Tampa Art Festival

Well, it wasn't actually in Tampa, it was in Wesley Chapel which is basically a suburb of Tampa.  The art festival was pretty awesome, the weather was absolutely perfect.   Here's a photo of my booth :

I actually have a banner that says "Jennifer Simpson Art Photography" but this is my new jurying photo so I had to blur it out lol.  I was happy with the booth, it looked all golden :).This was my second out of state art show, my first this year, and I do believe I'm hooked lol.  I love the traveling aspect of it, staying in a hotel, the sense of adventure.  How fun!

Oh, my long lost blog

The wedding was amazing and beautiful, the weather was perfect.....everything was relaxed, casual and fun with a laid back soundtrack and an easy going pace.   Richard and I had both our families there,  our parents, kids, and siblings as well as a few very close friends that might as well be family.  The setting was on the river with orange and gold leaves still on the trees and the water a deep blue/gray/green in the background.   We decorated with daisies and pumpkins, the bouquets looked like they were picked in a field of wildflowers.   The colors were orange and pale aqua and yellow and chocolate brown.  It was so pretty and informal.   There were even little tiny creatures (spiders maybe?)  trailing little threads of gossamer through the air all over the place.  That sounds kind of disgusting but it looked so pretty and magical lol.  Just little sparkling threads of silk floating on the air whenever  you looked toward the sun.   It was like fairy guests LOL.  Ok, maybe I'm romanticizing it a bit....but it was really neat.  We don't have any photos back yet....I'll post some when we do.  We went to Asheville for our honeymoon, we stayed at the Residences of Biltmore,  a super nice hotel right at the gates....if you get a chance to go to Asheville, NC, I highly recommend it.  It had a separate kitchen with full sizes stainless steel appliances and granite countertops....a living room with an awesome fireplace a separate bedroom, huge bathroom with a two person shower and jacuzzi tub.  So very romantic :).

Getting married November 7th

I've been quite a bit busier than usual trying to get everything organized.   Well, my mom is doing the majority of the organizing as far as catering, layout, tent rentals etc. but that leaves me with dress + jewelry shopping for everyone, honeymoon reservations, picking colors, cake inspiration, guest favors, etc etc.  I've absolutely loved going through all the wedding amazing-ness on Etsy - I'm really trying to have a mostly hand made wedding.  It's obviously in the fall, it's outside and I'm hoping there will still be some leaves on the trees.  The colors are orange and pale aqua.  That's my favorite combination in my artwork right now so it's what's inspiring the whole color scheme.  Richard and I bought a house together over 3  years ago, so I guess this is just making everything official lol  - it will be nice to have a ring on my finger.  It's going to be a very small wedding, family only - the kids will be our bridesmaids/groomsmen.  It works out well that way, 2 girls and 2 boys (3 are mine and 1 is his).  And they're all around the same age - between 17 and 21.   Wow, that makes me feel older seeing that in writing.  I got married and had my kids super duper young though so I spent my entire 20's raising children (as did Richard). Now that they are older and pretty much on their own I get the opportunity to recreate myself and focus on who I am and who I want to be and I get to do  it while married to my best friend :).  I'm really looking forward to this next chapter in our lives.

I bought an old Volvo station wagon

Yay! I'm so excited. I bought it from a fellow vendor at the Knoxville market named Dave (thank you Dave!). I can actually take all my stuff now and fit it in. In the Maxima, I had to lay the front seat down and my tent went from the front seat all the way to the back seat and all my art, etc was crammed on top of it. Nobody could ever ride with me ever. Now I have a whole empty seat next to me which is just lovely. Here's a photo of my beautiful car :) :





We had just finished washing and waxing it. Red's not my color, but I have some big plans as far as paint, etc. This is my blank canvas lol. I'll have to post photos as I do things to it. I really want to take some photos of my booth and put them on here too. My daughter Mia is going with me to the Chattanooga Market tomorrow - it will be her first time. I actually have a free front seat now. Yay! That's a picture of Mia, she'll be 17 in a month, she's my baby, my youngest :). So, I'll try to take some photos at the market tomorrow and get them posted.

I hope it's a great day :).