Let's try this again

     I'm guessing that after going back to work as COVID was waning, I stopped writing here and honestly forgot about this blog. I was dealing with memory issues after the car wreck. I was missing lots of pieces of memories for about a year and a half. What seemed to help was diving head first into my artwork, sans blog.

     I went full time as as artist Aug, 25th 2021. I had been doing art festivals on the side for over ten years, nut just in my home state of Oklahoma. My first out of state show was in Evergreen, CO and I killed it! The following weekend was another art fest in the same town and even in the same park, so I was a bit worried that maybe that town had had it's fill on the first weekend, but no, it was the same results! I was officially off and running as a full time artist. That fall, I had not booked a lot of shows because of deadlines missed since I still had a full time job when those deadline passed. But, I started applying to shows for the following spring and summer of 2022. I ended up doing 26 festivals in '22. I had shows in Oklahoma, Colorado, New Mexico, Nebraska, Texas and Arizona. I bought a travel trailer and new truck to pull it. It was crazy, exciting super fun, a ton of work, and way too expensive. I met so many artists on the circuit and learned something from everyone of them. Of course there were awesome shows and there were not so great shows. One thing that kept me motivated and positive was an idea that I kept in my head, and mentioned to other artists that may have been having a bad show. The thing I kept saying and fully believing (still do) is "A bad day at an art festival is, and always will be, better than clocking in for someone else". My summer was truly spent camping in Colorado, going to art festivals on the weekends to make money, and fly-fishing and creating more art during the week. One can only be so lucky!

"A bad day at an art festival is, and always will be, better than clocking in for someone else"

My travel trailer under the Milky Way while camping in Silverton, CO. Photo by Trayson Conner.