Going Places!

Going Places!

What a great way to Plein Air paint and get fit at the same time! I parked at the Island Lake trail lot in Orangeville and off loaded my bike. With a full pack of gear, surprized at how much I could carry on my back, I headed in to the park interior. Beautiful, is the only way to describe the job they have done to enhance the trails and build so many wonderful bridges and walkways.

I realized a short way in, that there are many things I probably could have left at home as I was pretty exhausted by the time I reached first big hill. No matter, I planted myself there as it was a good view and had a lovely picnic shelter to sit under (could have left the camp stool at home). Hey, what's that noise as I set up my easel ......

.........where did all that dust come from? It turns out that the front of the Island Lake trail, borders on a fully operational gravel pit, and I chose a spot adjacent to a working pit! Ahh, no worries as I only planned to stay for an hour and a short way into the painting I lost track of all the noise and dust, and focussed on the scene in front of me.

One of the nice things about the park is the feeling of camaraderie with other people on the trail and a mutual admiration of the nature around us. I met a lovely lady named Debbie who was out for a hike and felt that going through the park helped re-energize her during her day (she works from home). I also met several other families and both hikers and bikers came by to chat.

I have a bit of work left to do on the painting but I took reference shots to continue working later. I look forward to going back today and perhaps spending a bit more time in another spot (minus the gravel excavating) Will keep you posted!

Where did the spring go!

     What happened to all the spare time I thought I would have.  I seemed to have filled it up quite nicely with preparing for art shows, teaching the last of my spring classes and yes, a whole lot of painting.  I have finally finished my new website which is easy to update and includes a Wordpress Blog.  Now I have two blogs to keep up with!  You can access it here www.wadsworthsmithart.com

       One of my latest paintings is in a juried show at Maggiolly Art till the end of June.  I have had a lot of interesting feed back from it and I have changed the name on it from "In The Middle" to "The Right Path".  As It depicts the only semi safe-stairway up from the Elora Gorge either of these names suit, however I am now thinking of changing it again. I was thinking about "This Way Up" ?

First day back to work!

      I feel like I have lived through a winter scene from Dr Zivago. The ice storm was a true reminder of how dependant we all are on electricity. The rains fell, the trees bent, the beauty of it was amazing and the devastation extreme. We spent from 4pm Dec 21st till Dec 24th at 8pm, without power. However, my husband and I survived by playing crib by candle light, talking, laughing and yes, even dancing a little.
      Christmas the day after we got our power, was a reminder of how grateful we should all be for conveniences and how mindful we should be of not letting the computer drive our lives!
       We are happily back in our routine and we now have a major deep freeze happening outside. This time we are trying to be ready if the power goes again, the water buckets are full, the candles and matches handy and the fridge stocked.
   I post a few photos below.

Day 1 Our Birch trees bent but thankfully did not break

 

Day 2 brought frosting on top of the ice

 

 

 

On Day three, the sun finally came out!