Category Archives: Completed

Cabin Life in Wilsonia, Part Three

The saga continues of my cabin life in Wilsonia. This is from only 4 days!! How do people stand the excitement of being there all summer long??

20. Meeting a family from all over California who gathered at their cabin and learning of their very rich history (as in full, not wealthy, although it could have been, but we didn’t get into that!). Almost every time I make new friends in Wilsonia, we discover connections in common.

21. Meeting Katie, whom I talked to on the phone last spring when she scheduled a star thistle eradication spraying appointment for my home in Three Rivers. Really! I recognized her voice when she told me where she works! What a cutie! (Isn’t everyone in their 20s cute??)

22. Re-meeting the superintendent, reassuring him that I don’t have cabins both in Mineral King and Wilsonia and that I am NOT stalking him, and learning that “Woody” is short for Woodrow – would you believe he is named after Woodrow Wilson?? Isn’t that really interesting??

23. Meeting Jill’s brother, Dave’s brother, and Dave’s brother’s wife, who remembers meeting me at my Exeter studio or some show I did way back when. Wow! Thanks, Marguerite!

24. Meeting Ty, who is a fantastic (and perhaps a little crazy) hiker, and hearing his adventuresome tales. This man KNOWS the area!

25. Further cementing my friendship with the wonderful Sheri, who gave me a tour of her beautiful cabin, which is a perfect blend of old and new. (More kudos to the master craftsman Mark Vetter.)

26. Discussing the oddities of running a one-person-business with the very talented and good-natured Paul. We share the inability to properly bill people who have become friends. (DO NOT TAKE ADVANTAGE OF OUR WEAKNESSES, I beg you!!)

Original pencil drawing, Redwood & Dogwood, 14×11″, matted and framed, $400, available for sale here (Please forgive the shameless self-promotion. In spite of all the fun, I am earning a living here too.)

27. Meeting David, who is on a quest to visit every one of the largest Sequoias – twenty? forty? We had such a good time looking through his books and maps – Good luck on this, Dave! I will be in touch as I learn a few facts to share with you.

28. Learning with Dick and Mel how to handle the reproduction of my drawings for this project. No conclusions reached yet, but thank you for letting me practice with you two!

29. Enjoying more of the Best Grapes I Have Ever Eaten In My Entire Life – thank you Jill and Dave!

If you made it to the end of this post, you deserve a reward. How about a little eye candy?

There. Isn’t that restful? I hope you feel refreshed after our WWW (Whirlwind Weekend in Wilsonia)

Drawing Like A Crazy Woman To Catch Up

Miscalculation of the drawing schedule means I have to draw faster. Truthfully, my pencils aren’t moving any faster. By “drawing faster” I mean that I need to work longer days, take fewer breaks and paint even less.

That’s okay. I love to draw. I love to draw cabins. But you knew that, right?

Look at this cute little cabin. I learned recently that it was built by someone from a Scandanavian country. There is a second cabin with a sauna on the side. The whole compound is sort of miniature looking – very very cute place.

Visiting Wilsonia

After spending days, weeks and months just drawing, designing, studying photos and thinking about Wilsonia, it feels almost dreamlike to be there in person.

I was privileged to be a guest in this little cabin:

If it weren’t for the fact that the water heater has only a 10 gallon capacity, I might be tempted to move in permanently. Smart folks, my hosts! 😎 This might be my favorite cabin. (I know, I say that a lot!)

Visiting Wilsonia causes my project to become more complicated. As I become more familiar with the cabins and the community, I get to know them all better and I keep seeing more things to draw.

I redesigned some of the pages to accommodate more drawings, and added several pages. This means that I need to complete more than the 230 drawings on the schedule for 2013.

It might be good to stop visiting Wilsonia until the drawings are completed and the design is set in cement.

But, then I’d miss you all. Wow, your friendliness, hospitality, enthusiasm and support just bowls me over!

Thank you, Wilsonia!

Neal Won!

As an aside, I have an Unca Neil (yep, that’s how we say and spell it), had a friend named Niel, and now I have a friend named Neal who won my little contest. It was a “name that street”, based on a pencil drawing for the upcoming book The Cabins of Wilsonia.

(sorry to be so redundant – rumor has it that Mr. Google can find a site easier if I repeat the important words like “pencil drawing” and “cabins of Wilsonia”.)

As I meet and talk with people around Wilsonia, I often have questions about various cabins and lots. It has been very surprising to me to hear, “We never go to that part” or “I only know my immediate neighborhood”, or “I don’t really know the street names”. Maybe my book will help with some of that by creating interest in other neighborhoods.

But I digress. Neal knew exactly where this drawing is:

It is looking down Pine Street. Since I am not naming cabins in my book, I don’t name them on the blog either. I believe in protecting privacy. Besides, cabins change owners in Wilsonia, and if I name a cabin and then it changes hands, my book will be quickly outdated. Nosirree, I’m going for timeless.

What did Neal win? A package of notecards with this image on the front:

Way to go, Neal!!

Counting Difficulties

Remember I said that all the drawings for July were completed?

Apparently I have a counting problem, or an overeager approach that short-circuits reality.

Now I’m scrambling to finish the drawing quota for July.

Well. oops. Good thing it is still July, or I might have to fire myself.

Your Opinion Requested

When you design your own book, it is hard to know when to stop messing around with the design.

While in Wilsonia last week, I spent time at a cabin that I have already drawn. I wasn’t sure the angle was the best one, but at the time it seemed to be the only one.

I was wrong. Now, I have to decide if it needs to be redrawn. Perhaps I should have left my camera at home for this trip. Decisions, decisions. . . where is the big boss to tell me what to do?? Oh – in the mirror? Hmmm, she doesn’t look adequate for the job. . .

May I have your opinions on this?

Thanks. You can comment by hitting “Leave a Reply” or email me at cabinart at cabinart dot net. (I wrote it out that way because someone somewhere sometime said you shouldn’t put your eddress in your blog or all the robots and spiders and trolls will bother you. Better safe than sorry!)

Just Drawing, and Drawing, AND DRAWING SOME MORE

Excuse me for shouting. I might be getting a little cranky. Heat does that. That’s why people go to their cabins in Wilsonia in the summer – to get out of the heat.

Before I start complaining, I’ll just show you another completed drawing and quietly go back to the drawing board. (Do you know anyone else who can honestly say that?)

I had planned to do a different angle of this cabin. The roof is interesting from that other angle, but the light wasn’t so good. I redesigned the page and chose this angle with its dappled light on the stone chimney.

How to Participate in This Book Project

Greetings, Gentle Readers.

There are 2 ways to participate in this project:

1. Email me your stories and thoughts about cabin ownership, membership in a lovely mountain community, or whatever seems appropriate to you to be included in the book. I plan on including many of your thoughts as quotes

2. Comment on this blog. Otherwise, the sound of crickets chirping and grass growing leads me to believe I am all alone here. Sob.

It has come to my attention that the commenting system on this blog is quite annoying.

At the top of each post it says “Leave a reply” or “# replies”. This is clickable. Click it. Type your stuff into the appropriate places and submit or respond or enter. (I’m fuzzy here because as the “administrator” of the blog, it shows me a different method.)

You will think your comment didn’t go through. It did. It lands in a Spam folder, which I have to open and mark as “Not Spam”.

After that it goes to a “Pending” folder. I have to open that and mark your comment as “Approved”.

I will correct typos and remove anything I deem too personal for the World Wide Web. And, I will respond to your comment.

Then, I will go to the Spam folder, mark my comment as Not Spam, go to the Pending Folder and approve my own comment.

No wonder people don’t comment on this blog! If I knew how to make it easier without breaking the blog, I would. However, I need to go draw now.

Thanks for visiting, reading and commenting.

Drawing # 150 something or other

I remember some numbers, like my second grade best friend’s telephone, or my 6th grade teacher’s birthday, or how many feet in a mile.

But, because the numbers are changing so rapidly, I can’t remember the number of drawing I’m on.

I do remember which street I am on. Park. Park is long. That will be a large-ish chapter.

Pine is next.

What’s Going On Here?

List Lady Here. A progress report, thoughts on building a book, and new information about the arrangement of Wilsonia streets for you:

This cabin on Park Street/Lane/Road/Avenue (just kidding on the last one!) is an architectural design repeated throughout Wilsonia. There were 5 cabins like this. Now there are 4, and one has been remodeled so isn’t immediately recognizable as the same design. Do you know which cabins these are?

All the drawings are finished for June. Yes, you read that right. This is so I can do all of July’s drawings in June. What’s going on here? July is going to be extraordinarily busy for this California artist. If I don’t draw ahead, I’ll fall behind.
I found someone who calls himself The Book Designer. He is a book designer. (Duh.) He helps people self-publish their books. (If they pay him.) I feel greatly reassured that when the time comes to make some difficult decisions such as cover design, typestyles, and finding a printer, The Book Designer will be my new best friend.
Has anyone else besides me noticed all the streets in Wilsonia that begin with “L” are going east and west? This is confusing at times. When I think of all those L streets, I’m flipping through my mental Rolodex, reciting Laurel, Lily, LeConte, Lupine, Lilac. . . sometimes they are alphabetical, sometimes they are random. But I just figured out that they ARE alphabetically arranged in Wilsonia, beginning in the southern end of the community! There’s an AHA! moment!