Stuttering start in Cle Elum...

Well, I was in Cle Elum for all of a day and a half when my schedule changed. Along with serious work I did find the trail next to the runway which is useful for daily exercise. It also provides wild flower photo opportunities. Someday I might run into a horse on the trail!

Here's a screen saver of some flower I found. Guess I'll learn the name of it later-

Allison's Graduation!

OK, one more of our big Summer 2008 Events happened this past weekend- Allison's graduation from Eastern Washington U. with her Bachelor's in Social Work. This was a huge accomplishment while raising two kids, oops, one kid at home! The little dark-haired boy is our grandson Sammy. The big kid is her husband Julio, a wonderful father and husband! We had a nice barbecue lunch at the house afterwards with local family attending- the little boy in the last picture is Ezra Baird, son of Ben & Mandy Baird. Ben is one of Allison's cousins living in the area.

Omak & Okanagan country...

First time to Omak, home of the "Suicide Race" as a part of the Omak Stampede in August. The countryside around here is rugged but beautiful. Nearby are a town and lake by the name of Conconully. Situated against the Okanagan Forest Conconully is a camping & fishing destination. Good place to disappear from civilization! No cell phone coverage! The pictures above are in order- a valley in the Scotch Creek area south of Conconully, Lake Conconully itself and finally the Tiffany Range in the Okanagan Forest. More on this quick project and area scenery later.

Views of Caterina Winery...

Here are a few shots of the winery starting with the entrance, there is a lot of space to fill from an art perspective. I won't try explaining all the shots, you'll have to check out the winery sometime to understand where everything is!

First Friday show at Caterina Winery

My latest adventure was getting set up for Friday, June 6th at the Caterina Winery in Spokane (905 N. Washington.) There are about twelve 8"x12" prints matted at 16"x20" along with five canvas gallery wraps. The wide mat look is new for me. These are white with black core which creates a more formal gallery look. Having 4" of "spatial relief" around the picture (the width of the mat) also helps the picture stand on its own against a variety of backgrounds. I will try to include a picture of the show in my next post.

Also within a couple days I will have a link to an online gallery where prints of the images involved in this show can be ordered. In the future (November is my next show at Arbor Crest- River Park Square) I will pre-load a slideshow and online gallery link.

Good news for Sammy and all of us!

This is Sammy practicing his golf swing back in early April.

There has been a huge development at the University of Minnesota on EB research! This case specifically deals with RDEB, the type of EB that Sammy has- Recessive Dystrophic (Epidermolysis Bullosa.) It's weird. After a couple years of dealing with this situation the act of saying the full words for RDEB is like saying "middle linebacker", it just rolls off the tongue as a series of syllables with no unusual meaning. In reality RDEB carries serious consequences with it which I won't go into right now. You can check out more info on EB at http://www.debra.org and here is the link to the University of Minnesota article on a stem cell (from cord blood & bone marrow) transplant case that appears to have corrected the collagen deficiency in the skin- http://www.ahc.umn.edu/news/releases/eb/index.htm

I will post more updates as available on this type of research.