2011: A mix of old and new

— This year’s Bella Vista Arts & Crafts Festival will include both old and new faces selling their wares.

Returning for her second fair is Rhonda Jones, owner of Main Sweets Bakery in Noel, Mo. She has operated her shop for nine years and was at the craft fair four years ago.

Jones, along with her business partner, Amber Beauford, has reserved two booths this year in order to show all of their different items.

Jones will have on hand wedding cakes, brownies, cookies, peanut brittle, gift baskets containing Amish jams and jellies, and more.

Beauford, who also owns Blossoms by Amber, will display and sell some of her floral creations, handmade party hats and aprons, and handmade soaps.

Jones said preparing for the annual craft fair is a lot of work, but it is worth it in the end.

During their first year, Jones said, the pair were amazed by the response of the patrons.

“We were unbelievably busy,” she said of those three days in 2007.

She is anxious about this year’s event and believes they will be busy once again.

“We ask a fair price for our food. And everybody likes food.”

Jones said her baked goods appeal to everybody - men, women and children.

Among her inventorythis year will be a cake that was recently showcased in the fall edition of Arkansas Bride Magazine.

“That was quite an honor,” she said.


New York City native Jeff Leedy, owner of Jeff Leedy Studios in Horseshoe Bay, Texas, will be packing up his brushes and canvases and coming to the 2011 craft fair.

Leedy’s discovery of his artistic talents goes back quite a few years.

“Somewhere along the way, I saw that I had two skills, two talents that were always with me - my humor and my painting.”

He graduated from Syracuse University in Syracuse, N.Y., with a degree in illustration and advertising. He also studied five years at the Art Students League of New York.

With his degree in hand, Leedy worked a number of years as a freelance illustrator.

He began dedicating an hour a day to “the kind of art I wanted,” which was impressionism.

Leedy said he has one main goal in his art.

“Making art that I love to paint, also art that makes us laugh. I need to make us laugh. It’s my mission; I almost can’t help it!” * * *

Peter Rujuwa’s love of sculpting can be traced to his youth.

“At age 6, my friends and I sculpted our own toys from river clay and soapstone scattered in the mountains surrounding my village in Africa, Zimbabwe.

"Our homemade chisels were dry sticks split in half.

“My art is tribal art called ‘Shona Art’ and is named after my tribe, ‘shone.’ This art is nonspiritual functional, but an imagery expression of my tribe’s traditional values of unity and love within the extended family relationship,” he explained.

Moving on from those early days, Rujuwa, whoowns Unique Rock Art in Indianapolis, said he uses mainly serpentine stone, which is about two points harder than soapstone on the Mohs scale of hardness.

“My tools include chisels, files and water paper. I finally polish with heat and beeswax and boom, it is ready for a new home!” the artist said.

Area, Pages 22 on 09/28/2011