Loryn: Now that my hallway repairs are complete, I get to do the most fun (and sometimes hardest) part—choosing colors. The four swatches above are colors that I tried. The first is a gorgeous pale blue that looks wonderful in the can and not so wonderful on the wall. One of the hardest parts of choosing colors is that the location and light source makes such a big impact on the color. That color would probably look great in a light-filled room, but not so good in a dim hallway.
The second color is a very pale green that simply looked like dirty white on the hallway wall. The third color is a darker version of the same color. Again, it’s a beautiful color that looks too bright and overwhelming in a space that isn’t well light.
The fourth color is an old friend, as it is the color we used in Lynne’s living room, shown below. It is a blue-gray with a lot of red in it. It looks terrific in rooms with northern aspects, but it turns very icy in southern light. It also makes a fantastic background for paintings. I am planning to turn my hallway into a gallery, like this corner of Lynne’s living room:
It looks more gray than blue in this picture. I’ll take more pictures when I have the new lights in place, all the transoms open, and lots of paintings, photos, and prints on the walls!
Back on the road after the great time in Chesterton, we went to the campground hoping our campsite would be open early. It wasn’t. It didn’t help that we were an hour earlier than we thought. The northwestern counties of Indiana are on central time and we just a hundred miles away are on eastern time. Time is not a constant in Indiana.
The gatekeeper sent us to the Nature Center to occupy our time, no doubt wondering about our clock reading skills. The best exhibit was a glass-walled room looking out onto a bird-feeding station complete with a microphone to pipe in the sound of running water and bird peeps. It was quite lovely and peaceful until I remembered the hummingbirds were trying to kill each other.
Unfortunately, the Nature Center did not entertain us for very long and we were at a little bit of a loss about what to do when I thought: “Silly, you are at Lake Michigan. Go see it!” And we did. We went around a roundabout to a sign marked “beach” and there it was. Awesome, breathtaking, and blue.
The photo above is one of the first of many I took. I just cannot get over the juxtaposition of the blue with the sand. And since it was raining there were people walking the beach with black umbrellas over their heads. I thought for a moment that we had exited the roundabout into a Victorian time warp. If you enlarge the photo by clicking on it you can just see them in the far right corner.
The blue, the sandy brown, the rainy atmosphere and the Victorian umbrellas were a perfect introduction to Lake Michigan.
I'm smiling, but guiltily, because I'm eating the last of the ribs. Kristin has a blue-checked gingham bow in her hair.
During our drive to the Dunes, I was kept busy searching the internet for things to do and places to eat lunch. Most of the restaurants with good reviews were either too far out of our way or closed; but I did find that the town of Chesterton was having a Wizard of Oz festival.
Kristin and I spent some time speculating on why Chesterton had a Wizard of Oz festival. Perhaps Frank Baum was born there? The home of a Munchkin? A retired movie star had relatives there? We gave up on the guessing and found this history of the festival. I know there are a lot of advantages to collecting, but I didn’t know you could use a collection to start a festival.
Since we had almost reached our destination and it was still early, we decided that a stop in Chesterton would be fun. We were curious and a festival always has food booths.
Chesterton's Wizard of Oz festival program.
Chesterton is small and parking was scarce, but we found a family near the center of things willing to offer their yard for $5.00. That seemed reasonable since the Subaru was packed to the gills and it was less worrisome to park it in a private driveway than on a public street.
After finding our way past the trains (long and noisy) into the Chesterton downtown, we discovered a big bonus. Most of the top-rated restaurants in the area had booths at the festival. What was to prevent us from sampling a little something from all of them?
After grabbing the obligatory lemon shake-ups (why don’t we ever make these at home?), we proceeded to walk from one end to the other ogling everything from jewelry to collectibles to fair knick-knacks plus a spattering of Tin Men, Dorothys and Wicked Witches willing to pose and even sign autographs. I’m thinking of adding a parade of little girls in blue-checked gingham dresses, ruby-red slippers and braids to my bucket list and then crossing it off, because who knew?
Even the Wicked Witch of the West gives autographs.
Walking was a nice change of pace after riding in the car, but by the time we came back to the start we were foot weary and stomach empty. We looked at and sampled a lot of different foods, but the best was the short ribs from Wagner’s Ribs. They were so good I am contemplating a two-hour drive just to eat those ribs one more time. After that we were beginning to feel a little stuffed, but there were still the baked goods from Tonya’s Patisserie. Negotiating a quick compromise between our eyes and our stomachs, we had a pumpkin pie tart and cinnamon rolls packed to go. (They were good, even cold, but I am a severe judge of desserts. I grew up eating my mother’s homemade cream puffs fresh from the oven and my standards are high.)
I'm taking the photo but she is saving some ribs for me.
With our desserts and the whirligig we bought for our campsite safely tucked away, it was time to leave and continue our adventure in the Dunes Country.
Oh-oh…first an elf and now a reindeer. The Christmas season is attacking me even before Halloween.
This squiggle is done entirely in color pencil. This is another one where I was searching for the different browns that a primary and secondary color could produce.
This elf squiggle dances his way around Santa's workshop.
I believe this elf is happy that December is not that far off, but I am appalled at how rapidly the season will be upon us. It is just a waxed, downhill slide to Christmas once Labor Day has passed
This squiggle is all marker with a simple complementary color scheme of red and green.
the crafty sisters 