A friend recently sent me this photo.
What a place of honor! Of course, it could have been just set up for a photo shoot, but still. . . this cabin looks to be the perfect combination of rusticity with elegance. And knowing my friend, I’m sure it is fabulous!
You too can have your own fancy looking book called The Cabins of Wilsonia. (But you’ll have to find your own table-top easel.)
While working on The Cabins of Wilsonia, I took 2 friends for a short driving tour of the cabins. One of them laughed at me when I said for the fifth or sixth time, “This is my favorite cabin!” She wondered how many cabins could possibly be my favorite.
There was a pattern. All of my favorites had shingle siding. Have a look at a few:
Look what happened to my own drawing studio as a result:
My studio as it looked while I was working on the book.
My studio as it now looks.
For tickets: http://www.artsconsortium.org/sovast
The upcoming book The Cabins of Wilsonia is an album. It is a collection of pictures designed to show the overview of a cabin community. It is pictures of the typical, pictures of the unique, word pictures of cabin life expressed in stories from cabin folks. It is designed to show the many architectural styles within the community. It is a medley of little details, such as the way the sun lands on something ordinary and makes it beautiful. It shows things that are ordinary to cabin life that may be unusual in “normal” life. It is a picture of cabin life in the 20th century. It is pencil drawings made from photos that I spent days and days shooting, editing, cropping, choosing, and three years putting together. It is the celebration of a very special treasure of Tulare County and Kings Canyon National Park.
It is not a directory of cabins. It is not a comprehensive, all-inclusive list of every cabin. It is not a history book. It is not a complete representation of every one of the 214 cabins in Wilsonia. It isn’t photos. It isn’t a list of cabins that used to be there. It isn’t a collection of cabins that currently belong to the Park. It isn’t a hastily thrown together piece of work.
The Fourth of July is a busy busy time in Wilsonia. When my husband (AKA Trail Guy) and I arrived, our host had posted a schedule of events in our cabin.
We headed over to Grant Grove for the annual parade. It is a parade with few entries, but all are patriotic and enthusiastic.
This is possibly the most impressive horse I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Ever.
Motorized vehicles were more common than horses. They hold more waving people than a horse does.
Then, I went to work and pre-sold some books, The Cabins of Wilsonia. Please excuse me for being redundant here – Google likes to see what a blog is about within the blog because it helps them find whatever people are seeking, and I hope people find this blog if they are seeking the upcoming book The Cabins of Wilsonia. (STOP IT!)
Trail Guy and I took a walk around Grant Grove Village. He found his favorite flower, a leopard lily (AKA Tiger Lily). If you want to know more about Trail Guy and wildflowers, the info is in my other blog. It will open in a new tab so you don’t lose this window of The Cabins of Wilsonia. (STOP IT!!)
I photographed a cabin to draw again. 268 drawings – you’d think there’d be nothing left to draw of the cabins of Wilsonia (not the title of the book here – will Google notice?) However, you’d be mistaken. This will be a commissioned drawing – photos have been ordered, and I’ll provide sketches too so that this very gracious cabin owner is thrilled with her original pencil drawing of her cabin of Wilsonia (I SAID STOP IT!)
It wasn’t all work. We joined our dear friends from Wilsonia on a walk. It wasn’t really a hike because we took no water, snacks or daypacks. Trail Guy is explaining things about the area. He knows a lot and is great to have on the trail.
The Manzanita/Azalea Trail has a great view. The cabins of Wilsonia are down there in those trees. (Would you please just STOP IT?)
Okay, I’ll stop it now. 😎
Did you know that the more decisions one has to make during the course of a day, the more depleted one’s mental strength and willpower become?
This could be why I feel tired. (Or is it the mural I just finished? Maybe it is that old treatment plant for the neighborhood water system that I helped demolish. . . )
Here is the next slate of decisions before The Cabins of Wilsonia goes to press:
1. Re-evaluate the cover and end-sheet colors when the paper sample arrives.
2. Decide when enough proofreading is enough.
4. Figure out how to convert the whole shebang to a PDF. (Will the computer challenges ever end??)
5. Figure out the price of the book.
6. Figure out the right discount to offer as a pre-sales incentive. You all have to have a reason to hand me your hard-earned dollars before a product is available!
Will I see you in Wilsonia over the Fourth of July weekend?
Getting closer every week. . . closer to what? Getting the book, The Cabins of Wilsonia, to the printer, that’s what!
Shooting stars are small, but in great numbers they make an impact, just like all the tasks left to do before the book goes to the printer.
What’s left?
1. Figure out how to align the page numbers perfectly so when you flip through the book, they don’t jump.
2. Redo the page numbers, which are off because I added 4 more pages in order to have multiples of 16.
3. Make sure the page numbers match the table of contents.
4. Write the acknowledgements page (and stop asking people to help because the page will need to be revised every time someone new helps!)
5. Decide if I want a Library of Congress Card Catalog Number.
6. Figure out how to convert the whole thing to the format required by the printer.
7. Count my pennies to see if I have enough to start the printing process.
8. Oh yeah – choose the paper for the pages. They don’t have my first choice, so I will have to be sure that I don’t get careless and accidentally choose my third choice instead of my second.
Small stuff, except for that page number repair business.
See how all those small shooting stars make an impact when assembled in a meadow. Very soon all my small drawings will be assembled in a cover!
There are over 200 cabins in Wilsonia. I have eddresses for about 40 of the cabin owners. Once in awhile I send out an email update on the project.
Now that the drawings can be sold, I emailed each of the folks whose eddress I have, folks I thought might like first dibs on buying the drawing(s) of their cabins.
I sent this drawing to a couple.
As I looked at it on my screen, I thought “HEY! Why are the lines on the roof crooked??” Then I hit Send anyway.
The next day I went through my photos to see how I could have made such an amateurish drawing mistake. Yikes, the humiliation.
This is what I saw:
The lines are crooked on the drawing because they are crooked on the roof. I bet you probably can’t even figure out what was bugging me here!
Allll righty then. Confidence restored.
After some computer research into Adobe Photoshop, which sells for about $600, I learned that Photoshop Elements, the dumbed down program for hobbyists, sells for about $60. If it is “dumbed down”, a degree in advanced computer design may be required for the big girl version!
Perhaps by looking through the window as I did when beginning the project all full of excitement and hope will restore a bit of excitement and hope as I recover from some hard truths.
I bought Photoshop Elements and it should arrive within a week. Because it is by Adobe, the same outfit that made the program I used to design the book, I’m hoping the learning curve won’t be terribly steep. A few years ago, I dabbled in the very earliest version of Photoshop Elements, so maybe this won’t be too hard. Lots of maybe and hope there. . .
The Book Designer recommended a book printing company in Michigan. I sent the preliminary info for a preliminary estimate on the cost of printing. One of the questions was “How many book titles do you publish a year?” Heh, heh, heh. My last book was printed in 1998. That would make about 1/16 of a book title published per year.
Now that the drawings are finished (with the possible exception of a couple of do-overs and some frou-frous for wordy pages), it is time to work on the written parts.
But first, let’s take a little break and enjoy some sunshine.
First, the chair is my redwood throne, made by Bob Kellogg of Three Rivers. I noticed 2 of these chairs on the deck of a cabin on Fir Lane (FINALLY know what to call these streets!) and was aghast, nay, HORRIFED to see they had been painted. When I reported it to Bob, who is in the category of My Amazing Friends, he said he was the one who painted them, because they are not redwood. Always good to go to the source.
Next, there is a lovely blue garment, a congratulatory gift for completing the drawings in 2013. I LOVE blue, particularly this shade, and THANK YOU, PAT!
But wait! What else is blue? It’s a new briefcase to carry my laptop back and forth between the house and the studio. The old one developed holes on the bottom, and then the zipper permanently unzipped itself. It did pretty well considering I got it for free for joining the Book of the Month Club back in the 1980s.
I thought I could sit in my throne in the sunshine while wearing my new blue top, and work on the written parts of the book. Nope – it was too warm and too sunny too see the screen.
P.S. I’m sure that tree is leaning because Perkins The Outdoor Cat has been scratching on the same side, trying to push it over since it was planted in 2002.
P.P.S. (I think that’s the right to indicate a second post-script) I KNOW the studio needs painting. I’m busy putting together a book. Priorities, priorities. . .
I know how to draw in pencil, and I know how to draw cabins. In spite of having put together The Cabins of Mineral King, I have a little bit of fear. It doesn’t paralyze me. Instead, it keeps me on my toes.
The fear is that the book might look like “loving hands at home”. In order to avoid this dreaded description, I plan to hire a book designer as a consultant. Hopefully, he will prevent me from making any lame-o mistakes.
Okay, Mrs. Book Builder, gaze upon the lovely blue shutter and think calming peaceful thoughts.