Building a Park!

Our community is building the first all-abilities playground in the county, and I'm the Art Team Lead! I have awesome people on my team with mad art skillz, and it's been a pleasure to work with such creative souls! The funnest part of this project is that it is all community-built by volunteers in our area. As soon as I heard about it, I couldn't help but get giddy with excitement! How could I not do this?!

This is what our playground is going to include:

There's a pirate ship, train, mountain castle, rocket ship and more! Our job as the art Team is to take the features and bring them to life through our artwork, and I'm looking forward to seeing the end result.

There are teams for PR, materials management, fundraising, child care, food, children involvement, and building, among others. If you want to be involved and live in Utah Valley, you can find the volunteer form here.

I'm totally going to be playing on this playground along with my kiddos because it's going to be so awesome! Also, we can say we built it, and there's no better feeling than making a big difference for someone in your own backyard!

Crystal Classic Race

A while back we visited my sister, our kids had some quality cousin time, and we cheered on the dads in a cold 5K race:

The kiddos loved cheering and watching the runners and the dads got excellent pace times. Growing up, our whole family supported every track meet, swim meet, baseball game, and art show! (And there were a lot of us, so we spent a lot of time supporting one another!) I loved the sense of community and support and want our fledgling family to have that same sense of love for one another.

Kirk has been a master supporter of all my crazy ideas, even if they require a lot of hard work. He built the booth for the upcoming local makers show that will be showcasing art by Feather & Fir, and he's always been a big believer in my dreams. I love that guy and want to reciprocate and teach our tiny posterities how important it is!

I've been pondering lately about how best to teach support for others' endeavors. What did/do your families do for that?

You're Invited to Meet the Makers!

My art and goodness from other local vendors is going to be available for browsing starting next week, and the Salt & Honey Market.

They have a special Meet the Makers Party the evening before the show opens for everyone else, and you're invited:

Discounts, goodies, meeting cool people? Yes, please! I'll be there, too and would love to see you that evening!

Road Trippin'

My sister is an angel and took our kids for a couple days so Kirk and I could hear ourselves think without tiny voices ringing in our heads. Sometimes you don't notice how noisy your everyday life is until you take a break from it for a bit, you know? And guess what? We held hands. Without being used as a jungle gym. It was amazing.

We drove through the canyons and forests around Flaming Gorge, and be still my heart! There is just something about the red rocks and the snow that I cannot even get over:

It was a good break, and it was good to be reunited again. We need to take breaks so we can appreciate the many gifts we forget about when they occur on a daily basis.

Color This Bear Coloring Contest

Guys, around here we have been stricken with the plague. It's been an all-hands-on-deck situation over here, but it's finally under control, we've finally gotten enough sleep, and we're most likely not contagious anymore. All good things. We've had a lot happening in the last little while, and I'm excited to share some of our latest adventures! One of which involves this wild guy:

Right now I'm hosting a coloring contest of the grolar bear illustration I made. If you have caught the grown-up coloring book bug, this will be a fun contest for you, friend! It's running on Instagram, and here are the details:


1. Download the bear coloring page for an amazing introductory rate before it goes up to full price April 15. Secret pricing rewards for friends. That's how I roll.
2. Print it up and color like there's no tomorrow! I have some fun treatments to show you and can't wait to see what you can come up with too.
3. Post your creation all over Instagram using #colorthisbear.
4. You get a bonus entry for each post using the hashtag #colorthisbear and for each person you tag in those posts!
5. A winner will be randomly picked from the entries. Will you be the lucky person?
6. If you win, you get to pick your favorite animal to be turned into a similarly-styled coloring page! How neat is that?

This contest runs through March and into April. A winner will be selected April 15 because coloring takes time, right? I can't wait to see what lovely things you have in store for this little guy!

Wild and Wondrous Series Update

It's birthday season around here, so I've been a busy little bee drawing illustrations for the birthday peeps. This year I asked everyone what their favorite wild beast was and then drew it coloring book style. I've been calling it my Wild & Wondrous illustration series. It's been fun so far and it's been interesting to see what animals are picked! Here are a couple more additions:

There are more in the works, and you can see the entire series here as it gets updated.

I like to shake things up every year and do something a little different to celebrate birthdays. I find it helps keep things interesting and meaningful. In the past I've created art, organized a large family gift, gathered heartfelt notes from everyone in the family, put together a photo album, taken the birthday boy/girl out for a one-on-one lunch, given a meaningful gift, or even given gag gifts (haha, suckers!). You never know what you're going to get with this wild card! (Unless your birthday is later in the year, then hopefully you can figure it out based off of the pattern from previous birthdays.)

What do you like to do to celebrate the birthdays in your family?

Family Sledding Adventure

It's funny how something so simple, like sledding, can bring such happiness! We recently took our little family on a sledding adventure, and it blew tiny minds:

Our kid was so elated with the experience that she wants to go several times a day! Although it can take a lot of work to bundle everyone up then dry them off, these kinds of adventures are worth it to us. I believe spending time in nature during every season is important for a healthy lifestyle and open perspective.
 
We think opting outside together as a family helps our family grow closer, so it's one of our default family activities. What do you like to do with your family during the winter?

Snowflake Series

Last month I worked on a mini illustration series of color snowflakes in honor of the magical magic that is winter:

I may or may not have gotten carried away with some of the crazy colors, and I played around with different styles, but seemed to find my footing near the end. It was a great exercise for me! I am currently working on a Wild and Wondrous animal series and posting them on Instagram. Or, if you'd like to see some of my past series, you can now see them on their own page on my website!

I have such a hard time picking a favorite winter activity, but sledding and snowshoeing are at the top of my list. What about you? What's your favorite snowy activity? (And don't say "staying inside!")

Grolar Bear

Have you ever heard of a grolar bear? It's sometimes called a pizzly bear? I don't know, but it's supposedly a mix between a polar bear and grizzly bear as their habitats increasingly overlap as we overheat our planet by burning fossil fuels. While most animal hybrids don't occur in the wild, these do. So, I drew one:

I've been working on an illustration series this year of these animal illustrations and should have a hefty stack of them come 2017. Due to the illustration style, these little guys can be preeeetty time consuming. Hard? Sure. Worth it? Duh, yes. If you want to follow along this series, I'll be posting them on Instagram and also on my Feather & Fir business website they are completed.

Valentines

Around here, we've been making valentines until our eyeballs fall out of their sockets. Even though most of the hard work was post-thumbprint, I still had to get a baby thumb to cooperate 54 times to complete all his valentines:

So silly! And a little time-consuming. Mine were much easier:

All it took was some swift white crayon action and some just-as-quick watercolor added. The longest part about making my valentines was setting them out to dry.

Do you give out valentines? What did you do this year?

At the Ballet

Our kid is turning out to have quite the affinity for dancing, so when her dance teacher told us about the Alice In Wonderland ballet she had helped choreograph, we went on a mommy-daughter date to see it:

The makeup and costumes were so creative, and so were the imaginative parts that would normally be difficult to show on stage. They pulled it off, though, and captivated P-double-B's attention until the last 15 minutes (when she emphatically declared that she was done watching and wanted it to be over). I'm just happy we made it that far, silly turkey!

After the performance was over, we joined the throngs to meet the cast and talk to them. My favorite part of the performance was the caterpillar who was comprised of 5 people. Pepper's favorite part was when the Mad Hatter kept fixing Alice's hair and making her wear different hats!

This was the first real ballet we had been to together, and I'm sure there will be many more to come. Have you ever been to a ballet before? If so, which one?

Frigid 5K

That crazy dreamguy of mine recently ran a frigid 5K, and boy was it cold! He ran through arctic winds and stinging snow pellets like a champ, then jumped in the frozen lake without a care in the world:

(My favorite is the face of the guy watching Kirk as he performed quite the remarkable cannonball.)

Of course we were there to support the insanity, but stayed warm and bundled all the while. Plus, as usual, we got to share in the spoils of a race well run! Pepper has already claimed the penguin plunge key chain Kirk earned, which she assumes is a medal of bravery.

Kirk has been making plans to run a race every single month this year, which we're excited about! This should lead to many great new adventures for our family. He's already gotten plans through April, but if you know of any fun races May-December, I'm all ears.

Call for Volunteers!

I am the Art Team Lead for the upcoming All-together Playground that is going to be built in Utah County in just a few short months. It's a playground that has many accessibility features and will a community-build project. How fun is that?

What a great reason to pull together as a community and make something we can all be proud of. If you want to learn more about who it helps, you can do so here.

I am putting together a volunteer team of artists, craftspeople, and designers! Our job is to make the playground beautiful and fun while incorporating historical elements that make our area unique.

If you'd like to be on the Art Team (which I don't know why not because it's going to be awesome), please sign up here, so we can get cracking! There is a lot of work ahead of us, but it will be so much easier with more hands.

Other teams are looking for additional members as well, so if you're interested in helping with the construction, planning, child involvement, special needs, or the many other ways of helping, please sign up here as well. Or, if you are able to help financially, you can find sponsor opportunities here.

And of course, spreading the word about this project is one of the best ways you can help!

So what do you think? Is this something you'd like to be involved in?

Burns Night

If you're Scottish, you probably know of the great tradition that is Burns Night. It's a jolly gathering of friends during which we feast at a fabulous Burns Supper, toast and roast, and share poetry while appreciating all the good and irreverent things Robbie Burns, Scottish poet, gave to the world. It's usually hosted around the anniversary of his birthday and can be quite the formal affair with kilts and tartans all around.

We decided we had waited long enough over the years and would host our own evening of singing, toasts, and rhyme-sharing:

You should know that Burns Supper includes traditional Scottish fare, which was most likely born out of desperation if you take a close look at the ingredients. Luckily, both Kirk and I come from strong Scottish stock, so we survived.

The cock-a-leeky soup is a nice take on something similar to the chicken noodle soup that is comfortable to so many people. The neeps and tatties are good too, and aren't too adventurous unless you haven't ever had mashed rutabagas before. They're pretty much orange potatoes, though, no biggie. The most interesting dish by far is haggis, which is usually sheep offal mixed with oats and spices and boiled in a sheep stomach. We don't typically have access to such ingredients, so in order to make our Burns Supper a success we had to take a new-world spin on it. Still.

First of all, meatloaf is the worst. Second of all, haggis is crumbly liver-flavored meatloaf.

But, the flourished recitation of Address to a Haggis makes it acceptable. We were lucky enough to have a true Scotsman do the honor, and the brogue was better than we could have dreamed. He really let it loose for us, too. What a pal!

This is how the evening works:

• The guests are piped in (yep, we had a friend who brought his bagpipes along!)
• There is a welcome speech and someone recites the Selkirk Grace:

Some hae meat and canna eat,
and some wad eat that want it;
but we hae meat and we can eat,
and sae the Lord be thankit.

• People gather and eat the soup course (we made cock-a-leeky, which is a soup with chicken, leeks, and barley)
• The haggis is piped in and the cook presents it to the guests
• Someone recites Address to a Haggis and brandishes a knife and carves open the meat at the appropriate place in the poem
• We toast to the haggis!
• The piper tastes the first bit and declares it fit
• The feast commences and can include a dessert course (we made a version of cranachan!), a cheese course, and a coffee course too
• After eating, a program begins with an Immortal Memory Toast to Robbie Burns
• There are poem and ballad recitations of works by Burns
• There is a Toast to the Lassies by one of the men
• There is a collaborative reply Toast to the Laddies by one of the women
• More poems and literary discussions ensue
• We end the evening by joining hands and singing Auld Lang Syne in one another's faces as we jig in and out of a big circle

Fun, huh? It was nice to learn more about the traditions, share sentimental toasts, and join in a festive rendition of Auld Lang Syne to end the evening. The poetry was so nice, and the company nicer. It gave us a great excuse to break out the fancy china and my literary anthologies! We may need to make it an annual tradition, especially now that I know how to track down the appropriate offal ingredients.

Have you ever heard of Burn's Night or been to a Burn's Supper before? Do you want to learn more about it or have any questions about this fun tradition?

An Atlas of Impossible Longing

I recently finished reading this little gem of a book:

I love the vibrancy of eastern culture and this book definitely brought India to life. Roy is such a poetic author, too. Some of my favorite themes in this book were:

• The analogy of the house (and family) drowning then recovering as the water recedes
• A need for a secret, quiet place where people can think, escape, dream, and rest
• Tradition vs. following one's heart
• Parenthood: presence, absence, focus, adoption
• Religion: puja, Partition, Muslim and Hindu
• Speaking freely: the parrot, Kananbala, Larissa Barnum
• Love: parent to child, forbidden, marriage
• Gardening and nature

Have you ever read this book or any books by Roy? If so, I'd love to hear what you thought!

See ya, 2015

So long, 2015. Let's be honest, you were a doozy. Nevertheless, we had some good times too. The Word Of The Year was "DO," and do we did. Here's a little review of the ups and downs of 2015:




The very first day of the year, my brother's roof literally came crashing down from burst water pipes in his ceiling. He and his family stayed at our house for a month or so while his apartment was fixed. We all learned a lot about living with other people, and we enjoyed the company. Plus, I got to cook my first pheasant, compliments of my brother's hunting prowess.

I got to try out my snowshoes, and did some hiking, more hiking, more snowshoeing, and even more hiking!

Taking a leap and turning in a piece of artwork for the LDS International Art Competition was scary! I hadn't focused that hard on a finished piece of artwork in a long time, but it came together with a steady schedule and purpose. That was a lot of work, but I learned a lot about my art process along the way.

I had been really interested in beekeeping and took a class about it. I loved it! Bees are so amazing and I feel like we are kindred spirits. Oh tiny sisters, I love you! Unfortunately, we can't have bees in our current house, so it will need to wait until we have a different home.

I got back into rock climbing! It had been years since I last enjoyed it, but with a trusty friend to show me the ropes again, I took it up again and had some of my best lunch breaks!

For my birthday, we took a trip to Zion National Park with friends and went on some wicked cool hikes. We got to do some light bouldering and also visited the Valley of Fire, which will forever hold a special place in my heart. We stopped by a crazy cool ghost town and of course an old cemetery. We played games and talked without any children interrupting. Yes, it's a thing!

Not too soon after that, Kirk got laid off due to the dip in the oil market. Well, poop. While it was a major bummer, we looked for the silver lining and decided to move forward as a single income family with a stay-at-home parent. What a lucky kid we have! We had to make some major adjustments. It was a palette cleanser and turned out to be the catalyst for many life introspections and realignments in our lifestyle and the direction in which we want our family to go. All good things, but a painful route.

With a clear and free schedule, we were able to attend a wedding in San Diego last minute. The sunshine was just what we needed, the little kid got to go to the beach for the first time, and we got to see family that we hadn't seen in forever. Cousins, guys.

I got up the guts to submit my first piece of art to the Springville Museum of Art's Spring Salon. It was so much work too, but I am proud of the final product and loved the way the piece turned out.

Also, I got up the courage to get my own website up and running. There are a lot of moving parts and every time I would change something, I would discover 10 more things that I needed to do. Gah! So. Much. Work. But also, it's a labor of love that I'm super proud of! And, I got some business cards made, which helped me feel a lot more official. Being a business owner has been so rewarding and I can't believe I waited so long to get started. Once I got through all the worrying in my brain and got things done, it finally came together. I finally found my purpose and style, which was a major win!

I had my first art booth at the Beehive Bazaar last spring! For some reason, it was a super scary step for me to take but I was blown away by all the support from friends and family and was humbled that people liked my art enough to buy it. Thank you, friends! And, I got more comments on my booth than anything else. Kirk made it for me to display my wares. Isn't it amazing?

Our family took part in a fun run.

We were in charge of a large family reunion, and it was full of crazy fun times and crazy fun people. We hiked along a petroglyph ridge, visited our old stomping grounds in Nevada, spent time splashing in the pool, and swapped stories. We also got to spend some time with our little family visiting Zion again, and tricked our daughter into hiking with us there.

Pepper took some swim classes and turned into a little fish and may have proposed to her instructor.

I did some hiking, more hiking, even more hiking, and solo hiking.

Then, there was that one time I had a baby. He arrived a couple hours after one of my favorite woodsy hikes. He just needed a little encouragement but he came with a smile and a sense of humor. We took a couple weeks off of our regular lives while we adjusted and got to learn how we would be as a family of four. We spent those weeks exploring the wilderness, exploring more, and exploring even more.

We planted and cared for and harvested a garden and flower beds this year. We also got some unexpected blessings from our labors and dried, juiced, and froze some of the best food.

Again, we participated in the Beehive Bazaar. Kirk's booth construction was all the rage again, and I added more pieces to the booth. I loved making all the art!

We got to cheer Kirk on in his half marathon through the beautiful fall foliage. He practiced diligently and did a great job!

I submitted my first-ever art piece to the Springville Art Museum's Religious and Spiritual exhibit. Again, it was a ton of work but I love the way the piece turned out. (The post will be up soon!) Plus, I was able to see a vast difference between this piece and my first submission from earlier in the year. Progress, guys!

I read some books.

Pepper's preschool ended, and she said goodbye to her friends there and hello to a full-time life with a great stay-at-home dad. She started a dance class, though, and fell in love with performing on stage!

My brother got married! In a whirlwind of familial excitement we spent loads of time planning, prepping, doling out unsolicited advice, and participating in general merriment. I took photos of our family with all the new additions before we all went our separate ways and started our own roots.

I got in some delicious autumn hiking, more hiking, and even tried mountain yoga hiking!

We partook in some of our favorite holiday traditions during the fall and Christmas seasons. The last quarter of the year is always one of our favorites! We also started new traditions to make our family life more intentional and to encourage one-on-one time and great family times too.

We cheered Kirk on in another race and got to share in the sugary spoils.

I tried a new thing on Instagram where I posted a different art series every month. I did an alphabet bird series, an autumn leaf watercolor series, and a series of requested wildlife sketches. I love being able to share my art with others!




2015 was indeed a doozy. While we are still trying to figure things out, we are managing to make the best of it and enjoy our precious family time while we can. 2015 was a good lesson in reevaluating constantly, making purposeful decisions, and getting up the courage to do things (because waiting through all the thinking is oftentimes more painful and difficult than actually getting things done!) So, there you have a few of our highlights from last year.

After talking with a friend about how I didn't think 2015 was a really good year, and that I felt I hadn't accomplished much, I was encouraged to write about it. Once I started writing, it opened my eyes to the many positive things we experienced last year, even amid the challenges. It was a great exercise in positivity and looking back I was surprised at what we were able to accomplish during crazy times and despite a definite funk.

So, if you've made it this far, first, you're a dedicated soul (thank you!) and second, I'm passing the advice forward. You don't need to post it publicly, but I encourage you to reflect on your past year if you haven't done so already and write down some of the major events. Looking back on your photos and social media accounts might help you out. So what do you say?

Around Here

Around here we've been getting into our new year grove, eating lots of comforting soups, going on icy hikes, fighting off various wintertime illnesses, and putting the kids to bed early. (I love that it gets dark around 5:30 because then the kids fall asleep easier. It's much better than the 9:00 pm sundown we get to deal with in the summertime.)

This month, we are a playful family (one of our monthly family values, which you can read more about here), so we've been doing fun things together as a family every evening. We play games or make a treat together. We've already gone swimming twice this week. Brrr.

And as per usual, we've been doing lots of art and projects around the house. Here's a look at all the animal sketches I did for my December days of Wildlife illustration series:

By request, I turned the baby giraffe into a printable:

It is available for free in my shop if you'd like to have your very own version. Consider it a little thank you for coming by for a visit!

What are you doing these days? I'm loving the cozy and quiet evenings, and of course the snow!

Word of the Year 2016

There is a tradition I have taken part of for the last several years which has brought depth and meaning into my life throughout the whole year. I pick a word to focus on for an entire year and make it a part of myself. Some people call it their One Little Word or their 2016 Word, but I've been calling it my Word Of The Year (WOTY).

If you want to see how I came to this word or what I'm hoping to glean from it this year, you can read more in-depth here.

It's amazing to see how this practice works for many different people. If you're looking for word ideas or additional thoughts on how this practice could work for you too, some other people who I know enjoy this practice are:
Jen Schow
Ali Edwards
Elise Blaha-Cripe

Is this something you do too? Tell me and I'll add your link to the post!

Is this something you'd like to do but don't know how to start? Ask me your questions and I'll answer them!

Family Values

It can be tricky to step back from day-to-day living to ensure that my daily actions are intentional. I know what it tastes like to feel like surviving is the best I can offer, but I don't like to remain in that place. I want to thrive in life, not just survive! And I want that for my family too.

When we realized our family needed better focus, we decided to incorporate a monthly Family Values tradition. (We picked up this idea from a podcast about family, with excellent episodes touching on the topic here and here. Give it a good listen!) The way it works for us is we pick a value we would like our family to focus on every month. We have weekly family gatherings (FHE, yo!) where we explore different aspects of that value, share stories and scriptures showing the importance of that value, post fresh visual reminders throughout our home, and talk about how it relates to our family.

This is a fairly new practice for us so we're continually finding ways to fine-tune it. We have bitty kids who have a difficult time understanding abstract concepts and understand literal concepts much better. So, we keep it simple by saying things like, "We are a helping family" or "We are a learning family." Then we drive it home even more by talking about how each person in our family helps and learns in his or her own special way like "Dad is a helping guy and keeps our kitchen so clean" or "Mom is so great at helping when you need to practice the piano". We also try to incorporate at least one family activity each week that illustrates the concept in addition to finding appropriate moments during each day to talk about the family value for the month. It doesn't have to be elaborate, it just needs to be present.

Some themes we've focused on so far are helping, learning, together, and playful. When we started out, Kirk and I sat down and made a list of many characteristics we value. The list was comprised of values we were proud of or were our natural strengths, values we need to improve on, and essential values we need our children to understand. Our list was much longer than months in a year, so we combined and simplified our values to fit our family needs. Plus, there will be many more years to come. I'm not concerned about repeating the same ones every year as long as they remain relevant.

We thought about mapping out the months ahead of time, but find it's easier to have options to pick from and focus on what our family needs the most during that season. Usually it's something our family is currently struggling with (like our helping month, haha! Painful, but necessary!) but sometimes it's something the season naturally dictates (like our together month which occurred during the hectic holidays filled with countless family get togethers, performances, and traditions). Kirk and I also have ongoing discussions about what values we want to instill in our family before the start of each month, so we don't feel like we need to stick to the list and can make sure our focus is what the most needed and most relevant at that time.

We are not perfect with this, but I have noticed more meaningful actions and purpose as a family. Our daughter is starting to recognize the importance of these values and is proud of herself when she exhibits them or sees them in others. It's been good.

We are barely new to this depth of family intentionality, so I'd love to hear what you have done to make your family teaching moments count. What meaningful practices do you have in your family? Do you have any tips to share about focusing on monthly family values? Do share!

Kid Memory Books

I don't know about yours, but our kids are so nutty and amazing! I want to remember their growth and silliness but even more I want them to be able to look back on their moments of triumph as well as their challenges. I hope that when they reach adulthood I can hand them a small record of some of the highlights of their younger years.

Ever since our oldest kid was bitty, I've been jotting down notes about her journey in a simple notebook. I write about her preciousness, favorites, silly pronunciations, newly learned tricks, precocious behaviors, learning experiences, little person wisdom, and our family adventures together. Now, I've been able to do that for our little one too.

I don't dedicate time every single day or even every week, but I keep an ongoing list of important moments to write about. Whenever I have a quiet moment to write, I use the list as a memory jogger to write a short note for each moment.

The entries aren't dated but show up in semi-chronological order. I've chosen to write in short paragraph form to allow for quick mental transfer between experiences. I separate the entries into years so each new section starts with a birthday because the growth is more apparent when grouped into yearly chunks. Each entry is a tiny snippet and doesn't go into elaborate detail but it exists and it's satisfying to watch the book fill up over the years.

There are many ways I record memories and each serves its unique purpose. Writing in the kids' books is one of the methods I employ. It's a quick and efficient way for me to record the crucial moments that will eventually be handed to them in a compact form.

Do you think memory keeping is important? If so, why? What do you like to keep records of? What are your preferred memory-keeping methods? So many questions! I'd love to hear more!

Painted Paper Snowflakes How-To

We tried a new family craft together as a celebration of winter. Making paper snowflakes is something my mama taught me when I was little, and we used to add glitter details to make them shimmer. Making paper snowflakes is now something we do as a family but with a couple of watercolor aficionados in the house, we added paint. Here's how to do this easy craft with your kids:

Paint white paper with blue and teal and purple watercolors (you know, all those great icy colors!) in whatever patterns you want:

Once it's dry, fold and cut up snowflakes as per usual:

We like to hang ours from the ceiling or tape them to the windows. Do you like to make paper snowflakes too? What do you do with yours?