I love this spot which is just off the Kilarney Lake trail heading towards the meadow. There is a short bridge that crosses the river and it’s a wonderful spot on a sunny day to see the surrounding trees and sky above reflected in the stillness of the water.

This was the first time in a year I’ve taken photos with my holga. It felt really good to be shooting film again.

There was something magical about yesterday’s snowy weather. I felt like a kid again as I walked up my street to catch a bus to work. I was warm, cozy, and happy all bundled up in my many layers and I wasn’t bothered at all about having to slog through the wet snow. It reminded me of winters in Ontario, of those days when the snow is thick on the ground but the texture is dry and fluffy, the sky is clear and the temperature is surprisingly warm. I walked outside a lot yesterday, part of the way to work and all the way home later in the evening. There were a lot of other people doing the same but maybe not for the pleasure of it like I was.

Good Things from Yesterday:
- Getting fresh air and exercise
- Helping put together an excellent Christmas luncheon for Hop Studios
- Goofing around outside helping to clean off Travis and Susie’s car
- Feeling over-sugared from eating Susie’s excellent homemade caramel (it’s so good, yet so bad for you.)

It is Sunday afternoon and I’ve decided to take a break from the frenzy of Christmas baking I’ve been up to for the last few hours. I haven’t done baking for Christmas in a few years and I am trying all new recipes. I started with a batch of candied orange peels, then onto chocolate almond bark, with a finale of chocolate truffles. I am waiting for each batch of yummies to cool and set, but otherwise I am done. Overall these were really easy things to make though the citrus peels were the most labour intensive, requiring multiple reboils in hot water to soften and remove the pith. I may do a second batch of these and do a better job with pith removal because they make the taste more sour than sweet.

Good Things from the Weekend:
1. Getting set up with a new cell phone (and plan) that is about one thousand times more advanced than the one I’ve had for almost five years.
2. Baking chocolate chip banana bread
3. Making and sharing Saturday brunch with friends
4. Having a recovered Boris back to the land of the living
5. Getting out for a walk on a rainy but lovely Friday night

Taken with a pinhole camera, while sitting in the window of Brioche on West Cordova Street in Vancouver. They have really yummy soup, and very delicious looking desserts I have yet to try.

Yesterday evening I went on one of my favorite Vancouver walks with a friend. When the water is at low tide, it’s possible to walk along the beach all the way from Kitsilano to Jericho. It is really peaceful down there, with wonderful views of the city and the North Shore. Try it sometime.

Taken with a pinhole camera.

Ten good things:
1. Taking the whole weekend off.
2. Unexpected invitations to a very yummy brunch with nice people.
3. A whole three days of glorious sunshine.
4. Finally buying my very own copy of “The Iron Giant”.
5. A mini road trip out of town with the help of a loner car from Ariane.
6. Watching osprey, ducks, and hummingbirds fly.
7. Seeing garter (or is it garder?) snakes in the wild for the first time in ages. (My sister had one as a pet when we were kids.)
8. The weather being warm enough to take out my parasol, wear flip flops, and eat popsicles.
9. Shopping with Mandy in unexpected places.
10. Shooting what I hope will turn out to be a kick ass roll of film.

Taken with a pinhole camera. Somewhere along the way I have become a nature photographer. I *think* I am okay with it…

Ghost on the rocks. Bowen Island, Miller’s Landing.

I am really happy with the shots from my little cardboard pinhole camera, taken on Bowen Island over the weekend. I hadn’t used it in almost a year because I wasn’t really sure if I liked the thing, until now that is. I will keep shooting landscape photos for now, and perhaps more portraits as well.

Kirsti has a few of the light painting photos of me up on flickr. I really love this one.

Taken near Porteau Cove, BC.

A few days ago I was looking through a set of shots taken with a pinhole camera back in the spring of 2007, and rediscovered this shot. I’m not sure why I didn’t scan and upload this at the time, but I absolutely love it now.

One of the gifts I was given for Christmas this past year was a one month unlimited pass to Semperviva yoga studio. I activated the pass in mid-February, purchased another one on-going when it expired and have been attending yoga class almost daily ever since. It was the kind of gift that kept on giving, and the exact kick-in-the-ass I needed to get back into the regular yoga practice I kept thinking about instead of doing. Semperviva is my yoga studio of choice for the excellent roster of teachers, and their great deal for an unlimited monthly pass ($80!). I was a regular visitor there when I first moved to Vancouver three years ago, but stopped attending after six months mostly due to lack of funds. Now I feel like I can’t afford not to go because I feel so much mentally and physically happier with regular yoga.

As part of my commitment to yoga I have decided to participate in Vancouver’s Yogathon on July 21st, at UBC’s Thunderbird Stadium. The yogathon requires participants to do as many sun salutation as possible in the 108 minute timeframe. The event is to raise funds for Camp Moomba, a place for children whose lives have been impacted with HIV/AIDS. I have a personal fundraising page setup and hope to donate $200 to the charity. Please sponsor me if you can.

I went to see Volver at the Hollywood Theatre yesterday evening, and really enjoyed it. I am behind on my movie viewing so thank goodness for living near a second-run theatre. I did go see Hot Fuzz on opening night a few weeks ago, but that kind of prompt movie attendance is a rarity for me these days.

My favorite scene in Volver was watching Penelope Cruz’s character sing her heart out at her daughter’s request. It was a song filled with passion and the regrets of life, taught to her by a mother she thinks is dead. I loved the scene because of the emotion it seemed to generate within her, bringing tears to her eyes.

I can’t remember if I have mentioned this already, but I have recently added more prints for sale in my etsy shop.
I’m hoping to upload more soon, once things settle down and I get the chance to scan my most recent holga photos.

A special thank you to Liz Shuman for blogging about my store on Abstract the Day earlier this week, and to Leslie Webster for the featured gallery of my work on Apartment Therapy: San Francisco today.

[Edit: I meant to add this to the entry earlier...]
There are two things you should check out this weekend if you live in the Vancouver area: Vancouver Moving Theatre’s production called “We’re all in this Together. The Shadows Project: Addiction and Recovery” ends on Sunday. The play is inspired by the ancient tradition of shadow theatre (see the photo on their website) using stories of the Downtown Eastside. It features a cast of thirty community actors performing as shadow-casters and musicians.

There is an open house at the Orphaned Wildlife Rehabilitation Society (O.W.L) this Saturday and Sunday. I learned about this organization, located in Delta, after reading Conversations with an Eagle by Brenda Cox. The book is her personal account of working closely with a Bald Eagle named Ichabod, during her years of volunteer work at O.W.L. The open house gives people the opportunity to see more of behind-the-scenes at the rehab centre than is normal. I would really love to go to this, but sadly can not make it this weekend.

I took this photo with my holga a few weeks ago on a trip to the Squamish area to go exploring with friends. It was a beautiful, peaceful day, with weather hot enough to make us wish for shorts and sandals to wear. It came very close to this type of weather again yesterday. Spring is here and summer isn’t far behind.

Yesterday I attended the Creative City Conversation, conference at the Vancouver Playhouse. The purpose was for “the City of Vancouver to gather information to develop a 10-year, long-term plan for arts and culture in Vancouver. Local, national and international speakers were invited to share their experience and stimulate discussion. It was free and open to the public.”

I want to write more about this experience at a later date, but for now let me leave you with a talk by Ken Robinson at the TED conference earlier this year. Mr. Robinson was the keynote speaker at Creative City and gave a very entertaining and inspiring speech very similar to the one for TED.

With it being Friday and all, I am really looking forward to the weekend, especially since there seems to be so much going on.

Tomorrow is Earth Day, and there are many events happening in the Vancouver area, such as Evergreen’s 7th Annual Celebration at Jericho Beach.

Saturday also kicks off BC Book and Magazine Week, with a variety of events to chose from for those who love to read and want to support local authors and publishers.

Here are two links to items I have enjoyed very much:

A twenty minute lecture by Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert that challenges the idea that we’ll be miserable if we don’t get what we want. The link is courtesy of Hendrik:

A very inspiring series of photos by Zefram, as featured on File Magazine.

The essence of the spiritual path lies only in the beauty of the ordinariness, in the mundane, and in freedom of separation between the spiritual and the ordinary.
~ Dr. Thynn Thynn

Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius. Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius.

~ Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

One of my photos was recently accepted into an online Holga show, and I will post a link when things go live. Last week I submit something to a toy camera magazine I really like, and I hope to hear good things about that submission too.
*Fingers crossed*

Five great things from the week:
1) Monday afternoon’s long vigorous walk in Pacific Spirit Park with Christina. We were treated to hints of golden light through the trees near the end of our walk, and the sun followed us as we drove home.
2) Dropping by Jamie and Maja’s for dinner on Sunday evening after our long ferry ride from Salt Spring Island. Unsurprisingly, Jamie makes really delicious cookies, but did you know he also barbeques a delightful pork skewer? (Meat cooked by a vegetarian….yum!)
3) Getting sucked into a really good book and reading the whole thing in a few short days.
4) An unexpected trip to Daiso with Hendrik, and laughing with him over the hilarious hamster stationery.
5) Savouring the tantilizing taste of White Truffle Chevre on Leslie Stowe raincoast crisps purchased from Salt Spring Island Cheese for our snacking pleasure. It was to die for.

As I came through my front door on Tuesday afternoon I was greeted by the latest issue of Ascent Magazine and its headline on the cover, “the yoga of everyday bliss: finding contentment in life & laundry.” It was a well-timed line for me to read as I was stopping by my apartment to pick up my clothes and head to the laundromat.

The article is a very good read, focusing on finding contentment in everyday moments rather than seeking out a short-lived happiness based on particular circumstances. This is refered to as Samtosa, “a state of contentment that relies on no particular situation….unlike the happiness, joy or elation that (I am) more familiar with, is a constant state of mind…. No matter what is happening in life, the state of contentment is possible.”

Right now I feel…content.

In the mornings when it’s not raining, I love to watch all the overhead avian activity, as the sun comes up and I wait for the bus. None of the birds I see are very exotic but I take pleasure in witnessing how they make a start to the day just as their human counterparts do the same.

Often there is a large flock of pigeons gathered together along the telephone wires near where I stand, and I watch as they jossle for position or preen their feathers, letting loose ones fall to the road below. Sometimes there are tiny sparrows sharing the wires, and if I listen carefully I can hear their shrill cries above the noise of cars zooming by. There are also gulls flying overhead, on their way to somewhere, and many crows returning to their daytime territory after a night in Burnaby.

The birds have shown me that humans aren’t the only ones with a busy morning commute. And I wonder if they sometimes feel as we do, like staying in bed just a little longer and hit the snooze button.

Ten good things from this week:
1) Booking a getaway to somewhere I’ve been wanting to go for a long time. I’m very excited.
2) Seeing all the colourful leaves on the trees as we drove to and from the ferry on the island last weekend.
3) Catching up with Simone and Jacquie over dessert at Sweet Obsessions.
4) Wandering around at lunchtime with Christopher, freezing our behinds off as we searched for a hotdog vendor to feed us. The delicious Japadog was our reward.
5) Listening to the heavy rainfall outside my window as I lay in bed reading a good book.
6) Calling Hendrik at home and the humour of neither of us recognizing the other’s voice. The funniest part about it was that we’d talked as recently as that morning.
7) Going through my stuff and selecting all the photos, papers, and random bits and bobs I may use in the workshop I’m taking this evening.
Finding in my closet a brand new shirt I’d forgotten I had recently purchased, and wearing it with pleasure.
9) Fighting my Wednesday afternoon lethargy, with a long walk, a workout and then a twenty minute nap.
10) Enjoying (what seemed like) a bottomless bowl of thai yellow curry for dinner with Mandy.

This weekend I was away on the second annual Travis Smith birthday sleep-over extravaganza on Vancouver Island. As I reminisced about last year’s event I was reminded of this photo, featuring Noriko as a woodland elf with giant leaf. It was the first time I met her and Jason, and they have since relocated to Toronto. When I think about this and other more personal things, I am amazed by how much can happen and change in one year…

This week in Leodom, brought to my inbox by Free Will Astrology:

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) – I was sitting in San Francisco’s Cafe Gratitude, meditating on your horoscope. In my notebook I’d doodled a giant hand reaching down to earth from the clouds. It was holding a silver platter that bore a book whose title was “Fresh Instructions.” This gift was being offered to a half-lion, half-human creature that represented you. Shortly after I finished this drawing, a woman came through the front door of the restaurant and sat at a nearby table. Her t-shirt had a message that was the perfect caption for the image I’d made: “Maybe God has bigger plans for you than you have for yourself.”