A Special Project

Placerville Art on Parade: Five Years

For the past several weeks, I have been working on a special project—a book! The book is called Placerville Art on Parade: Five Years and is a compilation of my photographs of the 149 works of art created for Art on Parade over the last five years.

The photo above shows the cover of the book. I created the book using the publishing program from the online publishing company, Blurb. You can view the book (and order one too!) by clicking on the link below, right. When you get to that page, you can actually go inside the book and see pages.

In addition to the book, there will be a poster, bookmarks, and note cards coming soon. If you are interested in any of those items, contact me directly via email at whrstudios55-artonparade@yahoo.com.

This is a fundraiser for Art on Parade: I'm donating all profits from this book to Art on Parade. I'm hoping it will help us continue Placerville Art on Parade next year and for years to come!

I talked about this year's Banners on Parade a few posts ago. There are brochures for a walking tour at various businesses downtown or you can go to the PDA website and see pictures of the 2009 banners.

A New YouTube Video

Some of you have seen previous YouTube videos that I have done. I recently completed one that shows photos and videos of the 2009 Wagon Train and Founder's Day event that took place in June in Placerville. You can click here to see the video.

Placerville ArtWalk in July

Don't forget to put July 18th, 5-9 pm on your calendar! That's the evening of the monthly Placerville ArtWalk. It will also be a special evening for Gold Country Artists Gallery: we will be celebrating our 17th anniversary that night. Hope you can come and help us celebrate!

The Month of June

I've always liked the month of June. It's my birthday month, but it has always also been a transition month of some kind for me. It's the real transition from spring to summer, the transition month from one age to another, etc. This one has been an interesting one too!

More on the Iphone

A couple of posts back I mentioned that I got and iphone and I wanted to give you an update on that experience. What an incredible phone! I am still learning about it and am trying to use it as much as I can so I can learn more about it. There was just an upgrade to the 3.0 operating system for the iphone which I downloaded the other night and it adds even more great stuff.

I'm finding that I especially like the GPS capability: you can use the phone to map where you are and get directions (map and text) to where you want to go. In the new 3.0, they have added a slick "Voice Memos" app that will be very useful. I also really like it for reading books. I used my Palm PDA to read books and am now using the iphone—the iphone is better since the screen automatically adjusts to the ambient light and becomes brighter or dimmer as needed (and it's great for reading books in bed before you go to sleep).

I also love the sleek design of the iphone—it just feels good in your hand. Its surface is smooth and it's weight is just right. I did get a screen protector from Zagg and a skin for the back from Gelaskins to protect front and back from scratches. I also find that I enjoy the little touches that they included in the operating system of the phone—like having a text message button right in the contact list, being able to end one call and answer another or put one call on hold and answer another very quickly.

Anyway, it's a great phone and highly recommended!

Books I've Read or am Reading

I've always got several books loaded on my iphone and have read several over the past couple of months that I have really enjoyed. Right now, I'm hooked on David Baldacci books and am reading the second of his four-book King & Maxwell series (Split Second, Hour Game, Simple Genius, First Family). Great books all!

I'm also hooked on anything by Clive Cussler and James Patterson. I read Cussler's Dark Watch most recently and Patterson's 8th Confession, along with The Whole Truth (another by David Baldacci)—Deb is reading this one now and loves it. I highly recommend any of them.

Wagon Train/Founder's Day

On Saturday, June 19th, there was a great event called Placerville Founder's Day and Wagon Train. This year, it was the 155th birthday of Placerville and the 60th anniversary of the Wagon Train. The whole city was decked out and ready to celebrate! The Wagon Train left Zephyr Cove (on the southeast shore of Lake Tahoe) and made its way over Echo Summit to Placerville over the week preceeding the event in Placerville.

There was a lot going on all over Placerville that day, but especially downtown on Main Street. The Wagon Train came through Main Street about 2:30 pm or so and there were about 13 or so wagons and lots of horses (pulling the wagons and individual horses being ridden throughout).

I really enjoyed just being downtown and taking LOTS of pictures (like the one on the left, above).

Trip to Santa Cruz

On the day after the Founder's Day/Wagon Train, we went to the Santa Cruz area to visit Deb's sister Jeton and her daughter Jeni and to just be in the area for a few days. Santa Cruz is about 200 miles from Placerville, so it's not a bad trip. We drove directly to the coast and took Highway 1 south to Santa Cruz. For the majority of the 3 days we were there, it was overcast but still beautiful.

We love the ocean and miss being closer sometimes. We got there Sunday afternoon and had dinner at one of our favorite restaurants there, The Crow's Nest (highly recommended). On Monday, we drove south to the Monterey/Carmel area and had lunch at the California Market Restaurant at the Highlands Inn.

The pic above is of one of the cypress trees in Carmel on the day we were there. On our way home from Carmel, we drove the 17-Mile Drive past Pebble Beach and the beautiful coastline along that area. One of my favorite stops there is "The Lone Cypress" whose image, I found out, is actually trademarked by Pebble Beach!

I got to spend a little time in one of my favorite all-time bookstores—Bookshop Santa Cruz. While at the coast, I took lots of pics and a few movies (mainly for the sound of the ocean!). One of the pics I took along the Santa Cruz coastline is shown at the top of this post.

Yard Sales

I've decided to have a bunch of yard sales this summer to help get rid of some of the "stuff" we have. The first one is tomorrow and Sunday (6/20 & 21) and I've got lots of old stuff (frames, books, collectibles, household items) that I will be selling. I want to get my garage and storage shed cleaned out by the end of the summer. Seems like the more space you have, the more "stuff" you have!

Gold Country Artists Gallery

I have quite a bit of new work at Gold Country this month. Here's the link to my page on the GCA website --> Bill's page on the GCA website. Check out my work; there is some from the car shows last month and one that I did of the stagecoach (it gives rides on every Third Saturday downtown).

I hope to have more new ones at the Gallery in July of the trip to Santa Cruz and from Founder's Day/Wagon Train.

Hope you have a great summer!

Happenings in May

Here it is the last day of May and I'm trying to remember what the heck happened this month! There were some great thunderheads in the mountains during the month and I did get a few pics of those (like the one shown above).

Census Job Update

My stint as a Census Crew Leader ended this past week. I had a great crew and our Address Canvassing Quality Control, for the most part, went pretty smoothly. It was an incredibly busy month that right now seems like a blur! I'm hoping to have another job with the census in late summer or fall, if I get selected.

Car Shows

A lover of car shows am I and the month of May was a great "car show" month—except the ones I am talking about were all on the same day! On May 17, the Sacramento Shriner's Hospital held their annual Concours d'Elegance at Mather Field in Sacramento and on the same day was the annual Hangtown Car Show in Placerville.

I always enjoy any Concours as the cars displayed are always incredibly beautiful. I got to the show early and wandered around, camera at the ready! A friend of mine was showing his just-restored 53 Jaguar for the first time (that's it on the left) and it was a beauty! I took lots of pics of many of the wonderful cars there (they were pieces of art!). I'm putting a few of my pics from the Concours on my GCA web page pretty soon, so check it out when you can.

The Hangtown Car Show on Placerville's Historic Main Street was the biggest car show I have ever seen in Placerville! I left the Concours and drove directly to Placerville and took lots of pics there too (mostly for the PDA). The picture here is one I took from the Cary House Hotel balcony looking east on Main Street—there had to be over 200 cars on the street that day. Between the Concours and the Hangtown Car Show, it was old car-lover's heaven!

Banners on Parade

For the fifth year, the Placerville Art on Parade project is in full swing. This year, as in the past two years, the art items that will be displayed in Placerville's Historic Main Street district will be banners. I wrote about this in my March blog, so I won't bore you with all that again.

The main thing that happened in May was the judging of the finished banners on May 27 at our local community college. We had two local art instructors as judges and there were 34 banners that were judged. I was there to take pictures of all the banners for the Banners on Parade brochure. The one to the left is called "Butterflies & a Ladybug" by James Stewart and is one of my favorites!

As always, I was thrilled with the quality of the banners and their wonderful renditions of local scenes. If you are around Placerville this summer, make sure to pick up one of the brochures and take the walking tour to see all the delightful banners.

Busy Summer

Summertime in Placerville is a busy time, what with all the activities downtown. The two big events in June are the Wagon Train & Founder's Day Street Faire (June 13) and the Bell Tower Brewfest (June 27). I always enjoy the events and take lots of pictures for the Placerville Downtown Association. Check out the Placerville Downtown Association website. The banners will also be displayed soon on the PDA website.

That's it for now. Hope you have a good summer!

An April Flyby

Strange title, I know, but April has just flown by (or did I flyby April?)! I have been so busy with the Census job that I've been hardly able to breathe.

Census Job Update

During the first full week of April, I trained (along with an assistant) 17 Address Canvassing Quality Control Listers. Then, they actully started work on April 13 and it was like a tornado through the first week, a minor hurricane during the 2nd week and a hearty breeze this past week. All of the folks I trained are doing their thing and doing a good job at it too!

iPhone

I felt a need for speed, so to speak, and decided to get a new Apple iPhone—and am I ever glad I did! Way back in 1996 when the first Palm PDAs came out, I bought one and have had one ever since to keep track of my calendar, contacts, and I have used it to read over 100 books (it has a great backlight).

To me, the Apple iphone is the next logical step as it has basically everything but the kitchen sink in it. It's also my first foray into anything "Apple" and I must say I am really enjoying it.  If you are interested in finding out about the latest iPhone, check out the Apple website—there is a great video that shows it in all its glory.

Last Day of the Month

So, here it is the last day of April and I realized I had not added anything to this blog this month. So, I just had to do this quick one. Hopefully, I'll have a bit more time next month to be better!

March Notes

This has been a busy census month for me and I have been one of two Featured Artists at Gold Country Artists Gallery this month. The work above is one of my experimental pieces called Alternate Universe.

New Job: Census Crew Leader

Since last November (2008), I have been a Recruiting Assistant for the 2010 Census. During the time from November through the end of February, I tested over 400 people in the Placerville area (and another 80 or so in the Sacramento area). It was a great experience and I got to meet a lot of fine people.

As the testing phase wound down, I was offered the chance to switch over to a new job—that of Crew Leader for a Lister Quality Control team in the Placerville area. 

As you can imagine, the run-up to the actual census month (April 2010) requires a lot of preparation. One of those tasks is to verify addresses of all places where people live so that when the census forms go out, they will go to the right places. To do that requires two teams of people in every area of the United States and is a massive effort. There are production listers that go out and do the initial address-checking. When they finish, a team of quality control listers go out and check their work—I'm heading up one of those teams (17 people).

I went through the training for that during 5 days in mid-March and have been preparing for to train my crew starting on April 3 and continuing during the week of April 6. Then on April 13, crews will start the QC process culminating, hopefully, in an accurate list of all addresses in the US.  So, a lot of my time has been spent getting ready for this effort which will go on over the next 2-3 months or so. I'll keep you posted as to how it is going as it happens.

Featured Artist at GCA

During the month of March, I was one of two featured artists at Gold Country Artists Gallery.  I created about a dozen new works for the show. It started on March 2 and goes through April 5. most of my new work is images of Lake Tahoe from a day spent there in late January (see previous post in this blog). The picture on the left is the window at the Gallery this month that features my work.

It's been a fun experience to have lots of my work highlighted at the Gallery and I've enjoyed it.

I've also been trying out new programs to create Photographic Art and will tell you more about them as time goes on and I learn more about them.

You can go to my page at the GCA website by going here.

Placerville Art on Parade

Our Placerville Art on Parade committee received all the entries for the 2009 Banners on Parade and there are 35 entries this year! This is the fifth year and again, we are doing 30"x60" canvas banners. Artists apply to do one of the banners and we supply the canvas. They will finish them by late May and all of them will be judged on May 27. I can't wait for them to be done and am really jazzed by the wonderful canvasses that will go up downtown in early June. You can see 2008's Banners on Parade pictures at the Placerville Downtown Association website (all of the other years—2005-2007—are on the website too). I'll be taking the pictures of the banners this year (as they are being judged) for use in the brochure and on the PDA website.

As we head into the Spring weather, I hope life is good where you are!

February's Goings On

This has been quite a month.  I haven't done an entry to this blog as I have been so darn busy with other things!  And birthdays...  It was Joey's birthday on the 7th and Jordan's birthday on the 21st, so we had a couple family celebrations along the way too.

Placerville Art Walk

We have had an event downtown for years on the 3rd Saturday of each month where some of the galleries and businesses stay open from 6-9 pm and serve munchies and some have wine and such and live music sometimes.  It's just been called "Third Saturday" for a long time.

Our Arts Council (El Dorado Arts Council) is spearheading an effort to enliven and enhance 3rd Saturday and to that end there was a committee formed (I'm a member) and we have been working on the "new and improved" (and renamed) Placerville Art Walk. Gold Country Artists Gallery is one of the major sponsors, along with the City of Placerville, Placerville Downtown Association and others. It will really get going once the weather gets nicer (April-May) with music, more promotion, and (hopefully) more businesses staying open for the event each month. I'll keep you posted about it.

Banners on Parade 2009

As in the past 4 years, we are having art downtown from June through September. The overall effort is named Art on Parade, with banners being the types of art this year (and over the past two years). The application information is out now to people who might be interested. Last year we had 30 banners up in the downtown area. The banners are 30"w x 60"h and each is hand-painted by an artist.

My main job with this effort has been to be the photographer of the banners once they are completed. The photographs are then used for the brochure and other items that we produce. You can see 2008 banners on the PDA website (and previous year's Art on Parade items).

The pic above on the left (Alchemy by Tracy Lewis) is one from last year's Banners on Parade and one of my favorites.

Flower Power

Nope, you aren't having a 60's flashback—I did say "Flower Power"! We have an effort in Placerville by some folks to have hanging flower baskets on all the light poles downtown, and this year we will have 22 of them hanging in the downtown area thanks to a very successful fundraiser last year.

The effort started with 4 baskets in 2007 and 8 baskets in 2008. After the fundraiser last year we had enough money to fund 14 more baskets for a total of 22 this year! We're planning another fundraiser for May 1 and hope to raise more money for more baskets.

The pic on the left is one I took of the baskets hanging on the Bell Tower in downtown Placerville last summer.

As in past years, the baskets will go up on Earth Day, April 22. And how beautiful they are!

Joey & Jordan's Birthday

Our nephew and niece celebrated their birthdays this month. Joey was 3 on February 7 and Jordan was 6 on February 21. For Joey's birthday, we went to the Folsom Zoo and had a picnic outside; for Jordan's birthday, we tried to get into a Chucky Cheese in Sacramento, but it was so darn busy we just gave up and went to a Round Table Pizza in Cameron Park and had her party there.

Here are two pics from their birthdays: Joey on the left and Jordan on the right on their special days.

Getting Ready for March

Finally, I'm working on some photographs that I took in January at Tahoe (see my previous post on this blog) for my Featured Artist stint at Gold Country Artists Gallery in March. I, along with Valerie Bye, will be one of the Featured Artists for the entire month at the Gallery. So, I'm madly working on a lot of new pics from the mountains (mostly Tahoe) for that show. I'll have more to put up here from my show pretty soon.  You can also always see my work on my Gold Country Artists Gallery webpage.

Finally

Census stuff... I have been doing my "Recruiting Assistant thing" for the U.S. Census Bureau and so far have tested almost 400 people in the Placerville area.  I only have two more weeks that I will be doing testing, then I will be going into training for a Crew Leader position—once I find out what that is all about, I'll let you know!

That's it for now!

Lake Tahoe in Late January

Took a drive to and around Lake Tahoe a couple days ago and it was (as usual) incredibly gorgeous! We love to drive to the lake (about 60 miles away) and then drive the 70 miles around.

Emerald Bay

That picture at the top is of Emerald Bay taken on 1/29/09 and as you can see, there is very little snow. It was perhaps 45° that day and the bay was calm and its usual beautiful blue.  There are three areas you can stop along the road to view the bay and we stopped at all three. It's one of our favorite stops along the trip around the lake.

The beauty doesn't only include the lake, either. Across the road from the stop along the north side of the bay are some wonderful rock outcroppings and since there was very little snow, the vegetation on the slope showed some wonderful colors that lead right up to that gorgeous blue sky.

Over the years, I have taken many, many pictures of the Emerald Bay area and never get tired of it. Just across the road from Emerald Bay is a trail that I haven't taken yet, but want to when the weather gets warmer so that I can get some pics from a higher vantage point.

West Shore

We continued our drive north along the west shore and got to the point near Tahoe City where the road goes right along the lake. I was able to stop and walk down to the water's edge and get some pictures, one of which is shown below.

There was a little bit of a breeze on the lake, so there were some small whitecaps lapping the shore. But, it wasn't too cold and there was very little snow for January 29!

North Shore

We continued our drive around the lake through Tahoe City on the north shore, then through Incline Village and into Nevada. Along the northeast shore of Lake Tahoe, there is a rest stop that also has some trails around it and some wonderful vantage points for photographs.

I took this picture at that location and with the snow-capped mountains, the reflections into the lake are exquisite! I spent quite a bit of time taking pictures at this location and it was gorgeous!

East Shore and South Shore

We continued south along the east shore of Lake Tahoe and had lunch at one of our favorite places, the Zephyr Cove resort near South Shore. We usually make that a destination when we want to have lunch somewhere around the lake.

After lunch, we drove through the casino area and back into California past the redone downtown area. We found a turnoff that took us closer to the lake and found a beach where we could park and walk out onto the snow/ice of the lake itself. I took this picture looking towards the north shore.

The lake was very low and I could walk out for quite a ways on the snow/ice before I got nervous. Again, the beautiful snow-capped mountains to the north just added to the overall beauty of the place that day.

Home Again

From the south shore of Lake Tahoe, we got back to the beginning of the loop around the lake and made for home. What a great day!

PS Tryout of my new camera

This short day-trip was sort of a "shake-down" for my new pocket camera, the Canon PowerShot SD990 IS Digital Elph. I got it just before Christmas and had used it but hadn't really tried it out as my major-use camera for a day. I love it! For a camera that I can put in my pocket, it takes 14.7 mega pixel crystal-clear images, wide-angle shots, and movies.

I highly recommend any of the Canon cameras and know that if you try one, you won't be disappointed!