The one thing about having the studio just a hope, skip and a jump from the house is I get to have the animals hang out with me all day.

We live 15 minutes from the city so I am not really around a lot of people while painting but Moke, Sancho, Danny and Arnold are always there to keep me company.

Moke loves to sleep as close as he can to me. So if I am painting, he is on the floor at my feet or if I am working on the computer he is snuggled on my lap. Sancho, on the other hand, is just content to have me in his sights but prefers to lounge untouched.  Arnold and Danny (the cats) are pretty much there only if they are hunger or just want a good belly scratch. Usually they are off tormenting the birds or sneaking up on the moles.

Yesterday I turned around from the easel and there was Moke softly snoring on my office chair. I have no idea how he was sleeping in such an uncomfortable position but it made me laugh out loud. He opened one eye to look at me, wiggled his tail but pretty much drifted off back to sleep, quite blissful with his location.

Dogs and cats are definitely a source for unexpected smiles and unconditional loyal love. Money can buy you a pretty good dog, but it won’t buy the wag of his tail, that you have to earn. Earning it is the fun part.

For 15 years, I made a very good living painting portraits, which on a side note, I am now retired from every doing again!! In fact I just finished my last one and now that chapter is closed in my life! Whoop, whoop! Anyway back to the faces…

So painting faces is not hard for me but adding faces that match the style of Hanging Loose was not as peasy as I thought it would be.  The art of Hanging Loose characters is dependant on the simplicity of the line, not detail. So the faces had to be as simple, sounds quick….

Grrrrrr…..I filled a waste basket!! No kidding, I was so frustrated! Finally after quite a few hours and too many pencils and erasers to count….Wah-La, I drew her, then I drew another one with a snowman.

I quickly threw it onto canvas and it just poured out of me. I love when I have creative moments that makes time stand still…within hours there she was! Then I painted the snowman version and I LOVE LOVE LOVE her and so did Dave at McStevens….hot chocolate and lemonade labels here we go!

Promptly after that, I drew out half a dozen more canvas paintings to do. These are small canvas paintings that are perfect to work on when I need a break from the two large Hanging Loose commissions (yes, Coralee I am talking about yours) and the three new Princess and the Pea that I have to finish!

Then she told me the significance of the photo, it is because of what her team was called. She said that she loves laughing, music and art and well my art makes her heart happy. She began to list off the several pieces of The Girl’s art that she had, in fact she has a room she calls The Girls room. She loves them all but her absolute favourite one is Tit-zie Fairies. She told me this is the name they called their team…The Tit-zie Fairies Fighting  Back against Cancer. In the photo is all of them with fairy wings and wands.

She giggled when she told me but then she told me something else, her adult children, two daughters and one son, picked each of their favourite fairies in the painting and had them tattooed on their bodies so that they would carry with them something of their mom. Something that would make them smile because it made her smile! What do you even say to that? I just felt really humble. I fought back the tears for the rest of the day til I showed my hubby the photo and told him the story.

I am usually pretty good at just letting the tears fly, stink, I cry at commercials on TV that are sappy, but this was different, I think that if it started crying in front of her, I would have been blubbering for awhile, and not been able to stop.

Right from the start, I have always donated a percentage of my sales for breast cancer from The Girls art but it became more personal a few years later when my own mom had to fight breast cancer. Let me tell you, there is nothing in the world that prepares you when a family member is diagnosed with cancer and the surgeries, drugs and the fear of the unknown that they have to face. It makes you appreciate that accidents and disease can steal suddenly what we take so for granted. 
When she explained how my art means so much to her and her kids, how it makes her happy and how she wanted to get one of The Girls paintings for her young grand daughter so that when she looked at the art, she will think “my Grandma gave me this”, well let’s just say that I am still using a kleenex while I am writing this. How do you put that feeling into words?

I paint for a living but when you met someone like this, it just makes painting a little more meaningful. I wish her and her surrounding family all the love in the world. Thank you for making my day a little more special and the reminder to laugh, love and sing everyday that we and our families are blessed with.

We both use to be avid skiers, my husband an instructor and I was on the ski patrol for over 10 years but we haven’t skied for at least the last 8 years. We have been doing the hot holidays instead. To say that I was nervous was an understatement. I definitely don’t have the courage and dare devil attitude anymore.

Looking up the mountain, the jitters started and they continued on the ride to the very top. My hubby kept telling me it is just like riding a bike, which was not the best idea since I really haven’t rode a bike in awhile either.

Once you are on that chair lift, you are pretty much committed so I better remember fast! When we glided off the lift, we stopped and chatted about finding the easiest run down that we could find. No black or blue runs for me…it was green, green was for “go easy baby!”

By the time we arrived at the bottom, I was thrilled that my body did remembered how to ski. It wasn’t pretty and definitely not technically correct but I made it down and didn’t hold my breath all the way down. Jitters were disappearing and I was ready for the backside of Louise!

Only one way down

We spent the day reacquainting ourselves with the runs and stopped several times for “refreshments”. The last run of the day reminded me that I should really start doing some more exercising as my quads were screaming by the time I took off my skis. Actually a lot of muscles were complaining but it was a good complaining!

While we were at the top of the mountain, we often stopped just to take in the scenery that was surrounding us and my artist side emerged several times as I was in awe of the constant change of colour as the sun moved around the sky. It brought back the memories of paintings that I did for two big projects, The Deerfoot Inn and Casino in Calgary, AB and the lovely Timberland Resort in Kimberley BC.

Bear Shadow Mountain in Kimberley BC

I do not consider myself a landscape artist but there is magic about the mountains and I actually had fun painting over a dozen colourful pieces for those two projects many years ago.

Two Jack Lake, Banff Alberta

This ski trip may have inspired me to do two things; one is to maybe pull out a canvas and paint a fresh landscape, the other is to pull out some exercise tapes and start using the muscles that came out to say hello when I was skiing!

Blossoming Bosoms was the first real painting in the series and I had a dozen ready for a fall show.  I decided to launch them as a fundraiser for breast cancer at The Bessborough Hotel in Saskatoon. 200 women and even a few brave men showed up, making it a huge success!

The second big showing was at The Sundog in Saskatoon, I had lineups of women buying the art and telling me why and who they were going to give the art to.

I also had artists buy prints and explain to me how they loved the line, the colour and that it made them want to go home and paint. That is a real compliment when someone tells you that. I have always been willing to talk about techniques and secrets about painting because everyone can learn so much from each other.

The thing that starts to bother me is when people come up to me and tell me how another artist is copying my art. “Have you seen the art?” “Yes,” I nod my head, “in fact, the artist has purchased my art, told me I inspire them and even stated how much their work looks like mine.” Hmmmm….something wrong there? Do you think?

I have no problem when I inspire someone else to create, other artists have done the same to me. I have a problem when it causes confusion to clients and especially when they start coming up to me and telling me…”Oh, your work looks just like so-and so, did YOU copy them?”

This is where I draw the line in the sand, it isn’t that it just effects my pocket book but more importantly it is now affecting my reputation as an artist! I have been painting for 30 years and it is my living, it isn’t a secondary job or hobby. My reputation is important to me, it is my name, it is who I am.

So imitation is NOT, NOT, NOT a form of flattery when it touches every level of your art.

The one thing about being a true creative artist, not one that depends on copying another persons art or style,  is that I am constantly changing and growing. My new art Hanging Loose and Princess and the Pea series is a result of that. I guess there will always be someone that makes art by “imitating” but flattery comes from someone telling me how original my art is.

What a pleasure it has been to work with him on my Princess and the Pea and The Hanging Loose art. We signed our first deal with McStevens who just released the first Hanging Loose Lemonade this month. How cool is that???

They used one of my favourite tropical paintings. It actually is an image of me and my buddy, along with our girls at the beach. I can’t wait to hold the containers in my hand and make some lemonade!

Lemonade, Sand, Sun and Girlfriends