Oh my gosh, I'm so far behind!

Life has been happening at a record pace these days. A great deal of May was spent working on lesson plans for the three summer camps I'll be teaching at the Dallas Museum of Art. I have also had a festival and a trip to Colorado thrown into the mix.

Here is Lily at the Scarborough Rennaisance Festival we all went to. She is some kind of mystical character. Notice the long sword on her back. Her boyfriend gave that to her.

My sister Ruth joined us. She looked so pretty and oh my, she has gorgeous hair!

Here I am with Lily's griffin on my shoulder. It was hot and I was sort of melting all day long.

Jeff and I. He really loves his kilt - he looks good in it too. Jeff has a wee bit of real Scottish blood flowing though his veins. They wanted him to walk in the parade, but he didn't want to. Maybe next year. This was our fourth festival - we really love going and dressing up. I actually take notes of the shows we go to for my storytelling programs. I learn a lot watching other live performers.

My trip to Houston with Jeff

Jeff had a bowling tournament in Houston a little over a week ago. I went with him and we had a wonderful, mini vacation together. On Saturday while he bowled during the day, I stayed in the hotel room and worked on my lesson plans for the summer camps I'll be teaching at the Dallas Museum of Art. Afterwards in the late afternoon, we went to the The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston. IT IS AN AWESOME MUSEUM. It is also incredibly huge. We only had three hours there, but boy did we make the most of it. Here I am in front of a marvelous painting by Matisse. It is so exciting to see paintings by the masters.

Miro.

Pablo Picasso. Weird guy.

What is she looking at I wonder.

The lady has a protruding bottom lip. She must not be wearing her dentures.

What a decadent, lulling figure this yellow man is. It would be fun to create a story with a character based on this image.

We couldn't use flash in the museum, so these images have an odd, beige color to them. We would have taken more, but we were in too much of a hurry trying to see as much of it as possible before they closed. Someday, we need to go back and see all of it!

George Jetson Goes to Houston

Remember the "The Jetson's"? I loved that cartoon. Our hotel was in an upscale community in Houston. We were located by super fancy stores, the Galleria Mall, Furriers, we saw lots of limo's driving folks around.

I noticed that the streetlights and signs seemed to float over the intersections - COOL! This was taken during the day - it is way cooler at night.

Best dang restaurant ever - The New York Delicatessen. They bring a dish with three different kinds of pickles to much on while you look over the menu. The food was VERY New York, very traditionally Jewish and soooooooo good!!! We went there for dinner. Liked it so much we went back for breakfast the next day.

While we were eating breakfast, a super long Humvee Limo drove up. Who was in it? A few lovely Arab women dressed in Western, designer clothes and their children. They all rode in the limo to the restaurant for breakfast.

Not all of Houston is lovely.

While leaving Houston, we drove past miles & miles of this. Very ugly! I wonder what the cancer rate is in the population who live near this area.

Plano's Live Green Expo

That's Ed Begley Jr. in the photo. This was my first festival last Saturday. It was rainy, muddy, yuck, yuck, yuck. Thus, everyone was packed in the building that had been set up with booths giving away all kinds of freebies and packed into the room above to listen to Ed talk about the virtues of living green. (He looked good - a healthy lifestyle is working well for him.)

Me, well I was outside all morning in the children's craft tent trying to help with two crafts I'd helped prepare, and also doing 1 1/2 hours total of storytelling on a stage while trying to stay dry under a little awning. The good news is that I had hardy, fun children who came to my storytelling programs and helped me tell them. We actually had a pretty good time. Considering that the outside crowd was so small since EVERYONE wanted to be inside staying dry and not caking mud all over their shoes. I ended up having a really good time and meeting a ton of cool, environmentally aware folks. A good start to the day.

Oh, I had five pieces of art in the Live Green art exhibit too and have enjoyed really good feedback on them! Yee-haw!

Fiesta!!!

Festival number two on Saturday. The weather had cleared significantly, though the sky was super cloudy. That was alright it kept the temp down and we gladly watched a few musical numbers in cool comfort. This was my favorite act. Couldn't understand a word the singer was singing or speaking, but oh my, he was GOOD! He playing marionette here.

Another image. I have to tell you that this guy was as good as anything I have ever seen. EVER.

This was some kind of song about love between two people. Good singing, good dancing.

Two delightful little girls dancing away on stage in their full, colorful skirts.

I believe this couple was from Bolivia. Very neat. I tried food from Brazil that was so delicious, hung out with some friends, listened to some of the youth storytellers and told an interactive tale with three kids who were awesome as a whiny gecko! Fun, but I was super tired from the morning spent at the Plano Live Green Expo.

OakCliff Earth Day

This was festival number three for me last weekend. It was Sunday, and a far better day weather-wise. I have no photos of me on the stage doing my show. Let me say that it was quite gusty, but I got through it well enough. The Dallas Guild members (I'm a member too) had a nice location in a far calmer area. They enjoyed a day of sharing earth friendly stories and good friendship.

This is Lucinda Wise, she is a storyteller and a warm, friendly human being. She is also extremely smart...I wonder what her I.Q. is...

This is Lucinda without the shades, so you can see her twinkly eyes!

Here are storytellers Gene & Peggy Helmick-Richardson. He has a PHD in bugs. BUGS I tell you! Peggy has a degree in biology...they are great EarthDay storytellers!