Black Widow vs. Long Horned Beetle. These beetles are about 2” long, flying, can dent a car, and nasty. They are invasive and eat the roots of trees. So the spiders are doing us a favor but at the same time having giant widows around the house is not optimal.

New growth in mid August! This summer hasn’t been as hot as last, so far.

New seating area looking north. Good for sunset watching. Olive tree is getting a soaking.

I came up out to stay for four days in August, and by some miracle the weather was not too brutal (yes, about 107 mid afternoons, but cooling down well at night). My goals were to meet some friends, go to life drawing group, and water the plants before school starts.
But the barn called me. I took some paintings into the space to see how they might work for the Hwy 62 Art Tours in October. I will show Hill&Stump in the barn, and new desert work in the offices. But the sickly green and oily fingerprints on the walls of the bigger office space (pictured above) wasn’t cutting it. So impromptu spray out and two coats of paint later, we have a white box gallery!

We are not painting the small office with the bureau in it, the patina there is really beautiful. Am hoping that we will have many wonderful art shows in the Dairy Space!

Even when we are not at the Dairy, work continues thanks to our fabulous handyguy, Matt. He’s rebuilding out barn storage room, repairing the roof (again) after wind and monsoons, and continuing to haul out trash one truckload at a time. He also added supports to our patio, which was starting to lean badly. We are grateful to have found such a great guy.