Happy Thanksgiving!

It's just past Thanksgiving and almost the last day of November and another month has come and (almost) gone. I like to get at least one blog done each month and, well, this is it!

Census

The dominating task for my month of November has been working for the U.S. Census—yet again!

The Stockton Early Local Census Office (ELCO) was one of two Census offices opened in the U.S. in 2008 to serve as sort of a "staging area" for the beginnings of the 2010 Census. From that office, several other Local Census Offices (LCO) are being born, so to speak. One of those offices is the Placerville LCO, which is actually located in El Dorado Hills.

For that office, many workers are needed to gear up for the 2010 Census and I have been hired as one of them. I started out on the 2nd day of November with a full week of training in the Elk Grove Local Census Office (south of Sacramento). Then I had a week at the new Placerville LCO and another week (the week just prior to Thanksgiving week) working at the Stockton office.

All of this is to help get our new Placerville LCO open and geared up to do the work of the 2010 Census. I'm working as an office clerk (with hopes of moving up, eventually, to other positions in the office) and right now, our office is pretty small but will grow as "Census Day" (April 1, 2010) approaches.

Check out these websites:

• www.2010.census.gov – has info about the 2010 census
• www.census.gov – this is the site to find out about working for the census in your area
• There is an article in the Dec/Jan issue of Reader's Digest about the census—see the actual article here.

It's exciting to be part of a great group of people doing a job that comes along every 10 years and that has been going on since 1790!

Deb & the Christmas Tree

Deb recently helped her friend Ann, the owner of Annieberries on Placerville's Main Street, decorate a Christmas tree along Highway 50 just before Thanksgiving. Ann was a sponsor of one of the 80 Christmas Trees that now adorn the highway as it goes through our great city.

Ok, let me back up a bit... Up until about 3 years ago, there were decorated Christmas Trees displayed along Highway 50 as it passes through the heart of Placerville every year during the holidays. We have had major construction going on with Highway 50 in Placerville for about 2-and-a-half years (what a mess!). So, this is the first time our Christmas Trees are back!

Deb was there on a bright, crisp Saturday morning before Thanksgiving to help decorate Ann's tree. You can see the pic of the two of them (Ann on the left and Deb on the right) above after they completed decorating the tree.

The trees are mounted on poles just behind the barrier on the right-most eastbound lane and when all 80 trees are lit, it looks great!

And speaking of Christmas trees... We just got ours "out of the box" yesterday and Deb is busy decorating it—well, she is actually trying to get all the lights to work (she has much more patience than I do!) and will decorate it over the next couple days.

About 5 years ago, we bought an artificial tree and it was one of the best investments we ever made! We never thought we would have a "fake" Christmas tree, but it is a great one and looks great during all the time we have it up. It never dries out and we can keep it up for as long as we want!

Christmas Ornaments & Miniatures

For the last several years at the Gallery (Gold Country Artists Gallery), we have had a miniatures show in December and will again this year. For my miniatures this year, I decided to do some photographic art-looking pictures. One of them is shown right at the top of this blog (A Christmas Stagecoach), another one just to the left (Santa Dude) and another one is shown below, near the end of this blog.

Our miniatures show is called "Small Wonders" and if you peruse some of the web pages of our members at www.goldcountryartistsgallery.com, you will see some of the miniatures that members will have in the show. You can go directly to my page on the website by clicking here.

In addition to the miniatures, I've been making some Christmas tree ornaments using some of those very same miniatures. The miniatures pictures that will be on display at the Gallery will be framed 4x6 pictures. I took some of those pictures, shrunk them a bit and decoupaged them to small pieces of balsa wood with tinsel cord attached so they can be hung on a Christmas tree.

Years ago when Deb and I were first married, we did a bunch of decoupaged Christmas tree ornaments and they have become treasures that we look forward to seeing again every year.

Thanksgiving Day and Weekend

Since both Deb and I worked the day before and the day after Thanksgiving, we went to a restaurant this year for Thanksgiving. It's one of our favorite restaurants (Marie Callenders) and the dinner was great (you could even get seconds if you wanted them!).

After dinner, we went to see the new version of A Christmas Carol with Jim Carrey. We all liked it and will be anxious to see it again when it comes out on video for Christmas next year.

On the Friday after Thanksgiving, we were both busy. I worked at the Census office during the day, then went to the Gallery in the evening to be downtown for our annual "Festival of Lights". That's where the big fir tree near the courthouse on Main Street (that's it on the left) is lit and Main Street is closed so people can wander and shop. There were thousands of people out and about and it was a great evening!

Coming Up

Now I have to get our Christmas letter going. I will do a paper copy and some kind of thing in this blog too—I haven't decided yet how I'm going to do it exactly. But, I've created a monster with the Christmas letter and if I don't do it, I'll never hear the end of it!

By the way—in case you are wondering—that picture above is called A Christmas Wagon and is one of my miniatures at the Gallery for our Small Wonders show.

So, stay tuned: You'll either see the Christmas letter here or you'll get one in the mail. We'll probably do fewer ones via mail this year just because of the cost and time involved to do it. But, if you don't see it in your mailbox, you can always see it here!

Have a safe and happy Holiday season and I'll talk with you again next month.

October's Bright Blue Weather

October is my favorite month of the year. Light takes on a special quality this time of year and makes everything look bright, and, well... blue! I have been particularly aware of the quality of light this time of year since I have been a photographer.

The picture above is my rendition of a photograph created as a piece of photographic art (that is, made to look like a painting) and is entitled East Carson River.

I will have a bunch of new work in Gold Country Artists Gallery during November, so come by if you can and see it!

Census

In my last post, I talked about the 2010 Census job I was about to do called Group Quarters Validation. Well, that was a very quick operation and I worked a total of about 4 weeks on it. I will be starting another job with the census as an office clerk in a newly-opening office in El Dorado Hills (about 20 miles away) next week. That one will be a full-timer and should go through a good share of next year.

Airshow

In early October there was an airshow at the local Placerville airport and they were celebrating 80 years of being an airport. There were lots of small planes and a couple of large helicopters. It wasn't a big show, but it was interesting.

There also were airplane rides and flybys and it was lots of fun for people who love airplanes.

Art & Wine Festival

In downtown Placerville on the evening of Saturday, October 17, we had an Art & Wine Festival. There were about 40 wineries in various businesses downtown, good music, art demonstrations, and the display of all the banners from Banners on Parade.

During the Art & Wine Festival, the banners are displayed so the public can view them up close and personal and then they are auctioned off to the highest bidder during a silent auction that evening.

Lots of people were downtown that evening enjoying wine and wonderful music and to top it all off, it was a beautiful-weather evening to boot.

Mountains & Colors

Our fall colors are shining this month and I love to take lots of pictures. I went to the Hope Valley and the Markleeville Area and I caught the colors at their peak. I went there on one day, then Deb and I went there a few days later. Our colors here in the mountains are mostly of the gold-yellow variety, then when you come down to the lower elevations, you start seeing more of the reds in the Japanese Maples and others.

There are lots of wonderful photographic opportunities very close by and I try to take advantage of them as much as I can.

Wherever you live, make sure you take the time to notice the wonderful fall colors and the quality of the light that embraces them!

A Slice of Life

Quite a month... I'm working for the U.S. Census again and have been going through lots of paper.

Family Stuff

That pic above is a photo I just took this morning of Joey (our nephew) and I just really liked it! Deb's Mom had a pacemaker put in a few weeks ago and is mending nicely. Barth had a slight accident on a motorcycle this past week and has mainly sore muscles (no major damage to anything or anybody except for his soreness).

We're all looking forward to Fall!

Census

I've got another job with the Census—this time it's something they call Group Quarters Validation (shortened to GQV). During this portion of the overall census preparation, we will go to various places that house many people (like hotels, homeless shelters, hospitals, jails, etc.) and see how many people can be there at any given time.

The census is coming up in April, 2010: hope you are all ready! I'll keep you posted. You can always go to the census website and see lots of information about it there. I never knew how much preparation goes into the decennial census!

Paper Thoughts

After my Mom passed away several years ago, we packed her items and brought them to our home to store and I have slooooowly been going through them. She had lots of old paper items (old magazines, books, etc.) that she sold at a flea market for many years.

Over the last several days, I've been going through lots of old Life, Look and Saturday Evening Post magazines (and many, many others of way long-ago dates) and sorting them out. I find I especially miss the old Life magazines (www.life.com – even Life has a website!) and how much they showed about what was going on worldwide before we had all the instant Internet capability. It's been kinda fun going through the old magazines and, even, looking at the ads!

If you want to have some fun, do a search on the Internet for your favorite old magazine that is no longer around and see what's there.

It seems like our lives are so darn fast now and the moments are not being captured like they use to be for future generations to peruse. Where will all those online photos be in 50 years? Oh, they will undoubtedly be searchable to the nth degree, but you'll have to know what to look for and there may not be the time to "peruse" all those (then) "old" articles as things will be even faster-paced then. Just looking back and thinking ahead to (maybe) what's coming...

A new month is coming and my favorite one at that: Fall, changing leaves, cooler, differences in the quality of light (if you take the time to notice!) and all that goes with it. Until next month...

Placerville ArtWalk

On the evening of the third Saturday of every month, the Placerville ArtWalk happens on Historic Main Street in downtown Placerville, California. It is an event that I always enjoy and this year, in particular, has been especially fun since the Gallery that I am in (Gold Country Artists Gallery) has been one of the major sponsors.

Placerville ArtWalk, by the way, is spearheaded by our very own El Dorado Arts Council.

Placerville ArtWalk: The Video

I've been taking lots of photos and short videos during the Placerville ArtWalks this summer and decided to put it all together in a short video (a little over 6 minutes long.). If you are interested right now, you can go see it on YouTube here. I thought I'd delve a little deeper into some parts of the video in the rest of this post.

Code Blue

During each of the Placerville ArtWalks, there has been a band playing at the Bell Tower right in the center of town. In May, the band was Code Blue and they are a great band that plays 60's rock music. There were lots of people watching them perform and sometimes getting up to dance. What a great evening!

In and Around the Gallery

During the ArtWalks, we have had a lot of people come into the gallery. The photo at the top of this post shows lots of people in the gallery during the June ArtWalk event. The June Placerville ArtWalk was one of our busiest ever, and what makes that amazing is that usually that evening is not as busy as other third Saturdays because the El Dorado County Fair is happening that weekend.

Below are a few views in and around the Gallery:

• In the photo on the left, Gold Country artist Chris Navratil helps young lady MaKayla Morris learn about pottery-making
• The center photo shows the front of Gold Country Artists Gallery during one of the ArtWalks
• The photo on the right shows a crowd gathered around Gold Country artist Lorrene Davis as she demonstrates the creation of a piece of silver metal clay jewelry

My Favorite

I think one of my favorite happenings during the summer Placerville ArtWalks was watching a band by the name of Diddley Squat playing at the Bell Tower. They are a blues band from northeast Texas who are great musicians and real crowd-pleasers. Rick "Saxman" Sims is one of the band members that I particularly enjoyed watching and of whom I took lots of photos. The photo on the left is one of him "serenading" an audience member up close and personal.

All the Placerville ArtWalks this summer have been great photo opportunities and it's been fun wandering around and taking pics when I can during those evenings.

ArtWalks Coming

We have one more "official" ArtWalk coming up on September 19th, then the Art & Wine Festival during the third Saturday in October. If you want to have some fun, plan on coming to Historic Main Street in downtown Placerville on a third Saturday during the next couple of months.

Free Stagecoach Rides

By the way, during the afternoon of the third Saturdays of every month (12pm-4pm), you can have a free stagecoach ride downtown—ahhh, but that's another story!

More About the Video

You may be wondering what I used to create the YouTube video. On every PC there is a resident movie-maker program called (amazingly enough), Windows Movie Maker. It is pretty easy to use and great for simple videos.

I like Windows Movie Maker for simple videos, but I am going back to using Pinnacle Studio. I have used it in the past and like its capabilities, versatility and flexibility more than Windows Movie Maker.

If you haven't tried creating a movie for yourself with stills and video, try it out—it's really fun and no matter if you have a PC or a Mac, you have the capability built-in (the Mac has iMovie).

One of the other videos I created this summer was about the Wagon Train & Founder's Day event on Historic Main Street in June, 2009—you can see that one here.

The El Dorado Trail

For awhile now, I have been walking portions of the El Dorado Trail several mornings a week.

Background

As I usually like to do, I like to find out a little background about things—how they came to be. The El Dorado Trail is part of the Sacramento-Placerville Transportation Corridor (SPTC) and began in the early 1990's. You can see more about the beginnings of it here. Basically, the trail is part of the "Rails to Trails" program and follows the old railroad corridor from Camino to Placerville (and further west, eventually).

You can also find some good maps of the trails at www.trailsnow.org.

Walking/Running/Biking the Trail

I try to walk the trail in the mornings when it is cooler (at least this time of year!). Mostly I walk the portion of the trail from Smith Flat east to the bridge that crosses over Highway 50 and heads toward Camino. That's where I took the picture shown above; it shows a view as you walk west on the trail near Smith Flat.

Sometimes I start my walk further west at Placerville Station (near Highway 50 and Mosquito Road). Walking east from there is interesting because you pass through an old tunnel (a very short one) and when the air is just right, you can smell the smoke from the many trains that passed through the tunnel on their way to/from Michigan-Cal Lumber in Camino.

You always pass folks who are walking, running, biking and sometimes riding a horse. There are restrooms at a couple points along the trail (Smith Flat and Placerville Station) and they are well-kept.

If you are in need of a new place to walk, run, bike or ride your horse, check out the El Dorado Trail!

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!