Strathona Charm

 Strathcona is indeed a charming neighbourhood.  It's a historic neighbourhood in East Vancouver that borders downtown's China Town and the industrial side of Clark Drive (near my studio).  Many of the older homes have been renovated in recent years, causing the price of real estate in this area to really jump.  Here are just a few photos that I took while I walked to Gailan's studio sale the other day from my studio.  I loved how the Robin just sat there while I tried to take photos of it, getting as close as possible.
Hope your day is going well! I'll be loading a kiln and packing up for my set up for the One of a Kind Show tomorrow.  It's almost show-time!

Watercolour Wildlife

As you may have noticed, I've been away for the past 5 days in Princeton BC (about 3.5 hours away from Vancouver) at a resort camp that we attend every June for a staff conference for Dean's work.  The climate in the interior of BC is really different than that of Vancouver-  I live in a mild and temperate rainforest climate, while Princeton is much dryer with much more extremes in climate- ie. cold in winter and hot and dry in summer.  There are so many birds and wildlife that we got to see while we were there; besides all the sparrows, birds, and eagles, we spotted (and photographed) a baby fawn close up, lots of deer, a marmot, and a little striped chipmunk.  Someone in our group even saw a 'cinnamon' coloured bear right by where we were hiking that day- yikes!
All the wildlife and of course the patches of birch and aspen trees were pretty inspiring, so, when it got cold and a little wet about the 4th day in, I spent some time indoors with Sasha (he's got such a cute and goofy smile on his face) doing some watercolour painting together. Here's a couple of bird paintings I managed to finish. Hopefully I'll have time to finish a few more that I started so I can share them with you here. To see more work from this little mini-watercolour series see here.

Inspiration #4: Pacific Northwest Rainforest Birds

 A recent trip to the Ecology Center at Lynn Canyon for this inspirational moment... we will see where it leads! I do like to use birds in my work but know that the bird trend has been a little over-saturated at times.  But then I get up-close to an owl or canary and I'm smitten again.  BTW the birds under glass at the Ecology Center supposedly died of natural causes.  And when Sasha was looking on the forest floor for bugs for our nature walk he found a dead baby bird.  I guess the recent storms we've been having knocked that little one out of it's nest. 
A little bit about Lynn Canyon.  Please check out the link- it's got a virtual tour of the park, which has a Suspension Bridge and beautiful tall rainforest trees.  We live about 10 minutes away from the park and try to go as often as possible. It's become the latest tourist trap in summer- since it's free to go on the suspension bridge it's 'Vancouver's best kept secret that's gotten out'.  Hopefully they keep it free for years to come.

Bird Sightings!

We have been watching the 'Planet Earth' series of videos lately- absolutely amazing footage of animals and plants on this beautiful earth of ours- if, of course, we can manage to keep it this way! The bird footage in the series has been great to see, especially the birds of paradise portions, where the male bird struts and dances around to try to impress the ladies! On my own bit of bird sightings, we went to the Parrot Sanctuary in Nanaimo, BC with the kids a couple of weekends ago. It is really unbelievable how many exotic birds have been plucked out of their natural habitat to become soon-to-be unwanted pets. The bird sanctuary provides a home with other birds as parrots live in flocks and like to be in the company of other birds. The birds are really loud but friendly- will say 'hello' to you when you walk into their space, but I really can't imagine having them in my own home. Furthermore, they often live for up to 100 years!
Anyways, the bird theme in my life has, of course, come out on my ceramics more recently. Since finding a baby bird that had fallen from it's nest in spring, I have been playing around with bird shapes on my ceramics. Some cardinals have recently appeared as a hommage to the cardinals I would see when I grew up out east. Also a couple of hummingbirds, a pheasant, and the little sculpture of a sparrow that I hope to make more of.

In other news I was back at the clay studio working away on the Christmas orders that have started to come in fast and furious... I also posted some new work on etsy, and hope to continue posting more images over the next week to have the shop well-stocked for the holidays.
The Portobello Holiday Market is coming up really quick so there will be more Cardinal Tree Ornaments finished in time too! Save the date: December 13 & 14, Noon-6pm at the Rocky Mountaineer Station- $2, kids free!