Real Patriots

Several weeks ago on a Friday morning, I drove Highway 16 all the way from Lindale to Gladewater to do a little antique browsing.  As I was driving down the road enjoying the country setting of the two lane highway, I couldn't help noticing all the homes along the way that were proudly displaying their American Flag.  It was no where near July 4th, and Memorial Day was long gone.  It didn't take me long to realize that these flags are proudly displayed year round by these proud people.  By the time I started noticing all the flags on this little country road, I had already missed several photo opportunities.  I decided on the way home, I'd stop and photograph as many as I could.   In a span of only 23 miles, I calculated that there were about 60 flags flying, based on the photos I took.  I have to share these with you.  Lots of photos so sit back and enjoy.  I picked out the best ones.  Most of them were shot out of my car window so pardon the unedited photos.

 

Wooden Flag:

Hard to find this one but it's all the way on the right side.

 

Flag is next to the front door.

 

I asked this sweet man if he would pose next to his flag.

 

Flag displayed on cyclone fence:

 

Stars and Stripes:

 

In the carport

 

On a fence post in the middle of nowhere:

 

On  a gate:

 

In an entryway planter:

YOU'RE HALF WAY THROUGH

On a child's tree house:

 

 

Next to the workshop:

 

On the front porch with the Christmas Decorations:

 

On trees:

 

On barns:



 

VietNam Veteran

(check out his 'America' T-shirt)

 

In buckets:

 

Behind Shrubs:

 

Over garages:

 

Multiple Flags:

 

Vacant houses: 

 

Old flag:

 

Next to street:

 

Next to front door:

I realize this is a long post, but you just had to see all the flags.  I photographed many more, but these are the best of the lot.  It's simply amazing that there were so many flags on such a quiet country road.  It makes me proud! 

Have a nice week!

American Grafitti

A few weeks ago while I was in East Texas at my lake house, I decided to take a back road all the way from Lindale to Gladewater to check out the antique stores.  Along the way on highway 16, I ended up in the sleepy little town of Winona, Texas that has one  blinking red light.  These two very interesting buildings caught my eye.  I would love to find out the story about how this art work came about and who the artist is to give them due credit.  Amazing work I must say and so creative!  How many familiar characters do you see in the painting?  Please post your answers on this blog for all to see.  There are some I recognize, and some I don't, like the octopus in the bottom center.  (double-click on the image to enlarge)

Here's a better photo of the train and the track.  Look at the detail and how the artist captured the effect of the train coming around the corner.  Awesome.

Just to the right of this is another building that appears to be someone's residence.  I stood in the parking lot for a few minutes trying to figure out the artist's interpretation of this work.  Wilma Flintstone and Barbie.  Does anybody have a clue?  Again, I would love to give the artist due credit.

Here's a closeup of 'Wilma Flintstone'.

Here's a closeup of 'Barbie'.  She looks like the original 1959 Barbie doesn't she?

On my drive back to Dallas on Highway 80 I stopped in the small towns along the way, including my home town of Grand Saline.  I love very old buildings and would love to do a little research to find out the origin of the building and the history of the tenants.  This building is next to the old movie theater that has since been torn down in Grand Saline.  Does anyone know the history they can share?  I'll bet all the Grand Saline readers could tell a story or two about the Grand Saline movie theater!

_{^{I'd love for each of you that remember the theater to post your most vivid memory here.}}

Next stop was in Wills Point, Texas.  This old building now houses a darling quilting store, but I wonder if anyone remembers what was there, say back in the 1920's.  Comments?

A couple of weeks ago, the Sunday edition of the Dallas Morning News posted an article on the front page of the 'guide' section about this movie theater in Wills Point.  It is supposedly the oldest operating movie theater in NORTH AMERICA!!!.  How cool is that?  Such a beautiful theater and I believe there is concern that it might be shutting down soon.  How sad.

While posting these photos, I got a bright idea that the next time I'm in Grand Saline, I'm going to find someone that has access to all the buildings along Main Street that have been abandoned and see if I can get a private tour of the building.  I want to find out the history of the buildings and find out what types of stores occupied them back in the day.  That will be a future post I'm sure.

Be sure to add comments below if you have any interesting information to add or share.  I am very, very interested!

Til next time~

Ladyfingers Side Patio Makeover Part III

So finally I'm posting the rug I almost put out with the Tuesday garbage pick-up a few weeks ago.  It had stains and gunk all over it, and thinking it was ready to toss, while dragging it out to the street, I got an inspiration and made a u-turn back to the garage.  I remembered I had a stencil upstairs in my craft closet, and some left-over black Ralph Lauren paint from years ago.  Basically, except for the 2 cans of spray paint I purchased, this project was 'free'. 

Here's the original rug.  I just went head-first and started creating as I went.

 

I added a little water to the black paint and just stippled it on to the rug.  It's so porous, it took a little time to do this to get good coverage.

Next, I just laid the stencil on the edge of the rug and painted the leaves lime green, and the little flowers hot pink.

I didn't go to extremes to lay the stencil out perfectly, I just lined it up where I thought it should go and started painting away.  I love the way it turned out.

 

So here's the rug with the chairs I re-did a couple of weeks ago.  This is still a work in progress so I'll be posting photos randomly when I complete the next step.

Enjoy!

Bling-Bling Skirt

I found this awesome skirt at Salvation Army several months ago and wore it to work for the first time on Friday.  There are yards and yards of fabric in this skirt and lots of silver sequins stitched all over.  I found little trails of them all over the office during the day as some of the not-so-well-stitched ones fell off.  Kind of funny to see a trail of sequins on the floor at all the places I had ventured during the day.  Ah well,,,for $7.99 who cares?  I got the belt for 99 cents so beat that if you can!

 

The necklace is from Charming Charlies.  What a perfect match! 

 It's pouring down Rain in East Texas and I hear frogs croaking near the lake's edge.  I love rainy nights, pizza, wine. Nothing better!

Have a nice long weekend!  I'm going to try to photograph some fireworks on Sunday night.  It's pretty tricky to get the camera set up correctly for this type of photography, but I'll show you what I take no matter how they turn out.