Zoo Pictures

I finally uploaded pictures from my visit to Virginia Safari Park on July 13th.  Here are a few highlights of my trip there.  From the walk through part:

A peacock

 Kangaroos

My daughter took these next two pictures:

Giraffes (you could feed them but we didn't)

Flamingo house

My daughter feeding a parakeet in the parakeet house.  My husband took this picture.

These next pictures are from the drive through section of the park. 

 Wildebeest

Up close and personal

Zebra

Camel

Wide view from the car

I hope you've enjoyed these pictures.  There's a lot to see and if you ever get a chance to visit the Virginia Safari Park you should go.

The Zoo Trip

As I mentioned earlier, I'm on vacation.  Friday the 13th, my husband, daughter and I took a trip down to the Virginia Safari Park.  We had visited it before, but that was a few years ago.

Basically, it's a drive through zoo where you can buy feed and feed the animals. We didn't buy feed this visit because I wanted to get pictures and the critters can be more aggressive when they want food. 

The Park has added a walk through section with caged animals so there was lots more to see.  There was a reptile house, a parakeet house where you could feed them right out of your hand, a flamingo house, and you could also feed a giraffe (but we didn't).  There were monkeys, tigers, tortoises, farm animals, kangaroos, cheetahs, and peacocks, to name some.  And one large white cat was prowling in the grassy area behind one of the monkey cages (I don't think it belonged to the zoo :) ).

The drive through part has various kinds of deer, camels, llamas, elk, wildebeest, camels, bison, ostrichs, and zebra, to name a few.

We took lots of pictures but I haven't uploaded them to the computer yet. 

The day was cloudy, but the rain held off until after we left.  We had a great time.

I'm Back!

I've been neglecting my blog, but I'm going to try to post more frequently.  I'm on vacation right now (have been since Friday) and figured it would be a good time to get back in the swing of things.  There's been some interesting things going on which I'll detail in some catchup posts.  But for now, hi, and thanks for reading.

Entering the Fair

Well, it's almost midnight here and I am a bit tired.  I took a vacation day from work because today was the day to take entries to the county fair.  I entered four pieces of art--a watercolor painting, a drawing, a mixed media artwork, and a computer art piece.  I also entered the photography competition for the first time, putting in six photos.  It took me most of the day to print and mount photos and frame my art.  But I didn't have to wait long to enter my stuff.  I missed entering the fair last year so it was great to be able to get some things together for this year. 

Judging of art and photos is tomorrow morning.  Not much prize money is involved, but I'm hoping to win something.

Catching Up and ACEO Giveaway

Well, it's after midnight again and I've spent most of the evening catching up on email and checking Etsy, eBay and Zazzle.  While reading eBay groups, I found out Ayala Art blogged that she is giving away 14 ACEOs in a drawing to be held on July 15th.  If you'd like a chance to win these ACEOs, just leave a comment on her Friday, July 08, 2011 blog entry.  Click on Ayala Art above to get to the blog.

I just had another five days off from work (trying to use up most of my paid vacation days).  I didn't work on art, but I did take a lot of photo references of mostly flowers at the arboretum on July 8th and July 10th.  I bought a few more frames at thrift stores and got a lot of still life materials (mostly flower arrangements, but also some vases and candlesticks) at an auction I went to on June 29th.   Now if I can just get motivated to work more on my art!

Saturday Snippets

Whoops, it's after midnight.  Just ignore that time stamp above. :)

I checked out plexiglass at Lowe's today. It comes in some strange sizes but I found out they will cut it for free. Home Depot doesn't cut their plexiglass at all. I needed to check on this because the SVWS prefers watercolors be framed with plexiglass, as do a lot of shows. The SVWS show will run from October 1 to December 1 this year and I want any entry I have in it to be properly framed. I'm trying to figure out if I can do my own framing instead of paying a pro to do it. Art Supply Warehouse has some standard sized frames that come with plexiglass already so I want to compare costs.

I went to a big yard sale looking for still life subjects but didn't see anything that wowed me. I also spent time transferring pictures I took in the last couple of months from our old computer to the new one and putting copies of pictures that I can use as art making references and Zazzle fodder into appropriate folders.

Tomorrow I plan to go to a medieval fair where I hope to take lots more reference pictures.

Next to create some new art!

Vacation time

Today is the first day of my vacation from work.  I don't go back until next Thursday.  So I decided to try to get back into posting to this blog.  

I spent most of today going around to thrift shops.  I bought two metal picture frames for $1.00 each.  These frames are the type that usually come two sections to a pack with two packs needed to make a frame.  So I got a great deal on them.  I hope to work on some new art while I'm off to put in them.

I recently sold another "Zoo Goat" birthday card on Zazzle.  It's been popular with overseas customers.

Well, that's it for now.  More later. :)