Category Archives: houses

Woods Hole: doorways

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For the past few months, I’ve been riding my bike around Woods Hole, taking pictures and organizing them in different categories. It’s time to open the summer doorways file and share this selection, before the trees lose their leaves. This orange door and dusty gray-green trim are some of my favorite color combinations.

Buzzards Bay Ave., Woods Hole

Look through the window and see Buzzards Bay on the other side.

Gardiner Rd., Woods Hole

I love the mismatched doors of this gate.

Buzzards Bay Ave., Woods Hole

This house is the only family owned residence on a block taken over by academic buildings and science labs.

Albatros St., Woods Hole

A reminder of warmer days.

School St., Woods Hole

Woods Hole houses

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Over the summer, I took these pictures of some of my favorite houses and rose bushes in Woods Hole. I’ve been riding my bike around these streets for 50 years, but am looking at the same sights with a new eye through my camera.  

Albatros St., Woods Hole

For the most part, the village has charming, modest sized houses on small lots. Many were originally built as summer cottages. With water on 3 sides, growth has long reached full capacity. Values are high and properties are kept in the family, rarely going on the market.

Albatros St., Woods Hole

Does this sound too much like a real estate ad? I just want to give an overview of the neighborhood. So far, the trend toward McMansions has been held at bay!

Buzzards Bay Ave., Woods Hole

Quissett Ave., Woods Hole

Close-ups (cottages)

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I’m a hopeless homebody and have been putting cottages and other cozy shelters in my artwork forever. This first yellow house is from the back cover of  the first edition of Mary Had a Little Lamb.  The board book version shows a portion of the picture that doesn’t include the house.

MHALLchickensWM

This one from You and Me: Poems of Friendship has a ribbon porch roof decorated with tatting.

fastfriendsWM

I used cloth-covered wire to make the gingerbread edging along the roof line in this cottage from The Hollyhock Wall. Looking more closely, there is a lot of cloth wrapped wire in this scene: tree branches, hollyhock stems wicker furniture and straw hats. The dolls are about 1 1/4″ tall.

HHWyellowhouseWM

This is the Russian grandfather’s  house from Peter and the Wolf. See the whole illustration in an earlier story about the CD here.

peterhouseWM

This quintessential  thatched cottage is from the rhyme, “One, two, three, four, Mary’s at the cottage door”, which is in my new book, Pocketful of Posies. Find out about the book and the traveling exhibit of original artwork here.  Also, see the whole double page spread in another post here.

PFOPhousethatchWM

Note: See other posts in the Close-ups series archive here.

Mushroom houses

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These mushroom house have been packed away for over 30 years and earlier this spring I brought them outside and took some pictures. I made them for a story that was included in an elementary school text book. This was my first real illustration job after graduation from art school. I recently wrote about the project  in a post about my first picture book, The Way Home, here.

The Great Cleanup was a story about some ecologically minded insects who organized a recycling effort to reuse the trash that was dumped on their neighborhood. I’ll show some pictures of the insects in a future post.

I was still using my Singer Featherweight back then, which was good for top stitching and maneuvering around tight corners. There was plenty of hand stitching, too, around the mushroom cap roofs and front landings.

The houses are 8 ” to 9″ tall and the stems are hollow, with walls of 1/2″ foam rubber. The caps are filled with fiber fill stuffing.

I can remember picking out textured and knobby fabric for the stems, caps and chimneys. It was good to dust them off and display them in the grass.

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Ojai House

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Last week I was in Ojai, California, staying at the wonderful Oaks at Ojai Spa. After a long hard winter spent mending my broken wrist and concussion, it was wonderful to eat healthy food and excercise in a beautiful place. I’m feeling rejuvenated and like myself again. It’s as if I went away for “the cure”.  One morning, we went for an early brisk walk around Ojai and saw this most adorable house with a live oak in front. After we returned to the spa, I grabbed my camera and rushed back to take pictures in the early morning light.