Awesome summer

A Sunny morning is always a good reason to be grateful. So is the quiet after the storm. It's been such a busy summer, and now I am loving the quiet. Still busy, just quietly so. This week Solange and I are painting the entire interior of my house, with the aid of a few friends. It's forced me to organize my ridiculous amount of paintings. It's made me more aware, which will force me further to do whatever needs to be done. Downsize. Simple sounds good to me.
I've been meaning to start blogging for such a long time. So much news! This year has truly been a whirlwind. I'll backtrack to April, when I flew to Vancouver Island to visit my dear old freind Judith Crichton. Judith lived in Kanata for many years, and moved out to Parksville 3 or 4 years ago. She treated me like a queen, took me around to all the cool places, including Dan Grays' studio. That was inspiring. It's always inspiring to see people making the right choices for their life-the creative one. It supports other artists own aspirations. Gives me further permission to live likewise. Check Dans' awesome paintings out at http://members.shaw.ca/dfgray/. We've just recently shared space at "Pastels by Invite" in Qualicun beach, B.C. This show was organized by Dan, and included historically important work with work by contemporary pastel artists from all over Canada. Thankyou Dan!
May is France time. Shortly after my twice yearly exhibit at my studio, we took off for France. This was the first trip I have lead where we didn't go to Paris. I love Paris, but this trip was really awesome. I got 16 paintings done of my own, on top of teaching, and as the sign says, tasting and touring too. This trip was really relaxing, mostly so because of the excellent company I was keeping. My group this time really sank into their work, loving the studio, swimming every single day-hot and sunny throughout. It was glorious. I'll work backwards, and tell you all about my awesome summer, art and students.