Wrangler's First Sale

I spent the weekend visiting one of my sisters.  It was a great opportunity to see her new house and the garden where she works.  I also showed Wrangler's paintings at a local art festival.  They close off one block of a street in A's neighborhood and vendors associated with the area are invited to attend.  When one of the head people found out the A had a sister with a painting horse he insisted that she get Wrangler's artwork there.  

I sold the first one to one of the other vendors before I was even finished setting up.  But things slowed down considerably.

The weather was a little nippy but the wind wasn't bad so things didn't blow over.  I did have to contend with the neighborhood kids playing basketball in the driveway behind me, rollerblading and running around on scooters.

As you can see the street was crowded with vendors.  Then, when they opened the gate, it was crowded with lots of people, strollers, kids and dogs all day.

I had to look across at this table all day.  She was selling those noisy door hangers for $25.  She had a very good day.  I'm estimating she sold at least 15.

The women that bought this was very excited and she bought a shoe too. I was selling those for $5 each and ended up selling $25 worth of old shoes.

Santa was there too, getting his picture made with everyone.  There were also bands playing all day which added to the festivities.  

• I tried to dress the part with by cowboy hat which I think drew some attention.  People would walk by and sort of look at the art the look up at me and see the hat then look over to the "Wrangle the painting horse" sign.  There would be a moment of confusion then they would look back at the paintings.  I would usually then say, "yes, the horse does the paintings."  Then the conversations would began.  Sometimes the one that recognized it was a horse artist would grab the person in front that had walked by unrecognizing and say "a horse did this."  Kids usually caught on before their parents.  I could always tell when someone understood because a smile would suddenly cross their face.  One person said she had a ranch with 5 horses and she was sure one would do this.  Good luck with that is all I'm saying.  Someone asked if I was paying my way through college with his art.  I guess he couldn't see my gray hair with my hat on.  Someone picked up a horse shoe, laying right next to the paint brushes I had on display,  and asked "is this what he paints with?'  Several people thought I should have the horse there.   I should have said, "do you want the people selling honey to have their bees here?"  The honey by the way was selling for $20 a 1/2 pint and they sold out of the 90 jars they had.  I think I'm selling that next year.  All in all an interesting day.  Sold 7 paintings for a total for $220 plus the $25 for the shoes.  So I sort of got paid to go visit my sister. At least I'm breaking even with the art supplies now.  I might have to figure out how to sell the paintings from Wrangler's  facebook page next. 

Cherokee Heights Art Festival

Wrangler has been invited to sell his works at an art festival this weekend.  

 My sister L wanted to come down and try her hand and painting with Wrangler so we could have more paintings to offer.

 L mixed the colors while I handed Wrangler the brushes.

 I think L's color choices were more bold than what I have done.  Can you see the blue horse above?

 I normaly only do one or two paintings with Wrangler at a time.  But since L made a special trip here and was having such fun, we did a record 4 at one time.

 L also did some rotating of the paper which I haven't done before.

For this last one L wanted to help Wrangler while I mixed the paints.  I'm not to thrilled with the colors but I think it is interesting to see how Wrangler's technique changed with a different handler.  Anyone interested in purchasing an original painting by a horse come see us at The Cherokee Heights Art Festival.

The Big Goat Roundup

We got a call yesterday that they were taking the goats up at the market today.  We didn't have an opportunity to round them up until this morning, in the pouring rain.  

 They were split into two groups and it took 1 1/2 hours to round them all up and get them to the barn.

 They were about as far from the barn as they could get but headed that direction without any trouble.

 Spray Paint, one of the bottle goats, was with the rest of the herd.  This probably saved her seeing as J had already marked her for sale.  He thought she was ugly and didn't want to keep her.  But since she was keeping up with the herd and not causing any trouble (remember Sissy), it looks like she'll stay.

 Once we got them all in, we sorted out the nannies we were keeping.

Then we went through the bottle goats and got out all the males to sell.  We culled 5 nannies and lost a couple more during the year so we ended up keeping 7 bottle females and 6 others.  That makes a total for 44 females.  

That left 61 to sell.  It was pretty much a trailer load.  Now the billy is in with them and we will be looking for some little ones in about 5 months.

Just Kit Sunday #92

I caught Kit Kat in the window with the sky reflecting on it.

 I think in made for an interesting special effect.

 Sort of makes him look ghostly

or ethereal. (extremely delicate and light in a way that seems too perfect for this world) 
I really liked that definition.

Good Fences # 85

J picked up our new billy goat last week.  We found him on Craig's List for $100 less than the breeder we've been getting one from.

 This one is a 2 year old boer billy goat.  Our last few have been kikos.

 This one is quite the pet.

 Every time I tried to get his picture he just tried crawling through the fence too me.

 This was the best I could do.

I did manage a bonus Kit Kat picture.
For more Good Fences click HERE.

We Have..... Mulch

What better time to get mulch and spread it than when it's raining.  This seems to be par for the course for me.  I guess J is busy with other things when the weather is nice so if I want help I have to wait until he can't do anything else. 

Bonus Kit Kat picture

 Kit Kat was on hand to inspect the load of mulch.

 And Emma was a good companion while I did the prep work of evening up the edging.

 J was the work horse, loading, hauling and spreading the mulch where I pointed.

 The blackberry vines took some edging and weeding before mulching.

 They really look neat and tidy now.

 And I had to rake and weed the daylilies.

 Now they are put to bed, ready for winter.

Don't you just love how fresh mulch makes everything look so good?

Closing Gates

Yesterday we were able to turn a 5 minute job into an hour and a half job.  J had a couple of gates to close after moving the cattle again so we made it into a job for riding the horses. 

 The horses really have the best view on the farm.

 And I cannot believe how green it is for November.  (We had snow this time last year)

 Jessica took a try at getting a hold of a hedge apple.

 J wouldn't let her keep it and she looked longingly at the great feast of them on the ground while J closed the gate.

 J has decided against taking Jessica on another endurance ride this year.  It really is a lot of work keeping one in shape for that.  Plus, with the shorter days he would most likely be finishing in the dark if he tried a 50 and I don't think that was appealing to him.

Then when J got off to close the next gate he took my camera and I have a picture of me riding Otoelene with more than just her ears showing.  I can't think of a better way to spend a nice Sunday afternoon.