An Artist's Date ~ Gourd Pickin' in a Heatwave

Our dates tend to be a little different than most.

The romantic and sentimental things are done on a daily basis, you know... surprises with wild flowers, dinner and a movie, or making a cup of tea for your sweetheart.  And then when a celebrating day comes when those things would be expected, we do something .......completely different.

Now, I'm not saying the sweet things don't exist, just that I guess we drum to our own beat.

We have both been sick the past few days, sick in the middle of a heatwave with low grade fevers, sinus problems, nausea,  and just plain yuckiness. We had been needing to go to the gourd farm since we were completely out of gourds and we use them so often in our artwork. So, John picked this afternoon to make an appointment at the farm.

After a light lunch and a gift of earrings and a necklace that John had stashed away, we got ready to go. Today was relentlessly HOT, in the triple digits with a heat index that made if feel like 108 degrees. This made the trip a little oppressive, with a traveling time of three hours round trip, especially when we found that our air conditioning in the vehicle decided to stop working after the first 15 minutes. But we endured anyway, drinking lots of water and the occasional "Slushy" along the way.

Once we arrived, we were immediately greeted by this little guy, who so delicately perched himself on the side mirror to say hello.

Now the excitement could begin, picking through bins and barrels of wondrous gourds, each having their own potential to be a beautiful piece of Art. It didn't take long to gather many, thank goodness, because the heat was so bad the sweat was just pouring down our faces and mixing with gourd dust.

 

 

An hour later we had our stash...lots of gourds that would soon be Art Dolls, Drums, Bowls, Vases, Masks, and Jewelry. We carried our bounty to the side yard with the help of the farm's beautiful Weimeraner, who wanted to play the whole time...teasing and poking at you as you searched for your gourds.

Our picks

We got lots of gourds, plus a bag full of little bitty tiny ones about the size of my thumb.

Next time I will dress a little more appropriately, since my Maryjane shoes showed they're displeasure from the barn floor.

All is well. We had a good time together..a fun time...a productive time...a HOT time...and above all, time with each other and that's what counts.