Drawn the Road Again

Category: Folks

  • Farm to table

    Farm to table

    These are not sketches of veggie bins at the farmer’s market—this is what our back porch looks like every year at this time. When we’re at home, the Tailor and I eat almost entirely seasonally and locally (what can I say—we’re weirdos). So that means we buy all of our winter vegetables in November, and…

  • Detour

    Detour

    For as disorienting as being awoken before dawn by owls can be, it’s nothing compared to how it feels when you suddenly find yourself on the opposite end of the country than you planned to be. When you’re expecting to land in Houston, and what you get is a hurricane in your path, a sudden…

  • I see dead people

    I see dead people

    Okay, you’re going to think I’m a total weirdo for getting so excited over bunch of headstones (and I have many, many more sketches than these…), but since it’s Halloween this week, I figured I could get away with it. I have to tell you, I have a serious, major thing for colonial graveyards. My…

  • Tea for two

    Tea for two

    Speaking of Canadian fall color, almost exactly two years ago I had the chance to stay at Victoria’s Empress Hotel, and see its climbing ivy in all its autumn glory. Both then and just recently, when the Tailor and I visited Victoria together, a major highlight of the visit was the Empress’s world-famous High Tea.…

  • Tourist (lobster) trap

    Tourist (lobster) trap

    No trip to the Maritimes is complete without a good lobster meal (or two, or three…). And a pound of fresh lobster looks mighty impressive on a plate—good drawing and good eating. Now, a fifteen-foot, fifty-ton roadside lobster statue? That’s something I could sink my teeth into.

  • Memory lane

    Memory lane

    There’s only one drawback (no pun intended!) to the sketching trip I’m currently on—and that’s that I’m missing my ten-year reunion at RISD this weekend. So to all my friends from college who are whoopin’ it up this weekend: I’m raising a glass to you from afar!

  • Studio soulfood

    Studio soulfood

    My friend Jessica and I had the opportunity to teach a letterpress class at Penland last year. For one glorious week we got to immerse ourselves in Penland’s unique studio culture. Somehow these folks seem to have figured out the secret to bringing out an artist’s best work. Step one: put them in a beautiful,…

  • Bottled up

    Bottled up

    You know how much I love kitschy restaurants and giant statues of random objects—so you can imagine how happy I am whenever the two are combined into one. And when said eatery serves up a mean huckleberry shake to boot—you can bet I’ll be a fan for life.

  • Portland pig-out

    Portland pig-out

    Portland is absolutely chock-a-block with edible kitsch. This is the city that’s home to the neon pink doughnut shop filled with naughty puns, coffin-shaped party boxes and velvet Kenny Rogers paintings. The artisanal salumeria that made a tongue-in-cheek cameo on Portlandia. The coronary-inducing but oh-so-delicious pork-sandwich lunch counter, appropriately (or prophetically) named Lardo. The trouble…

  • Cropping up

    Cropping up

    I spent one of my teenage years living on a rural military base in North Dakota. An interesting side effect of having to bus half an hour into town every day for school is that I learned to recognize every type of crop in the fields along the way. But when I moved to Washington, where…