Meadow had to detour around one. And on our return, a guy told us he saw us in the meadow and also saw a bunch of bears at the same time. It is a large meadow.

Judy and I spent hours on the beach. We found beautiful shells, sand-dollars and drift wood and on one evening saw a tiny fawn, all alone, on the beach. The next morning, we saw tiny hoof prints next to larger ones. I saw several deer the morning we left.

We were both thrilled to see Calypso Orchids on the edge of the forest next to the beach.



I had big plans to paint a lot, but alas, it rained most of the time. I painted this of the inside of the cabin:



and this from one of the windows..... I did one of the same view last year which is on a post from last summer.

Back home on June 21st. I spent most of the next 2 week with a case of vertigo. I'd rather forget those 2 weeks. Went to Juneau on June 30. The vertigo finally went away a few days later and hasn't returned. In Juneau, I house set in a lovely home with a very nice cat named Ferguson, spent lots of time with Alyssa and other friends,celebrated the 4th of July, had some medical tests (all normal), did some hiking, and did some shopping. As always, lots of plans to paint a lot and didn't. It did rain a lot.... my favorite excuse.

A group of painters in Juneau calling themselves the Plein Rein Painters meet every Saturday and go somewhere and paint together. I went with them on one of the Saturdays that I was there.

We went to the Mendenhall Glacier on a cloudy morning and the sun came out there over lots of bergs and this is one of 3 little paintings I did.


On July 14th, I flew to Anchorage from Juneau with my friend Aimee .... on our way to Homer. Our plane was late and we missed the last flight to Homer and ended up spending the night in the airport and flying the next morning about 5. We visited our friends Sue and Kathy, both gracious hostesses. We went in Sue's boat, across Katchemak Bay to China Poot to fish for sockeye with a net and dinner at Halibut Cove. In Homer, viisited a winery, Brigetta's beautiful garden, lots of galleries. Another trip across the bay, a car ride and hike and ATV trip to Sue's cabin on the Rocky River. We visited there in 2001 when I painted this of Sue's cabin:
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and this of the cascades coming into the river from across from the cabin.


I painted this this year of the cascades.

Above the cascades is a waterfall. This is the way one crosses the river.... steel cables. As Sue said "It's not for everybody." It wasn't for me. I settled for seeing Aimee's photos of the falls.



The wild geraniums, roses, and indian paintbrush were at their height around the cabin.
The rose was pink, painted pink, but the scan isn't pink. I don't know why.

Back home on July 21. Van was home from fishing for a week. I celebrated my birthday on the 26th and have enjoyed a string of parties and potlucks.... Tis the season, with productive gardens, plentiful fish and ripening berries.



I painted this a few nights ago as the sun was setting, down at the beach..... my scans are all washed out.... The fireweed are beautiful now. There are 2 or 3 young black bears around town.... I see one or the other most days in the fields eating wild strawberries.