2018 Ireland Day Three: Dublin to Dungarvan

Tuesday, June 19, 2018 (Go South: Dublin to Dungarvan, Co. Waterford )

Today is first official day of our Ireland tour with Inroads Ireland.  Today we head south and will not be back to Dublin and the Hotel Clarence for one week.

7:00 a.m. finds us eating breakfast with members of our first week's trip.  Breakfast buffet is a part of the tour and each day it is a treat.  Besides all the stuff on the buffet we can order one hot item off the menu.

Here are our tour participants this first week:

Lin Sisson, Taunton, Massachusetts (who will be on all three trips with us)
Stuart & Mary Bell, Tybee Island, Georgia
Joseph & Ellen Aebig, Yorktown Heights, New York
Cami Lucht & Amy Theilen, Ames, Iowa
John & Mary Poehlman, Racine, Wisconsin
Candace Reinheimer & Rebecca Weber, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Brantley Hodges & Jonnie Hart, Shreveport, Louisiana

By 8:30 a.m. we are meeting our tour guide, Mike Brady.  Mike will be both or our driver and our tour guide. By 9:00 a.m., we are loading our suitcases onto the small van our group of 15 is taking south in Ireland.

Our first stop in Ireland is the Moone High Cross (County Kildare), Ireland's second tallest cross.

The 17 foot tall cross is located in the remains of an old abbey believed to have been established by Saint Colmcille. High crosses like this one and their intricately carved designs have inspired the faithful through the ages and became integral to Irish culture, history and art.

Today we stop in Castledermot (County Kildare) for our morning coffee break.  The group has the option to eat, shop or do both.  Denice and I decided to partake in this offerings of the Mad Hatter Cafe which proved to be typical of the kind of cafes we will find in many of the small towns we visited.

After lunch we did a little walkabout.

After lunch, we got back on the van and headed over to the Castledermot Round Tower (County Kildare), a 10th-century round tower founded as a monastic settlement in 800 AD.

Our next stop was in Graiguenamanagh (Couny Kilkenny) where we visited the Duiske Abbey, built in the 13th Century.

Lunch today was at the Pomegranate Cafe, Graiguenamanagh (Couny Kilkenny), which looked like this inside.

Denice and I went for a walk around Graignamanagh Catholic Parish church and its graveyard.

As the afternoon proceeds in Southern County Kilkenny, we head over to a 6,000 year-old megalithic portal tomb. These are tomb entrances that are preserved long after the tombs themselves have been dismantled by farmers, probably for the stone.

Tonight our accommodations are the Tannery Townhouse, Dungarvan (County Waterford).

The beautiful Georgian guesthouse is owned and operated by one of Ireland’s renowned chefs and around the corner is his fantastic restaurant. We decided to eat tonight under the direction of chef Paul Flynn. Dinner tonight was a seven course chef's choice that we devoured which included appetizers (black pudding, cauliflower soup and jellied fish), salmon, lamb, trout, beef.  Then it was a banana and chocolate dessert followed by cheese.

Yup, that is the high life in Ireland.

Our room tonight is in another building owned by the Tannery.

Still, we are in Ireland, and on the sea coast.  It is special.

Under the Pakistani Bus

Under the Pakistani Bus

Here is the fourth Holy Roller made in the on-line class led by Michael deMeng.

This concept started with a picture file I have had for years of the art that is the bus in Pakistan.

I did not have a bus in my toy collection so I selected this damaged old toy truck.

I added to the truck bed a rusty grain scooper. Then I went on the hunt for the "holy" figure who would ride on this roller. I choose one of the WWF wrestlers I have in a box and found a piece of decorative metal to add to the mix.

A plastic bear head was added to the human body.

I decided that to reach for the Pakistani bus style I would collage on some of the truck base rather than rely on just paint. 

After working on the whole structure for a few sessions, I was done with all I wanted to add and paint.

So we have, Under the Pakistani Bus.

Had A Little Lamb

Had A Little Lamb

I began this project to have something to do at the October version of Make What Ya Brung at Shake Rag Alley in Mineral Point, WI. Make What Ya Brung is a group of former students from Valley Ridge Art Studio who maintain their art friendships by gathering twice a year in the Lind Pavilion at Shake Rag to make any kind of art they feel like.

The supplies I gathered for this project included a valve with a glass dome, a frame from a decorative mirror and muskrat belly board stretcher. I hauled this with some other project materials to Mineral Point and then decided that two boards I had bought at the last sale at Hippie Tom's Serendipity Farm would actually work better.

The glass dome from the valve was always the central focus for me. I wanted to try out a paper transfer technique I learned from Keith Lo Bue which requires very old paper so that the paper becomes transparent.

I used a page from The Second Reader which had Mary Had A Little Lamb and thus...my theme.

I texturized the top wood so that it would paint up with ease (a technique I learned from Michael deMeng).  I added a dollie to the bottom wood to create more texture.

Now it became time to put the things together. I painted up the parts for the capture.

After I returned home from MWYB, it was time to assemble. I decided that I would add some collage to brighten up the piece (as taught to me by Andrea Matus deMeng).

I decided I needed to find a lamb, the one that Mary used to have, and that was accomplished by a trip to Michaels.

I had brought a brass angel (probably found at a flea market) and had it with me at MWYB when my friend Cris Smith made me pledge not to use it unless I made a cast first.

This sounded easy until you factor in the fact that I have never made a cast. I had a variety of options but went with a product I had picked up at the Artist and Craftsman Store in Madison, Smooth-On Body Double Silk, which is a two part mix that you pour over the object to create the cast.

The next step was to use the Smooth-Cast Smooth Cast 300 to create the new objects.

After some painting and a few more touches, the pieces was done.

Or, was it?

After looking at the initial photos of the finished project, I decided it needed something to crown the whole piece.

Amongst all the goodies in my basement I found a part of a baking oven to use as a further extension of the theme of "Had" a sheep.

A little bit of highlight painting went on as well.

And, finally, we have Had a Little Lamb.