Totally Texas -- Cottonwood Fest springs anew

Richardson’s Cottonwood Art Festival

Cottonwood Park

1321 W. Belt Line Rd. (between Coit & Waterview)

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The view out my window as I wrote this was a cold spitting rain. Now it’s sunny and the Weather Channel forecasts temperatures for this weekend in the sixties to seventies -- great weather for the spring session of Richardson’s Cottonwood Art Festival this Saturday and Sunday, May 4-5.

My family has attended Cottonwood happily even in the rain, and even if the breezes are still chilly, a brisk walk in the park should get things warmed up. Cottonwood Park, that is. Or get out of the wind under tents with the art, sip something warming in the Lakeside Courtyard while listening to day long music by local entertainers. And bring treats for the park lake’s fearless ducks and geese, who gobble treats no matter what the weather.

With more than 240 juried artists exhibiting, there’s something for everyone to like. The boys are partial to giant animal sculptures, preferably moving ones. Most of the art is on the east side of the lake. Across the bridge to the west is the ArtStop children’s area, with arts and crafts activities for children, including a chance to sculpt clay on a potter’s wheel.

The festival is open from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday. Music is 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, 10:40 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday.

Although admission and parking are free, you will need money for food, drinks, some children’s activities, and of course, art. Vendors generally take credit cards.  ATMs are available at nearby shopping centers. Park on side streets or behind Cottonwood (where the playground is always open). Best parking is early in the morning, but whether you come early or late, you’ll do a lot of walking, so wear comfortable shoes.

More information, entertainment schedule and list of participating artists, see www.cottonwoodartfestival.com/.

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Also this weekend -- Sunday’s A Peep at the Coops tour of urban chicken keepers. Maps of tour sites are available for $5 at Stonewall Garden, Stonewall Jackson Elementary School, 5828 East Mockingbird Lane in Dallas, beginning at 11 a.m. Sunday. Tour proceeds benefit the school’s learning garden. For information, including tips on chicken etiquette, see
www.apeepatthecoops.org/.

Totally Texas -- Plano's 19th century farm

Heritage Farmstead Museum

1900 W. 15^th St. (just east of Custer Road)

Plano, Texas

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We’re doing a countdown of activities before school starts Monday, and realized we haven’t been to Plano’s Heritage Farmstead Museum in way too long. The showpiece of the four acre site is the ornate two-story Farrell-Wilson House, built by Hunter Farrell for his family in 1891. My daughter’s twenty-first century kids, however, prefer the chickens.

The flock’s resident rooster is speckled Sussex Jewel, hatched along with his sister Juliet in March of this year. Jewel presides over a flock of hens of several breeds, acquired by purchase, donation, and in one case, rescue of a homeless hen. (Please note that the museum can only accept hens, not additional roosters.)

The museum’s animal population has varied over the years we’ve been visiting, but in addition to the chickens it currently includes goats, sheep, donkeys, guinea fowl and two turkeys of the antique Bourbon Red breed -- Sam and Travis. And although she’s not in the “live” stock category, the life size model cow called Buttermilk (resembling a similar cow in the Children’s Museum at Fair Park) allows visitors to practice their milking techniques.

We took a break in the rocking chairs on the wrap-around porch of the Farrell-Wilson House, whose nine original colors, including red, green and yellow, make it a showplace even in this century. The site was a working farm run by the Farrells and later by their daughter Ammie and her husband Dudley Wilson until the 1970’s. Soon after Ammie Farrell Wilson’s death in 1972, a museum was founded to preserve the house and grounds, which host more than 30,000 visitors each year.

The museum’s buildings also include the 1880’s Young House, moved from its original site in far north Plano; a one-room schoolhouse (red, of course); and the various outbuildings of a nineteenth-century farm, including carriage house, curing shed, root cellar, and blacksmith shop.

The museum’s grounds are open Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. except for major holidays. During summer hours (through September 1 this year), docents lead tours of the farm and buildings at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday through Saturday, and 1:30 p.m. Sundays. Entry fee for docent tours is $5 for adults, $3.50 for children ages five through 18 and for adults age 65 and older. Tours last approximately ninety minutes. Visitors may also take self-guided tours of the grounds only, for a suggested donation of $2 per person.

There’s more information available at www.heritagefarmstead.org/. And tell Jewel we said “hi.”