New Beginnings!

1. What a way to start the school year! With no electricity for the entire day before school starts - that day of last-minute preparation. I managed a haircut with just scissors on the front porch after the lightning stopped, but before it got dark. Showers were finally taken around 8:30 at night when it seemed like the power wouldn't be coming back on, and miraculously, there was still hot water after at least 13 hours without power.

My FOURTEEN-year-old son, who unquestionably is not going to make it to age twenty-five without relentless intervention by me, needed that shower last night and there was not going to be any more waiting. So I placed two candles in his bathroom, inside a latched lantern. I cleared the counter, set it down, and delivered the lecture. Do not open it. Do not touch them. Do not place anything close to them. DO NOT F AROUND.

You know.

Five minutes later he came downstairs, nearly crying from pain, with two burned and blistered fingertips shoved into a glass of water and a story about how it happened that was blatantly bullshit.

By some miracle he got good sleep and his blistered fingertips no longer hurt by morning. This morning went PERFECTLY. His bed was promptly vacated, medicine remembered, hair styled (!), top lip shaved, teeth brushed, lunch packed, and he was dropped off in good spirits and with a few minutes to spare on a beautiful, breezy, post-storm morning.

I didn’t get a picture this morning, but I will when I pick him up. My little baby... in HIGH SCHOOL.

2. Now that I have that out of the way, it's time to get back to painting the walls of my new shop! That's right, you heard me, the dream (maybe, with any luck, we'll see) has come true and I'm turning Coming Up Violets into a shop and studio. A physical location floated into my lap like manna from heaven and the walls were set to be about half painted yesterday when we woke up with no power in our entire town. Can't really paint in the dark!

But the walls will be painted and the stuff will be moved in, and the fantastic work of lesser-known artists both local and farther off will adorn the walls and tables, and there will be art classes for children, gallery shows, and a smallish workspace for a few artists to get together and work on their art.

It will be at Moon Lake Village, behind the Moon Lake Library, at 5866 E. River Road, Mentone, Alabama, in a freestanding building that used to be a classroom at the school where my son attended for 5th and 6th grade.

And the Grand Opening party is tentatively scheduled for September the 2nd, 2023.

Join us if you can!