fiction plane

We went to The Police concert on Monday night. Vancouver is the first stop on their reunion tour. It was a great show. As an added bonus, Sting's son Joe Sumner and his band 'Fiction Plane' opened the show. There is something to be said about genetics. At times you would swear it was Sting singing. After their set, we went back out to the concourse and picked up their newest CD...'Left Side of the Brain'. I am really enjoying it. If you are interested in having a listen, you can hear the track 'Two Sisters' from this CD here. Have a listen and tell me if that doesn't sound like Sting...talk about good genes!

goodbye, ken

I received very sad news today. My ol' island friend Reenie called to tell me that her dad had recently passed away. Ken, a US military man, moved to Nanaimo way back in the late seventies to work at the US naval base in Nanoose Bay. I had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know him and his wonderful wife, Jo through Reenie, who I met during grade 10. Even after her parents moved back to the states, we stayed in touch via Christmas cards and such.

We were lucky enough to have a chance to visit with them during a trip they made to Nanaimo last summer. Sure glad we took the time to go over and see them.

Goodbye to the wonderful man who always reminded me of Santa.

You will be truly missed.

tagged...

I have been tagged by Rachelle, one of the DT gang...

Each player starts with 7 random facts/habits about themselves. People who are tagged need to write on their own blog about their seven things, as well as these rules. At the end of your blog, you need to choose 7 people to get tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them that they have been tagged and to read your blog!

1. I sang backup vocals in a band called "Unrealistic Expectations", a band we formed to perform at our company's Christmas party a few years back. We recorded the performance and actually produced a CD of the show.

2. I have three piercing in my left ear lobe and two on my right (I went through an asymetrical phase back in the 80's; hair was short on one side not the other, etc. This is my everlasting reminder, which I don't mind cuz it's a little different).

3. My favorite vacation spots are Las Vegas and Disneyland.

4. I, unfortunately, chew my nails.

5. I was engaged at 17 years of age and married exactly a year and a day after becoming engaged (we didn't plan that, it just worked out that way). Stephen and I will be celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary this August.

6. I HATE the taste of coffee...always have (but, I love the smell of fresh ground coffee...go figure). Even so, I stop at Starbucks every weekday to pick up my venti, non-fat, no foam, two pump mocha syrup, steamed milk.

7. I give really good hugs; I learned from the best...my Nana G!

I am tagging the following wonderful folks...hope you don't mind...
Shari, Tracie Lyn, Marilyn, Sammy, Heather, Ty and Marcia

'bantock' piece continues...

As promised earlier, here is another look at my 16"x16" piece as it is presently. Time to do some more work on it, but thought I would give you a peek at the work-in-progress. Wonder what it will look like when it is done...and how will I know when that is? Hmmm.






This is a close up of a section that I particularly like.

ah, springtime...

I love our springtime. Sure, we get our fair share of rain, like today, but that helps everything grow and bloom. And really, what smells better than the fresh air outside after a good rain?

I took this yesterday while we were waiting in the border line-up.

Here are a couple shots from last week's trip to Burnaby Lake. It was a much nicer day.

i'm on a design team!!

How psyched was I to learn today that I had been selected to be a member of Lazar StudioWERX design team? I was over-the-moon excited! Lazar StudioWERX has some of the most fantastic rubber stamps I have ever purchased; not to mention the rich coloured papers.

Thanks go to my wonderful friend Janice who pointed me in the right direction and encouraged me to put in a submission! You're the best, BC!

Emails were flying back and forth today as those of us chosen for the team introduced ourselves. This is going to be so great!

I am adding a special listing for the blogs of my new DT gang. Mosey on over and have a peek.

Special thanks to Christina and Becky for giving me this fabio opportunity!

published!!

Oh my gosh! I am soooo excited! Our quiltlets from the Artfest 2006 swap, hosted by Shari Beaubien have been published in the May/June issue of Cloth Paper Scissors! The best part is that they featured four quiltlets and one of them was MINE!! Woo hoo! Yup...I consider this a very significant moment in my art journey!



Many thanks to Shari for all of the hard work that was put into the swap itself and everything involved in getting them published. Thank you, dear friend!!

weekend with nick bantock

What can I say... Nick is incredible!

I was fortunate to spend this past weekend with Nick in his 'Urgent 2nd Class' Collage workshop. My lovely art friend Nadine and I headed over to Victoria where we stayed with another of our fabulous art friends, Mary and her hubby, Don. The three of us were in the class together, which was terrific. Thank you again, to our wonderful hosts.

Nick's teaching was centred around process rather than technique and I learned a ton.

We started with 2"x2" illustration board doing several exercises within set amounts of time to force us to not think too much about what we were doing.

This is Mary's 2"x2". After we worked on our squares for about 30 mins, Nick had us pass them to the person on the right, so I had a chance to work on this piece as well. It was a great exercise.


We eventually worked our way up to 16"x16". I thought I would be intimidated by that size, but as Nick says "getting rid of the white" right away with pastel chalks, makes it much easier to jump in.





Here is the start of my 16"x16" with a quick coating of chalk pastels.






Nick would give us prompts every 30 mins or so...(i.e. "two figures", "gold") which we could then choose to incorporate into our collages.

This is about two hours in.

Here it is after about four hours. Nadine and I decided to continue working on them during the ferry ride home. Doesn't look like much yet, but you can really see the different textures.


Nick said that we needed to be prepared to put in 10 times as much time as we had (approx. four hours), so there is much more work to do before the piece is completed. I will post it as it progresses.

The class size was perfect with just eight of us...the three of us as well as Pat, Patti, Jill, Rose and Olga. After the first day of class we had a pot luck dinner with Nick, Joyce and our hosts Lori and Allen. We played a really fun game which allowed us to get to know a bit more about each other [I would tell you about it, but our friends Janice and Mo are taking the same workshop this weekend]. At the end of the second day, Nick said we produced some of the best work he has seen in a workshop and acknowledged that there was no competition and the group was very supportive. Wow!

Thank you to Lori for hosting the workshops at her amazing home.

If you are interested, Nick has a series of upcoming workshops in his studio on Salt Spring Island. Here is a link to his website. You can find out more about the workshops by contacting his partner and web curator, Joyce.

Another wonderful art experience!

mother's day countdown

Lisa Vollrath is offering up more goodies in her countdown to Mother's Day. Check it out here.