My Chalk In The Park.

Cheryl looks at my latest Mural 

Well, Things are becoming a little to real for me as the only celebrity in a small town. The Chalk Drawings have brought about fame I am becoming uncomfortable with. Yesterday, the supervisor of the park flagged me down and told me I could keep doing chalk drawings anywhere I want.. Including the Band Shell! I guess I should be happy that she did not tell me to stop drawing and start scrubbing.

Running in Muscatine.

We spent the morning in Muscatine as usual and ran along the river. The Dryad Saddle Mushroom has been blooming out again. They usually fruit in the Spring and the Fall, so it makes sense... even with the lack of rain.

Dryad Saddle

Shaggy Cap

I did not harvest any of those, but Cheryl did find some more Shaggy Caps to harvest. The ones we missed a few days ago had become too old and started to turn black. Ink caps are so messy when they disperse their spores.

 

Rough day making a Raccoon.

Drawing on the sidewalk is a hit and miss affair for me. Some days everything flows just right, while others are just a fiasco. On those days, it seems there is nothing I can do that will work out. But yesterday was one of those days where everything seemed to work out just fine. 

Rocket the cat helps.

I even had Rocket, the neighbor's cat, follow me to the park and "help" with the process. Mostly he acted as my "Lovely Item: so people will not be creeped out by a 50 year old man playing with crayons on the trail. I don't know why, but a friendly cat flopping around near by seems to make you more approachable. ( At least I hope so....) Perhaps the theory is because Cats tend to be fussy when choosing who they hang out with. And if they are willing to hang around someone as odd looking as me, I must not be that bad. (Plus, Cats probably think most humans do strange things all the time, so this behavior is normal.)  

Rocket the Cat Naps.

Whatever the reasons, Rocket stayed with me for more of the project and only left when the guy next door started mowing his lawn. It was a beautiful day yesterday, and I really could not see any reason not to be outside most of that time. I was too windy for bubbles, and even for chalk! 

He sleeps while I work. 

 But I did manage to get enough chalk to stick to the trail to make an oriental dragon. Granted, it was a much simpler version, but I liked the design. I even had enough extra colors to fill in the sky around it. You might notice that there is nor orange. You would never think just how limiting a lack of orange color could make things. Cheryl says she has more chalk coming later this afternoon. 

Finished!

 And the disaster "do it yourself" chalk I made two days ago might actually be salvageable. Who knows? I guess we will find out soon enough. But for now, it appears that the rain is going to wash away all my previous designs and clean up the park for me without any scrubbing required. Lucky me! I guess I could use a day off anyway. It is possible that the rain will subside mid-afternoon and I may be able to go out later... If I have the motivation and energy. 

Closeup.

 The Park Supervisor said that people have been walking through the park more trying to find my drawings. That does motivate me to do my bit to help keep people active. Not that I care about that really.. Mostly I just want them to notice my art. And leave me alone... Contradiction? Yeah, I'll admit its a strange thing. 

The kids are helping me out.

One parting thing to mention before I sign off, the Kids from the Day Care have decided to join in on the park decoration. Some of them are actually pretty good! I'm going to assume that they are girls as the "theme" for most of the chalk drawings was "MERMAIDS!" (Not that boys are incapable of drawing mermaids....)

Some have serious drawing skills. 

 I noticed that the only thing that was missing was a black shade, so I left them a few charcoal brickets. A day later, they found them, but I don't think they knew what to do with them. Mostly it looks like they just wrote their names on the sidewalk all over. Well, Maybe they will figure it out later. It took me 20 years to learn that charcoal was the "Black Chalk" that people used. ( I actually discovered it by accident.) Hope everyone is having a fine Sunday today. I feel bittersweet about the rain, but I also hate looking at my art for too long. Having mother nature wipe things clean and allowing me to rebuild can be reassuring, in a way. It makes it seems like it never happened... Like a ghost in the night. I like that mystique. Not to mention that eventually, Stockings are going to take all of our time and the temps will make it a bad idea to be out there drawing on the ground. So this is just a phase, as most of my hobbies tend to be. Thanks for stopping in

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