We go to the Tempe Art Festival every year we’re here. Lots of arts, lots of crafts, lots of music AND lots of food. What could we not like? And, of course there’s the ‘A’ hill to climb. But, we’ve not gone to the Fountain Hills Arts and Crafts Festival. Well, this year we remedied that and what fun it was. Beautiful setting near the lake there. But the art - stupendous. We saw some beautiful things that, if we had a stick house, we’d buy. One woman had a 2’ x 3’ picture of a wave coming in.
White foam cascading over the top, blue sky and clouds with all different shades of blue in the ocean waters. Beautiful from afar but, get close, and you’ll note that it is all embroidery. Tiny stitches overlapping to make the colors blend yet seem distinct. The small sign under it said that it had taken her 3 months to complete it and I have no doubt about this. So realistic.
We saw several gourd artists but one stood out with carved openings in the gourd, turquoise pieces inlaid and many small geometric carvings all over it.
Big crowds and this was a Friday. Imagine the crowds tomorrow.
Of course, I say I’d buy it but then I’d have to cough up the money. Fat chance. We did find one vendor that we bought something from: the Tupperware lady. Yep, 5 hours at the Arts and Crafts Festival and we walk out with Tupperware. How sad. But - we don’t have a home to display all the art. We bought a Navajo rug several years ago and have room to display that. But more display space is hard to find.
We supported the Kiwanis and bought a brat to share and then supported the Rotary and bought a piece of fry bread to share. We had sprinkled confectioners sugar all over it and were munching down when a lady at the end of the table looked over and said: ‘You two are so skinny, I can’t believe you’re eating that.’ ‘Yeah, but, I haven’t eaten for 3 days to earn this,’ I said. Smart mouth that I am. But I smiled and we both knew we were both joking.
After we had walked every inch of the Festival we toured the lake along the path. I sat next to Thomas Jefferson as he explained his Declaration. (One week later and you can still see where I fell on my knee. Not pretty.)
and waited for the ‘on the hour’ fountain stream. Sure enough, at 4:00 on the dot, it started, small but kept getting higher and higher. Wow, what a sight.
The fountain was installed as a tourist attraction for Fountain Hills. (Hmmm, wonder where they got the name for the town?) It was listed as the tallest fountain in the world by the Guinness Book of World Records from 1971 to the late 1990’s. It operates every hour on the hour from 9 am to 9 pm, drawing from a 33-acre, million gallon lake and reaching a height of 330’ with only 2 pumps (remember a football field is 300’). On special occasions, the fountain can attain 560’ with all 3 pumps running. If the winds exceed 10 mph, the fountain will not operate. The wind was more than that this morning but calmed down by 11:00 and the fountain began to rise. You can see the white tents of the festival behind the fountain.
There is a disc golf course around the pond. One of the holes is very near the lake. And, here are 2 golfers who came prepared with fish line, trying to retrieve their discs from the lake. They were at it for 5 minutes at least while we walked and they were still at it as we passed. Good luck, guys.
We really like our new refrigerator which has a water and ice dispenser. Sure is great on those hot days. I can just fill it with ice and water and I’m set. But, we think we’ve got a problem with it. (Remember, we bought this in September.) It’s not getting as cold as it should. A while ago, about 2 weeks after we got it installed, we noticed a strange smell - no, not food. A plastic burning or wires burning smell. Gary looked around, but couldn’t find anything that might have caused that. So we tried the old baking soda trick. And, slowly but surely the small dissipated. Check 11/17 for the continuation of the story.
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