Portait Painting

I've never painted a portrait before--  well I've painted portraits of flowers, animals, bugs.... but never a human portrait.
But I've been in a bit of an artistic rut, and I needed something to bend my mind in a new direction, so I thought I would give it a go.
Guess what!  It's HARD.
Well, hard for me.  I know several extraordinarily talented portrait artists, who make it look so easy.
I really didn't think it would be that different from painting anything else... but I have to say, painting this portrait absolutely has been one of the most tormenting stressful artistic experiences I've ever undertaken.  A very good challenge....
but this picture of my daughter with her giraffe literally had me swearing at the paint.

Here's the thing about painting people:  You sit and chip away at this thing, and then you walk away to go to the bathroom.  When you come back, somehow the mouth is in completely the wrong spot, and the nose is far too small, and the eyes are staring in two different directions.  So you fix it.  You fix it all until it's perfect.
Then after dinner you come back and stand aghast as you stare this painting that looks like someone else's child-- not yours-- it looks absolutely nothing like yours.  So you attempt to put some shadows near her eyes because you decide that what it needs is eye work, and then realize that you've just aged her by 20 years.
Then, you think finally you are finished with the awful thing, so you do the trick that artists do where you hold it up to the mirror and see how it looks flipped around... and now her cheeks are full of marbles.

Anyway, a good exercise.  And fun to get out my [anciently old and rusty] oils.   I might do a little more work; maybe a glaze in a couple of weeks, and I still haven't decided if I want to leave the hair and background thinned and sketchy or if I should fill it in...I've always sort of liked the half and half look of an "unfinished" painting....  but anyway, here it is in it's current state:  Violet and G-Raff.

Beginning Ballet

Violet started ballet a few weeks ago.
Before she started, I kind of had mixed feelings about it.  I think it's fairly common to worry that ballet will just be a kind of vanity activity--  you know, that maybe it's too much about the pretty pink costume, and the polishing of a little girl into this delicate little dolly--  really, there was definitely something about the idea of ballet that made us hesitate and cringe.
But, somehow, somewhere, Violet got it in her head that she wanted to try ballet.  And then we found out that one of her best little friends was signed up for it.
So we decided to give it a go.  

And oh my goodness-- she adores it.  ADORES it.  

I'm not sure why I was so focused on the vanity of ballet. You know, I spent my entire youth dancing, and doing gymnastics and it definitely was never ever about any of that.  It was HARD work.  It did, however, make me feel beautiful.  I was tiny, really puny, and somehow through dance my body was able to shine in a way that was never possible in every day life.  
Also,  I was (still am) really shy and awkward, and HATED any sort of team sports.  I always ended up first getting hit by the ball (it didn't matter what sport, the ball always ended up hitting me in the face), and then, secondly, getting yelled at by every other kid on the team for my complete failure to kick/hit/bat/run/throw/catch....
But dance and gymnastics were always different.  There has always been something about the quiet independence of dance that I just love.  Gymnastics too.  There is definitely a kind of silent strength that comes with the sport that always felt very empowering to me.
No yelling across the field; no contact.  No one else at all, really.
Just a huge floor, or a set of bars; space to fly.

So I guess it shouldn't surprise me that Violet loves ballet.  She and I are cut from the same cloth.
She comes home from class just beaming and talking non-stop about what she learned.  Yesterday when we got back, she immediately set up the entire living room exactly like the studio-- with a little obstacle course to leap and sachet through.
It's really fantastic to see her so proud of herself, and excited--
--and to see that through dance, maybe her introvertedness can shine a bit, as she focuses in on her legs and arms and toes.

After the first month of lessons, all the mommies got to come into the studio and watch the kids put on a little show.
It was a bit like watching bunnies dance.
They were adorable.  See if you can spot my string bean...

Weddings

I really love going to weddings.

I especially love going to weddings when you see how so completely very happy the two people getting married are.

And, I have to admit, as an artist, I love to see how differently the idea of wedding is interpreted. You get to see this wonderful collage of the couple's life-- their favorite friends mingling with outspoken relatives, wrapped in their favorite colors, eating their favorite foods, often in their favorite most sacred spot on the planet-- be it a family home, or a temple, or a church, or their favorite boulder looking out over the ocean.
You get this little snapshot of what is important to two individuals.  It's usually some form of tradition mixed with personal expressions of beauty, and creativity and resourcefulness and love.

Even with the most traditional weddings, you never know exactly what it's going to be.
Maybe I'm just lucky, but I feel like we've gone to so many weddings in the past few years that have truly been unique labors of love.
You know what it's like?  It's like handing out egg cartons to a class of kids, and telling them each to go home and make something.
Some kid will just bring it back full of eggs or marbles.  Another kid will turn their egg carton into a cat or a dragon.  Another kid will fill each pouch with dirt and plant sweet peas.
It's always so fascinating and beautiful to see how the framework idea of wedding is brought to life in different ways and shapes and colors and forms.
I love it.
Of course weddings aren't all about the fuss and frazzle-dazzle of the details; but I do remember, from our own wedding, all of these silly little projects unexpectedly brought me so close to so many people I love in such a fun and creative-crafty way.  It's this underhanded way of having an excuse to talk about color and fabric and flowers and food with everyone you meet, something I kind of relish in.

There were so many late sweet nights sitting with Tyler in our tiny studio apartment in the middle of a dark Seattle winter, printing out invitations, stamping birdies on the envelopes, drinking wine, laughing...  

Well, September has been full of weddings for us.  We went to two weddings in two weeks, and they were both incredibly fun and beautiful, and very different from each other.  

The first wedding was in Colville, Washington.  Our friends Nicolle and Jay got married at their gorgeous home looking out over acres of farmland.  This truly was one of the most incredible and heart warming events I've ever been to.  The entire event just exuded happiness.  I don't think I will ever forget the beautiful picture of Nicolle and Jay standing under the trees with their son, Ari, just wrapped in pure happiness to be sharing their home and love for each other with their family and friends.  And everything was beautifully hand-done.  The flowers, the food, the candles on the the driveway-- their house just glowed with all of these little projects that, you could tell, came straight from  Nicolle's heart.  Violet got to come, and she was absolutely in heaven.
  

The second wedding we went to was vastly different, but equally as fun.  Tyler's cousin Caitlin and her boyfriend, Miguel, were married in southern California over the weekend at Sherwood Country club.  (Does this place ring a bell?  It's where Tiger Woods has his own personal golf tournament ever year).  Well, it was a fabulous wedding!  Oh, California, how lovely you are!  It was a beautiful evening event  with incredible food and probably one of the best live cover bands I've ever heard.  An enormously fun party wrapped in purple roses, with dancing and, again, this enormous amount of love and celebration just dripping from every detail.  

Violet stayed with my folks for this one, so Tyler and I had the excuse to take a little holiday by ourselves :)  We went to Santa Monica and tooled around on the beach.  More photos?  Yes!  Although, sadly, I didn't get very many non-blury ones of the Caitlin and Miguel..    

Sunflower

Hello, September.  Aren't you pretty.

Sorry it's been so long.  We were busy growing a sunflower.  

We're very proud of it.  I'm not really sure why it decided to grow and bloom (most of the other flowers kind of gave up in August).  

It didn't seem to care about the glass and roofing scraps in the soil, and it certainly didn't give a fig that we only watered it every-other never.  

I think Violet is planning a birthday party for it.  I'm sure it will be quite an event!  All flowers are welcome to attend :)

Recent Parade Fun

We've had some fun parades recently!  Hope they will brighten your day (they brighten mine :)  

 Beach Findings Parade 

Painted Clams Parade 

Crabs Parade (Tyler made this one)

 Waiting-to-Hit-the-Piñata Parade 

Cat and Bear in Chairs Parade

Happy Thursday, everyone!

Love, Violet and Chowder

Camping with a 3 year old

Here is a secret:  Camping with a 3-year old is awesome.  

You think it's going to be really hard and horrible--  that it's going to take too much planning and that your kid won't sleep, and that she'll be falling in rivers and getting eaten by bears and bugs, and that she'll throw tantrums the entire time because she'll want to play in the fire and eat poisonous berries.  

Well, at least that's what I thought.  

But then, as we were getting ready for the trip, I started to notice how excited V was getting--  just completely consumed with excitement, in that way that is, I think, unique to kids.  She was excited to drive a long long way and listen to music in the car.  She was excited to sleep in a brand new sleeping bag in a tent and pack her own little tote bag of toys and animals to bring.  She was excited to have a camp fire and toast a marshmallow and brush her teeth under a tree.  

I think maybe this is what separates taking a 2-year old camping from taking a 3-year old camping--- 

They are able to anticipate and get excited.  There is this mental capability that exists that just isn't there in younger kids-- they are suddenly so interested in adventure and learning and exploring, and understand basic activities (like sleeping and eating and cooking) as facets of life that can be thought about and done in different ways (like the idea of cooking our dinner outside over a fire basically blew her mind)--and this is what camping is all about, after all, for any of us.  

Well, maybe luck was with us, but really everything went so incredibly well.  Violet spent the entire trip having fun making leaf bathtubs for her my-little-pony, and finding stumps to climb.  She slept legitimately well (ok you guys, she slept until 7:15 one morning; that's a good 2 hours past her average wake up time at home). Maybe it was the 4 mile hike?  Or the residual comforting smell of campfire smoke in her sweater that she wore night and day... I don't know.  It was like some perfect dream that I never imagined could actually happen.  And she took it so seriously.  --Like she knew we were out of our element (or maybe finally in our element?) and didn't get into trouble one spec.  

She was just this little fun person, wanting to help out the whole time, and enjoying her vacation away from home.  And I think Tyler and I both got this flash of how great things are going to be as she grows older and we get to share more and more of the things we love in life with her.