Fred the Farmer

If you've looked at children's toys lately, you've seen Bob the Builder--videos, trucks, books, and other such items. Well, in our church there's Fred, the Farmer.
Typical of the surviving prairie farmers in this area, he has worked incessantly all his life to make a success of his farm, his town, and his church. He's in charge of the courthouse clock tower, the church cemetery upkeep, flower arrangements at church every Sunday, and a host of other voluntary tasks that quietly get done without anybody noticing...oh and he still farms, and, somewhere, he finds time to weld and build. (You're not much of a farmer around here if you're not also a mechanical engineer, painter, cement worker, and welder.)




One day, I asked Jean, Fred's wife, if my carpool and I could swing by her house and take some pictures and whether we would be attacked by the farm dog if we got out of the Suburban. (I hadn't seen him, but I just knew they would have a big old dog guarding the place)
"Sure, come by anytime," she told me. "and that dog won't bite you, but he just might lick you to death."

So, driving home from school a couple of days ago, we cut through the country. When we ran across Fred's house, I pulled in and talked to the man himself--just as he was leaving to plow a field.

"Go ahead and take all the pictures you want," he told us. "See, there's the new sculpture I'm working on. It's going to be a sphere--8 feet in diameter."

Sure enough, there it was in the driveway. "This rock pile," he continued, pointing to a tall stack of stones, "well, one night, soon after they put this line here to anchor the electric post after the last big ice storm, I came running out to check on something and tripped over it...so I put this stack of rocks to keep that from happening again."

Tori and I snapped away; She really liked the metal silhouettes; I liked the birdhouses. They sit calmly in the garden against a wild prairie background, keeping little birds safe from the ever present threat of chicken hawks.
Anyway, here they are...a tribute to the ingenuity of Fred the Farmer, Jean, his wife, and their friendly, old brown dog, who followed us faithfully around trying to lick us to death.

P.S. Tonight my husband informed me that they are naming a bridge for Fred. He's famous around here for his county commissioner days. Doesn't surprise me in the least.

Goodbye, Miss Haversham

I hear quiet chords of anthem music. Claye has decided to tackle her room...a museum of ancient treasure that has sat serenely for many months in complete stillness, quietly collecting dust. She is methodically moving from corner to corner with the dust cloth, polishing and restoring every precious object, and to my great delight, even deciding to part with some of them, relinquishing them to the school-benefit garage sale.

"Do you think she will mind if I give this away?" she asks, all concerned,holding out a bouquet of artificial flowers.
"What? Aren't those from your sister's wedding?"
"No, my cousin's wedding."
"But that's almost thirteen years ago. Surely she won't mind."
"And if I get rid of the lava lamps...?"
"That would be great. I'll take them to your sister and she can put them in the sale. They will add interest to her booth."
"But she's the one who gave them to me...."
"She won't mind. Nobody expects you to keep things forever."

Still, it's hard to part with things you like, especially if you remember who gave them to you and when. That's Claye's dilemma. She still has many of her childhood toys, and I think fully half of the attic holds boxes of her stuff. She loves all things Victorian and collects glass bottles; books by Dickens, prints by Gainsborough; she loves warriors and weapons--daggers and sais.

"What about this elf mask?" she asked again, holding out a paper mache and leaf concoction.
"The one you made for sculpture I?"
"Yes, I was going to throw it away, but it would look neat."
"Does it actually fit over the head."
"Um huh"
"Wow. Let me try it on. Amazing. No, we can't possible sell it. It will be perfect for a homecoming day at school--or a play prop--Midsummer night's dream or something.Let me put it in the attic."

...Well, she had to get it from somewhere.

My World--Claye's Art Show

My daughter's senior art show was a great success. Lots of people came. We all milled around and visited and ate little cheesecake bites and strawberries and lunch meat and cheese. Here's a few blurry clips taken from the video in small pixels, but you can get some idea of her artwork.




Since the show had to have a title, she picked "My World".
What was supremely ironical was the theme and artwork of the guy she shared the show with: His was called "Fin del Mundo" or "End of the World". Here are the pictures of his art work. It made an interesting juxtaposition for the lobby of the Art Building.



and on to other ironies: Sunday Scribblings prompt for this week was "Art"

Young Warrior

My daughter Claye* has finished another sculpture, model of a fellow student in her clay class. Now he has to dry for a few weeks and then go to the kiln to be baked--hopefully not to explode.
I persuaded her to take a lot of pictures in case he does. The fellow art student who posed for this one really likes that she put him in chain mail, which looks "really cool" and he appreciates lions and includes them in much of his art, so the neck-medallion is a nod to that. Right now, the clay is wet, so the white texture lines stand out. Eventually, they won't. The drying has to happen at just the right intervals--inside and outside taking turns, so, it has to be wrapped in plastic, then paper for several turns until it is dry enough to fire. It could take a long time.


*Well, that's what I call her online.