Ferdinand, Ferdinand and the Beetle

Yesterday, my husband came home all smiles and said he got a raise at work, and to celebrate this, I bought him the Porsche bible: Porsche 911 Story. Not the flashiest title, I'm thinking as I write this, but as I flipped through it in the store, I noticed enough tables and diagrams of engines and other parts to keep my mechanical engineer husband reading late into the night. I decided to make a card to go along with the book and quickly read up on the history of Porsche makers, Ferdinand Sr. and his son, Ferry Porsche.

Turns out they also invented the Volkswagen. So I wrote a short story.

Ferdinand loved cars. At work, he was very serious. Building cars is a serious business, you know. But, every night, Ferdinand invented crazy, happy cars in his sleep.
Ferdinand also had a son named Ferdinand. It got a little bit confusing for Ferdinand's mother, so his parents called him Ferry. Ferry loved cars too.
One day, while Ferdinand and Ferdinand were having tea in the garden, a bug landed into their teapot.  This gave them the idea to build a car just like this bug.
The bug car had big headlights and a round body.
Everyone loved this car and soon everyone called it The Beetle.

Artful Moments

Nothing like sitting in a quiet house munching on leftover birthday cake and sipping on hot tea while the sun is deciding if it wants to stick around for the rest of the day. I'm on day 3 of my artistic challenge and managing to find little bits of time here and there for it. I spent a delightful afternoon at The Outpost drawing whatever was around and today I painted some sticks with the kid.

#3 Salt and Pepper

 #2 Painted sticks

30 Day Artistic Challenge

Your voice is deep and soothing, I'd love to hear you on the radio.
I envy the way you can dance.
You are an amazing cook.
You always listen to me and I always feel like new after talking to you.

It's easy to pass off a compliment, to brush it off and say, oh it's nothing. I do it all the time. Like it's bad to admit that maybe we do have a talent. What's wrong with having a knack for something or for showing off our unique style? For the sake of modesty, what untapped creativity is being shrugged away?

oh, it's just a hobby.
oh, it will never amount to anything.
oh, I just do it for fun.
It's just something I do when I have the time.

Imagine that by some miracle, we woke up one morning and all we had to do is whatever that talent was. Even if this talent was just a small desire for now. And what would happen if we spent hours and hours on that one talent? In no time we would certainly become experts and our talent would grow and grow.

What if you could be renowned for the salmon that you smoke?
Or the weird stories that you tell?
Or for the obsession you have about food?
Or how you visualize a better city?

We know or we read about people who get to use their talent all day long and we continue to say:

oh, it's just a hobby.
oh, it will never amount to anything.
It won't bring home the bacon.

What if for 30 days, we used our talent every day for as long as we could. What would that look like? I've been told recently that I should write and illustrate a book for children. Thinking about this is too big. Too unknown. So I am proposing a challenge. A 30 day artistic challenge. To be honest, this is a huge challenge for me, and I probably won't post this too soon....but I think one way around being a 3 day monk, is to keep the momentum and to do that you have to gather speed.

Here is today's drawing. I was imagining a place where children can go to find lost things.

Number 1 Lost and Found

Wanna Wear a Cape?

Wearing a cape instantly gives you an air of mystery with a touch of weirdness. When caped people walk by, we subtly do a double take and ask ourselves, why is this person wearing a cape? Hopefully they're in a marching band, or part of a historical reenactment because wearing a cape for no reason is weird, right?

But isn't it cool too? An air of mystery with a touch of weirdness? You're might be wondering why I'm going on about this cape thing? I was just thinking about my inner voice. You know, the part of you that is intact, the way you were as a child. That voice that quietly yet relentlessly reminds you to be authentic when you find yourself being pulled by fears of failure and judgement. There are many ways to hear this little voice, some meditate, pray, journal or abandon themselves to their hobby or passion, but I think that as long as you can be silent for a moment, you can hear it.

When my son naps the house is quiet and I can hear mine asking me to do more art, more drawing, more writing. It wants more laughter, more quirkiness, more silliness, more color and more fun. It calls for simplicity but also for folly. So that's how the cape came to mind. I had a friend in university who wore a dark green, floor length, wool cape. She painted her living room coral pink with huge green palm trees. By the window she had a huge leopard print lounge chair and stacks of books scattered all around. You could tell that she listened to her inner voice and acted on it's desires. Because of this, she was also surrounded by interesting people; inventors, artists, perfumers, writers and designers. I loved hanging out at her place.

It seems we, just as most species on earth seem to be biologically wired to blend in and bond to others to survive and that probably explains why we stop wearing our batman pajamas to school around grade 1. We learn quickly that the weird kids have a hard time making friends and we leave our costumes at home. Over time, because of this, we lose our ability to be who we truly are (which explains why so many of us wear Lululemon yoga uniforms and insist on granite countertops.)

If I am truly honest with myself, I can admit that I am jealous of that friend with the cape, or that man with the tattooed torso, or that neighbor with the Harley, or that kid in pajamas and rubber boots. Because they are listening to their inner voice and acting on it. What could I do today to actualize my inner voice?

a quiet moment on the sofa

Party Hats

Rain, Rain, Rain, Sun, Rain, Rain, Rain, Rain. That was this week's forecast. We were invited to a birthday party and every time I mentioned it, the kid said: "Where's my hat?", so on the one sunny day, the kid and I rode our bike to Urban Source and filled a bag with fun crafty things. Urban Source collects remnants, bits and pieces and thing-y-majigs from 100 different industries and serves it up in giant bins: stickers, lids, tubes, papers, stamps, lettering, postcards, photos, string, rubber bits, etc..I love this store because it gives your creativity a big jolt without breaking the bank. Our hats certainly brightened this rainy morning!

Soap Stubs and Twist Ties

Once you get started, seeking simplicity is like a soft tune you keep in mind throughout the day. I've noticed in the last couple of days that I am getting stressed about Father's Day and complaining about it to myself. Nice eh? Is that a sign or what? So let's make it simple and fun. The kid and I made a card with sprinkles, walked my husband's bike to World Cycles for a surprise tune up, and gathered some decorations. MUCH better and I'm sure he'll appreciate it.

These past few days, I've slowly cleaned out drawers, baskets, bags and pencil holders, putting things aside "stuff" for goodwill. It reminds me of the Chinese artist, Song Dong, who convinced his mother to allow him to display everything in her home. 10,000 personal items turned into the most mind blowing installation which he entitled "Waste Not".

His mother, Zhao Xiangyuan, was born in mainland China in the '30's. The huge political changes of the '50's and 60's robbed her family's wealth and her father was deemed a counter-revolutionary. She kept everything. For me, someone who has never lived through war, a depression or political upheaval, seeing piles of old pots, stubs of used soap and old shoes, was unusually beautiful and unreal.

I still remember the comparison Song Dong made between our generation which so easily acquires and throws out, and that of our grandparents. Chinese or not. Even when my grandmother passed away, my relatives were amazed by the amount of neatly organized, labelled jars of pencils stubs, plastic bags, margarine containers, twist-ties, etc... that she had kept in her home. Things that even goodwill probably wouldn't take. She never wasted either.

What's it like to not waste? I don't see myself keeping everything like Zhao Xiangyuan and my grandmother, so I guess the only way is to prevent things from coming in. So far, my 30 day list has helped toned down the spending and the shopping, but "things" should also include distractions, stress, time-wasters like television, negative thoughts, doing too much, multitasking, eating too fast, driving too fast and noise. Asking myself these questions also helps.

1. Is this "thing" supporting what's most important to me?
2. Is this "thing" useful, well made and aesthetically appealing?
3. What is the "cost" of keeping this "thing", cleaning it, repairing it and removing it when it longer works?

and so the soft tune keeps humming....

Wabi Sabi Pottery: an exercise in letting go!

I beat the winter blues this year by signing up for the first pottery class at the newly built Trout Lake Community Center. I was reluctant to join for different reasons; partly because I'm pretty tired in the evenings, plus it lasted past my usual bedtime of 9:00 pm and I usually get that art buzz of ideas and can't get to sleep. But I decided to join anyway. 

What a fascinating mix of people! We were mostly beginners who had never sat at a wheel before and were anxious to get started. Since I was my quieter self, due to being tired, I listened more than usual. It seemed difficult for some to relax and simply enjoy playing. I heard a lot of: "Am I doing this right?","Is this how it's supposed to work?", " I can't get mine to work.".

 If you've ever taken a pottery class, especially if you have ever tried to throw anything on a wheel before, you know how patient and accepting you have to be of anything that might have some use. You may have the intention of making a beautiful platter or pasta bowl or even a simple cereal bowl, but soon enough, as the clay whips around the wheel and you desperately try to control it, you learn to love your warped, dented soy sauce plate. At every stage; throwing, trimming, firing, and glazing, you must relinquish your idea of what your piece will be like. So long my beautiful set of matching cups! Yay to my new soap dish, coin bowl and pencil holder!

As in the ancient Japanese aesthetic of Wabi Sabi which describes a certain beauty as "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete", it also acknowledges three simple realities: nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect. Pottery allows you enjoy this aesthetic by forcing you to let go of perfectionism and control and rejoice in dents, cracks, unevenness, and unpredicted colors.

I did get home late, and I did have trouble getting to sleep, but one thing I can say is that, there is nothing like eating breakfast out of a bowl you made yourself! You do get better at it. Promise. But even our teacher who could throw a perfectly symmetrical piece, was still surprised to see the final outcomes!

Coffee Bags Creativity!

What to do with those coffee bags? I have a huge stack of them. I had a feeling that these were not recyclable and when I did a quick search on the coffee companies' websites, it was confirmed. Ethical Bean and Saltspring Coffee addressed the issue in the FAQ section of their websites stating that finding a more eco-friendly bagging option this their top priority. I wonder if it would be viable to go directly to the main office and bring my own glass container? I guess driving to Ethical Bean, which is the closest, would defeat the eco-friendly purpose. At least they are willing to take back their own bags as well as the competitors, if you mail them. Mail meaning someone drives them back. Um.... Okay. Let's get creative!

Gift bag for my friend Sandi's b-day!

Rainy Day Tulips

Another rainy day afternoon...

Dirty Lanes

I love Vancouver lanes. It's amazing what you can find. It might be partly because my mother lives on the West side and she has to walk her dog several times a day that she can find almost anything in her lane. She has this weird knack for it. If I say, oh, I wish I had a coffee table, the next day, she finds a coffee table. It works for toys, books, furniture or plants. It's limitless. Her last find was a bag of mystery bulbs.  She planted them and now we have daffodils!

On my side of town, I don't usually find such treasures, it's dirtier, rougher. But I still find surprises. Here's what I found yesterday while trying to avoid the traffic on Kingsway.

Rainy Day Art

Rainy afternoons are great for painting. I took a picture of the construction bins outside of Gloria Cafe and had fun with my acrylics.

TADA! A Chef's Kitchen!

Play Kitchen Extraordinaire!

For a grand total of about $60, I finally completed this play kitchen for my son. Here's a list of supplies in case you feel like giving it a try! It was a lot easier than I thought.

Things I had:
1. nightable
2. paint, paintbrushes
3. jigsaw, screwdrivers, drill, drill bits
4. shelf (found in the lane)
5. blocks

Things I bought:
1. knobs and handle for the oven $5
2. sticky backsplash $10
3. sink $2
4. wood for the back and oven door $15
5. cabinet hinge for oven door $5
6. food $3
7. different lengths of screws $6
8. primer $15

Some tips: (sorry if this seems obvious)
1. Don't skip the primer, sand and paint 2 coats of it, then paint 2 more coats with acrylic.
2. Pre-drill all your holes. (Make sure the drill is drilling IN the hole and not OUT.)
3. Make sure you have screws that match your screwdrivers.
4. Keep your budget in mind. It's super easy to go bananas and start adding things like an antique faucet, a chalkboard menu, curtains, etc... especially with the fake food, it's easy to blow $100 on fake groceries! Search your home high and low for what you already have, borrow from friends, beg people for free stuff and then stop.
5. HAVE FUN and remember "It's a long term project"- let the paint dry!

Kitchen Play-Act 2

Just finished the first coat of paint on the play kitchen yesterday. It's starting to look pretty fancy- dancy if you ask me! I used some leftover gray and beige paint from our storage and spruced it up with an orange front. I still need another coat of paint, knobs, doodads and the backsplash- ohh la la! On va cuisiner comme des vrais chefs! I sure hope my Babe digs this kitchen as much as I do- he might just use the oven as a garage for his cars, and if that's the case, it's all good.

I've been on the look out for kitchen accessories and scored today in China Town and at Value Village! Yes, I know, I know, I can hear a collective gasp from mothers out there thinking "What about the BPA?" Children toys generally do not contain Bisphenol A- so I think the plastic veggies are okay. We will probably end up replacing them as my friend Meggie felts some for us. (hint, hint.) As for the few spatulas I bought, as long as we don't microwave them or suck on them a lot, I think we'll be fine. So I'm super happy. We're almost there- stay tuned for the final reveal!

I got a huge bag of food for $3. Once I discarded the french fries, potato chips and donuts, I was left with lots of fruits and veggies and some cans. I did find something curious. The flash on the camera gives it that "mysterious" look doesn't it? Can you guess what it is?

The Play Kitchen

I'm not sure if this is the case with all moms, but when it's time to take care of myself I get itchy and impatient. I have this thing with using my hands and letting my creative juices come out. This needs to happen on a regular basis otherwise my head gets filled with ideas and I start to feel dizzy. So it's extremely important for me to carve out time for my hands to move.

I got this idea to build a play kitchen for my son out of an old bedside table I've had for ages. "How clever!" I thought. Plus it went well with my "don't let Ikea into the house" vibe I've been on, so after looking at all the other clever builders' play kitchens on the web, I was ready to tackle this project. Never mind that I know next to nothing about woodworking.


First I collected tools from various friends and neighbors and powered the batteries. Then I went to the hardware store at least 4 times to get screws, knobs, primer and other "kitchen components". I'm not good with measurements, and the guy at the store has been super patient with me.

"1 and 3/8th?" he asked.
"Yes, you know, a bit longer than an inch plus two little lines." I replied with a smile thinking (please don't leave, I still have 8 other questions to ask.)

"So, you wanna work on the play kitchen?" I asked my husband for the 4th time because I was too nervous to use the skill saw to cut out the sink. Wanna? Wanna? Wanna? We cut out the sink and screwed on the back splash and then we ran into problems. So I went back to the hardware store. And the same guy was there.

"Can I have screws that are longer than this one and shorter than this one? I asked him with a really wide smile.

At this time I've managed to screw on 3 "gas knobs", to re-cut the oven door (12 inches and 4 little lines was not the right measurement the first time around) and to sand the whole thing. "It's a long term project." my husband said before he left on business. It's a long term project, it's a long term project, I say to myself every time I go back to the hardware store for advice and supplies.

And you know what?  I'm loving it! I'm making a play kitchen for my son with wood!! My hands are moving, my mind is quieted, my creativity is flowing and I'm happy. And that's how I take care of myself.

Little Art Project

Here's a step by step demonstration of a series of paintings I did over the month of January. I was inspired by the mountains on the North Shore.

I used:

1. a piece of maple wood which I purchased and had cut at the hardware store.
2. a package of heavy duty eyelets.
3. fun paper.
4. acrylic paints, brushes, medium for varnish and pastels.
5. a surface away from Baby. Notice his little curious hand....

First I made a stencil out of paper to create a "frame" for each of the pieces of wood and I outlined it in pencil.

Then I started painting/pastelling. I took turns with each piece and used the same colors to add continuity. There were many times I thought: "Man, this is ugly!", like at the moment I took this picture, but just kept going.

I bought some really cool paper which comes in a pad at the local art supply store and cut up shapes that I liked.







And glued them onto my mountains.

Then I used "Clear Tar Gel", which is this super gooey medium to make sure the paper bits would stay on and to give the whole piece a nice shiny finish.

Then I decided I didn't like the border pale and redid it in purple.

This one reminded me of Rio de Janeiro. I painted Copacabana beach and a slum, but no Corcovado.

This one reminded me of Vancouver. The beach, the coastal mountains and the Rockies. I made the clouds more festive than they usually are.

This one reminds me of the Gulf Islands, so I put little boats in the water....

Finally I measured the middle point and screwed in an eyelet in each piece of wood. Maple is really soft, so I didn't need a drill. Then I tied them together with string.

And ta-da! 3 mountain paintings.

Photographs to Take you Away

I should add to my post "Mommy Tools of the Trade", my camera. Taking photos as I push Baby in the stroller, makes the long cloudy Vancouver days seem a little brighter. I've found that the East side of town has a lot of unexpected treasures... things are not so manicured here.  It makes for interesting photo taking...

Featureshoot has an amazing collection of photographers and their work, many of which can be purchased at quite reasonable prices. Get inspired, get lost, chase the winter blues away, go look.

Michelle Allard with the Magic Hands

Michelle is a great friend I've know since high school, 20 years ago (already, yuck). She's multi-talented, and when I say multi-talented it doesn't really seem to capture what I really mean, more like multi-talented in many different ways with lots of talent. Yah, that's better. You could say that she might have magical hands... She uses them a lot to transform living and non-living things into new, beautiful, unique, and thought provoking shapes. I would never assume that I can talk intelligently about the art that she creates, most of the time I can't understand what artists are saying about art even though it's in English. But I can say that when I see her pieces, I'm taken away from myself and the room I'm in for a moment. They make me smile. I want to touch them. And that's what I like about her work.

I went to her opening the other night. Put Baby down to sleep and booted downtown to see her piece. Downtown at night! Oooohhh, it's been so long. I miss those nights of fancy cocktails... I digress. I took a picture, but my camera (it's the camera's fault not me) just didn't do it justice. SO, I'm posting other images you can easily find online instead. Google her and you can find lots of neat things she's done. Go Michelle! You're awesome!

Getting Crafty

There's something about being on maternity leave and at home that gets you feeling really crafty! You want to use your sewing machine again, start painting or scrapbooking, and can your own food. You visit Etsy and you start dreaming about starting your own pink tutu making business. Why not, right?

I decided to start simple: to recover my white, stained, dining room chair seats covers. Easy right? First get some fabric, unscrew the seats from the chairs and then staple the new fabric over the seats, and then ta-da! New covers!

Day 1. Visited the fabric store, brought home fabric which was promptly vetoed by my husband. Good call babe.
Day 2. Visited another fabric store, picked out something similar to the original fabric but that has specks in it to hide the stains better.
Day 3. Drove to my mom's to get her stapler.
Day 4. Walked to Canadian Tire to get staples. They didn't have any that fit.
Day 5. Walked to Rona to get staples. The guy there laughed at me and said that they didn't carry staples for that stapler anymore because the model was too old and to try their competition.
Day 6. Drove to Home Depot to get staples. Forgot to bring the stapler but did bring the model number. They didn't have the right staples, but suggested to try others instead. They didn't work.
Day 7. Went into the storage room, suddenly remembering that I had my own stapler. No staples.
Day 8. Return old staples to Home Depot, try to find new staples for my own stapler. No staples.

You would think that after all this, all the while lugging, pushing, and carrying Baby, that I would give up!

WELL, I DID!!!!! (only after I had a major tantrum when my husband, who didn't know about all this, asked me why I hadn't finished my covers yet.)

This is a classic case of not listening to the universe! Until a stapler fully loaded with staples rings my doorbell,  I officially give up and I'm okay with it! At least I have the fabric!

On a more positive note, I have successfully completed other crafts since then. Thanks to my friend Michelle for inspiration and my mom for her help! I made some cute pants and a hat for Baby from a pair of old maternity pants and some curtains. I will not be on Etsy anytime soon.