All Sun and Fun…no wind allowed

The weather for this past weekends Art Market was perfect.  Not a bit of wind unlike the previous, and the temps were much more in line with the  season.  The El Paso Diabetes Association held their annual Run/Walk downtown and as a result there was a lot more “foot traffic” at the Art Market:)

With the  weather playing nice, I felt it was time to sample some of  Independent Burgers‘ homemade ice cream!  It’s good stuff but the fancy cart is what sells it.  I wish they would come up with some way to have burgers as well…an Independent food truck might be a good idea.

I broke away for a bit to get some more pics of the freshly painted sphinx at the Scottish Rite Temple. For the past couple of years they had a color treatment that highlighted the headdress but recently returned it to the classical white:

The Temple sits adjacent to the recently opened Chihuahua’s Ballpark.  It was nice to see it sans construction barricades and busy workers.

It’s really shoehorned into the old City Hall space but it works.  It looks a lot nicer than City Hall ever did.  I won’t complain and hope to get out to a game soon to take it all in.  Back at the Art Market the races were finishing up and El Paso’s Ballet Forklorico was performing a demonstration:

Western Street where The Garden and Brick and Mortar sits is pretty cool now, a far cry from the days of being a dusty parking lot for Club 101.  The brick walkway and recently added overhead lighting jazz up the space, making it great for outdoor events such as this.  As always more pics can be found on flickr: Diabetes Run/Walk

DWNTWN ARTMRKT

This past Saturday we headed to the Union Plaza area in downtown El Paso to check out the DWNTWN ARTMRKT:

DWNTWN ARTMRKT

DWNTWN ARTMRKT

The market is a chance for local artists to showcase their wares and runs every Saturday on Anthony Street.  The first time I went a couple of weeks ago the winds were terrible and made it quite unpleasant.  This weekend the wind was gone, the temps were higher so we had a chance to really walk around checking things out.  There was a booth setup for free ornament making for the kids so our boys had blast making a little art of their own.  Thanks to Katie and her friend for helping our hooligans out with their ornaments!

Art

The city blocks off the street so the vendors can set up booths and have plenty of room for people to walk and browse.  There was a nice selection of arts and crafts, from jewelry to paintings as well as a few food vendors.

Vendor row

Vendor row

Union Plaza has gone through a revitalization of sorts with improved sidewalks and parking. There are a lot more restaurants in the area though they didn’t look open at the time we were there. The real highlight of the area is the old industrial buildings that now house may of the clubs and restaurants.   They have retained their character and clues to there past can still be found on the faded brick facades.

Western Coffee Company

Western Coffee Company

Moore

Moore

Post no Bills

Post no Bills

After walking around a bit and checking out the train station the kids were getting a bit unruly so we headed out to get some lunch.  I can see this growing and being real popular in the springtime, hopefully more of the restaurants will make an effort to be open for lunch as more people come.  More shots of the buildings in the area can be found here:

El Paso Downtown Artmarket