October is Shaping Up to be a Good Month

Wow, another fantastic weekend here, with absolutely gorgeous weather. A little more summery than I might like for October (fall's my favorite time of year!!), but beautiful, nonetheless.

I started out the day on Saturday going on a home tour in my neighborhood with my mom. There were ten homes on the tour, and they were all ones that had had some remodeling or major renovations done to them. It was really interesting to see, and some of the homes were so beautiful!

Unfortunately (but understandably) we were not allowed to take photos of the homes, so you'll have to make do with some of the fall photos I snapped as we were walking between houses.

The maple in my yard.

Saturday afternoon and evening was spent at the St. Paul Art Crawl. I went with my guy, and we had such a good time. We had dinner at the Black Dog Cafe, and then went on to see the art.

One of the things that I had read about ahead of time was the art vending machine, which I really wanted to make sure I got to, so it's where we headed first:

A number of different artists made small, cigarette-pack-sized, original pieces of art. The art was then put in this vintage cigarette vending machine. For $5 you could purchase a 'token':

You popped your quarter into the machine, pulled the knob for the artist you wanted:

And out came your mini original work of art!

They had examples by each artist on display, but the one that you got was a surprise in terms of the details.

This was the first one that I got out of the vending machine. It was so much fun, I couldn't resist getting one more!

I chose another one by the same artist. I thought the bunnies were so stinkin' cute. (Sorry, no link for the artist. I simply cannot find her online anywhere! When/if I do, I will add it in).

My guy chose this one, called Penelope:

Pretty darn cute, too.

At the next gallery we went into, I was immediately taken with this display:

I love, love, love the style of this artist, DC Ice.

She was so nice and friendly. We got to talking for a bit, and I learned she had illustrated several children's books, including this one which I just couldn't leave without:

She even signed it for me:

I also bought one of her works of art that was on display (it was so, so hard to choose just one):

Most of her pieces had really interesting/funny/unique titles. This one, entitled 'Chlorine Dog,' was not as long or funny as most of the others. But she told us the background story to this painting and the title, and then it became very interesting, and extra-special.

A studio/workspace in one of the galleries.

Another place we stopped by was Play by Play Theater Bookstore. We really just happened to stumble upon it when we were going from art studio to art studio. But I was so pleased to find it! It used to be at a different location, and I loved going there. When it closed down, I assumed it had gone out of business. But I talked to the owner last night, and she said that she had needed to move buildings because the owner of her previous location had sold the building. All her things for the store had been in storage for months, but she had finally recently re-opened it in this new location. It was quite serendipitous that we happened to find it!

Play by Play

And finally, the last piece of art from the evening:

This is by an artist named Chris Shockley. I fell in love with this the instant I saw it! So very Coraline. :) Love those wooden button eyes! This one is destined for my craft room.

Wow, that was a lot. I actually had more from this weekend that I wanted to share with you, but I think it will have to wait. I've gone on long enough for now!

One last thing I want to try to do this weekend, but I don't know if I can stay up for it on a school night - the finale to Mark Mallman's 78 hour show. Yes, that's right, he's playing for 78 hours straight, and it's all ending tonight. He has a lot of wonderful local musicians joining him. I'd love to see part of it; we'll see if I make it. (If he can play 78 hours nonstop, you'd think I could stay up a little late on a Sunday...)

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend wherever you are!