Gorgeousness & Waves

I get my butt to the beach as often as I can, sometimes it's daily, if my head cooperates enough...

besides the incredible beauty of it all...I also sit there and appreciate that gorgeous guy of mine XO

Run To The Water

When the world gets to be too much...

I don't walk but I run to the water!

Elegant Elsie

We've got some things going on with Elsie and we're nervous and scared.

She's older, about 7 years old, she's a big girl and apparently 7 is old for a big bun

but I can't accept that her time has come already and I can't imagine Henrie without her...

A couple weeks ago, she hurt her front left paw, so we kept an eye on it but it healed

but about a week after she started to hold in and wobble on her back right.

I worried right away that it was her heart because her breathing suddenly became more rapid

but the doctor squeezed us in last week and checked her heart and it seems good, strong & healthy.

The vet thinks that it's arthritis kicking in but it still can for sure just be an injury...

obviously we're hoping for an injury because that will eventually heal

but there is still the small possibility of bone cancer as well, so I am pretty much terrified.

So wish us luck and send us good positive mojo because tomorrow

Elsie goes back to the vets for scans and blood work.

I find putting them under anesthesia very scary, even if it's done quickly...

I am worried that the stress of the tests and even just going into the vehicle will stress her

and send her into full blown stasis but it feels like but we have no choice

because she is eating abnormally now, half of what she normal eats and she's being fussy

which to me usually tells of wanting to eat but discomfort stopping them.

We need to see what is going on internally and we need the blood tests to make sure her kidneys

are strong enough to handle long-term pain meds in case it is indeed arthritis (or worse).

Drawing blood from a rabbit isn't always easy and they usually have to put them under just a bit

to get blood because they usually have to pull it from the jugular

because rabbits veins are so small and delicate.

(I am scared that she'll get a hematoma from the blood draw just like my poor Teela did).

   I am scared of calcium problems....of bone cancer...that she won't wake up...

Ugh Ugh Ugh...this is the scary, stressful, awful part of loving!

Suntastic Sunset

I am just beyond words that I get to have this kind of beauty in my everyday life.

This is the lake near our home, just a 10 minute walk away, there are plenty of public accesses.

 We keep our eyes peeled from wherever we may be and if it looks like it'll be a decent sunset

we head to the water (when my head allows).  My heart fills with gratitude for all this beauty!

Babushkas and Nieces

I am working on a new babushka inspired character...

My niece sometimes draws for a bit too...cozy rainy summer evenings...ahhhh.

Flowers, Monsters, Dark Caves & Positivity

So I do try my best to always have a positive attitude, life is just harder with a bad one

BUT

now and than the chronic/acute head pain that I live with on pretty much a daily basis

just gets to be too much for me and I end up feeling sorry for myself,

never for long, but it does happen!

It's common for me to have a bad headache for two weeks straight with no break and that often turns

into a bad migraine for 3 or 4 days.

It really often feels like a tussle with a monster...

a tenacious, long-nailed, mean, nasty monster

that drags me into it's pain-filled dark cave of migraines!

But ya know, it often too take the tiniest things to spark the positive attitude to return.

The other week, it was these flowers from my honey & niece.

In the rare few seconds

when I could actually open my eyes, lift my head or look around,

these flowers greeted me every time and would make my heart smile

and with that smiling heart, I started to focus on what I would do once I could get back up

and that was get right back into my studio and make new colored pencil butterflies.

Butterflies that I could pose and photograph on these gorgeous bouquets.

Now unfortunately, it took four days and by the time I finished new butterflies most

of the bouquets were done BUT it was the hope that they flowers sparked that was most important.

So thank you guys...for the beauty and the reminder to get myself back to my joyful heart XO

Weekend Wishes

I hope that your weekend is full of natural beauty...and some familial beauty too!

Try to remember to focus on the positives way more than on the negatives XO.

Food Friday

This is a pretty typical looking dinner in our house...

Zucchini with Daiya melted on top (Daiya kinda sucks unmelted but melted it's a differernt thing)...

the always present steamed kale with nutritional yeast & tofu of course & homemade Miso soup
YUMMY & KIND...I hope you give this tasty and healthy mix a try...Happy Eating XO.

Woodsy Walk

One of my favorite things about the place where I live
is that there is a 90+ hectare conservation space right in town...

Here you see plenty of beaver activity, damns, felled trees, something you see deer
and pink lady slippers blooming...hopefully we'll never see a bear!!!

The North Star Travelling Cafe

There has been this somewhat elusive phenomenon in our little tiny city, ha ha...

It's an amazing, adorable, quaint, special and very vegan phenomenon

called 'The North Star Travelling Cafe"

You gotta get to the farmers markets early or they are usually cleared right

out of their gastronomical delights & than your whole day kinda sucks, ha ha!

They are opening a restaurant in our very not vegan town & my tummy grumbles with anticipation!

Heron Inspired

A new heron inspired character is in the works...

I am struggling a bit with this one so far so I hope he smartens up!!!

Part Of A Lake

We spend a lot of time exploring the big lake closest to our home, we grew up around/on this lake
(we now take our niece with us and I think I see her slowly falling under it's spell too).

With our four beautiful seasons and how it changes with each one, I don't think we'll ever tire of it!
(P.S. Can I just say that these are some of my very most favorite new photos).

Getting Soft On Softoleum

I should be able to show you guys the finished prints of all of these guys starting next week...

The softoleum typically has a bad rap but I gotta say, I am getting used to it and my wrist likes it!!!

Bonding Of Bunnies

We've been doing some bonding between Leisel and Yuuji...
Taking it slow...taking our time.
Leisel has been here over 6 months now and her aggression at the gate with Yuuji has gone finally!

Just this past month they seem to not want to leave each others side at the bonding gate
soooo let's cross our fingers & toes that they accept each other and become friends.
They both need it, as do I, I can't take seeing my sweet Yuuji alone without Teela anymore.

Food Friday

We have a little tradition....Scone Sunday.

I am SO not a baker

but every few Sundays I like to treat my hon, my niece and myself by whipping up homemade scones that I serve with jams and butter and tea with soy milk...

I yell 'Scones are ready' and they come running with smiles plastered on their faces,

I kinda love it, this little tradition, this sweet bit of domesticity.

I am determined to learn vegan baking...it's a summer time goal,

(but so is a lot of biking to work off the desserts that I do make!)

Dabbling and Bad Habits

I've been dabbling with printmaking again...

I tend to cut a bunch of blocks before I do the hand-pressed printing part,

it's probably a bad habit..I plan to do some actual pressing/printing this week hopefully!!

My dear friend and mentor Dave Carlin gift me a whole whack of his beautiful chisels

& some vinyl too, I think he was excited about my renewed interest in picking up printmaking again and it's so awesome to be using chisels that he actually taught me with in highschool!

Starry Night Heron

Here's a new ink pen just finished up...

"Starry Night Heron"

Prints will be in my shop by the weekend

and the original is up for grabs, just email me if your interested

or keep an eye open for it in the shop.

Matilda Update

Even though last year I composed more posts than ever (185) in all my years of blogging,

I still ran out of time to post things from last summer before winter came etc.

So bear with me as I catch up a little bit here and there with some posts that were left behind!

So as a very brief recap on Matilda the pigeon, in case your new to my beloved blog;

At the beginning of last summer
(read about us finding her right here)
we found a baby bird in the middle of the road who clearly needed help
(she grew into this gorgeous creature)

We brought her home, intending to care for her a day or two or at least until she flew away.

But she ended up learning to fly and stayed with us...she stayed with us all summer...
(click right here to read a blog post about our days with her)

She'd come outside into the yard with us but never flew away,
she'd always come back into the house...

She was lovely and we did fall in love,

it was hard not to, click right here for one of my favorite moments with her.

I'll never see pigeons the same way again and now they'll forever be one of my favorite birds.

 (She was hands down one of my most favorite things to photograph that season...

so I just have to post these last remaining shots of her that I haven't shown you yet.)

She was bonded to us...we to her...
(click here for one of our most perfect day with her from all of last summer)

but as she got older we realized maybe staying with us wasn't the best thing for her,

as much as we didn't want to let her go, we wanted what was best for this wild heart of ours.

We got concerned when we clearly couldn't' leave the room for even 5 minutes without her panicking about where we were and than swooping all over the house frantically looking for us.

We were able to be with her a lot, but there would be a lot of times when we wouldn't be home
and she'd have to go in a cage, because we couldn't have her flying around unattended,
pooing where the bunnies were etc...
so we got more and more concerned and questioned if we could really give this wild bird
the best home even though setting her free felt impossibly mean and hard to do...

.

We ended up talking at length with a local bird rehabilitation expert,
And she explained that yes, Matilda was attached to us

but given the real chance between us and a real flock, she'd likely chose the birds.

Her coming outside with us and not flying away was not unusual,

we had no pigeons around our house for her to identify with...
we were her flock so if we lived in the house,
that's where she figured she was suppose to live too...
(click here to see a bunch more photos of our life with a pigeon in the house)

So we decided, long before winter arrived, to give her the best chance,
that we wouldn't feel good about keeping her
if we didn't give her a real honest try at being wild.
We agreed not to force her, if she decided to stay with us than she was welcome to,
that we'd fit her beautiful heart into the family if need be...

My parents, luckily, were at the time feeding a large group of pigeons,
so we brought Matilda over there to meet their flock and as soon as we let her out of the cage,
she went to the birds (read more about her introduction right here)
but when they flew away, she didn't know to follow...
so back to us she came and back home we went to try again the next day.

Each day she got more and more involved with the flock and on that 4th day
when the flock flew away into the horizon and setting sun, our Matilda flew with them.

I get emails from people now and than asking if we knew how she doing
and whether or not I knew if she survived Winter...
Trust me I was wondering too...
every single time I saw a pigeon my heart would give a little twinge!
I am SO beyond thrilled to finally give you all an update and say

YES, she is doing GREAT
She finally made an appearance at my parents just the other week
and guess what...she knew her name, ha ha!!!

Dearest Matilda,
you'll always be one of my very favorite memories & experiences XO
(She has for sure inspired a story of her very own which hopefully someday I'll share)