My belated Christmas wishes for everyone!

Been another hectic holiday season for me and everyone, I'm sure! But I wanted to pop in here to wish you all a Happy Holiday Season. Here is the pressed flower card that I created for this year. I miss my beautiful cardinals that were so abundant where I grew up in North Carolina and in southern Missouri where I lived for 16 years. Sadly, we don't get these beautiful red birds here at my feeder in South Dakota. But I had a joyous time creating them from my summer petals and leaves! Wishing you all much peace and joy in the new year!

Made it into the South Dakota Magazine...second time...pinch me!!

What a year this has been!!! You might have seen the nice little article the South Dakota Magazine folks did about my 'Mt. Rushmore' pressed flower art in their May/June issue this year. Well, now I am in the November/December issue! I got a call from John Andrews, their Departments Editor, in September. He was working on an article about his travels along our SD Hwy 20. He remembered my art from the previous story they did and wanted to see the rest of them. I had all my art in Watertown getting scans for fine art prints made so I met him at Expressions Gallery, where I have two of my originals. I just received my issue in the mail the other day and I'm so pleased with the article! John did a wonderful job! '...but still speaks with a slight Southern twang'...nawwwww...not me!

Here is what John wrote in the above article:
Eight miles down the road lies Wallace, birthplace of US Senator and Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, though the sign announcing the town's claim to fame no longer stands along the highway. In Wallace we met Marie Ann Robinson, the state's only pressed flower artist. She gathers flowers, leaves, fruits and vegetables from her yard and creates award-winning pieces of art.
She showed us a sample of her work. In a Black Hills scene, a flowing waterfall is made from onion membrane, and the rocks are mushrooms. In another, the wooden walls and floor of a weathered building are day lilies. Robinson explained that after they die and are rehydrated, lilies develop a deep brown color and resembles wood grain when pressed. Her interpretation of Henri Matisse's Woman With a Hat uses peony petals, poinsettia and white poplar leaves. Robinson's popular South Dakota series includes pheasants, mallards, geese, buffalo and a work in progress featuring wild turkeys.
To prevent deterioration, the art is secured with aluminum tape and sealed beneath a layer of mylar and two pieces of glass. Oxygen absorbers and silica gel packets remove any moisture, so any changes in the botanical material won't be noticeable for decades.
In the early 1990's, Robinson was arranging wreaths and working with live flowers when she found a lily of the valley pressed in the pages of her grandmother's Bible. She learned about pressing flowers and began making small bookmarks and magnets (some are for sale at Watertown's Expressions Gallery, where you can also buy originals or prints of her larger pieces). Then a friend gave her a book on pressed flower art and she expanded into bigger pieces. She joined an international pressed flower art guild on the Internet, and learns many of her techniques from Russian and Ukrainian artists, including a new framing method that is similar to vacuum packing the art within the frame.
Robinson has lived in South Dakota since 2002, but still speaks with a slight Southern twang she developed growing up in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina. She and her husband, a Webster native, lived on an acreage near Clark, where she tended 12 flower beds and a large vegetable garden. But a few years ago she decided to downsize. The flower patch at her Wallace home is considerably smaller, but she still finds what she needs around town and by exchanging materials with fellow artists.

Sunrise in South Dakota...awsome!!!

We were at our place on the lake this past weekend and up early, of course, so my husband could get out there and hide in the pre-dawn...waiting on the ducks to wake up. He didn't shoot any ducks but I got some nice shots of our beautiful sunrise. Love the sunsets, too, but the morning sun comes up over the lake and colors up the sky and the water. These will be my inspiration shots for some pressed flower pictures I hope to create this winter. Enjoy!

Leaves are starting to fall...let's remember summer!

We have had a very cool September here on the Great Northern Plains! Leaves are turning lovely shades of yellow...little bits of red and orange...mostly in the sumac. This year we even got to wear our shorts for a week or two. And got to jump in the lake! The gardens did well. Just wish the tomatoes had a bit longer to ripen. I still have some cosmos and marigolds blooming...most everything else has finished up. Now time to put the garden 'to bed'. I will pull out the Queen Ann's Lace and the Ammi Majus that would self-seed the world if left to their own devices! But the perennials I pretty much leave as they are till spring. The top growth catches the snow (don't even want to think about this stuff too much just yet!) and helps protect the plants from our occasional temps of 30 below (and really don't want to think of this at all!). Here are some pictures of my summer garden on Nine Mile Lake and my garden here in Wallace. Enjoy! Think of winter another day.

SD Public Broadcasting show about my gardens and art!

Just like magic...I'm right there on TV!! What an exciting evening for us! And it turned out pretty well, I think, considering I was a nervous wreck throughout the 4 hours of taping and interview. Rina and Joel were very professional and did an outstanding job, first of all trying to calm me down. Rina's dialogue was perfectly accurate and Joel did a great job of filming and editing the piece. Thanks to both of these wonderful young people! Here's the link:
http://www.sdpb.org/tv/shows.aspx?MediaID=58521&Parmtype=TV&ParmAccessLevel=sdpb-all

SD Public Broadcasting will air my interview on September 2 at 8pm!!

What a wonderful job these young folks did to make me feel comfortable during my interview! I was very impressed with their professionalism. Rina did the interview and Joel did the taping. Four hours and four tapes later I enjoyed their company for lunch.
I think it all went pretty well. I only had to stop them once, in the beginning, so I could catch my breath and get some water to help with extreme dry mouth...stress responses are noooooooo fun! The weather cooperated. No rain and no wind...a miracle in itself these days here on the Great Plains!
Now to wait for the airing of the segment on 'Dakota Life'. It is scheduled for Sept. 2 at 8pm and will run at other times during the entire month. And Rina will send me a copy of the segment on DVD...maybe they will let me post it here!

More news!!! Gonna be on TV!

Well, I was just thrilled to have an article in our own South Dakota Magazine...and now I just found out that South Dakota Public TV wants to do a segment on my gardens and art for their 'Dakota Life' show!! Blew me away!
This is what happened: about 5 years ago my husband, Loren (I call him my biggest 'cheerleader'!), emailed the show to tell them about my art. Well, we never heard anything and soon forgot about it. Then the other day I got an email from them saying they want to do an interview and taping. Thank goodness I just finished my spring cleaning! Now to hope that we don't get any bad storms to tear up my gardens. They will be coming out next Wednesday, Aug. 4th. Already losing sleep over this! But should be lots of fun, too!