It's the most wonderful time of the year! I absolutely love Christmas. I love carols, twinkling lights, and the food. But like so many families this year, my husband and I find ourselves in a precarious position. We are fortunate enough to live in a green zone. Half of our extended family resides in a grey lockdown zone, which means there is a good chance we won't be able to be with them for Christmas. It's particularly heartbreaking because my little boys are two and a half, and their grandparents miss them dearly. That being said, we are figuring out ways of coping. I've been playing around with watercolours more, and I'd like to start sketching again in acrylics, just for...
The Idea... About a month ago, I had this crazy idea. Pandemic Halloween seemed almost like a canary in a coal mine, festively speaking. After I took my own children out on a pre-planned route to visit select neighbours who had prepared goodie bags for them, I looked down my street and realized that I had never seen it look so dark. Not a single house had a light on, let alone a candle in a pumpkin. It was like someone threw a thick blanket over the street, and it was eerie. At that point, it seemed highly unlikely that Christmas would be saved from the chopping block. So how could I use what I do best (paint) to help populations who...
I am so excited about this. Beyond excited. Nervous. Pumped. All of the things. When the lockdowns first started happening, I was incredibly concerned about two vulnerable groups: the first being longterm care patients, and the second being children in homes that were already struggling. With that in mind, I began trying to figure out how we could use art to reach out to both of those groups to make them feel valued, loved, and cherished during Christmas. All over the world, major events are being cancelled. So to counter this, I decided to call this campaign #SantaIsntCancelled. Part one of Santa Isn't Cancelled is an open invitation for anyone and everyone to create handmade Christmas cards with a holiday message...
Something's Coming... It's hard to believe that this website is coming up on six years old. I felt like a total imposter when I first set it up, and a charlatan when I set up my Facebook page. I struggled to get one hundred people to even like the page. I was still finding my proverbial voice, and hadn't yet moved into my current style of realism mixed with hints of impressionism. Two years later, I started offering in person paint classes out of the studio I was renting at 176 Lakeshore Drive in North Bay. My little Facebook page started to gain steam, growing to 500 followers, then over 1,000. I was running a paint class almost every other...
Welcome, autumn... We had a frost warning in North Bay last night. Despite the name "North Bay" giving us a bad rap of being frigid year round, even though we are just a smidgen further north than Ottawa, this was definitely out of character. While I was slightly concerned for the wellbeing of my tomato plants, I was more excited about the arrival of autumn. I don't fare that well in summer heat. Give me crisp, spice-scented fall air any day. I love everything about it, including those grey fall days that just bring out the intense colours of the trees. Pass the hot cider and pumpkin pie, I am ready for autumn's bounty. This past week, I've been focused...
