Sylvia's Farm

This is one of the most beautiful places I know of in the outskirts of Sacramento and it's where we were invited to have our annual summer Gourd Club Potluck. Well, it's almost getting to be a TRADITION. The weather was delightful! We all arrived at 10:00 a.m., greeted by Sylvia and her husband. We unloaded food and supplies, said our hello's and then got down to business.

We had a "show & tell" for new pieces that had been completed since the last meeting. Only two of us finished our puppets but there was other really interesting and beautiful gourd art on display. I introduced GOURDO to everyone and he immediately fell in love with the little goat puppet.
Our president helped us start a mask, from cutting a chosen gourd in half to deciding what we will want to do with it and placement of the eyes, nose and mouth. You kind of have to plan ahead on these masks so you have an idea what you want before you start drilling holes and adding features. The "puppet lady", who taught us to make puppets last month, brought a mask that she had completed. That would be the wolf in the bottom middle picture. Scary isn't it? She was even surprised that it turned out so downright menacing. I think she did a great job on him. He was a good example of what we could do with our "half of a gourd". It gave us motivation. We worked all morning on these masks.

Around noon we had a delicious lunch on Sylvia's back porch. She used real plates( not paper ) and different colored hankerchiefs for napkins. What a great idea..., and then, with our tummy's full ,we took a tour of her garden.
Sylvia's gourd patch goes on FOREVER and she has many different kinds of gourds growing beautifully for next Springs use. They need to dry all winter, or at least 6 mo's, and sometimes up to a year, before you can use them for artwork. See the sweet baby gourd in the bottom left corner?( click on photo for a close-up) Those will be good for pins and ornaments. They're so cute! The photo on the bottom right shows just some of her dried gourds. She had a whole barn filled with drying gourds too. She is the quintessential "crazy gourd lady", only she's not crazy at all and she will sell gourds to anyone in need..., and sometimes she just give you a few on the sly.

Thanks Sylvia. We had such a good time.

P.S. Gourdo wants to thank Madeline of Madeline's Album (in Alabama) for coming up with his name. He forgot to tell everyone that she was the person who gave Farmlady the name that seemed the most perfect for him. Thank you Madeline. It's just the best name and he wants you to know how much he likes it.

On June 15 Madeline posted this on her blog. I love it.
I don't think she will mind if I share it with you.

"Live simply.
Love generously.
Care deeply.
Speak kindly.
Leave the rest to God."

It's a good thing for everyone to remember, including myself.