Houston Brick /Summit Lake

I took a load of my handmade rustic willow furniture to the Houston Brick, an 1845 brick hotel along US 40 in Lewisville. The building has been refurbished by local volunteers and serves as Lewisville's utility office and community center. My friends Sue and Tom Saunders head up a spring, fall and Christmas bazaar that features local handmade arts and crafts. I picked up my items today and looped by Summit lake and saw a wide variety of waterfowl.I like to multitask to make any trip I take an opportunity to observe wildlife. Buffleheads, scaups, pie-billed grebes, a few swans, hooded mergansers,horned grebes and gadwalls.There were several large rafts of coots that have been there for several weeks. I could hear the sound of them swimming and diving despite the fact that they were a long distance away. There were no loons seen today. Lovely sunny day made for a nice drive. I unloaded my stuff and loaded up some curly willow branches to take to the Judge Stone house in Noblesville to make a tree for some pears and a partridge to roost in. The folks at Nickle Plate arts headquartered there are working of decorating for the holidays. My handmade rustic willow furniture will be for sale there during December. My friend Bruce Neccar has a studio there and helped me set up the tree. He gave me a print of a horned owl he just painted today. His bird prints are wonderful and will also be for sale. He and I have combined forces to show his prints in my birchbark frames, which make for a good combination. I went to the Fashion Mall yesterday and visited the new West Elm store which is featuring my friend Geoff Davis' hand carved birds. Nice to see local art out there in a primo location. This Saturday my friend John Bundy and I will exhibit our wares at the Indie Arts Vintage Marketplace at the Fountains in Carmel 9-4. This is a group that has had great success with showings at Glendale this summer. They feature vintage and antique dealers. The Fountains is at 502 East Carmel Drive in Carmel, of course. See www.indieartsvintage.blogspot.com. John is legendary for his carved duck decoys and he and I have partnered to produce a series of tables that feature my rustic bases coupled with his highly finished and colored tops.