Ultra Feast, Cattle Point and Art

If you’ve seen the office, you will remember that they decided to have an ‘Ultra Feast’ for Pam when she was pregnant. We did this at work last week. One of our coworkers is beginning her maternity leave and she had her last day at work with us, so everyone brought something to share. There was food to eat and nibble at all day long. The two particular highlights for me were some specialty home made cupcakes that were brought in, and the samosas. Our other coworkers mom makes excellent samosas, which he has brought in for us to enjoy a few other times. Ultra Feast is not only a fun term, but it breaks up the day nicely with some good food and a chance to have little conversations with others that we don’t always cross paths with very much outside our offices. Which does seem strange, as we work in the same building, but break at different times, or office doors are closed, so just don’t see each other a whole lot.

I also had a Victoria day last week. I took a mid-week vacation day, and I brought my boys, plus Jordan’s girlfriend and her cousin who is visiting from England, to the mall for some morning shopping. Then we picked some food for a picnic and brought a cooler to the ocean. A favourite spot of mine is Cattle Point. On a clear, nice day, you can see Mt. Baker – and it was both clear and beautiful. It’s in the Oak Bay Area of Victoria and had been a favourite walking spot for both sets of my grandparents. So I always think of them when I am there. My grandma had given me a little sketchbook that she had used with watercolour to paint a few scenes there. Syd from England loves photos, so we took pictures of them at the beach, and there is even a piano by the ocean so she played us a tune. They looked at ocean critters and seaweed and eavesdropped on a guy setting up a whole fishing rig and talking into a device like he was preparing to do a how-to video. He was quite passionate and a bit theatrical about it all.

And my art. I have aimed to get the book drawings completed by August 1st if possible, or as close to that as I can. I’d written out the text, noted which images I see accompanying each phrase, which images are already complete or need to be done. And I started mapping out a visual storyboard so I can see it all. I am pleased to have quite a few done and could picture just how I want the other images to look. So that’s what I’ve been working on. 4am is my preferred time. Which means I’m ready for bed by 8:30pm 😂 – but I like the peace of the morning, the focus of that undisturbed time. It’s still quite a bit to do. I like to do two of each painting. It takes the pressure off of one, I can choose afterwards which one turned out better. It’s really the way to go, it’s too upsetting if you try to do one ‘perfectly’ and then if something goes wrong and you have to start over, it can be very discouraging. So starting by sketching it out twice is the key and then the painting is much more relaxed.

I LOVE my book project, so although it’s a big task, I know that a month from now, I should be done, so my intention is also to be very present with it. Not rush through it, but to appreciate that I am doing the thing that I’ve visualized doing for so long.

This is my summer so far. Working to accomplish my goal, plus enjoying the sun, my family and some time with friends as I can squeeze it in!

Hugs,

Devon