Jennifer mentions that a lot of their pieces are handmade, and this is where our conversation really takes off. A self-proclaimed Hot Glue Queen (a title I’m sincerely jealous of), she and Steven keep busy year-round with endless arts & crafts projects that span mediums. For the past two years, Steven has tended his new passion for woodturning. And that angel on the northernmost end of their yard? They made it.

I looked to my left and saw the most precisely placed array of lights and light-up figures, everything red and white and orbiting a singular more colorful centerpiece, an electric tree, the lights of which seemed to move in all directions. I’d found my first winner.

There’s a humanity to her unique artistic process—turning clothes into memorial quilts for grieving families—that’s impossible to ignore, particularly when you’re standing in front of the quilts themselves. How it must feel to spend most of one's time making things that one won't likely ever encounter again…

By infusing the Ghost Walk with robust lessons in history, Cody Yeager manages to create a strangely grounded event—this despite the amount of time we spent talking about, say, the ghost cat who lives on the 3rd floor of the old Gates Hotel building.

Wild Bloom Yoga takes it on the trail, to the beer garden, and to a mindful place. See how Lexi Stickel is making her business fit into the landscape of locals’ lives.

“We love to hear people say they drove by our house and they loved the decorations or that their kids really like Frosty,” said Stephanie Hoffman. “I would miss coming home in the evening or leaving in the morning and seeing the lights. I would miss watching cars slow down to look at the lights. I believe the decorations help people get in the Christmas spirit. As a kid, my parents used to drive us around to look at lights. It was one of my favorite things to do.” 

“It’s kinda hard for me to do this—it’s a lot of work—but I do enjoy doing it, and I do it because the kids come by and they like seeing everything. I have people who will pull up in front of the house at night and stay for 5 minutes just taking it all in,” said Dorothy Waters. “Some years I think, Well, maybe I shouldn’t…But I always do. Recently a neighbor said, Boy, I’m glad you do this every year, it’s so nice to look at.”

“My husband Nathan and I started decorating the year we purchased our home (2003),” said Nancy Hansen. “We started out with a lot of inflatables and then slowly moved to what you see today in our yard and part of our neighbor’s yard. (Yes, part of what’s in her yard we do for her since we had extras, and she loves it. She added the snowman this year.)”

For years, our columnist Sarah Cook and her partner have made popcorn and hot chocolate hopped in their tiny Subaru, put on All Classical Portland, and driven around The Dalles as they pretended to assign trophies to the most spectacularly decorated houses.  This year Sarah is handing out accolades in CCCNews with four awards. First up: Best Tree goes to the Hutesons.

So you’re basically a family of weird artists? I ask about 20 minutes into our conversation, and the pleasing look that alights on their faces means they know it’s a compliment. To be clear: my understanding of weirdness is a deeply affectionate and creative one; this might be one of the coolest and most artistic families I’ve encountered in a long time.

Life is in the details. And this week’s column by Sarah Cook calls out many of those in our own backyard. It’s easy to get tunnel vision and want to just get from A to B. But Cook shows us, if you take your foot off the gas for a moment, and grab a local guide app, there is some pretty cool stuff we walk past in TD without even noticing.

Harley Newland and his wife, Julie, give column writer Sarah Cook a tour of their local landmark of a yard.

“I think my advice is, ‘don’t be afraid to just try.’ It’s the same advice I’d give my kids. There’s no harm in pursuing these things because you never know what’s going to click and really resonate with you. Whether it’s a male-dominated field or not, I feel like that’s been my mantra about a lot of things; you might absolutely hate something, but you might just really love it.”

Sarah Cook reveals the simple steps to printmaking after a crash course with Maggie Middleton, Apprentice Printer at Crow’s Shadow Institute of the Arts in Pendleton, who gave the demonstration at The Dalles Art Center. Check it out. Maybe it’s time for you to gouge away.

“It has helped me to process things when I’ve submitted my own stuff,” Colleen Ballinger said about her occasional contributions to the Poetree, which change in response to seasons and current events and depending on the amount of work she receives from others, including strangers.

The world of printmaking includes subtle differences in technique; prints can take the form of lithographs, linocuts, woodcuts, monoprints, and monotypes (to name just a few), any and all of which are produced by the artists working at Crow’s Shadow studio in Pendleton and are currently on exhibit at The Dalles Art Center.

The Dalles Art Center has teamed up with a group of metal fabrication students at Columbia Gorge Community College to fabricate and install a sizable metal display that will greet visitors outside as they approach the Art Center, on the corner of 3rd and Washington streets.

Sarah Cook takes us back to the Futurism with Art Teacher Kerry Cobb. The 10-year art movement starting in 1901 had “an edge that borders on being almost menacing,” and Cobb mapped out the absurdity and, at times, explicit aggressiveness of the movement alongside the mounting tensions of the pre-WWI state in which it emerged.

“The daunting and implicit expectations we sometimes have of our loved ones interfere with our ability to care for them, let alone for ourselves; I would not have the framework for attempting to embody this way of living, loving, and showing up if it were not for bell hooks.” - Sarah Cook