Thanks for reading the March 2022 issue of This Awful Awesome Life. Every issue is available on our website in case you missed one.

Our theme for April will be rain.

Rain is a part of spring, “April showers, bring May flowers.”

Every April in elementary school, this saying was in my classroom.

We made tulips and daisies out of construction paper to replace the snowflakes, hearts, and shamrocks from the previous months of the year. What was your April craft in school?

Some of us love the rain: others find it depressing, especially when it rains all week. Rain can make flowers and crops grow, but floods can destroy them and ruin homes. When was the last time you jumped in a puddle or got in trouble for tracking in mud?

We’ll be looking at books, movies, poems, songs, and quotes about rain. Lilly Kauffman and Orlando Bartro will be back with articles and two of our favorite authors, Robin Barefield and Ann Howley, have new books coming out. Linda Cahill will share more delicious recipes from Pampered Chef perfect for a rainy day.

We’ll have a quiz and reading recommendations. Plus, we’ll be streaming some rainy-day films.

Our vegetable of the month for April will be carrots. Will I be making a carrot cake or a savory roasted carrot dish? Maybe, I’ll be making both.

Until next month, Stay safe. Stay well. You are important, and you are loved!

All my best,

Fran

Answers to the March 2022 “Every Picture Has a Story” Quiz

1.       “Christina’s World” by Andrew Wyeth - C.  Christina was a neighbor and muse of Wyeth with a muscle-wasting disease who often dragged herself across the family homestead to get around.

2.       “American Gothic” by Grant Wood - D. Both A & C are correct

a.       The couple in the painting were models supposed to represent a Depression-era father and his daughter for the painting.

c.       The female model in the painting is Wood’s sister, Nan Wood Graham, and the man is his dentist, Byron McKeeby.

3.       “Girl with a Pearl Earring” by Johannes Vermeer - C. The model in the painting may have been his daughter or a mistress, but the image presented is a “tronie” an idealized image cloaked in exotic clothing and not a specific person’s likeness.

4.       “Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe” (“The Luncheon on the Grass”) by Edouard Manet - A. This painting scandalized 19th century Paris because Manet depicted a nude in something other than a classical setting.

5.       “Ophelia” by Sir John Everett Millais - B. His model Elizabeth Siddall posed in a bathtub in Millais’ London studio and the foliage from descriptions in Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” was painted outdoors.

6.       “Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee” by Rembrandt van Rijn - D. Both A & B are correct

a.       This painting was stolen from the Boston Museum in 1990 and has never been recovered.

b.       Police suspected Whitey Bulger but could never find enough evidence to connect him to the crime.

7.       “Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear” by Vincent van Gogh

a.       Vincent van Gogh cut off a portion of his left ear, but because he painted this work looking in a mirror the bandage depicted covers his right ear (mirror image). - D. All of the above are correct

b.       The artist supposedly got into a fight with his friend and fellow artist Paul Gaugin and that is what caused him to cut off part of his ear.

c.       Vincent van Gogh wrapped his ear in a newspaper and gave it to a local prostitute for “safekeeping” and not as a romantic gesture.

8.       “Guernica” by Pablo Picasso - B. This painting is a plea for peace after Germans bombed the tiny town in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War and the dawn of World War II.

9.       “The Scream’ by Edvard Munch - A. Munch was inspired to paint “The Scream” after witnessing the sun setting over the fjords and seeing the sky turn blood red as if nature were screaming.

10.   “Portrait of Adele Blouch-Bauer” by Gustav Klimt - D. All of the above

a.       This is one of a series of two paintings of Adele by Klimt. She is the only person to sit for him more than once.

b.       The painting was stolen from the home of Ferdinand Blouch-Bauer by the Nazis in 1941.

c.       The recovery of the painting by Ferdinand’s niece, Marie Altman in 2006 is the subject of the film, “Woman in Gold,’ starring Helen Mirren.

11.   Lascaux Cave Paintings by Unknown - B. The Paleolithic images were discovered by 18-year-old, Marcel Ravidat who fell into a hole in the ground while walking his dog in the Dordogne region of France.

12.   “Portrait of Madame X” by John Singer Sargent - C. This painting scandalized the Paris Art World because the model was the wife of a prominent French banker, and it was considered unseemly to paint her in a sensual way.

13.   “Flaming June” by Frederic Leighton - D. Both A & C are correct

a.       This painting disappeared soon after it was painted and was discovered inside a chimney by a construction worker in the early 60s.

c.       This painting now hangs in Puerto Rico’s Museo de Arte de Ponce.

14.   “A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte” by Georges Seurat - B. After Stephen Sondheim saw this painting, he composed the hit Broadway musical “Sunday in the Park with George.”

15.   “Mona Lisa” by Leonardo da Vinci - C. Multi-spectral imaging in 2006 revealed that the smile on the “Mona Lisa” was originally bigger, but da Vinci painted over it.