The Painting Years: A little paint, a little paneling

This family quote, “a little paint, a little paneling,” originated with my dad. He probably learned it from his mother, perhaps. I just did a Google search on that quote and believe it or not, the only two entries that reference it are on this blog!

On family vacations, when we would invariably pass by a dilapidated house or barn, held up with just a few boards and rusty nails, and showing sky through the roof, my dad would point at the structure and quip, “a little paint, a little paneling,” as if that was all it would take to make the hovel presentable. I still use that quote today and since we can safely assume my dad invented the phrase, I will give you permission to use it as needed. Just remember who invented it and give credit where credit is due. Or, you could make a donation through PayPal to the King of Texas each time you use it. The King says a quarter per use (he acknowledges it is a tough economy for his subjects) would be greatly appreciated. Donations would help with the upkeep of the castle (he is retired and on a fixed income, you know).

It would certainly be appropriate with this sketchy painting done in thinned-out oil paints on an 11×16 canvas. I’m not sure what I was referencing when I painted it—it could have been an exact copy of a painting or even sketched from a photograph in a magazine. I’ve always liked loosely painted subjects and that’s the style I tend to lean toward now when I do paint.

The Painting Years: Texas Bluebonnets

This tiny painting measures just 4×6″ and is an original oil painting that I did when I was about 17 years old.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

A brief lesson in composition by Brian Loflin

Brian Loflin, a professional photographer living in Austin, Texas, was my boss umpteen years ago (I shant say how many lest I reveal my agedness) and is my photography mentor and lifelong friend. I met him when he was doing a fashion photo shoot for Jones & Jones, an upscale department store at La Plaza Mall in McAllen, Texas. This was one of my first jobs out of college and I was hired to do fashion illustration and write newspaper and ad copy. I was asked to assist Brian and since I had a yen for photography, I relished the chance to do so. Not long after, he offered me a full-time position, and despite the long commute, I accepted without hesitation.

I worked with Brian on myriad advertising and marketing projects and acquired so many skills in the year I was employed as both a graphic designer and photography assistant at his studio, Loflin & Associates, in Brownsville, Texas. I drove from my tiny hometown of Donna, Texas five days a week to Brownsville to work. It was approximately 60 miles each way, so that was a roughly two-hour commute, as traffic wasn’t heavy in that area. If I had to commute 60 miles in the D.C. area, it would take me well over two hours each way, I’m certain. I didn’t mind the commute (especially after my dad offered me his bright orange diesel VW Rabbit to lessen the cost).

Under Brian’s watchful eyes, I became very proficient at b&w film developing and printing, learned a lot about studio lighting for both products and people, went stark crazy learning how to spec type for brochures (this was covered wagon days, well before Jobs and Wozniak offered us Apple and desktop publishing), and accompanied him on unusual photography excursions such as the workings of an aloe vera plant from the field to the final product (fascinating!) and the christening and photo inventory of the world’s largest offshore drilling rig (exhilarating!).

In this recent posting on his natural science photography blog, he offers a brief lesson in composition. Enjoy!

http://bkloflin.wordpress.com/2011/12/29/its-snowing-somewhere/

Brian and his wife, Shirley, have published three books: Texas Cacti: A Field Guide and Grasses of the Texas Hill Country: A Field Guide, both published by Texas A&M University Press. Their latest book, Texas Wildflower Vistas and Hidden Treasures, will be hot off the press shortly. Their Grasses book recently received the Carroll Abbott Award from the Native Plant Society of Texas.

The Painting Years: Landscape with deer

This was a 24×36 oil painting that I copied from a small postcard in Lila’s “morgue file.” (I don’t remember the original artist’s name.) I was immediately drawn to it because of all the blues and greens. It was a monumental undertaking because of all the details and all the color mixing. I most certainly didn’t complete this one in two Saturday sessions! I was so tired of it at the end that my father tried to bribe me with money to finish the deer in the background with more details. I had completed the one on the far right and was so exhausted that I just painted brown amorphous shapes in for the others! (Maybe one day I’ll surprise him and finish it. Hmph.) He just told me that this was yet another painting that Lila advised me against attempting. Well, except for not finishing the deer, I showed her, huh?

The Painting Years: Apple harvest

Here’s one of my favorite oil paintings. I don’t recall the artist who did the original. I was probably 15 or 16 when I painted it. This is an 18×24 canvas.

The Painting Years: Birds in flight

Here’s another painting I copied while studying with Lila Prater in Weslaco, Texas. I was about 15 when I painted this 18×24 canvas.

The Painting Years: Taking the bait

I did this 8×10 painting for my father when I was about 15 years old. I think I copied it from an original illustration in a fishing magazine. This was one of the unframed paintings in my dad’s frame shop (guess he didn’t like it enough to frame it, huh?) The canvas is cracked (cheap student paint supplies, perhaps?) but that gives it a cool old-world feel now!

Note: It’s funny how I signed my name in a different way and location on every painting. I have put it one of the following positions: right side at the bottom, nestled by an object like a vase in a still life, all caps and first and last name written, all caps and just first name written, or just my first name with an initial cap. I also only dated a few of them. What consistency, huh?

The Painting Years: First florals

Yesterday I organized my father’s “framing shed” workshop and found some of my old oil paintings that I painted from about ages 12-17. The two paintings below are framed and hanging in the house. Discovering the unframed paintings instigated this trip down memory lane and I thought I would share some of my first paintings with you.

My parents took me to the Lila Prater Studio in Weslaco, Texas, for an interview with Lila when I was just 12 years old. I had already been drawing since elementary school and they wanted to further encourage my interest in art. Lila had a strict rule—no students under 15 years old. Classes ran from 9:00 a.m. to noon every Saturday and she discovered that most younger students don’t have the attention span nor inclination to give up a Saturday morning to paint. My dad showed her my portfolio of drawings and I remember him saying, “she’s not like other kids.” (She’s still not!)

Lila decided to make an exception and give me a spot in her Saturday morning oil painting class. I remember there were about five or six students at the time. I was the youngest at 12, the next was a young man who was about 17 or 18, and the others were in their 40s and older. I don’t remember all their names, but I remember some details of my fellow painters. One dark-haired woman, possibly in her late 40s, always dressed up for class and never spilled one drop of paint on her white-colored clothing. She wore a simple white smock/apron and never got paint on it either. I, on the other hand, occasionally used my clothing as a wipe rag (much to my mother’s chagrin).

Another woman, probably in her 50s or 60s at the time, was a retiree named Violet Treasure, who wore her silver hair in a bun perched on top of head. Hers was such an unusual name that I thought it couldn’t possibly be her real name. I did an online search but can’t find anything about her, unfortunately, but I never forgot her name. She painted on really large canvases and almost always painted female nudes. She was a supremely talented painter. I marveled at her use of color—where I tended to see skin as one tone of beige, her brush strokes infused purple, lilac, pink, green and every other hue into the figure. I would learn just how difficult this was when I attempted to copy a painting of a young Native American girl. Initially, my subject was just one shade of brown (think coloring book style) and it was just so flat and uninspiring. Under Lila’s patient guidance, my subject’s skin began to reflect all those colors that Violet used in her paintings. I never did master skin tones but I had an instant respect for Violet’s painting skills.

The young man’s last name was Somerville (or Summerville), but I don’t recall his first name. My dad, who was in Customs at the time, worked with his father, Red Somerville, who was an immigration officer at the port near Nuevo Progreso (which was a mere eight miles from where we lived in Donna, Texas). I remember how slowly he painted and how meticulous he was. He hardly uttered a word while he was in class—he was too intent on replicating works of the masters. (He would have done incredibly well as a forger!) One painting I remember him copying was The Gleaners, an oil painting by Jean-Francois Millet. I always aimed to finish a painting in one or two weekends (impatient even at that young age, I was). He, on the other hand, spent three hours painting just the hands of the wheat gleaners! I marveled at his patience and expertise. When I moved on to a new painting instructor in a different studio, he was still working on his copy of The Gleaners!

There was a pass-through from Lila’s studio to her dining and living room, where her husband, Neil Giles Prater, was bedridden with a long-term illness. I just did a search online and learned that he died at age 83 on June 10, 1977 of pneumonia.

I actually spoke with Lila sometime in the 90s and she was about 92 years old then. She was in an assisted living home and had lost her eyesight. She remembered me and some of the images I painted. I just did a search and found that one of her two daughters passed away in 2010 and the obituary indicated she was preceded in death by her parents, Lila and Neil. Further research revealed that there was a Lila V. Prater, from Weslaco, Texas, who lived to 107 and died in 2003, and I’m pretty certain she’s one and the same Lila Prater. 107 years old—amazing, isn’t it?

Lila had a huge filing cabinet that she called “the morgue,” where we could sort through and find an image to paint. As a rookie, I invariably chose images to copy that were well out of my scope, and Lila would encourage me to pick another. Sometimes she won, sometimes I did.

My first painting was a landscape, and the very next painting was the first floral piece below, done on an 11×14 canvas. When I picked the painting I wanted to copy, she said it was too soon for me to do such a detailed work. I pleaded with her, stating it was to be a gift for Mother’s Day. She relented and I faithfully replicated the work. When I was 15, I painted the second floral, a 24×36 canvas, as a present for my mother.

By copying the work of other artists, I learned myriad painting techniques and color combinations. Lila also taught me how to use the grid method to enlarge or transfer an image to a canvas. Learn more about the grid method here. For this posting, I’ve made both images the same size, although there is a huge difference between them in reality—11×14 vs. 24×36.

I studied under Lila’s direction for about five years and rarely missed a painting session. She was a wonderful teacher and gave me a great foundation in painting. When I was about 17, I began taking lessons with another instructor, Richard (last name escapes me) in Donna, Texas. His teaching method was vastly different from Lila’s—he didn’t allow us to copy anything and we had interesting exercises like using limited palettes of black and white paint only. We did a lot of still life set-ups with fruit, bowls, vases and figurines.

Re: framing—my dad would buy really beautiful but very inexpensive frames in Mexico to showcase my paintings. I remember that we would swap them out whenever I painted something new that matched the color of a particular frame!

2011: A Visual Recap

I’ve picked one photo from each month of 2011 as a way to recap the year. Now here’s to 2012—hoping it is a year of immense creativity, preparing for my first solo photography show in umpteen years, partnering with two friends in publishing ventures, staying connected to family, nurturing friendships both near and far and old and new, growing my graphic design and photography business in fresh and challenging directions, hosting soirees, communing with nature, updating my garden with quirky and photogenic new plants, hitting the road in search of adventure (and fresh photographs), getting back to my painting (fine art, not walls), shooting more photos (and not just botanical), honing my writing craft, acquiring new skills and learning something new every day.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

The skies really are bigger in Texas…

I discovered this one above the local Target store at 8:00 a.m. the day after Christmas and couldn’t pass it up!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Craft Room: Blue baubles for Bobbie

Non-tarnish crocheted wire and bead necklace and earrings made with Czech glass, glass pearls, dyed stone, shell, lampwork beads, crystals, resin and metal beads © Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Brrrrrrrr…Yellowstone in winter

So cold your camera will stick to your cheek (the ones on your face)!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Curse words from the craft room

Last night I crafted these for my friend Judy to give as gifts to relatives this Christmas. She picked out the styles and together we figured out how to do them without instructions (eek!). I know how to make some projects, but this was my first attempt at making “cluster” beaded earrings. I just know you’ll love the first pair and if even one of you ask me to make a pair for you, I will gather my beads and head for the hills. Before I run, I will unfriend you on Facebook, screen your phone calls and block you from e-mail. You know I will.

In that first pair of earrings, each of those little beads has to be mounted on a headpin and a loop created to attach to a very, very tiny chain. When you attach them, they will fall off at least three times per bead. You will drop them on the floor, not find any of them (and pray that your cat doesn’t hoover them up), then have to start over with a new headpin, bead and loop. And when that happens often enough, you will utter words that will make a sailor blush. The process will take up more than two hours of your life. Just one pair of earrings. Two hours. (I tried to entice her with simple designs by promising to make her 20 pairs of them—she wouldn’t bite. And really, I could probably make 50 pairs of simple earrings in two hours!)

When you finish making this pair for your friend, and she says “Only two pairs to go,” you will tell her, with nary a blink from your weary eyes, that she will pick another style or suffer the consequences. And so she does, and in the process, you learn how to do two other styles that are not quite as torturous to your eyes, hands or psyche. Then you will fall asleep at 1:00 a.m. and pray that those teenagers appreciate that more than five hours went into creating these beauties, and that their aunt did not buy them at Claire’s Boutique in the mall. Even though you picked out the most complicated designs ever, I still love you, Judy.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

North and south of the equator

Skipper Butterfly and Bumblebee on Buttonbush bloom, photographed at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Saguaro National Park in Tucson, Arizona

Saguaro cactus photographed in Saguaro National Park, Tucson, AZ

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Garden Club Craft Night, 1.8.2007

I’ve been a bit of a slacker as the Head Weed of my garden club for the past couple of years, for which I apologize profusely to my Weedettes. I came across this fun project where everyone painted garden signs on little strips of wood that Michael prepared for us. I printed out phrases that the Weedettes transferred with carbon paper and then painted with regular acrylic craft paint. Michael had pre-drilled holes at the top and bottom of each plank so that we could string them together with rusty craft wire. We enjoyed the wintertime craft nights so much that Karen suggested we switch it to a craft club instead. Other crafts we did included cement leaf casting, making topiaries, garden photography, sculpey clay jewelry, mosaic mirrors, floral acrylic painting on canvas and floral pins made from felted wool sweaters. Come to think of it, I do miss hosting these creative get-togethers. I’ll make a concerted effort to organize some events in 2012.

I prepared this collage and sent it out later that night as a recap of the event. Looks like a bunch of happy crafters, don’t they?

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

From the travel archive: Sunset at Solomon’s Island, MD

Solomon’s Island is located at the southern tip of Calvert County, where the Patuxent River meets the Chesapeake Bay.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

What happens when you stop to photograph burros in Arizona

Circa 1990s, road trip with Michael in the wilds of Arizona. We stopped to photograph some adorable burros and before we could get out of the car, they decided to join us! Scanned from color transparency film; most likely shot with my Nikon N90 and 35-70mm lens

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

A bird’s eye view of Pixel and Lobo

Allow me to introduce Pixel and Lobo, the newest additions to our household. They’ve been with us for two months and are now almost seven months old. Pixel is the tabby and Lobo (Spanish for “wolf”) is the silky gray one. Both are boys and very rambunctious.

Our 11-year-old cat, ZenaB, isn’t happy but she’s very curious about them. We lost our beloved Jasper, a tabby who looked a lot like Pixel, a year ago, and we thought maybe ZenaB might benefit from having another cat (or two?) again. After two months, she’s well aware they’re not going anywhere, but that doesn’t stop her from growling continuously at them when we try to put them in the same room. So, in the interest of peace, we are introducing them v-e-r-y  s-l-o-w-l-y, a few minutes every day. Pixel and Lobo call the guest room home base but sure do love to run loose on the main level. We wait until ZenaB has decided to go downstairs to my studio and then we let them run loose for awhile. My friends have asked why I, as a photographer obsessed, don’t have more photos of the kittens yet. Have you tried photographing a kitten? These two are too wired to get closeup portraits!

And, as pet people tend to do, we call them almost everything but their given names. I wanted to name them Pixel and Jpeg, but Michael liked Lobo, so I conceded. We also consider Grayscale or Halftone instead of Lobo (both I thought were cute). Pixel, who was scrawnier when we got him, picked up the name “Lil Bit,” and Michael still calls him that. Lobo has been called “Smokey Joe” on numerous occasions. When he looks at you head on, he really does look wolf-like—almost like he belongs on a Twilight poster. I hope to get some more artsy photos of them soon—if they would only sit still long enough.

The sky is ablaze and all I have is Michael’s iphone and we’re in an ugly strip mall parking lot.

Such is life…but it was such a spectacular sky that I simply had to share this image I shot last weekend. And no, the color was not enhanced in Photoshop! We thought about driving back home (just a few miles away), but after I shot this image, the sky started changing quickly and the opportunities waned. Just picture mountains and saquaro cactus silhouetted against this awesome sky. Sometimes ya gotta work with what ya have and shoot where you are.

Eye candy, batch #4

Sigh…culling through my archives, in preparation for my March/April 2012 exhibit, is making me want to photograph blooms and bugs right now.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Carpenter bee on Blanket Flower

Carpenter bee on Blanket Flower (Gaillardia grandiflora) ‘Oranges and Lemons’ cultivar

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

From the archives—missed this one!

Just found this composition in my archives—this shoot was particularly successful in the number of solid images I produced, so I see why I overlooked this one. This was a tulip growing in the conservatory; variety unknown. Enjoy!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

There aren’t enough hours in a day…

I was trying to open a jpg image in Photoshop and got this progress bar below. I guess I have plenty of time to make more oatmeal cookies if I felt so inclined.

How not to bake

Many of you may have read slept through my recent posting titled Wannabe Kitchenista. Apparently I haven’t yet given up the yearning to master all things kitchen since yesterday morning found me in the kitchen at the way-too-early-on-a-Sunday-morning time of 8:47 a.m, setting up shop to bake seven dozen (yikes!) oatmeal cookies for a cookie exchange the same day. I had at least four hours to accomplish this task, so piece of cake cookie, right?

I had the foresight to mix the batter the night before (industrious, aren’t I?), so all I had left to do was prepare teaspoon-size balls and start baking. Our stove runs cooler than the temperature I had to set, so after carefully bringing Batch #1 to completion, I determined that I would need exactly 12 minutes of baking time to get soft and chewy cookies.

Everything went fine for Batch #1-5. [Yay, me!] Just two more to go. And Nancy, the host of this soiree, said one batch was actually for me to take home, so I figured if I screwed up Batch #7, it was no great loss, right? I put Batch #6 into the oven and decided 12 minutes was plenty of time for me to check my e-mail really quickly.

Mistake #1. A minute of e-mail time turns into several minutes of blogging and then I remember the cookies. In my little cooking-challenged brain, I thought, “The timer will have gone off; the cookies might cook awhile longer in the residual heat, but the oven isn’t still actually on, right?”

Misguided Notion #1. It dawns on me at this point that the timer doesn’t actually turn the stove off; it’s simply an indicator to take your creation out of the oven. Duh. Yes, I’m sure that deep down I knew this fact. Fortunately, no smoke detector had gone off and the kitchen wasn’t overcome by noxious fumes yet, either (although I did see a tad bit of heat rising from the top of the oven).

I opened the door and saw the blackest cookies I have ever seen. Rock hard and black as coal. Culinary weapons, they were, like throwing stars straight out of a Bond flick. So, what was I, a guest at the “7 dozen, please” cookie exchange party, to do? I had to make another two batches from scratch. Lesson learned, I stayed put for the next 24 minutes, monitoring them diligently.

I toted my 84 cookies to the exchange, made some new friends, and let my host’s husband have my batch of oatmeal cookies. I don’t want to see oatmeal cookies ever again. What did I learn from this little experience?

Baking + e-mailing = throwing stars.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Below: my new not-cooking-challenged friends

Eye candy, batch #3

Pulled from the archives of my personal refrigerator magnet poetry, and created with a garden-specific set of magnetic poetry (yes, there is such a product!), I give to you my handcrafted poem attempt #2.

in my garden
through spring and summer
flower bulb root sprout vine tendril emerge
brown earth explodes with life
struggles in the harsh noon light
blooming yellow red blue fresh
quietly full and wild and fertile
bug & bee work hard & long
and a thick green eden thrives
a blanket of peace rustles
beneath sunshine and shade above
I weed cut grow protect
then breathe relax reflect listen live
murmuring come here sacred rain
water more this labor of love
this canvas my art
soft sweet sanctuary

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eye candy, batch #2

Pulled from the archives of my personal refrigerator magnet poetry, I give to you my handcrafted attempt #1:

January snow blanket melts
cold February moon gone
March winds a memory
a luscious light envelopes
tiny crocus petals whisper spring
most delicate green grass emerges
rain sweetens the earth
bird song filters down
from the impossibly blue blue sky
warm breezes weave through
a gorgeous tapestry of color

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eye candy

I’ve been going through my garden photography archives from the past six years, searching for images that I might use for my first exhibit since college (the covered wagon days). I’m scheduled for a solo photographic exhibit at Green Spring Gardens in Alexandria, VA from March through April 2012. The reception will be held Sunday, April 15, from 1–3 p.m. (Yeah, I’m well aware that it also happens to be dreaded tax day—take a break, come see me, eat some appetizers, and buy something so I can recoup my investment in this show!) So mark your calendars and get your taxes done so you can come see me! Even if you can’t make the reception, remember that the show runs through all of March and April. The horticulture center is open seven days a week, 9-4:30 on weekdays/Saturday and 12-4:30 on Sunday.

There will be more details to come, but I must say that I’m really jazzed about it. The horticulture center is really a lovely place to exhibit art and I’m honored that I’ll be having my work showcased in one of my favorite gardens. Thanks to Katie Delgado for introducing me to Green Spring Gardens more than five years ago. I had no idea such a lovely little park existed in our area. Many of my favorite botanical images were created there. And finally, thanks (in advance) for all the professional matting and framing work my father will be doing for me next month!

I’ll have matted/framed images, gallery wrap canvas images, and unframed/matted images available for purchase. A percentage of sales goes to Green Spring Gardens. My dear friend and Hearing Loss Magazine editor, Barbara Kelley, will be catering the event in her capacity as Kelley Hospitality, and I’m very excited about having her assistance with my first show since my college days. Check out Barbara’s hospitality blog here.

Below is a collage of just some of the images I’ve pulled out that are under consideration. It’s been raining for a few days here in my neck of the woods and I needed to see a good dose of color to lift my mood. Enjoy!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Wannabe kitchenista

Let me begin this post by stating that I am not a cook. I can count on both hands and both feet the number of times I have actually cooked (not an exaggeration). It is one of those endeavors that I wish I had the patience and skill to do. My mother was a wonderful cook. Both of my sisters seem to enjoy the task as well and are good at it. I have cooked so little that I can actually remember almost every attempt in the kitchen. Yes, I have had some successes. I make a crazy-good basil pesto (and lots of it) every year. (Last year’s posting on making pesto, along with the recipe I use, is here.) My cooking repertoire now includes a wonderful pesto chicken dish and my go-to grilled chicken dish with mustard and tarragon (courtesy of Martha Stewart). I can add my friend Barbara’s Baked Cranberry Orange Sauce to that tiny list of culinary accomplishments. It shouldn’t surprise you that my idea of a great (solo) dinner is a well-made sandwich—wheat bread, light on the mayo, turkey and cheddar cheese, with potato chips shoved in for texture—although a bowl of Cap’n Crunch is a close second. If it weren’t for Michael’s kitchen skills and cooking patience (aside from that one incident where he inadvertently poisoned me one Thanksgiving with a partially cooked ham), I would still be eating 10 for a $1 chicken-flavored ramen noodles and burned biscuits. (Did I mention how much I love 90-second rice in a pouch and Bird’s Eye Steamers?) Below are my top five memorable moments in the heart of the home.

1) Steak & Au Gratin Potato Dinner
Picture this: I am a college student, still living at home. My mother, sister Debbie, and her husband Bill are visiting relatives in Georgia. Kelley and I are left to fend for ourselves. My dad is working the 4-midnight shift as a Customs Inspector at the port of Brownsville, Texas. I decide that dad needs a good home cooked meal and I’m just the chef to do it!

I decide he needs a manly dinner—steak and potatoes. I’m assuming we already had these ingredients in the pantry because shopping in a grocery store was a foreign concept to me (and it kinda still is). As a rookie in the kitchen, I do not know how long it takes to cook a steak. Al Gore hadn’t yet invented the internet, so I didn’t have a recipe site to double check. I can’t ask my mom or sister because they’re out of the state. I can’t call dad to ask him because that would spoil the surprise. Dad doesn’t get home until 1:00 a.m. I start cooking at 9:00 p.m. Yes, you read that right. Four hours before he will arrive home from work.

I start the steak at 9:00 p.m. and continue to warm it up, over and over and over (and over) until he comes home. Can’t have steak without potatoes, right? I raid the pantry and discover an au gratin potato mix. It calls for x amount of butter and I decide (as if I possess years of culinary know-how to deviate from a tried-and-true recipe) that x amount of butter doesn’t look to be nearly enough. I add double that (or maybe it was triple?). It officially becomes the worst au gratin potato dish the world has ever seen. To this day (honestly), I cannot look at nor eat au gratin potatoes. They were that bad. Paula Dean might have eaten them, though—the gal does love her butter.

I hear my father’s car in the driveway and run to greet him. “Dad, Dad, Dad! I made you dinner.” He looks at me suspiciously since he has only seen me in the kitchen when I’m passing through it. He sits down to the seven-times-warmed-up steak (think shoe leather) and the butter-overdosed au gratin potato side dish. After the first bite, he gingerly asks, “umm…when exactly did you start cooking the steak?” I’m sure after I went to bed, he probably ditched it and headed for the Raisin Bran.

2) Some Kind of Pie
After perusing some magazine of my mother’s, I decided I was going to make a pie. I don’t remember what kind of pie it was, but I do remember my attraction to it—it was garnished with beautiful fall leaves hand cut from pastry dough. I spent an interminable amount of time cutting out the leaves and fluting the edges of the pie crust top and bottom. I was exercising my creative muscles, but it was exhausting. Then I read how long it took to bake—45 minutes. 45 minutes? Are you kidding me? I don’t have the attention span to wait that long. I remember running to my mother and begging her to watch it for me. What a saint she was…come to think of it, I don’t remember cleaning up the mess I made, either. I do remember that it was quite a lovely pie visually. And isn’t that all that matters, really? A for effort!

3) Rice Krispy Treats
When the recipe for rice krispy treats calls for butter, use it. Do not try to use I-can’t-believe-its-not-butter because it is not butter. Trust me on this. If you do, your treats will be swimming in a sludge of yellow liquid when you take them out of the oven. No one will eat them. Your boyfriend will laugh at you. You will never make rice krispy treats again.

4) Roasted Vegetable Soup
A few years ago, I decided that I would surprise Michael by cooking dinner (it always surprises him when I cook, so it’s a predictable reaction). It was winter, so what would be a better dish than a hearty bowl of soup? I proceeded to pick out the most complicated recipe in one of the many cookbooks I collect. (Don’t you judge me; I’ll get around to them some day.) Roasted Vegetable Soup. This complex recipe (I’ll bet it was one of Martha’s) required a trip to the grocery store, where I discovered that red and yellow peppers are not cheap. I loaded up on red, green and yellow peppers, yellow squash and green zucchini, onions and tomatoes. I roasted all the vegetables and then made the soup. It took forever. Remember, I’m now in Virginia, so I couldn’t beg my mom to finish it for me this time. Michael came home and was drawn in by the wonderful scent wafting from the kitchen. He settled down to a heaping, hearty bowl of soup and proclaimed it a winner, gushing and complimenting me on the dish. Devoid of expression, I announce that he will never have this dish again. Ever. So he better enjoy the leftovers.

5) The Ole Meat-and-Cheese-on-a-Toothpick-in-a-Grapefruit Appetizer
Some of you are old enough (go ahead, admit it) to remember the 70s and the meat-and-cheese-cube-on-a-toothpick-stuck-in-a-grapefruit appetizer. I realize this doesn’t entail any cooking, but I clearly remember making this kitschy appetizer. I remembered one time my younger sister and I asked if we could have a party. At the time, she was in junior high and I was in high school. We got permission and one of the appetizers we made was the skewered grapefruit sculpture. The property we lived on had a grove of grapefruit, orange and tangelo trees, so obtaining the base for this delectable was as easy as stepping out the back patio and plucking one! Tiny half inch cheese cubes stacked with ham slices (or was it dad’s bologna we raided?), then skewered on a toothpick and stuck into a large grapefruit—how retro! (As I’m reliving this memory, I’m half tempted to host a “back to the 70s” appetizer potluck just to see what my guests bring.)

AN ADMITTED BIBLIOHOLIC
In my career as a graphic designer, I have designed the covers and interiors of more than 50 books, both hard and softcover, on a wide variety of topics. I am also an admitted and unashamed biblioholic. I love books. I love well-designed and well-written books. Coffee table books, fiction, non-fiction, reference, graphic design, photography, art, craft, gardening, travel, poetry. All have their own sections in my library. On more than one occasion I have bought a book simply because of its beautiful design and compelling photography (one such book is a photo essay about octogenerians).

So despite my clumsiness in the kitchen, I adore a beautifully designed cookbook. And for some reason, cookbooks always end up on the extreme bargain tables, therefore I have amassed quite a collection of them. I love the more contemporary look of food photographs today and love perusing blogs by cooks who are both great in the kitchen and at photographing their dishes. I think it’s partly due to the styling and texture in the photographs that I am drawn to food photography as of late. I love the idea of being a great cook—they make it seem so effortless and so rewarding. It is a creative endeavor that also melds all of the senses.

POTS AND PANS AND GADGETS GALORE
I love the gadgets, pots and pans and the multitude of serves-only-one-purpose items that cooks covet. I drool over the Williams-Sonoma catalog. Last year, my friends Gina, Karen and Rob gave me a beautiful white KitchenAid mixer for my birthday because I had once said to Gina, “if I had one of those, I know I would be baking. I just know it.” I’m happy to report that it has been used several times. The first time it was used, Gina and I baked (way too many) Christmas cookies for her friend who is serving in Afghanistan. I recently used it to make pumpkin bread (yes, it was edible). For my birthday this year, Michael bought me a mini-pie maker. It has since produced four chicken and pesto pot pies, as well as cherry and apple pies. We’ll make a (mini) baker out of me yet.

IF-IT-DOESN’T-HAVE-FREEZER-BURN-THROW-IT-IN-SOUP
On Monday night, I decided to clean out the freezer and anything that didn’t have freezer burn (boy, were there a lot of bags that fit in that category!), went into my no-recipe-soup, which I like to call “If it doesn’t have freezer burn, throw it in soup.” Via telephone, my sister Debbie was my sous chef, advising me to throw in rice, a can of diced tomatoes and various spices. It was quite tasty and Michael consumed two bowls of it when he got home from work.

I am a Restaurant Impossible junkie (even if I think the two-day, $10,000 budget, and Chef Irvine’s overly dramatic demeanor is a bit much at times). I love watching Chopped, Cupcake Wars, Giada at Home and The Next Food Network Star. Watching those shows makes me want to learn how to really cook. I would love to immediately know what to do when I’m handed a basket containing boxed mac & cheese, gummi bears, canned cream of mushroom soup and string cheese.

But most of all, as a lover and maker of images, I love looking at simple, contemporary photographs of food. So, when I helped my friend Barbara decorate her Thanksgiving table this year, I offered to bring some backgrounds and set up shots of some side dishes that she had prepared in advance. Check out her Holiday Pumpkin Cookies recipe here. Her husband, Bill, is in charge of making the annual ever-changing pecan pie. This year’s concoction is Pecan-Bourbon Pie with a Touch of White Chocolate. Since this dessert is created sans recipe, he can’t really share his formula with you, but you can read all about it here.

FYI, for those of you who don’t already know it, Barbara’s father, Johnny Garneau, invented the salad bar “sneeze guard.” Yes, it’s true, and you can read all about it on Barbara’s blog here.

I always approach my photography with a graphic designer’s eye. I believe that is evident in my photographs—whether I’m photographing people, flowers, landscapes or something edible. Composition remains my main priority, no matter the subject. If you can hone just that one skill in photography, the rest—lighting and post-production—will follow. I don’t know where learning food photography could possibly take me, but it’s a lot of fun when I have a chance to do it. Who knows? It just might inspire me to spend a bit more time in the kitchen, camera nearby. Michael might just get that roasted vegetable soup one more time.

Photos © Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Re-post: Just how many hats does one girl need?

One of the blogs I subscribe to is The Jackie Blog. This morning I received a post from her titled, “Enraged Knitting for Beginners,” which I thought was funny and it reminded me of my experience with trying to read crochet instructions. My friend Nanda tried to teach me knitting a few years ago. I got the hang of it (if only briefly) and made what amounts to a not-so-absorbent coaster (I was aiming for a scarf, actually). Crocheting seems so much more productive and efficient to me. Knitting seems like 800 steps to gain a couple of inches. Maybe it’s just me.

Remind me to show you a photo of the technicolor eye sleep mask I crocheted for Michael on a flight back home from visiting my family a few years ago. Just 20 minutes after he said, “man, I wish I had one of those eye thingies so I could go to sleep,” I completed my version of a sleep mask for him. He did not hesitate to put it on and promptly drift off to sleep. This was particularly funny to me because it looked like a coat-of-many-colors-pre-teen training bra over his eyes. To create it, I crocheted two 3-inch circles and connected them in the middle with a one inch chain. I crocheted two long chains and attached them to the side of each disk so he could tie it around his head. (I had to tear the yarn to make each component since you can’t bring scissors on board.) I really didn’t think he would actually wear it, but he apparently has no shame. What a (sleepy) trouper he was (is)!

Below is a re-post of my crocheted hat obsession from September 2007. Now that winter has arrived and the garden is tucked in for the season, the yarn and crochet needle should be making an appearance soon.

Just how many hats does one girl need?

24 hats and counting, apparently—then add a few questionable scarves to the equation. Many years ago, in my formative teenage years, my mother taught me how to do a chain stitch, as well as single and double crochet stitches. That was the extent of my crochet education. (My younger sister, Kelley, never advanced beyond the chain stitch, but I must admit that she can make a really, really long chain stitch!) Sidebar: My Grandma Hester taught me how to use the same stitches to cover aluminum bottle caps. When we got a pile completed, she hooked them together and made dandy little trivets—now available for just 25 cents each at a yard sale near you.

So every few years, tempted by the yarn aisle at a craft store (honestly, what aisle does not tempt me?), I would buy a skein (or two or three) and attempt to make something wearable. I recall almost finishing a project (or two or three), but mostly I remember lots of half-finished unidentifiable yarn projects in a plastic bag in my closet. Fast forward to Christmas about four years ago—we were visiting my family in San Antonio, and on the drive up to see my younger sister in Dallas, I decided that “idle hands are the devil’s workshop” and bought some yarn and needles. I have to do something when I’m in a car for six hours—if I’m not driving, that is. Picking up crocheting again seemed logical. I could arrive in Dallas and still be social, creative, and productive—with something tangible to show at my destination.

I decided I would attempt to make yet another (likely-never-to-be-finished) scarf. With my crochet skills a little rusty, the yarn began to curl and I couldn’t keep it straight. My mom (a.k.a. my crochet guru) said, “well, if it’s curling—make a hat!” Hmmmm…how does one make a hat? I started a chain stitch, then a single crochet, and let it weave into a circle until it began to resemble a yarmulke—since I’m not Jewish, I continued crocheting past that stage. I asked her, “How do you make it go down to form the sides of a hat—do you go tighter or looser?” Since she replied, “Yes” (a non-answer), I asked her if she had ever actually crocheted anything. That’s when I learned that although she knew chain, single, and double stitches, she had never made anything! All these years I had just assumed that the afghans, ponchos, pom-pon hats, placemats, and tissue holder covers on the couches, backs, heads, tables and toilets of friends and relatives across the country were all lovingly crafted by my mother (all of which are now available for just 25 cents each at a yard sale near you).

I just began to wing it, and I stopped at the precise moment it resembled a hat (see photo, second row, 2nd hat from left——this is my first hat). I did this without any instructions, unless you count my mother’s advice. Mom wasn’t much help past the yarmulke stage, and reading crochet pattern instructions would make my brain hurt.

Never seen a crochet pattern? Here’s just a sampling of the (it’s Greek to me) language of crochet: to shape crown: Ch 1. Rnd 1: Work 7 sc in first loop to form ring. Rnd 2: Work 2 sc in each st. 14 sts now in rnd. Rnd 3: Work [1 sc in next st, 2 sc in foll st] to end of rnd. 21 sts now in rnd. Rnd 4: Work [1 sc in next 6 sts, 2 sc in foll st] to end of rnd. 24 sts now in rnd, etc.

Now, I’m smart enough to know what the abbreviations mean, but if I have to keep reading something in order to make it (sort of like having to read an entire software manual—who really enjoys that?), it kind of zaps the joy out of creating for me.

So, I confess that I am crochet-pattern-challenged, and must do it by sight, trial, and error. If my goal is a hat, I crochet until it resembles a hat and then I stop—ditto with scarves. Something must be working with my rather crude system because here I am—24 hats and 7 scarves later. I can make a hat in about an hour and a half (pretty quick results to satisfy a creative streak). It started out with simple hats made from one kind of yarn and has evolved (as you can see in the photo) into fuzzy trim and appliqued flowers. I cannot make a simple hat—it has to be embellished now. You’ll notice several of the hats are plain—this was practice until I had the shape down pat. Then I got brazen and started adding fuzzy borders, balls, bric-a-brac, and brims.

I crochet on road trips and instead of telling someone how many miles it is from here to there, I tell them, “That’s about a 3-hat trip for me!” Making hats (too many) is something to do during winter when I can’t putter around in the garden. Some I make as gifts, but most I hoard for myself.

And for an amusing take by another blogger on what not to crochet, go to the site below. Also look at “Top Posts” on the right and see some other funny crocheted items; the “Thongs” posting is funny, particularly the responses from readers.

http://whatnottocrochet.wordpress.com/2006/05/28/tissue-box-covers/

http://whatnottocrochet.wordpress.com/2006/12/10/thongs/

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