AROUND HERE

It's pretty quiet around here right now, the calm before the storm, but very soon things will be very different.

In March I moved my studio out of the house and into a shared workspace in Mile End. In part I needed a change of scenery, which has indeed been lovely, but the big reason for the move was that we needed more space at home. You see, in early December I learned I was pregnant with my first bebe.

And so these past few months we've been preparing and adapting our lives to include a new tiny human, just as my body has been adapting and preparing to grow a new life. I've felt really good throughout, physically well and just generally positive despite life turning into, as my friend Sarah put it, "one big nap." I'm incredibly mellow these days, which is lovely considering all will likely descend into chaos before the summer's gone.

Work has taken a hit, as you may have noticed. I'm taking a little break from seasonal collections, and have just shut down any made-to-order items in my online shop. Starting this week I'll no longer be heading to the studio everyday, ergo I can fill these last two weeks of lazy abandon with food & friends, picnics & parties, sleeping all day, three baths per afternoon, shopping & reading & aimless self-contemplation.

And then we will see what the future holds.

Thank you so much to everyone who has been so kind and supportive over the past months. To the lovely ladies of Montreal who hosted a nautical-themed baby shower a few weeks ago (of which I only managed to take photos of the food 'cause, you know, priorities), to friends and family from all over who have offered love & support & advice. And thank you to all who have sent gifts in the post, we are lucky to know such generous individuals. Thank you everyone.

LE BALCON

Summer's almost done, I can feel Fall in the air every day now. I'm trying to take advantage of the last hints of green on our balcony before it's all gone again till next year.

REGENERATION

We went camping and it was heaven.

OLD TIMEY

The weekend before last we headed out for some much needed r & r away from the city. The forecast was for 34 degrees and we wanted a beach and a fire and trees so we packed up the car and drove to the Long Sault Parkway, a collection of 11 islands connected by causeways and bridges created with the development of the St Lawrence Seaway. We chose to camp on Snetsinger island, one of the smallest and most private of the islands, wherein we spent 2 1/2 days of total bliss away from all the worries of everyday life and unnecessary junk we surround ourselves with daily. I've been a camper for as long as I can remember and this act of getting out, getting away from it all, getting closer to oneself now seems essential for mental and physical well being in the midst of hot city summers and work, work, work.



I'm coming to the realization (again, always) that something needs to give in how I organize my life and time. For years now my focus has been supremely narrow as I try to remain creative, eke out a living and retain control over all aspects of my business. Often, however, I feel that my life is my work - it's what wakes me up in the morning, it's constantly on my mind - and I don't mean in the good way. It's hard to talk about with other people because they don't understand (rightfully so) why I put so much pressure on myself, take things so seriously, obsess so much, worry so much, need such overwhelming control. It's hard to talk about with people who don't understand the constant, churning, seasonal (and thus largely disposable) nature of fashion, the eternal pressure to be moving on to the next thing, coming up with new ideas, being at once creator, representative, salesman, manager, marketer, cheerleader - there are simply some things I am no good at and never will be. It's hard to tell people who are not self-employed that, yes, my workload really is different, yes, my job really is hard and no, I never stop working, ever. But how do I convince other people that what I'm doing matters when I'm not always so sure myself? Not to say that I don't love & believe in the items I make - sometimes it's just really really hard to care about 'fashion'.



Also, I'm just not really very great at a working/living dynamic. I get terribly wrapped up in the tiny world of my studio and forget, completely, that there must be more to life. I know that, to a certain extent, this is the nature of working for oneself (especially in a creative context) but I am especially bad at seeing the bigger picture and I know this is a fault of my own and something I will need to continue to work on. When I left my job as designer at Nokomis, an Edmonton boutique I co-owned with my friend Jessica, I told myself that starting again on my own meant I would make smart decisions, find balance, do things "the right way". In some ways this has worked - I am slowly making enough to live on, slowly building a name, slowly, very slowly, making connections and pushing myself and growing. However I often find myself paralysed by indecision, unable to give up control, and terrified of spending money (a holdover from childhood).



Recently I have reached out to some amazing friends for help with my workload and to potentially work on some new projects that will remind me to raise my head from the sand from time to time. It's baby steps right now, but any step is a good step. No matter how much I complain about the pressures of industry etc. I know this is a beast of my own making and it's only me who can reach out and change my life. There are no magic elves, no fairy godmother, I need to man up, I need to ask for help, I need to remember about the living part of life. And this is why camping is amazing. To be reminded of how little one really needs to be happy, to be reminded how easy it can be to make decisions. Start small and go from there.



Part of the reason we camped where we did was so we could visit Upper Canada Village, where I had not been since I was a little child. Basically a living theme park, UCV is a collection of residences, shops and factories showing basic daily life in that part of Ontario circa 1860. Noticeably different from the more familiar (to me) Fort Edmonton (a similar park in Alberta), which is all forts & fur trade with the most basic of amenities at this time, UCV is industrial revolution in full swing, harnessing water power to run some still-impressive, still marvelously functioning factories including the woolen mill from which most of these photos are taken. Visiting Upper Canada Village reminded me again of the simplicity which I so crave but as yet remains elusive. From the ingenious simplicity of the machines to the pared-down simplicity of what is and what is not necessary to live a happy, productive life - I realize my world is very, very different from this glimpse of the past yet I'm happy to draw inspiration where I can.



I have a dream of making just enough money to buy a tiny piece of land somewhere close to the city yet far enough away to serve as an escape. I want some tall trees with a clearing in the centre, perhaps some water running through the property. I would like to build a tiny cabin all painted white inside with a wood stove and a loft for sleeping, a gigantic deck which could serve as an outdoor room in summer time, an outhouse and a well and an old bathtub outside to wash in. I would like to make use of wind and solar power to light a string of fairy lights along the porch, perhaps a swing, certainly a place to sit in the evenings and read good books. Eventually I would like to build a much larger building, with rows of salvaged windows, to serve as a studio space when I want to work without the distractions of the city, the siren call of the internet. I would like to go there in the winter and eat good food with family and friends.



In the meantime I would like to get a handle on my strengths and limitations, to make time for myself, my friends. I would like to deal with some of my indecision and fear and I would like to re-evaluate my role within the world of my choosing. Cause really, I just want to make things, and that should be the primary focus of my work.



I would like to focus on craft and production in a way that really works for me. I would appreciate a little more organization in my work life, and a little less in my personal life. I would like to find the easiest way between two points, rather than my usual route of taking the hard way, doubling back, taking the really hard way, sitting at the finish line while I watch everyone else pass me, lumbering to the end, nothing but a ball of nerves and stress, and then promptly getting sick.

Anyway, just some thoughts, and for good measure:

MANUFACTURED SOLAR SYSTEMS

My little Montreal family doesn't celebrate Easter. Religion interests us, but doesn't inform our lives. We're happy to observe the beliefs of others, but that doesn't mean we've made them our own. What we do like though, and what I in particular cherish, is carrying on the personal traditions of our childhoods, reinterpreting and adapting them into rituals of our own.

When I was a kid Easter meant food. All holidays meant food but Easter meant food + chocolate + chocolate food hunts. It meant decorating sugar cookies. It meant spending time with family and undoing one's belt and relaxing. Cecil B DeMille's 1956 version of The Ten Commandments always played on tv and I was allowed a special pass each year to stay up late and watch. It fueled my love of extravagance & epic & magic and I looked forward to it every year, despite it's dated decadence, un-child-friendly subject matter and nearly 4-hour running time. And we always decorated eggs, always in the same way, batik-style with abstract wax patterning and repeated dying. Our own tiny Pollocks.

It's important to me, now that I'm so far from my family and the people who informed my development, that I continue to observe these rituals I love, despite having to form my own opinions about the holidays they surround. It's important for me to share these traditions with the people who are foremost in my current life. And it's important I still revere and acknowledge the magic and joy they once brought. And so I am continuing on.

AND NOW, A RANT

{lovely, soothing lavender in blue glass before the *RANT* begins}

Hey, you know what's trickier than maybe you thought it would be? Getting older dudes. I always thought I would embrace aging like the hippie teen I sometimes still see myself to be. I thought I would come to love the changes in my confidence, social position, face, body and dress; that I would love myself just as I was. Here's the thing though - change seems to be happening in some fields, while willfully, cruelly skipping over others. Though I see all the worries, joys, frustrations, parties and passions of my youth writ large across my forehead, I certainly don't see them in my level of self-confidence, which seems to do nothing but deteriorate over time.

I kindof have this pact with my sister and my best bud Genevieve right now to write only honest, truthful posts on our blogs for awhile. It's hard to put yourself out there, perhaps unnecessary too (especially considering this is supposed to be a "work blog") but since my feelings permeate every aspect of my life and work, and since I don't seem to be blogging much at all, I thought I'd just try writing here.

So here are some issues I have about getting older:
1) It never occurred to me when I was 22 that my body wasn't always going to look the way it did then, certainly not with the amount of cheese I've eaten and booze I've drunk over the past decade. Willpower is not my strong point and a crepe complete & glass of wine will almost always win out over a trip to the gym. Now I have 10 years of pleasure, literally, under my belt but a body that doesn't feel totally my own. And can I do something about that? Sure. Will I? I don't know - it's so much easier to obsess over something that's not right than spend that time fixing it. Obviously I know the dreaded 'media' along with the industry I've chosen to work within have helped develop a rather unhealthy self-image. When women in their 50s look like Tilda Swinton, women in their 60s like Helen Mirren, it seems impossible to compete even as a 30-something. And the worst competition will always be my past self, which makes getting older hard because the ideals are so unattainable and the image of the past ever present.

2) At 19 I had the whole world within my grasp. The hard part is knowing now that I didn't know it then. Lately I've been thinking about why I chose to leave home at 17 to pursue a degree in fine arts. I know now that moving to a different city, attending university and facing all the wonders and challenges that brought was brave and probably as much newness as I could handle at the time. Looking back though I wonder why I didn't instead, say, move to New York, make art, meet people and start my life right off the bat. Thank god I had wonderful, supportive parents who allowed me to pursue my little dreams in the little way I did, but really - fine arts? What kind of idiot studies painting at university? If I could do it all over again I would've taken much greater leaps at an early age when I was supremely confident, blissfully unaware and didn't yet have a jaded bone in my body.

3) I remember my mother telling me something that my grandmother said to her, perhaps on an 80th birthday: basically you always feel the same, you always feel 24, but that face in the mirror just keeps changing. How can I reconcile my eternal, internal youth with a reflected visage that tells me I'm no longer fresh faced? How do people do this, deal with this ongoing physical change when inwardly one remains forever young? How do I stay true to all aspects of myself? Seriously, can someone tell me? Why is my self-worth so tied to my physicality?

4) When am I ever going to stop being selfish? I want children, possibly soon, but knowing I have to stop with the all-consuming introspection has me terrified. It makes me wish I'd just had a 'happy accident' years ago so I could quit finding reasons to put off obsessing over myself and be able to nurture another. Also? the older I get the more solitary I become. I LOVE time to myself, I LOVE privacy, I LOVE doing whatever I want whenever I want it (otherwise why grow up at all?) When am I going to become an actual grown-up though? Do I want to? Can I handle it? Why hasn't growing older given me answers to any of these questions?

5) What happened to my self confidence? I was never completely confident nor woefully insecure but I remember once feeling somewhat secure, empathetic, trusting my instincts and loving myself. As I grow older I question myself more and more. I don't trust things I never would've questioned 10 years ago. Am I just challenging myself, or is my life permeated by fear? 'Aging' hasn't lived up to my expectations of how I would feel about myself, my successes, the lessons I've learned, the things I've done. Isn't it supposed to get easier? Aren't I supposed to be able to present myself in a mature, concise way, to want to talk about my work, to know myself and show my best side to others? I still want to sit at the kid's table.

6) Why aren't I making any money (see: BFA, pursued dreams, hippie youth, etc. {oh....right}) At 16 one imagines that when they're 32 they will have some semblance of a lucrative career. As someone with one failed business already in their portfolio it's very hard for me to be starting again. Dudes, I'm working 16 hour workdays in a room, alone, in my home and earning an income which simply does not jive with my vision of future (present) me. It sucks to have self-worth tied to financial gains and industry respect but I can't help it, these are the things that make my life comfortable and desirable. I look at my contemporaries in other fields and wonder why age and experience have yet to pay off for me in any way. Hey! I'm talented! Hey, I work hard! Hey! I have an incredibly coveted job of which I am in complete control! Where is the security and $ I was hoping for?

7) Why is being a teenager so alluring when you're 30 but kindof !blah! when it's actually happening. When I'm 60 will I covet my 30s? When I'm 90 will I wish that I was 75 again (I'll warrant a guess that I'll still wish I was 17.) Lately I've been falling prey to all sorts of things that I would've (and did) shun back in the day when I was supposed to enjoy them. As a workaholic shut-in I watch a lot of internet tv, lately Buffy the Vampire Slayer which I thought was beyond lame when it came out and I was starting university. But somehow watching it now has brought me to multiple emotional breakdowns and I've been seeking out why. First, I think I love the routine, something to look forward to each time, a new episode, a new friend, an escape. Second I miss that thrilling, terrifying uncertainty - first love so strong it makes you sick, finding power in your youthful strength, challenges you've never faced before, freedom and ease of new independence. Also, vampire slayer! Hello! That trope of the extraordinary in the ordinary or vice versa, of which every human dreams. Third, the reality that sets in when I turn it off. I'm just ordinary in the ordinary after all.

8) I don't feel any closer to what I want, in fact I feel I don't know what I want at all anymore. Perhaps that's just time and age leading me down certain paths instead of having everything in the world open to me (which is easy - pick everything), but now I need to actually decide and that's damn hard work. Let's be honest, my life is lovely. I live in a city I love, with a man I absolutely cherish, I have a beautiful and comfortable home and life is taking its delightful course. I find, however, that in all this happiness and contentment I struggle to define myself and it's a chore having to work on myself after all this time when I thought I knew myself so well. Who am I?

9) Have you heard 'The Ballad of Lucy Jordan'?

10) Ok, ok, things are fine, what can I say? But it's just awful realizing after all this time I've spent with myself that I continue to hurt and dream, to want, to disregard. I need things and I'm superficial and I'm not sure of myself or of the future. I'm hard on myself, I desire more of myself, I wonder: will I ever be enough? Will I make a mark? To quote a friend: "my enduring fear is that I am just someone, and will never be someone in particular". Can a mid-life crisis happen at 32 or is it just a sign that I need to push myself more & again?

I'm going to end this rant now, sorry for posting myself all over the internet. My diary will never forgive me.

WEEKEND GIFTS

No matter how hard I work, no matter how many hours I seem to put in, my tasks are never finished and there is always more to do. With my studio in my house it's all too easy to fill every moment of spare time thinking about, preparing for, obsessing over and generally making work. Lately it feels like my life has become my work and it's really starting to bring me down, to cut into my personal happiness & my sense of self. I'm not quite sure how to fix this - stuff needs to get done and no one's gonna do it but me - but something's gotta give or I'm going to flip out. I know that the many frustrations and time-commitments I face are simply the trade-off for being able to do what I love, but it gets so hard when everyday becomes a 12 hour day, weekends are cut in half and even my dreams have me solving math problems and sewing construction riddles. I'm also a mild agoraphobic who finds it very easy to be sucked into the vortex of work so that I don't need to leave my comfort zone. Bad combination for living a full life.

For the past few months, since Christmas really, I've been putting in at least some work time every weekend and this one was no different. My big work push right now is completing and photographing the Fall 2012 collection, one of the most engrossing and demanding tasks of my work calendar, and (considering I'm already late) I can't rest until it's done. At least this is creative work, draining yes, but engaging and far from the drudgery that is sewing or, god forbid, pattern grading.

Anyway, with my rant now drawing to a close, I just wanted to share that I did indeed take some time for myself this past Saturday and Sunday, leaving the house BOTH DAYS (a miracle) and gifting myself with some simple pleasures. I took long walks during the afternoons and let the sun shine down on me till I had to loosen my scarf and take off my gloves. I ordered eggs benedict and gorged myself on hollandaise. I treated myself to chocolate and cheese and made risotto and had a glass of wine and watched Ernest Borgnine in 'Marty'. I talked to my sister and my dad on the telephone and spent time with my husband and he let me tease him a lot which is my favourite pastime.

I watched tv in bed and let the cat snuggle up on my neck like a beard and slept in till nearly 10 and left the blankets messy.

I made myself a pouch out of cream leather scraps and a favourite ikat and transferred all my best pencils (2H or 4H only, I hate me a smudge) and sketchbook into it.

I finally read my new issue of The Gentlewoman which came in the mail late last week and I especially enjoyed Bali Barret's 5 ways to spot a proper Parisienne: handbags are not pets; ignore pedestrian crossings; navy over black; perfume is an ever-changing accessory; sleep in your jewellery.

I stopped into Drawn & Quarterly and bought myself 3 books. I've been neglecting the modern classics for awhile now so I picked up Fitzgerald's 'The Beautiful and Damned' as well as Salinger's '9 Stories' which I read in Morocco in the Spring (my sister's copy, it was the only book either of us thought to bring, which was silly.) I got Julie Doucet's 'My Most Secret Desire' too which I read Saturday night and laughed out loud (masturbating with cookies? that's some funny shit). I took a weekend, what a novelty. And I need to remember how good it feels to do so, to connect with the people I love, to try and meet new people. To read books and look at the world and walk out into it and through it and be a part of it. To try to remember who I am and what I like and what makes me happy and what I need without feeling this guilty, guilty, guilt all the time if I'm not working. I am going to try and make a real effort over the coming weeks, months and years to gift myself with a weekend. Just a simple goal.

WEEKENDING

My weekend started with this delightful little package which arrived Friday afternoon from sweet Dara of H E R E W I T H M E. An unexpected treat, it contained a beautiful pair of copper chain and glass bead drop earrings. So pretty, so appreciated, a lovely sort of pick-me up on a cloudy sort of afternoon.

Saturday I bought a new (old) glass juicer at the St. Michel Flea Market because I've needed one for so long and $3 can't be beat. It reflects like a jewel in the sunshine. I'm going to make something with limes this week, maybe listen to some calypso. King Sparrow, as it happens, also can't be beat.

Sunday Morning R made pancakes, his particular specialty, and I ate them between bouts of receipt tallying for taxes. Something I never knew before moving to Quebec? Maple syrup is cheap out here dudes! We buy one of these 540ml tins from our local market every couple weeks for $7, no biggie. Each tin is even labeled with the name of the sugarbush where it was tapped so you can see exactly where your syrup comes from. I will never pay exorbitant prices for maple products ever again because it turns out MAPLE SYRUP DOES GROW ON TREES.

Pancake goggles? WHY NOT!

WHOLESOME THURSDAY POST

This was Tuesday night. We listened to Bing and ate chocolates, lit candles and gave treats to the cat. You can see her curled up on the radiator there behind the couch - that's one content cat. Now to take her lead, relax and enjoy it.