My day in Waco

The Waco Calligraphy Guild is going strong! Sandy and I drove to their monthly meeting this morning after she was invited to show how she makes her "Sandala's", which I have highlighted on my blog in earlier posts. It was a long day, but very worth the effort of the early morning rise and all it entails to get out of the house on time. The entire guild was so friendly and open to creativity. After a brief explanation of what mandalas are and an example from Sandy's own hand--drawing each, beautiful stroke with grace and ease, everyone got to work and created their own works of Art.

Amongst the participants in the meeting today was En Knipper, an almost NINETY year old calligrapher who has such a zest for life and an endless smile on his face. I met him at my very first Major workshop with Timothy Botts over 15 years ago with the Capital City Scribes in Austin. He drove down to participate with several others that I have not seen since. He even said he REMEMBERED me. I guess I did see him one other time at the Legacies National Conference in Dallas where I jogged his memory of our meeting. Nonetheless, he is RIGHT ON, has a cell phone and rode a ZIP line in Ecuador this past year! A man after my own heart! WRITE on, Buddy!!!! He is the good-looking one with the checked shirt pictured in the group below.

I think everyone had fun and learned something in the meantime. They also had their FIRST TIME ATC [Artist Trading Card] exchange that proved to be quite successful. I was happily surprised with the turn out, with one younger gentleman coming to a calligraphy meeting for his first time after seeing an ad in the paper this morning.... he was visiting his grandparents from Canada, eh!?

We were treated with lunch by the group who had the time to get a quick bite to eat. We went to this place called "Olive Branch" in the bustling, down town area of Waco! It was pretty good, too! You should have seen the size of the CUPCAKES! It was nice to be able to just sit and chat to get to know one another a little better. I was happy to see a lot of the gals that I had met either from them coming to one of our meetings, study groups, Southwest Calligraphy Conferences I have attended while I have been workshop chairman or President for CCS and workshops. All the calligraphers I've met [anywhere] are so forthcoming, generous and sharing. We're a GREAT Bunch! That pretty much wraps my my "WACKY", I mean Waco Day! LOL! Ciao!

Suzi Ickles Ed Knipper

Jeanne Dittman

Sandy... showing how to MAKE the mandalas!