Out and About - January 2016

♫Dream of Flying♫

January started off with my catching my husband's New Year's cold but I used the stay-in-bed time to look through all my collection of artists' journals to see which one I wanted to use to guide me through the year in my drawing challenge.  It soon became clear that Beatrix Potter's characters would be just what I needed.  You can read about that here. . . .

I hope to fulfill my dream to illustrate my own children's stories this year.  The Take Joy Society's first get-together was along this line and was led by our member who is a published author.  You can read about it here. . . .

My Christmas present from my second son and daughter-in-law was to take me out to tea at this shop in the quaint little town of Ellicott City. . . .

The food was delicious and more than sufficient.  We each had our own pot of tea served in these lovely pots. . . .

Now that Olivia's Mom doesn't need us to babysit since she is no longer working outside the home we had a playdate instead with Olivia on the 12th. . . .

The Take Joy Society had a second get-together this month continuing with the theme of children's books.  First we visited the Hagerstown Women's Club.  The woman who was the first President of the club is pictured below.  A story I forgot to tell in my original post is that she was Julia Child's aunt.  Julia would come for a visit in the summers to see her cousin and it is presumed that she had lunch at the Club with her Aunt.  From there we visited the exhibit at a nearby museum of Little Golden Books and then went to lunch in a charming cafe in town.  You can read more about this get-together here. . . .

On the 16th we were scheduled to babysit Olivia so her parents could go out to a friend's birthday party.  Olivia had been sick during the night (stomach flu), but as you can see she was fine by the time we got there later in the day. . . .

However, she insisted on kissing me on the lips when I was putting her to bed, and I could not say no to such a cutie-pie.  I ended up two days later with the same ailment.

On the 17th we had a light dusting of snow (photo on left).  It was just a teaser for what was to come on the 22nd (on the right).  You can read about it here. . . .

We ended up paying someone to use their high-powered snow- blower to clear the driveway for us. . . .

Our neighbor won a drone last year and used it to take aerial photos from his yard.  Our house is on the lower right. You can just see our snow-covered roof through the trees.  In the distance is South Mountain which is a foothill of the Blue Ridge Mountains. . . .

Because we were able to get our driveway cleared we got to keep our playdate with Olivia on the 26th. . . .

Our youngest is buying a house so we went to see it when it was being inspected.  The end of March we'll be helping him move.  He will be 28 this week so everyone gathered over the weekend to celebrate it.  I made strawberry cheesecake. . . .

We ended the month by going up to the Washington County Museum of Fine Arts to attend the opening reception for the Cumberland Valley Artists Exhibition.  They showcased photography and various painting and mixed media art by area artists.  Photography wasn't allowed, but I was able to take this photo of their Frederic Church painting in their permanent collection.  We toured his house last September in Catskill, New York.  You can read about it here. . . .

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Take Joy!