Twenty Five Big Ones

Doesn't this look weird? It's our laundry that came in from the cold- and it smelled great, too. But it looks (to me anyway, but we all know where that goes.) like some sort of odd layered dessert. What's a trifle? Doesn't that have layers? I guess you had to be here... (Very old painting in the background!)
In any event, Bob and I successfully celebrated 25 years of being together. This year, our anniversary was late, late, late. (For those of you who don't remember, we celebrate when the frost kills the basil). We officially celebrated Monday, but went up to visit our friends Don and Elizabeth in their new New Bedford digs on the weekend. We spent an utterly relaxing time, looking at art, walking their dogs, eating interesting food (that we didn't have to prepare!) and not working on my studio. It was a much needed break.
Of course, I forgot to bring my camera on this road trip, and spent the entire weekend lamenting this egregious oversight. Somewhere between Columbia and Foster, Connecticut (who knew? Foster CT?) there was a rock painted like an eagle and an even better on painted like a lizard (nice and mottled and gnarly). There was also a hot dog wagon shaped like (gasp) a hot dog and a few other choice things that got away. I suppose having taken (yes, this is true) over 7000 (that's seven THOUSAND) pictures for the last auction has something to do with my resistance to dragging my camera along everywhere. Just maybe, but you should have seen the things we saw...
Including some very good art: a digital show with interesting kaleidoscope images of birds grooming their feathers and the colorful geometric patterns they generated. Some nice subtle drawings, too. Also our friend Don Wilkinson's one person show at Colo Colo Gallery- very different scanned images of small figurines made huge and heroic. A true departure for Don!
Tomorrow we continue work on the studio. I do have one door that works, which is a major achievement, thanks to Bob's persistence and determination. The double French doors are slated for installation too. That will be a big step towards civilization. Bob had the light on in my studio yesterday when I came home. Despite only plastic on the windows, it looked cheerful and made me believe that I really will get in
there soon.
Oh and here's a gratuitous photograph of the last flowers I picked this year.

And Now For Something Completely Different (and a "What Is It?")

Here's something completely different! I am inviting you to accompany me and Jules on our morning walk. (In case you think we really haven't been doing anything except work on my studio...) This is the beginning of the dirt road where Jules and I go every day. These pictures are from a week of so ago, which explains why there are more leaves on the trees.

 The same stream that runs through the bottom of our property follows the dirt road. It's very pretty in a typical New England rugged rocky, forested way. It looks similar to where I grew up in the central part of the state and I suppose the familiarity of it is a solace.

The road is gradual; a bit of hilliness but nothing too steep or taxing. I let Jules set the pace. Some days, he briskly trots along, only stopping to sniff or pee infrequently. Other days? He stops and carefully analyzes every fern and tree branch for evidence of other visitors. We've seen coyotes, bobcats, blue herons, deer and droves of wild turkeys. So far, no moose or bears (I am eternally thankful for that!)
But here's the "What is it?" About half way out on our walk last week, Jules was investigating something deposited by another animal and I'm sort of wool gathering when my eyes rest on a tree right in front of me.

Hello! What's THAT? And strapped to a tree no less! This is why I brought the camera along, so that I could document that camouflage woodland anomaly. I googled it when I returned home. Weird. But I did figure out what is is; see if you can guess.

So we continue on, and we finally emerge to where there are a few houses, before the road turns dirt and empty again. While this isn't a great picture, it's such a pretty spot. There's a really old red mill (turned into a house) and several rough bridges and a dam with the above mill pond. The mist rises off of it in the morning and reflects all the autumn leaves. Spectacular.

Again, not a stellar photo but the leaves on the pond almost looked solid, as if you could walk on the water. That mossy ridge to the right is stonework at the top of the dam and where the water spills over. Jules and I are really lucky to have such a nice walk!

Okay: the odd box is a hunting camera set up by someone (probably with a gun) to monitor animal traffic in the area. That's creepy on so many levels. I mean, first of all, it's an unfair advantage for the hunter to know the comings and goings of the woodland denizens. Secondly, it's creepy that I am on their camera (as well as other woods walkers that I know), especially the first time I saw it when I pushed my face right up to it and got a great big look at it. They also have images of me taking pictures of it. Plain and simple, I think it's icky that this thing is out in the nice peaceful woods, anyway. Can't we get away from technology anywhere? But here it is a week later and it's gone. Either set up in another location or at home where "they" can watch all us animals on their computer.

More Fun With Food- And Progress!

Looks like another dinner that talks back to Bob and me! Incredibly, that was salmon and potatoes (and very good!) This is what happens to artists after slaving away endlessly at studio building. (A variation on "empire building").
But wait: we actually played hooky the other day and took a much needed trip up to MassMoca. Nice weather, great art experience (except excuse my for mentioning maybe like 75 too many Sol LeWitt drawings? I mean, I like Sol LeWitt every bit as much as the next artist, but hell! It started to be sort of silly after a while. I've already seen a million LeWitts at DiaBeacon...) Anyway, we had a much needed break and then back to reality.

This is a better picture than the other day. The walls are all up and painted and there are fewer things interfering with seeing the overall effect of my studio. Doors and windows are slated to be installed this week. Can we stand the excitement?
Shockingly enough, I am on blog post number 301. I was so surprised to see that figure crop up on my "blogger dashboard". We have been here almost three full years- that's also shocking in its own way! Bob and I have really managed to accomplish so many of the things we fantasized about. That is including the above project. I know there are many family members and friends out there who never thought we'd get this far on my studio. I'm pretty amazed, too! Much of the credit must go to our good friend Joe who us a really talented carpenter, along with being a great photographer. He's guided us through complicated patches and just plain old showed up to work. God knows, he's probably had better things to do, then bang more nails.

This is one of my inside corners. I was originally having a window installed on this wall, too but decided I needed the wall for working on more urgently. And I'm glad; there's already a surfeit of light being admitted through windows and the doors. And there's the requisite evergreen on the rafter to propitiate the gods of studio construction. The scratchy area of paint is where the rafters used to go. I'm glad for the extra ceiling height! And it is sort of funny that I have windows back into the house. This particular window will be the door between my studio and what will be my storage room. That will be a big day, when we cut through and make a hole between the new and the old!

Exterior Grade Ecstacy

Quite a step forward! Today we sheathed about two thirds of the exterior of my studio. It made such a difference in terms of defining space and making Bob and Joe and myself feel like we're actually getting somewhere with this whole crazy studio thing.
First step is to cover the exterior walls in tar paper. Yes, some people use TyVek and other name brand "house wraps" but let's face it: they are plastic, expensive and tar paper has been in use for years. Additionally, as with many, many other materials, we have loads of it that came with the house. Like rolls and rolls. So it's essentially free. (We haven't had to buy nails, tools, insulation... all kinds of stuff!)
Then we nail on the siding.

I painted with primer as Joe and Bob nailed and measured and leveled. (The black hole is one of my windows. The windows get installed after the sheathing is done.) It was helpful to find out that the grey color our house is painted is essentially a very simple grey to match. We had the primer tinted so that it blends right in with our siding. We will paint the studio with regular house paint later on. Boy, does raw wood soak up the primer! We went through a whole gallon on just this side (and a couple of sheets on the garden side of my studio). Another one of those material underestimations that are hard to avoid! I'm picking up an additional gallon of paint tomorrow after work. Doesn't the paint job look great? Well, I did major in painting at Bennington so I guess my credentials speak for themselves.

Hey! Those ladders are getting themselves in every picture! Two things about this photo: One is how truly great the studio makes the entire house look. It sets up this dramatic and dynamic cascade of angles. I couldn't be happier. Our house looks very modern and geometric. Of course, being artists probably helped; something about raising the roof a few feet made the proportions just right. The other funny thing about this picture is that the perspective from which I took it (and maybe the back end of the truck) skewed the house and makes it all look tiny. I wouldn't have expected that. And it didn't feel tiny when I was painting it.
We were lucky to have exceptionally nice weather, though, warmish and sunny. This time of year could bring anything. Remember snow in October two years ago? Yeesh. Who wants to think of that?!?!!?
On a really nice note, our neighbor Meagan (who helped raise the second and third walls just a week ago) brought Bob and I an apple crisp that she had baked. She said she saw how hard we were working and felt we needed a little treat. We are really fortunate to have such nice neighbors!!

Roofin' in the Rain

Bob and Joe valiantly climbed ladders and got the plywood on my studio roof last Sunday in the rain. It was warm so not as miserable a task as if cold weather had accompanied the steady mist, but not nice weather at all! But they got the job done and now it needs the ice and water shield roofing applied. Give us a warm, sunny day, please.
The studio looks more and more like a real space. We toasted the heroics of the roofing crew with a glass of wine- under cover of the freshly sheathed rafters. Never mind that over night it pored and there was three inches of water in my studio Monday morning. Bob and I swept and vacuumed and it dried just fine.
This what I made for dinner for the roofing crew:

Yes, it's a meatloaf shaped (sort of) like a house. I assumed if I made it shaped like my studio, it would resemble a mistake. Anyway, the roof is completed as yesterday, Joe returned and under failing light, he and Bob once again scaled to the heights and laid down the ice and water shield. Go ahead and rain!

Today Bob and I are getting a load of fire wood.  Oh boy! More physical labor! Then we're stopping at Home Depot to price siding and get a gallon of paint to match the house. Progress is with us. The end of the exterior phase of studio construction is approaching. It's beginning to seem a reality that someday I will actually work in that space. We are taking a break from work on the studio after we get the siding up. Heaven help us! will we know how to do anything besides work?!!

Rafters Away

This morning we had all three walls up. Thanks (again!) to our saintly neighbors who came to our wall raising rescue at the end of the day yesterday. Our friend Joe had car trouble and our neighbors came over and assisted in the raising of the third wall. We would have felt so entirely deflated if they hadn't helped! We feel like we're racing against time and weather and work and so many variables... That's Bob up on the ladder, Thursday morning, shimming up the place where our walls meet.
Today was exciting because after a few delays and a measuring meltdown or two, we actually made good head way in erecting the rafters.

Each rafter had to lifted in place, measured and taken down so that a small notch could be cut in the end farthest from the house and relifted into place and then nailed. I got to be on the low end, which as I am really, really, really afraid of heights and detest ladder work (and have odd depth perception to boot) is fine with me. But mind you, the "low end" is over my head and there's all this open space and I wasn't comfortable at all. Bob, who is definitely part monkey, scampered up and down the high ladder, with that 20 foot long 2x6 board on his shoulder. I'm tired and I carried only a portion of the weight of all these rafters; I can imagine that Bob is exhausted. But we got most of them up!

Holy cow! It actually looks like a building! The space is nicely defined now: it has volume when you stand in it, or look back at the studio. (This is the side nearest our backyard, looking towards the driveway.)
I'm certainly glad, when I look back on all the work that we've done on a simple addition, attached to the house, that we weren't crazy enough to have attempted building a whole house. I don't think either Bob or I are natural born carpenters, but we're getting it done!

Brake Dancing

(And I am aware of the correct spelling of "break dancing"...) Bob and Joe and I worked on Sunday, starting early and measuring and whacking and chopping with the best of them. I have learned all manner of useful and informative carpentry terms; things like headers and sole plate and jack studs. And my favorite? If something is a tiny bit over or under (when taking a measurement) it's referred to as (and I am not making this up!) a "cunt hair". Apparently even Bob had heard this colorful term many years ago when he was briefly employed as a builder. And also, interestingly, what with Brazilian waxes and the general depilatory habits of the young this is becoming an archaic phrase. Will wonders never cease!
So onto my general discussion of all things studio building related. We realized by mid-Sunday afternoon that we were going to run out of 10 foot long 2 x 4's. It was agreed that I, as the least able to saw and nail, would be dispatched to the nearest Home Depot to secure more stock. For some reason, I wasn't in the mood, but finally I got in the truck. It is fortunate that I didn't get right on the highway, but noticed that I needed gas. I filled up and started to pull out of the station and promptly had one of those almost out-of-body experiences as I depressed the clutch and brake pedals and the truck just kept moving forward. I then realized why: I had no brakes! The truck rolled out onto Main Street with (unusually!) no one coming from either direction, as I was making a left hand turn across traffic. Somehow, with much coasting and careful down shifting, I managed to make it home, through several traffic lights and one woolly intersection where a major route hits the highway. Joe went to get wood instead.
So with one thing and another, we are still waiting to raise that third wall. It should happen tomorrow and then we can go onto the rafters and roof. And I'm still alive!