Happy Holidays!

Thank you to everyone who drops by here. Thanks for your friendship, support and encouragement. It means so much to me. I hope you all have wonderful holidays.

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I didn't have time to do a blog post but I did put some photos of my tourtières and some cookies Emma baked on my Facebook page. It's hard to keep up with my blog, Facebook and Twitter at the best of times and nearly impossible during the holidays.

By the way, we ate some of the tourtières last night (Christmas Eve) and they were delicious.

https://www.facebook.com/TrowelandPaintbrush

Water and Snow

Yesterday, despite a million other things I should have been doing, I sat down to paint a little and was so glad I did.

I have a habit of scooping something from the fruit bowl and taking it up to my studio to paint. Unfortunately, sometimes I get diverted by other things and forget it's there. One of fruit's virtues and, I suppose, downfalls is that it is very quiet. It might be useful if it shouted down the stairs every now and then 'Hey Kathleen, you might want to get up here, there's only so long we'll last!'

I did get up there in time. I did remember. Chloé was the one who suggested that I leave one pomegranate whole and cut one in half. I love the juxtaposition of the outside peel and the wonderful seedy inside of the fruit.  I painted it on a beautiful pad of Sennelier rough grain paper that Lucile gave me this past summer. I was thinking about Lucile when I painted the pomegranates and I tried to leave my painting a little looser than I normally do--inspired by her endlessly beautiful and fluid watercolour paintings.

Meeko and I are so happy to have our forest path back. We can only walk there during the winter as it is too swampy the rest of the year. We are so lucky that it is at the end of our street--a tiny slice of natural paradise in the middle of a suburban development.  It is the only place that I will let him go off-leash. He knows the routine. He knows the path. It provides a wonderful combination of freedom and peace for both of us.

On one of our walks this week, Meeko and I walked past one of the last bits of autumn colour outside--a lovely leaf hanging on despite the wintry weather around it.

Making our Christmas tourtières is one of the next things on my list. Still a number of things to check off my in order to be ready for the days ahead. Good luck with your lists!

To Cut, To Cut The Christmas Tree

Yesterday, despite the very cold weather, we ventured on our annual Christmas tree cutting expedition. This is a family tradition that extends to my own childhood. The tree farm we have gone to for the past three years is about an hour's drive from home. This farm actually sell cut trees at a location very near to our house but somehow going to a lot isn't the same as choosing your own tree in the middle of a snow-covered field.

Meeko is always very excited to go anywhere in the car even if he doesn't know where he is going to end up. A tree farm is much better than the vet!

This is Emma and Chloé standing in front of our chosen tree just before it was cut. It was so cold that they actually went back to the car and let Mama and Papa Lumberjack cut it down. There are many goofy photos of the junior lumberjacks that I would have loved to have included but unfortunately I was not given permission.

Here's the tree with its lights on. That's my job. Chloé and Emma then added the decorations. (If you squint a little, you can see one of Geninne's beautiful bird prints on the wall to the left of the tree. We have five of them in our family room.)

Even Meeko is getting excited about Christmas. Actually, I'm not sure he was all that joyful about having reindeer antlers on his head but he was a very good sport about it.

There was a lovely snowfall last night as we were decorating our tree. It's amazing how a little snow makes everything feel more Christmassy. For those of you living in places where snowflakes are rare or non-existant, I'll try to share more snowy photos in the days ahead. Good luck with all of your holiday preparations.

Snow-covered clematis seed heads in our garden last night

Dream in Color

Do you dream in color? I'm not sure if I do. Meeko might though. He woofs in his sleep which makes me think that he must have very nice dreams.

I just bought this t-shirt for myself. I saw it on a woman at the MOMA in New York in July. I went up to her and asked where she got it! Maybe it will inspire me if I wear it when I'm painting. Hope so. I bought it here.

And speaking of dreaming in color, last night I ordered my iMac. Do you ever have moments when your fingers hovers over the 'enter' key. Should I? Should I not? I took a deep, deep breath and did it! It is my Christmas present from my husband (and then some). I wonder if I should wrap it up and look surprised when I open it on Christmas day? I have a feeling that I won't be able to resist using it before that. It's expected sometime next week. I can't wait.

Sweet dreams!

The Joy of Paper

Do you have something that makes your heart go 'weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee', as if you were a young child flying through the air on a swing? That's the feeling I got as I opened this package full of paper.

I finally had a quiet moment to sit and open my order that arrived well over a week ago. It was full of beautiful handmade Twinrocker watercolour paper. Both Geninne and Diana had mentioned how much they liked it. I placed a small order a few months ago to give it a try and loved working with it. I did my painting of the French radish from my garden on it earlier this summer. I also did the painting of the serviceberry branch that was in my last post on Twinrocker paper.

This time, I ordered some round paper (oh, the delicious possibilities) and three different rectangular sizes. I love the feathered edges.

I am wearing my new copper ginkgo ring. It just arrived yesterday. I had forgotten that I had birthday money to spend (my birthday was way back in July). That's even better than finding some change in a jacket pocket. I wear it the opposite way to how the Tattooed Tinker model wears it in the photo and absolutely adore it. And I still have some money left over. :)

Here's a closer look at the ring. Excuse my non-model's hands. :)

If you have an artist on your Christmas gift list, beautiful paper is certainly a lovely idea. You can check out the inventory offered by Twinrocker here.

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Pssssst! All of my holiday cards are currently 25% off in my Etsy shop.