More Calvert Drawings

Barbara sketched the Calvert City Cemetery

In the top photo, Barbara is sitting by the car, sketching one of the gates to the cemetery in Calvert. Her sketch is the drawing below the photo.

This lovely park-like cemetery is the final resting place for many of our family members, friends, neighbors, and members of the community.

We grew up just a few houses away from the cemetery.

I remember that, at one time, Edie, who lived next door to the cemetery, would alert us kids to a funeral going on. Several of us would go home and get a fruit jar, put water in it, and pick wildflowers that grew in the empty lots around us. As mourners left the cemetery, we timidly presented them with a jar or a handful of Indian Paintbrushes or tiny little yellow, purple or blue flowers.

We had a lot of Indian Paintbrushes, but I know of only one spot where there were Bluebonnets growing wild at the edge of town near the school. Of course, we believed that we would be put in jail immediatly, if we picked a Bluebonnet, so those were not even considered. There were lots of flowers in the park across the street, but we dared not pick any of those, either. The temptation was great, but, if Mrs. Sneed saw you pick a flower in the park, well, it would be too bad! And, on top of it, there was supposed to be a $5 fine if you got caught picking a flower in the park. We knew better than to pick any of the flowers from the beds of the neighborhood ladies' homes. And, the wildflowers were really pretty and cheerful.

I thought that the deceased would have a lot of flowers on their grave. But those left behind must feel sad at leaving their loved one in the cemetery. So, maybe they could use some pretty flowers to make them a little happier.

The dark clad recipients quietly thanked us and left the cemetery as we walked backward into Edie's yard to watch.

I don't have any idea who the people were, or who had died. It just seemed like something we should do since we were so close to the cemetery.

In this cemetery, there are quite a few graves that are at an angle. These are victims of the terrible Yellow Fever epidemic that wiped out about half the town. No one knew what caused Yellow Fever, so the graves were put at an angle in hopes that no one would ever open those graves and allow the germs or whatever might be causing the illness, to escape and cause another outbreak of Yellow Fever. The population was over 4, 000 at that time, and, after the epidemic, about 2,500 remained. The population remained in that range, even when I was in school.

Since they were burying people, night and day, I don't think that anyone will ever know exactly how many people died then, or even who they all were.

My great-grandfather had a cobbler shop, one of the first businesses in town. He had a "Chinaman" working for him who contracted Yellow Fever and died. That's the closest that any of my family members came to the disease, as far as I have been able to find out. But old timers talked about it, and it is still a topic of conversation even today.

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Stork Update!

The nest in Przygodzic has 3 babies in it! Three eggs have hatched, with 2 more to go! I haven't been able to see them as one of the storks is always sitting on the nest when I have taken time to look. But I can tell about the eggs from the animated little eggs at the bottom or their camera shot.

You can check out the other links, and the link I have that says Stork Cams, which has a list of many cameras trained on stork nests in various places.

Hope the babies make it this year!

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I added something for those of you who are Hillary Clinton supporters and for those who just like to design t-shirts. It's under Design a T Shirt. She had a "widget" on her website to add to your blog, where you can design a t-shirt for her campaign. Unfortunately, the whole thing doesn't show, but I think enough is showing so that you can design a shirt, or click on links you want.

I know one thing. After my recent experience of trying to paint a t-shirt with acrylics on a stretchy t-shirt, I'll try not to do that again! I started it a year ago, and I'm still not finished! That material is so hard to paint on!

I don't know how anyone can paint enough t-shirts to make a living at it, go to shows, and that sort of thing. One was enough for me! I have another shirt to paint, but this one may just remain plain-unless I really get in the mood for doing something frustrating! (I guess that should read challenging. I think that painting on fabric is a lot more than challenging, though. It's sort of like sewing. It doesn't take long before I am ready to throw the sewing machine in the garbage can, when I try to sew! Not nearly enough patience.)

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I enjoyed watching Bill Stubbs on Houston PBS tv. "Moment of Luxury" took us to New York last night. Really enjoyed the trip. In our area, the program is on Monday night at 8 p.m. Check your listings to see when it is shown in your area.

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Thank you for reading and sharing.

Let me know if you see something that interests you.

Please remember to sign my Guest Book at the bottom of this page.

Stork Update/ Color Harmonies

Stork Update:
There are now two eggs in the nest! I finally figured out what the little white things are at the bottom of the picture, and those are little animated eggs hatching. They show the number of eggs in the nest. There had been just one. Now there are two little cartoon eggs.

Also, I added another link under Stork Sites that you might like to check out. Links #4 and 5 in my list don't seem to be working. They worked last year. I'm not sure what one says, so it could be that they have taken the site down. I thought that the other was working, but, apparently that is not the case. Maybe it will work later.

Funds might have been a problem. That's why I'm offering to donate part of the money from sales of my stork pictures to the project. So if you would like a lovely stork picture, or if you would just like to contribute to the fund, let me know. We can arrange for a picture, or I can put you in touch with those who are working with the project, or the lady who has been collecting to help them out.

I don't see that the Black Stork nest web cam in Germany is showing anything live, either. I enjoyed watching that one last year too. However, I have left it there because there is some interesting information on stork migration and their adventures in the sidebar. Hopefully, the camera will be back operating again soon.

Calvert Sign:
There has been a movie on tv about the life of Johnny Cash the past few days. My daughter pointed out to me that, at some time, maybe about 1957, Johnny and his crew were in Calvert. At least, according to the tv movie. I watched a bit of it and, sure enough, they make a stop at a little town as they are traveling from Austin toward East Texas. As the men are standing around, doing goodness-knows-what (since they start a small fire in a tree!), there is the big Calvert sign behind them. Of course, that sign was not really there in 1957. As I recall, there was only the city limit sign, and a concrete block sign that was put up by or for the FFA and several organizations like the Lions Club had additions on that sign. It had some flowers planted around it and was a nice, simple welcome to town.
Now, I wonder about the sign in the movie. It was a nice backdrop and a bit of advertisement, I guess.
I do know that they also showed neon lights from a motel in the background, near the sign. Calvert never had one of those! (Reminds me of the movies about Houston and the movie makers will have to throw in some big mountains in the background. I'm always sure that those movie makers have never been to Houston, or Texas!)
My daughter told me that it was the sign that advertises Calvert as the Antique Center of Texas. I didn't see that part. I thought the men were in front of it, but I did see Calvert on it and the sort of odd shape that it has.
If you get to see the movie, watch for the sign and let me know what you think. If you have actual information about why it was in the movie, I would like to know that too. Not complaining or anything like that. Just wondering.

Dream Tree Slide Show
I added a slide show (below) of some of the watercolors that I have done of the "Dream Tree" that I have talked about previously.
This was a tree that I saw in a dream and I woke up saying that I just had to go back and paint that tree. I think it was supposed to be in Franklin. Nothing I have actually seen, except in that dream.
Myrna Wacknov, on her Creativity Journey blog, issued a challenge a while back to write down all of the colors on your palette on little slips of paper. Put those in something, then draw out 3 colors. Use those colors to do a painting. Repeat as many times as you like.
I used my light table to trace several small versions of my "Dream Tree" on watercolor paper that ranged in size from 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" to 7" x 10".
The first color combination that I drew was Winsor Violet, Yellow (Pale), and Indigo Blue. I really liked the results I got with that so I did another one. The sky in the second one was much darker than the first, but it is still nice.
Then I did one in more realistic colors, thinking of the golds and colors of winter grass around here.
Next, I tried one, beginning with a color that I like-Cobalt Violet, and decided to make a violet tree. I added in other colors of yellow and green to complete the painting.
A monochromatic painting using all blue was my next choice.
Finally, I drew 3 more colors to use. This time, I limited my palette to Alizaron Crimson, Sepia, and Lemon Yellow. I have to confess that I had to cheat a little bit. I ran out of Sepia so I added in some Burnt Sienna just to complete the painting.
I could do many more! I do have one more drawn on a larger sheet of paper that needs to be painted still.
I thought that I would really get tired of doing one thing over and over. But, each one was different enough that I still had a challenge to figure out how to approach each area. Just thinking of how to use the limited number of colors was a challenge in itself.

Storms
I'm staying up, watching the tvweather news from Temple. There is a big line of storms headed this way and they have had a tornado warning for Temple and Milam county. For a short while, there were big, black dots in scattered all along that line of red and orange. Wish I knew what that meant! Kind of scarey, especially since there was a tornado at Breckenridge earlier as this front moved through.
I guess it is safe here, right now. I'm watching my weather forecasting cat as much as I am watching the tv weather! So far, she is just walking around, looking at things.
If she starts flattening out to the floor and just creeps along or stops dead in her tracks, I will know to unplug the computer and hide her under her favorite blanket. All we need is a bit of rain in the area, and Bitsy goes into action, looking scared stiff. When she comes out of hiding, we know it is safe and the rain or storm has passed. Sometimes the weather people miss the forecast, but Bitsy never does!

Art Notes:
Check out Virginia Vaughan's blog from the link under Artists and Authors on my sidebar. "Texas Country Reporter" is going to film her for their program while she paints 24 paintings in 24 hours. These will be done on the farm where she and her family recently moved from.
"Extracurricular" will be on display at the P. David Romei Art Center in College Staion. If you are here, be sure to go by and see some of the work by area art teachers.
I've been reading about Houston Interior Designer, Bill Stubbs. He is starting a new series on Houston PBS tv. There are a lot of very interesting things online about him. I'll have to check out his book, "I Hate Red! You're Fired!".
Thanks for reading and sharing. Please sign my Guest Book at the bottom of this page.
You can also join my group by filling out the little subscribe box at the top of the page, or you can click on the link that leads you to my group.
And do let me know if you would like one of the stork pictures.
Hope those storms weaken and just leave us with some nice, gentle rain, and only where it is needed so badly.