The Showdown!

Friends, family, fellow artists-

Wowsers! its been a wild few days….or maybe daze. From the moment Stephen King (Des Moines Art Festival Director) aroused us by phone after 1AM last Saturday morning, telling us our booth had gone a flyin’, to today as we sort through what is left and what is gone, we are still spinning.

The bad news is, of course, the loss of our beloved canopy, our display glass cases and interior pieces, two days of selling at the Festival and the general scramble of our 10’ x 10’ work space. Needless to say our forward progress toward next show in two weeks has been a bit derailed.

It’s good news to know that our light system still works, our booth wall fabric has been torn but is fixable and much of our “office” supplies survived thanks to the quick moving of the DMAF folks. A new canopy will be shipped to us on Tuesday. Our research of booth weight systems and techniques is fruitful and will be shared with fellow artists and show directors. Our spirits improve each day. We will make lemonade out of our smackdown.

It was a micro-burst, quick hard wind and rain, that took advantage of a wind tunnel effect on the DMAF site. Fortunately only 4 artists had serious damage; the rest were shaken but not tossed as we were. It was a freaky wind, as it had not been predicted. Our front canopy zipper was completely torn off letting the full force of the wind in. Once inside, the canopy and weights gave it a valiant effort to hang on.

Through all of this what has meant the most to us is all of your support, virtual hugs, emails and calls. Knowing that we have a group around us to help pick us up, dust us off, and shove us back into action is really the silver lining in all of this. It means more then you can know.

Thank you so much for everything.

Carla & Dave