Indeed, we’re waiting for dinner and then either we will go out or stay here. Kim and I have hooked up, sort of, with the British contingent. This is after all an all British organized vacation. We’re just tagging along.

Today, the weather and the snow was California perfect. It was around 28 degrees F, between -5 and -2 C. (I think it actually got above freezing today.) Much better than yesterday. We took a lesson, ach, there goes the British, ;-), today and then went skiing. The snow was so soft that it slowed everything down, making the blue trails (green cicle in the US) bunny trails and the red (US = blue square) trails blue (US = green circle) and the blacks more reddish etc. I got to practice my parallel stop, read hockey stop.

We´re having a good time in the inn we are in. The innkeepers are very nice a speak a little bit of English. My German is much better and so I can do more than get by.

All over the trails, there are lodges cum cafes cum restaurants, called Alms, usually with Hütte or hut, in the name. So, we have not had to use our water bottles or the camelbak. Today, we stopped in a picture perfect, sun beating down, winter wonderland, with wait service and outside chairs and chaise lounges. That beats California all to heck and gone. Had lunch and a couple of drinks (Jagatee) and then went out a skiied for another 2 hours. I also practiced and got my hockez stop working, kind of, and really got my glide going. (Remember we’re doing XC skiing here.)

Vienna was fantastic. However, I gained a ton of weight, even though yes we were walking everywhere. We had a great time and the advent markets, though more commercial and we thought they’d be, were fun with lots of Glühwien (glög) and Maroni (chesnuts) roasting on an open fire. I was ready to get out of vienna and start traveling. Salzburg was great but too citified for me. Innsbruck was a nice change but again, city and no skiinig. However, this is in the middle of basically no where or at least no where-esque and it’s beautiful.

Manni, our instructor, is pretty good. Now as good as some of our Aussie instructors but good. This place gives Royal gorge a run for it’s money even though no real ski in or ski out from this hotel. However, it’s cheaper and we get our own room. Though at Royal Gorge they give dinner every night.

We had a nice torch lit walk to an Alm for dinner last night. Real torches, not flash lights, and up the side of the moutain to Möserersee Alm. Mösern is the town’s name and See means lake. Möserersee. Good food. Real good. Pork roast. We’ve been happy with the food. Breakfast is coldcuts and müseli and you can order a perfect soft boiled egg for extra money.

There is only one or two beers here in this country. I ain’t kidding people. We’ve see Steigl and a Dunkles or Malz, a dark beer and maybe one or two more. Vienna had a couple more but that’s a big city. Here it’s a bleedin’ wonder when we get the Dunkles. (Oops, the English are rubbing off on me. 🙂 America has surpassed Europe, excepting Belgium, in beer manifacturing and has surpased all of Europe in variety. Yeah, we rock.

Having said that, this is a wonderful place to ski, eat, drink beer or just look at the beautiful scenery. Even when it’s -20 C, 2 or 5 F, it’s beautiful. We’re spoiled with the California temp and Royal Gorge has it’s gorge but that’s just one view while the views here never stop.

Dinner is coming. More later. Oh, and we no longer hurt. Yesterday, we were kaput but today, we rocked. Feelin’ good. Ja, the snow was slow but it was still happening.

So, we are out of practise but the good thing is that the group we are with are rank beginners. However, they made a hugh amount of progress.

Kim and I have our XC snow legs back and the instruction we got was very helpful. We just got back from dinner and the Y and Z on this kezboard is reversed. Zuck.

So, I donät think, oh, look a ä instead of a ‘, that I’ll be able to blog out until I get back home. I’ll trz but this is getting verz difficult.

Well, we are in Mosern bei Seefeld and we are going to go skiing tomorrow. So, we are about to have dinner all together since this is a package. Everyone is from G.B.

We had a blast in Vienna and I think I wont be able to do it justice right now.

Salzburg was good as well. Innsbruck, as my brother Johnny said, is like a snow globe but Mosern is even better at being a snow globe.

More later. Off to dinner.

Well, I just got back from Seattle where it was snowing. Indeed. And once I got back here, it started snowing as well. It’d snowed three inches before I even landed and three inches last night and around 6 inches today. That makes twelve inches.

And the roads are all plowed. Our driveway is plowed and there are no travel watches, restrictions or problems.

If you can get out of your own driveway, then you can easily come here even if it snows on the day you come up. I once drove back from NJ in a blizzard, many, many inches, and instead of taking 2 hours to get home, it took me 3. I was going slowly. So, getting out of your own driveway is your only concern. Here, it’s clear, clear, clear. You are now free to travel about NY.

The makeover of Room 21 (aka: The Harness Room – although we are thinking of changing that name as it sounds a little kinky!) has begun!

It is being painted, as we speak, a nice sunny yellow — sure to brighten anyone’s day. We have a new luxury plush mattress and box spring ready and waiting to be set up and new bathroom fixtures. I still have to shop for a new comfortable chair for the room, new rugs, and drapes. I’m also thinking of getting new lighting fixtures. I’ll be posting pictures as soon as it is finished — which may not be until January, as shopping for just the right furnishings takes some time!

No matter what you want to call it, I’m really excited about our up coming fiber art workshops! It’s great to see how much interest has been shown already. Ruth McDowell’s workshop is already close to filling up!

During this “downtime,” we have been driving around to as many area quilt shops as possible to distribute our fiber art workshop brochure. We have visited many fine shops that I wish I could win a shopping spree in! (But I had to settle for just a few fabrics in each. LOL!) First we hit a bunch of New York shops, then New Jersey, and then Massachusetts. I’ll be adding a quilt shop page on our Fiber Art Workshops website when I’ll list and describe all the shops that we visited.

In New York, much to my delight, we found a wonderful little shop just 15 minutes away from us — Log Cabin Quilts in Ravena. They have a great selection of contemporary fabrics and lots of embellishment goodies. I’ll be working out details for them to put together a trunk show type package that can be available at our inn when the quilt art workshops are in session.

In March, right before the art quilt workshops start we will be upgrading the electrical circuits in the art studio so that we can accomodate lots of sewing machines and irons. We will also be getting some nice ergonomic chairs.

I am remodeling one of the guest rooms this winter — Room 21. It is getting new paint, a new mattress and box spring, new bathroom fixtures, new rugs, and some new furniture. I’ll post pictures when I have some. Right now I’m preparing to do the painting. It will be 3 shades of yellow — from a pale, pale yellow to a nice sunny yellow.

Well, we actually had more than 17. We had 20 staying over, 4 of which didn’t make Thanksgiving but we also had another 3 more guests so we had 19 for Thanksgiving. Some left the next day but most left today. (I’m leaving us out of the count and I may have missed someone.)

We made 2 turkeys with Kim’s stuffing. One turkey was brined and the other was made in the usual fashion with sage leaves under the skin. We had gorgonzola and pecan salad with mixed greens and my famous dressing. I made a great snap pea and onion dressing and a cranberry sauce that was great. I also made a pozole rojo with five types of pork. Kim made her famous pumpkin soup. I also made some sweet potato tamales. We had mashed potatoes and candied yams, my favorite. On the day after, I made a Colombian paella. (That’s with chicken and beef sausage as well as clams and salmon.) Leading up to Thanksgiving, I made Venezuelan Steak and Colombian chicken. Aprepas and also Wiener Schnitzel. (If you’re guessing that we’ll be having some of these great treats next year, you’re right.)

It was a grand Thanksgiving. Plenty of fun. My Uncle Jack and Aunt Pauline didn’t make Turkey Day but did come the next day and stayed the night. My old friend from Smithtown, Donna, came with her mom but left before Thanksgiving.

However, my nieces, sister and brother and their spouses and girl and boyfriends all made it as well as my mother and our daughter. Plus some old friends from CA/Chicago made it, Bill and his family. Cute kids. Stanley came as well as John and his wife.

It was fun. Oh, and yes, we had a nice snow but the roads stayed very clear. So, come on up for the Winter Art Workshops.

Well, we have 17 people staying here for Thanksgiving and another 4 or so coming for dinner and at least another 4 who’ll pop over for dessert or drinks after dinner.

And I took off line 2 fridges. I had to bring one back on line and now I’m cramming everything into just two kitchen fridges and one service fridge. The freezers are still on line. I am going to take one of them off line before we go to Vienna.

I had some very old friends here from my childhood. And I practiced my posole and some other Colombian steak dishes. Very nice.

Melody’s quilts have been exhibited in national shows such as, all the Mancuso shows, the American Quilter’s Society, the International Quilt Festival in Houston and Chicago, and five times in Visions, and three times in Quilt National. Her major awards include a 1995 AQS Best Wall Quilt and in 1998, the IQA’s Pfaff Master of Machine Artistry. She has also participated in exhibits in Japan, Great Britain, the Netherlands and New Zealand. Her experiences in Japan and New Zealand have had a major influence on her desire to focus on teaching.

“As a child I thought being an artist meant only being a painter, so I did everything necessary to live out that role. Painting realistically was my aim and achievement, but it gave me no great satisfaction. In my last semester of art school, a classmate introduced me to quilting and something about its scale, process, and non-pictorial geometry attracted me. Once I made that first quilt I found an excitement that was missing from my painting experience. I switched to making quilts and have never had a moment of regret.”

Melody describes herself as an artist whose medium for the last 23 years has been quiltmaking. She was a professional dyer for twelve years and formed a company with Laura Wasilowski, called Artfabr!k. This creative duo traveled to quilt shows and conferences selling their hand dyed fabrics and threads, while at the same time making award winning quilts and teaching workshops in fusing both here and abroad. The Chicago School of Fusing, a completely imaginary school, became world renowned due to the musical antics of these two artists. Her education includes a BA in painting and drawing from Northeastern Illinois University in1981 and an MA in Fibers from Northern Illinois University in 1994.

InnSane

And we still have plenty of beautiful leaves on the trees. Red, gold, orange, pink, and, yes, green. It was warm and sunny and beautiful.

Boy are you missing out!

Pollo con Moras! Este va a ser una receta que uds ban a comer con gusto!

Well, we have some trick-o-treaters coming up. I have to keep running up and down the stairs! 😉 I may move my base of operations downstairs!

Well, it’s great exercise.

Oh, boy. They are starting to come in droves. When Kim and I lived in Los Altos, CA, we used to dress up and scare the little things to death. 🙂 However, with Kim in Huston, and me trying to run the inn by myself, well, I didn’t dress up. 🙁

And so it goes.

Well, we’ve had a Suicide King, some hippies, a dinosaur, skeletons, Miss Muffet with spider, and Goldie Lock with one bear as well as a host of stuff. I decided that I would put on ma jeans, ma hat, ma boots and dress like I used to dress in Texas. So, for here, this is a costume but I dressed like this for 15+ years.

I let my hair down and I now look like I could play with the band The Outlaws. 😉

Thanks, Kaye, for the wonderful painting of the “cockie”. That is, the painting of the Pink and Grey Galah. It’s a bird people. Fer cryin’ out loud.

I took some pictures and I hope to put it up soonest on the blog. Thanks for the warm regards.

And I’d like to thank all the people who have been sending us cards and letters thanking us for a wonderful time they had. You are too numerous to mention. Louise, yours was the last card. We got it today. Thanks.

See you next year,

Mark and Kim LaPolla

Now, you’ve people have been patient. This is the last set of photos that I readily have. We still need to download a few from the camera but I’ll have to wait till Kim gets back from Houston. She’s distributing brochures and scouting people for the Fiber Art Workshops. Don’t forget to took at the Alternative Menu if you want plainer food.

OK. That’s all my pictures for Kenn’s class. Enjoy.

Well, it’s hot! High of, supposedly 65 degrees but actually a high of 61. The whole week is going to be in the high 50’s and the lows will be in the high 30’s.

It’s so beautiful right now, the grass is bright green, the sun is warm and shining and the wind gives just enough of a bight to tell you it’s fall. If the wind fails to communicate this to you, the trees are bright red, golden, ah, gold, and pink and all the colors of the rainbow. There’s even some green left on the trees, not counting the pine trees.

Pat and Larry Butynski came for a stay here. Lovely people. And remember, read the alternate menu entry for plainer foods.

Winter Workshops here we come!

This is my first time to this quilter/fiber artist mecca. What a fantastic show. What fabulous organization.

Market was wonderful. So many great new products to set your imagination soaring. I picked up a ton of brochures and information. I think I’m going to have ship it back rather than put it in my suitcase or I might go over the weight limit — not to mention having to carry it. (I do not have one of those “new-fangled” suitcases with wheels — a definite must for the next time!)

I also met a host of new people and people I had only talked via email. It is great to put faces to names. I met Gabrielle Swain, Esterita Austin, and Laura Wasilowski who will be teaching for us in 2007. Their work is stunning in person. I peeked in the window to classroom where Esterita was teaching a class and the students work hanging on the walls were fantastic and everyone sounded like they were having a great time.

I also met Laura Cater-Woods demo’ing at the Bernina booth. We are very excited to have her coming to teach for us next year. Her free-motion work looks like such fun and she is such a enjoyable person to be around.

I took a workshop from Pamela Allen, who will also be teaching for us in 2007. She is such a blast! The workshop was great fun and Pamela has such a great sense of humor. Her “quilty” ties are just so cool — like her art, they are embellished to the max.

I also was able to see Katie Pasquini-Masopust again. I took a workshop from her way back at the start of my career as an artist and was stunned by her work then and her new work is even more incredible. I wish it were in our budget to buy one of her pieces. She will also be teaching for us in 2007.

Quilt Market had a good crowd in attendance, but it is nothing like Festival! The vendor aisles are teeming with happy shopper — I being one of them! All the tempting goodies make it hard to remember that I only have one life to live instead of 10.

I’m hauling many pounds of brochures over to the convention center from the Four Season where I am staying — a couple of blocks away. So far I think I’ve carried over about 70 pounds! (Notice how number of actual brochures doesn’t matter – it is the weight!) Now I’m off to carry my next load of brochures. Thank goodness the weather has be beautiful here in Houston — in the 70s all week.

For those of you who want plainer, simpler fare, or if you have are a vegetarian, lactose intolerant, wheat intolerant, or just intolerant, there is always the alternative menu. All meals have plenty of vegetables but the meat, if you aren’t a vegetarian, for the alternative menu will be plain chicken, and other plain dishes, such as chicken. So, get the alternative menu and enjoy.

Remember to tell us (in advance) if you’re vegetarian, lactose intolerant or just want the simple menu. And don’t forget to enjoy yourself.

Flash! See the results of our customer survey!

For those of you interested in the regular menu… During the winter, we’ll be serving German food and some Russian food. Remember, you get basically 3 nights of standard fare, e.g., Maple Salmon, Breaded Chicken, Sole Almondine, and 3 nights of German and Russian food. For weekend courses, it’s a different mix. During the summer program, we’ll be having, besides the standard fare, we’ll have 3 nights of Spanish cuisine. Of course, for the weekend courses, it’ll be a different mix as well.

See you at the workshops.

Don’t forget, we are also starting up art quilt and fiber art workshops. The following is a list of instructors

2006 Weekend Fiber Art Workshops

April 20-23
Fabric Collage
Lesley Riley
Collage, Embellishment and Surface Design
All Levels

October 19-22
Designing Your Own Landscape Quilt
Natalie Sewell
Intermediate Level

November 30 – December 3
Exploring the Surface an Integrated Approach
Judith Trager
Painting, Layering, Applique
All Levels

2006 Week Long Fiber Art Workshops

April 9-15
Releasing the Creative Block: an Introduction to Working in a Series
Melody Johnson
Fusing, Assembly Techniques, Design Variations
All Levels

April 23-29
Tempting the Muse: Beyond the Surface
Laura Cater-Woods
Personal Imagery, Collage, Embellishment
Intermediate and Advanced

October 22-28
Drawing, Painting, Realism in Machine Embroidery
BJ Adams
Layer and Blend Threads for Realistic Images
All Levels

November 5 – 11
Surface to Surface: Pattern in Nature and Fabric
Carol Anne Grotrian
Surface Design with Resists, Stamping, Painting
All Levels

November 12-18
Fabric Painting
Ginny Eckley
Painting, Free-Motion Stitching
All Levels

December 3-9
Designing from Nature
Ruth McDowell
Machine Piecing Techniques
Intermediate and Advanced

Originally Published 10/28/05

She’s having a great time and giving out a bunch of brochures for the fiber program.

🙂

That’s right. This winter, I will be serving filet mignon steaks, with a baked potato and, perhaps carrots or maybe string beans or perhaps, and I think this is the right thing, sautéed beets.

Not just shish kebob but actual steaks cooked to perfection with a little bit of butter on top and maybe some sautéed onions and peppers.

Yum!

With Kim gone to Huston and Quilt Market and the big, 50 thousand people, quilt show to spread the word about Hudson River Valley Fiber Art Workshops, I get to hang all of our paintings and photos and works on paper upstairs. And here’s the cool part, ANYWHERE I WANT.

Some of the hooks that TIsh and Eliot had were out of the way. Ouch.

Plus, I’m doing a bunch of maintenance. Sigh. Still have much work to do. For example, putting storms on the windows of the carriage house. I have them all up for the kitchen, or almost. I can’t find one storm window. Sigh.

Well, we’re still open and we’ve had a few inn guests even with the weather what it is. Today is sunny, finally. Maybe more people from the City will be up.

We have this rather large Jay, that John says is a Stella Jay, that has been eating the ornamental corn on the kitchen porch. We hung up ornamental corn everywhere, both inside and out, and one day, I found it stripped of all the corn. Then I say this big Jay eating it. It would land on the corn and peck at it, picking out each kernel.

In two days, we had three ornamental cobs.

We are still open and the foliage is still not quite completely changed. Well, I best go make breakfast for our guests.

Here are some great pictures of a wonderful workshop. Next year we are going to have to take a group photo of every workshop. I usually photograph at least the first night of eating but sometimes we miss day students.

Wasn’t that fun?

Well, it has taken a while to put these up. I ran out of space on blog spot and when I asked them if I could somehow expand my disk quota, I didn’t get an answer so I put these up on the website and am loading them via an image tag and a URL. Click on the photos to see the larger size.

This was a fun workshop and here are the pictures to prove it. Click on the title of this entry to see the 2006 instructor roster.

Some of these pictures made the website, too. Look under Painter’s Week in the fall. Now all I have to do it put up Backhaus, Salminen, Lawerence, Dews, Painter Week, and so many more. Sigh! Enjoy.

Though, you can sign up any time for next year. See you next year.

Painter’s week was the last. We had a lovely group of people. It was fun and

everyone enjoyed themselves.

I’ll be putting up pictures soonest. Plenty of workshops with pictures

that still need to go up.

See you all next year. Thanks for a lovely workshop season and don’t forget

we aren’t closed. The inn is still open.

Yours,

Mark and Kim LaPolla

(See below entries for new, menus, and other interesting tid bits. Scroll down.)

Date Instuctor Media Location
Jan 15-21 [5-day] Maltzman, Stanley Pastel Out/studio
Jan 22-28 [5-day] Pendell, Debi Mixed/Collage Studio
Feb 2-5 [3-day] Apgar Smith, Betsy Watercolor Out/studio
Feb 5-11 [5-day] Rose, Howard Oil Out/studio
Feb 16-19 [3-day] Carson, Sharon Oil/Acrylic Studio
Feb 23-26 [3-day] Lindsay, Ann Watercolor Studio
Apr 9-15 [5-day] Johnson, Melody Fiber Studio
Apr 20-23 [3-day] Riley, Lesley Fiber Studio
Apr 23-29 [5-day] Cater-Woods, Laura Fiber Studio
May 4-7 [3-day] Woolery, Lois Portrait Studio
May 11-14 [3-day] McFarlane, James Watercolor
May 14-20 [5-day] Wiegardt, Eric Watercolor
May 21-27 [5-day] Painter’s Week All
June 1-4 [3-day] Zhang, Hong Nian Figure Studio
June 4-10 [5-day] Daniels, David Watercolor Studio
June 11-17 [5-day] Rohm, Bob Oil/Pastel Outdoors
June 18-24 [5-day] Hoyt Cantarella, Virginia Oil/Watercolor Studio
June 29-July 2 [3-day] Apgar Smith, Betsy Pastel Outdoors
July 2-8 [5-day] Evans, Margaret Pastel
July 9-15 [5-day] Betts, Judi Watercolor
July 16-22 [5-day] Uhl Spicer, Jean Watercolor
July 23-29 [5-day] Dunlop, David Oil/Watercolor
Aug 3-6 [3-day] Granger, Nessa Watercolor/Collage Studio
Aug 6-12 [5-day] Maltzman, Stanley Drawing/Pastel
Aug 13-19 [5-day] Castagnet, Alvaro Watercolor
Aug 20-26 [5-day] Curtis, David Oil
Aug 27-Sept2 [5-day] Whyte, Mary Watercolor/Portrait Studio
Sept 7-10 [3-day] Rose, Howard Oil
Sept 10-16 [5-day] Mueller, Ned Oil/Pastel
Sept 17-23 [5-day] Taylor, David Watercolor
Sept 24-30 [5-day] Griffel, Lois Oil
Oct 1-7 [5-day] Lawrence, Skip Watercolor/Acrylic
Oct 9-15 [5-day] Painter’s Week All
Oct 19-22 [3-day] Sewell, Natalie Fiber Studio
Oct 22-28 [5-day] Adams, BJ Fiber Studio
Nov 5-11 [5-day] Grotrian, Carol Anne Fiber Studio
Nov 12-18 [5-day] Eckley, Ginny Fiber Studio
Nov 30-Dec 3 [3-day] Trager, Judith Fiber Studio
Dec 3-9 [5-day] McDowell, Ruth Fiber Studio

originally posted 10/09/05. See below for actual news.

Don’t forget to sign up for the winter workshops. They start Jan 15 2006. We already have sign ups.

You can click on the title of this blog for weather information or go to weather.com for more information.

It’s finally gotten below 72 degrees. But cold? Not yet. The leaves are turning colors and everyone is having fun. This is the last art workshop of the year, painter’s week. That’s all the food, fun and camaraderie without the instruction and the tution costs.

One great comment I got, (Loved the Salmon, Loved the Meat Lasagna, Would like to see the Pasta Primavera replaced, though normally we serve that with chicken and everyone loves it), was “please serve the dressing on the side because it was heavy for some.”

Well, my friends, you can always request it on the side. We had one workshop where 1/2 the workshop, about 12 people, got it on the side. So, don’t be afraid to ask for it on the side but do that in the beginning of the night before we toss the salad. Even better, ask for dressing on the side in the beginning of the week. We have all those dressing carafes so no problem.

And don’t forget, we have the alternative menu. That’s all veggies, mostly steamed veggies with some light sauces, like soy sauce. Some of those veggies get served with the regular menu.

It’s been HOT. 80 degrees. I must say. Is this Fall weather? We could have kept the pool open. We needed to have kept the pool open. Sigh.

80 degrees. What IS this, Southern CA? LA?

Diane, part of the wonderful Skip Lawrence workshop, gave us some great cheese and a figs preparation to try together. We’ll drink it with the wine that Pat Dews gave us.

We are touched and happy that you gave us these wonderful presents. Thanks.

And thanks again, to all of you out there, for all the wonderful cards and letters. Not to mention the wonderful comment cards. Thanks to all the artists that gave us art works: Pat Dews, Charles Gruppe, to name a few. And thanks to all the artists that added their fire to this wonderful endeavor.

BTW, what’s the difference between a gift and a present? You have to be present, and present, for it to be a present. 😉

Thanks again. And thanks to all of you for a wonderful season. Next up, painter’s week. (And to all the people who asked: no, I can’t come home with you to cook for you and John can’t come either. 😉

Well, the people from Skip’s workshop are just wonderful. They love the food. They love being and they love Skip. What more can I ask for? Well, they also love John and Victoria, our head waiter and our waitress, respectively.

Well, they love Kimberly and Kim and me. Yes, they love it all. We have plenty of returning people and some new ones. They even set up the studio and what a great job they did.

The maple salmon was a smash hit. Next, it’ll be the chicken.

We are proud to display this wonderful art project by Gerri Barrow. The concept behind this project was for Gerri to paint the creek side pine trees at the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn during each art workshop she has taken. Together, this is an impressive body of work, each tree done after the style of one of our, Hudson River Valley Art Workshops, excellent teachers. These are not in chronological order.

Each painting is of the same pine tree.

And finally, here is the latest one painted at the Brommer workshop. Sorry it took this long to complete the set but this one broke the disk space camels back or something like that.

Pine Tree after Jerry Brommer

Pine Tree after Betsy Apgar Smith

Pine Tree after Tony Van Hasselt

Pine Tree after Robert Wade

Pine Tree after Judy Betts

Pine Tree after Barbara Nechis

Pine Tree after Skip Lawrence

Pine Tree after Alvaro Castignet

Skip Lawrence’s workshop starts today. It’s the last workshop with a teacher. Then there’ll be painter’s week. And then only lodging guests. We’ll still be open as an inn but we wont open again until January 15th, 2006 for the Winter Art Workshops.

Mark is happy because everyone is loving the food. I’m happy because everyone is happy!

Pat and all her students are having a blast. There is paper, paint, ink, plastic wrap, bubble wrap, and all manner of STUFF all over the studio. It’s hard to tell where one person’s work space starts and the other’s begins.

The group is getting along very well, and they have to because there are 22 in the workshop and with all the STUFF it is quite crowded in the studio. We will definitely be planning some improvements. I can’t wait until we can build our big new studio, then the STUFF can really fly.

Fiber artists would love this workshop. I’m itching to try some of Pat’s techniques on fabric.

I made for the maple soy salmon, which they adore, and I made for them the artichoke and turnip, spinach and peppers with soy and pumpkin seeds. I also made a green bean, garlic and pimento dish that they loved. They got this with saffron rice. And of course, they’ll get the French apple pie.

Food Discussion

OK. Now, what desserts from this year would you like to keep. Pick one:

1. Chocolate Mousse
2. Waffles with Ice Cream and Chocolate sauce.
3. Fruit Cup with honey and yogurt
4. Cheese Cake and Strawberry Sauce
5. Lemon Meringue Pie
6. Brownie Pie
7. Banana Bread Pudding with hard sauce

I am keeping the French Apple Pie and the Sabayon. A plain fruit cup will be kept, for those that don’t want sweets. Everything else is probably going. I must have left something off that menu. If you can think of it, vote for it.

InnSane: Blackened Catfish: What to leave in, what to leave out

Here’s a question: if you were going to pick a culinary theme, what would you pick?

Oh, and an anonymous vote always gets the attention it deserves. Thanks.

InnSane

I think it helps if a post has these things in it. I think that’s better than comments. We’ll see. This is a test.

For next year, I was thinking of doing Blackened Catfish rather than the Maple/Soy Salmon or the Sole Almondine. I was wondering what you thought? I’m looking for dishes to keep for next year. Some people were upset that I am changing the menu completely. OK. Well, then, I’ll keep a dish or two but I need votes.

Please send your comments via the comments function here on the blog.

Thanks.

Thank you Gerri for the disk. I will put it on the blog in the next few days. We have Elements so I should be able to read the files.

Gerri has been painting the same pine tree by the creek using the instruction and techniques and influences of eight different instructors. I thought that that was an incredible project. What a beautiful concept.

I had a similar concept. I was going to have a Dejeuner Sur l’Herb (by Manet, nach) as a commission, every year with different friends and/or models in the painting every year.

Thanks also, Gerri, for the beautiful card. We all appreciate it. See you next year at Mary’s workshop. Thanks.