Category: Jamie’s Creative Life

May 22, 2014

Sharing Quebec City – Day 2

One of the advantages of our hotel in Quebec City was breakfast at Le Pain Béni was included and delicious! We started our first full day in the city with the best seat in the house, right by the window. The rain had poured all night long but it didn’t feel so bad curled up under the slanted roof and cozy under our Hudson Bay blanket. Still, with the promise of more rain it seemed a good day to go to a museum!

Early mornings and rainy days have their advantages, including sometimes feeling like you have the entire city to yourself.

It’s too bad Les Museée de la Civilisation didn’t have many spots that allowed pictures. We had a wonderful time exploring the People of Québec…Then and Now exhibit. I was especially fascinated by the variety of contemporary takes on Québec history and I just loved the stations that brought voices of the past to life with creative recordings. They had that perfect blend of being informative, humorous and just a little bit corny. That feels like home to me, hehe.

I wish I could also recreate for you a bit of the Haiti: In Extremis show that we experienced. It is still sitting in my heart and mind. It was one of those art experiences that asks you to expand into an entirely different perspective. It was intense, magical, frightening, spiritual… It was a different world.

When we left the museum, we were delighted to see signs of sunshine! It seemed like a perfect time to head into Lower Town and have a bite to eat.

We found this wonderful little restaurant with a beautiful outdoor patio. We tucked in for salads and a lovely glass of wine in the sunshine – and of course, some creme brulee!

Lower Town is a beautiful part of the city and we had a great time exploring. We’re not big shoppers but we did find some treasures, including a store that specializes in using reclaimed wool. We couldn’t resist the quality of the material, the local spin and the brilliant idea and so came home with socks and a toque!

We strolled so long we managed to find a quiet moment in front of the Fresque des Québécois! Earlier in the day there were dozens of people taking their picture in front of this mural, most coming up with creative ways to interact with the historical figures inside the painting!

We continued to walk throughout the beautiful city until it was clear it was time to sit down for another meal. We had to take advantage of this gorgeous break in the weather and found a patio right near our hotel.

There’s nothing quite like ending your day with a view of the moon and a chateau.

May 21, 2014

Sharing Quebec City – Bienvenue!

Rather spontaneously, Justin and I decided to take an extended weekend away to celebrate our dating anniversary by heading to Quebec City. In one fell swoop we booked our flights and hotel and before we knew it, we were on our way. I barely had time to remember that I’m afraid of flying! Good thing too because our connecting flight was tiny (only 19 rows) and if I’d thought about it too hard, I might have chickened out!

I’m so glad I didn’t because start to finish this trip was a delight, from our taxi driver who told us to expect four seasons of weather in one day (true!) to arriving in the old city centre and seeing this little boo.

Then there was our hotel – beautiful! We were upgraded to this lovely room and though we were worried it was going to rain throughout the trip, this suddenly made cozying up and listening to the rain seem like not such a bad option! It was a perfect combination of old world charm and modern luxuries. We were able to walk everywhere we wanted to go and the staff was incredibly friendly and helpful. We took a few moments to settle in and then immediately grabbed our cameras and headed out the door!

Steps away was this amazing artist’s row. Within moments we were learning about the popularity of copper etching in Quebec City and seeing all sorts of representations of parts of the city we would come to know and love.

Next we found our way down to La Promenade des Gouverneurs, a wonderful, wide walkway that gives you beautiful views of the city and the powerful St. Lawrence River. We walked the entire length of it and found ourselves on the Plains of Abraham.

This is the location of a pivotal moment in Canadian history. In 1759 the British defeated the French and took control of Quebec, changing the path of this land forever. While we were contemplating this place and our history, school groups were doing re-enactments – one group representing the English and one, the French. There was enthusiastic marching, yelling and charging! As with so many things during our visit, this felt so like home, so my culture, so my history, so a part of the fibre of our lives, from it being wonderfully corny to it being incredibly politically complex.

No matter how far we walked, the beautiful Chateau Frontenac was our landmark. No wonder it is the most photographed hotel in the world! We even managed to do a little exploration in the hotel, including discovering these amazing tiny circular hideaways for drinks overlooking the river!

As rain started to make an appearance, we decided to walk back to our hotel and passed by the incredibly impressive government building. It was full of statues of historical figures from Samuel de Champlain and the very beginnings of Quebec to more recent politicians like Maurice Duplessis and Robert Bourassa.

We’d only been in Quebec an afternoon and already we’d walked miles and miles and fallen in love with the beauty, the history, the character of the place

Despite the grey and the rain, we knew we had picked just the right place for us to visit.

We ended our day at the D’Orsay, enjoying steak frites and locally brewed beer. Perfect. And that was only day 1!

May 5, 2014

Painting As A Movement Practice

This weekend I was blessed to attend The Movement Basis of Artistic Expression, a Painting Workshop on Liberating Creativity workshop with Shaun McNiff, one of the founders of expressive arts therapy.

You know I’m all about liberating creativity!

Here’s Shaun (on the right) being introduced to us by Stephen Levine, one of the founders of ISIS Canada, which is where I received my training in the expressive arts. The minute Shaun stepped into the circle, he had us. We connected through rhythm, through sound, through movement, through colour.

As Shaun spoke, I wanted to gather every moment like a precious drop of water and share it with you. I know so many of us are hungry for this kind of experience, the aliveness we connect to when we let our creativity run wild!

Words, wisdoms and ideas Shaun McNiff shared…

You can never know at the beginning what something will be in the end.
If you can move, you can paint.
Creativity has an active nature.
Movement leads. The mind responds.
We all go too fast.
The simpler, the deeper.
The work will take you where you need to go.

Creating is an experience.

Every moment was a part of the creative process. Listening to Shaun’s encouragement to slow down, I took my time getting my supplies. I didn’t worry about whether there would be enough, whether what I wanted would be on the table, whether I was losing time painting. I just enjoyed choosing my brushes. I enjoyed looking at the colours and glopping them onto my tray. I didn’t want to miss a moment of the experience.

While Shaun played the drums or the kalimba, we painted. For the entire morning, we painted. No attachment to the product. No ideas, worries or expectations about how it would turn out, just being in the experience of discovery. Discovering the painting. Discovering our creativity. Discovering this moment. Discovering ourselves.

Process painting is powerful medicine.

In the afternoon, we continued to work with our paintings, exploring them with movement and witnessing one another’s work. We also had the opportunity to work with clay, to find the joy of discovering what wanted to arrive through clay in that moment. In the end, we gathered our creations in a beautiful ritual of celebration and closure.

This is exactly why I say that loving the arts is like loving the world. Each piece is an expression of the hands that shaped it, the moment they lived, the instincts they followed. This is sacred to me.

I’m sharing this as a part of I Made This Monday. What did you make this week?

April 17, 2014

Sunshine & Icicles: The Vulnerability of Growth and Loss

After a long, dark, cold, icy, snowy winter, last weekend it was incredibly exciting to see signs of life in the garden! As we bundled up hundreds of twigs, as we pulled away piles of of last year’s fallen leaves, as we chopped through remaining patches of ice, what a joy to see green.

Every time I would find something I’d let out a big “woohoo!” and call Justin over to have a look. It felt so very good to move into spring, my favourite time of year.

And then, the next day looked like this…

Those poor tender exposed shoots were met with the cold and the snow.

They remind me of my heart.

For the past while, my duties as my mom’s executor slowed down and I consciously took a break, knowing that when tax time came around I’d be back in it. I’ve been feeling good, feeling strong and inspired, motivated by the new studio and all that’s coming to life here.

And now it’s April and I’m facing my loss head-on again. I’m going through Mom’s papers, seeing her signature, stumbling across her little notes to herself. I’m back in last April, when we knew she had cancer and my sister Suzie came to visit and stayed. In an instant I’m as raw as I ever, my heart vulnerable in the face of the snow and ice.

I am a tender shoot facing the spring and the snow, the icicles and the sunshine.

And like the plants in my garden, I am both vulnerable and resilient and I will move, day by day, towards life.