Making Contact

 One of the reasons I have tried to make myself brave enough to draw and paint in public is that I think it is a great way to make contact with people. I always feel self conscious and like a bit of a fraud as I am sketching and painting, but people who come up to me are inevitably curious and generous with kind comments. And in return, I get to have some interesting conversations with all sorts of people.

I often find myself in New Westminster with time on my hands while I'm waiting for my car to be serviced. The Quay down buy the Fraser River is always a good source of inspiration and places to sit for a while. This day, I was working away on a tug boat when a little boy and his mom approached. He seemed really curious so I encouraged him to have a go at painting. I only asked that he paint on the left side of the page so I could do the painting of the tug. He made beautiful bold strokes and enjoyed mixing the paint, as is obvious. And he just could not resist adding a bit of blue to the bow of my tug, just above the textured tire bumper. I have to say, Oskar improved my boat. He even agreed, with the help of his mom, to co-sign the painting.

As I drove home, I spotted a Korean restaurant and spontaneously decided to treat myself to lunch. As I waited for my cold noodle soup and kimchi, I pulled out my pen and paints and did a quick sketch of the traffic lights. The waitress, who spoke very little English, was very interested and turned out to be a painter herself. She was too shy to show me any of her work, but carefully noted the type of Moleskine notebook  and reservoir paint brush I was using, with the thought that she may give them a try herself. My lunch arrived before I got too far along with the painting but, in the end, I decided I liked how the traffic lights hung in the middle of the white page.

Cypress Finale

It is the end of an era for our family. After 67 years at Ghost Lake Cabin in the Cypress Hills, my parents and aunts sold the cottage. I went out for a last visit in July, and spent part of my days drawing and painting.

 The first thing that strikes me when we drive east towards the Cypress Hills from Medicine Hat, are the enormous skies with puffy white clouds as far as the eye can see. The sky feels like a huge bowl above your head. In the evenings, we go up to Lookout Point, to Grandma and Grandpa Rae's bench to watch the setting sun turn puffy white clouds to every shade of pink, orange, red, purple and blue.

We spend lots of time on the front porch communing with the lodgepole pines, birds and scolding squirrels. The wildflowers are always amazing.

Cabin details remind me of my childhood and my daughters' years at the cottage. The snap of the latch on the screen door takes me back to crafty days, painting rocks, doing batik, weaving lichen and noggin knockers  into wall hangings and my girls making quilts and sun prints with grandma Maxine. 

 These are the trademark logs of Ghost Lake Cabin, their beautiful details fully visible inside and outside the building.

I fully intended to paint this scene but never quite got to it. And then the moment was lost. This is Grandpa Rae's odd penthouse bedroom above the biffy, defying gravity and all architectural logic and yet his beloved night time haven. 

Summer…Poof!

Is it possible that my last post was June? Where has summer gone? Indoor time was shifted to the outdoors; sunshine, natural things and a little bit of drawing and painting.

Bounty from the backyard

Squirrels and birds shaped my time at Cypress.

Beach Paradise

Missing two legs...

An excellent kick-off to the camping season, we spent four days on the beach on the west coast of Vancouver Island. Near the longest day of the year, we basked in long hours of daylight and almost perfect weather. 

Mountain Inspired

Birthday Painting for Me by Janice

Birthday Painting for Janice

My friend, Janice, and I have started a birthday card tradition. Every year we exchange cards of one of our original paintings. This year the theme seems to have been our shared mountain adventures at the Hytte.

Simple Sliver Drawings

I was waiting for my car to be serviced in New Westminster. There is an excellent coffee shop just down the road from the garage. It has high stools at a counter right up at the front window so I can sit and draw the street theatre as it unfolds. There was a narrow sliver view of a tree all backlit in vibrant green. And right in front of me was a construction site. A woman was putting bollards together out of the back of a truck then dragging them around in moving traffic. All of this was the front drop to the parade of people and ongoing interactions in the coffee shop itself; the slightly unhinged guy wheeling his earthly possessions, asking for cinnamon and all the while making everyone smile at his antics;  the  business man and his business coach/therapist speaking in business bubbles about building a courier business. It was all topped off by the non-stop cheery banter of the baristas, all polished and professional but somehow sincere too. Just another day in normal-ville.

A Day On Bikes

#1 Fail so #2 Try Again

We spent the first day of June, riding along the bike paths of waterfront Vancouver: Granville Island to the base of UBC, then back around to Yaletown. We were reminded of just how far you can get on a bike. It was glorious. We stopped at various points along the way to eat, sketch, study and take in Vancouverites enjoying their city. 

Chris practices Chinese.

Bike at a weird angle.

Symbols of the Kids Fest.