Back in the studio :D

Last week most of my time was spent behind the computer catching up with emails and paperwork and working on the composition for a particularly challenging commissioned piece. This week however I will finally be back in the studio! :D I have so many transfers waiting for me, I can’t wait to dive in! I want to complete at least two more borough pieces this week and hopefully I get to do another composition as well. I also picked up some nice new panels at Wallacks in Ottawa yesterday so there is some prep work that needs to be done on those. There are at least 5 borough pieces that are waiting for their layers of varnish and that little experiment I’m working on won’t complete itself ;) 

Luckily I have a whole bunch of podcasts lined up to keep me company :) I need silence when I’m working on my compositions but when I’m in the studio I love to put on a podcast. The Nerdist Podcast is one of my favourites but I also like to listen to the Nerdist writers panel, NPR’s Fresh Air, the Thrilling Adventure Hour and CBC’s Spark. I’ve got some other podcasts I listen to together with my husband, things like the Dice Tower and GeeksOn and I’m still looking for a good podcast on art so if you have any tips I’d love to hear them! But for now I’ve got a whole bunch of Nerdists that I haven’t listened to yet so I’m really looking forward to getting to the studio and doing some serious painting! :D

A Little Winter Break

We’ve had the luxury of a little winter break :) In December I became an aunt and it was finally time to meet my new niece and nephew! We spent a whole week in the Netherlands visiting friends and family. 

After that we had another week off to introduce my mother in law to winter in QC :) We had a lot of wintery fun! We went to the ice hotel and winter carnival in Quebec City, we did some snow tubing and we drove the ice bridge to Oka. We enjoyed some serene wintery landscapes while walking around in Cape Saint Jaques and Oka National Park. We warmed up with some amazing hot cocoa at Julliet et Chocolat and we had an early sugaring off meal at the sugar shack. The highlight of the week was a dogsledding adventure! We drove to Rawdon, QC where we received an in-depth instruction on the techniques of driving a dog sled and after that we got to try it ourselves! It was an amazing experience to be pulled through the pristine snow by a team of these amazing creatures. It was quite a challenge to make the corners and to stay on the trail and it was a good work out as well! We got to take the dogs from the kennel to the sled and learned how to put on their harness and attach it to the sled and after we got back we helped feed them. We had an absolute blast! I would definitely recommend it to anyone! If you’re interested check out the Kinadapt website, they are an amazing group of people with a lot of love and enthusiasm for their business and their animals.