Why the title?

"Pioneers take the arrows"

Oh, wait. I should be upbeat and taking arrows doesn't sound like an upbeat thing to say.

So, let me amend that statement.

It was courage and vision that led the pioneers to leave behind a comfortable, settled life and trek West to begin a new life in a new place. Many of those from the East that went West found a strength within themselves that they didn't see while they were in their old life. Instead of being one of those that just kind of went along with the others in the old life, they became leaders and visionaries in their new lives.

The sentiments of that last paragraph come from a favorite author, Louis L'Amour, in many of his books. So, I can't really say that it is an original thought from me. However, what he said is truthful.

Welcome to being a pioneer. Look ahead and ignore the "barking dogs" that give you negative opinions and comments. Louis L'Amour also spoke of the barking dogs.

In some of his stories, it was usually a father or older man telling a young boy how it was that when the Westward bound Conestoga wagons rolled through towns, the dogs came out to bark at them. His character then told the young listener that the barking didn't stop the wagons from going on to their destinations.

Following the advice of the Louis L'Amour characters, may we all forge ahead with our plans, after carefully considering all consequences and leave the "barkers" behind.

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

More Beauty to Share - Not My Own

Today will end up with a second post. The first was political and with the lack of morals, but this second one will be of paintings, not of my mother, but of other family members and others that were some of her painting students.

While she didn’t take much in the way of lessons from Mother, Jo’s mother, Elma, did do some painting. Most of her skills were with all forms of working with yarn and thread, in the way of Afghans, quilts, sweaters and much more. In a trip to Jo’s sister’s home in Colorado, I found a couple of paintings.

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If you notice the signature, it is actually the cattle brand that Merle and Elma had on all of their cattle. The name given to the brand was “Quarter Circle Bar T.” You can certainly see that the name is definitely similar to the graphic.

The next few paintings were painted by Jo’s middle sister who lives in Tulsa. In honesty, with all of these, I can’t begin to say how long they took lessons from Mother. Nor do I have any ideas as to the reasons they chose the subjects of their paintings.

These first two are from Jo’s sister that lives in Colorado. This first painting is actually one done by both Jo and her sister in Tulsa.

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The next one is one painted by the Tulsa sister.

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The last two were at the Tulsa sister’s house and were painted by her.

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Sometime in the future, there will be others to share. A few were done by various different students and given to Mother. Then later, I have quite a few done by Jo. She doesn’t think too much of what she did, but I did. I’ll be really proud to show those.

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