The sweetness of snow

Night shot -- Sudden spring snowfall
Photo: 
Barbara Muir © 2025

It was starting to be full on spring here -- snowdrops (the flowers) were showing up
in people's gardens. The Type bookstore in Forest Hill Village on Spadina that I love
had a flower box of tulips outside.  And then a day ago, at about this time (evening)
 -- I looked out and the snow was back, covering everything.  My phone lit up the
photos, so you don't get the full effect, but it was awesome.  Then of course it all melted 

But today at lunchtime -- large movie style snowflakes were falling.  They didn't last,
but they sparkled in the sunlight, and looked so beautiful.  Then of course full on
spring sun made them disappear.

Later I was walking my dog, and another dog walker and I laughed about the snow.
It had returned in very small sporadic flakes.  We agreed that it was beautiful, and
then laughed and said that we were clearly Canadian.

Have a loving your life day.

Art of the kitchen -- a sweet still life

 

Kitchen scene
Photo
Barbara Muir © 2025

Hi dear friends,

I am super tired tonight, after a great day painting, and a lovely walk
with a friend. So I don't like to show you work until it's complete.
Instead I'll let the delightful available still life from the kitchen
be the art on the blog tonight.  

Have a loving your life day.

More celebrations

 

Steven and me at the 

beginning

(Yes I was not blonde yet)

Photo
Wallace Muir © (my father)

It's out Monthaversary of our wedding day today, and as on

every month we toasted one another and wished each other
Happy Monthaversary. Here's a post from a former blog on
the topic.  Corny yes.  Is love corny, then I'm all for corny.

"People who read my blog often comment on how we
are always celebrating. Of course that's not true, but
Steven and I do notice a couple of important dates
each month that are just ours -- our Monthaversary
of our first date, and our Monthaversary of our wedding,
which happened 11 months after our first date.

Last year on this day I wrote to you that love is coming,
if it isn't in your life right now, and you want it. I could
never have imagined meeting someone who loved me
from minute one, before meeting Steven.  And I wish that
love for you in your life.

Are we perfect?  Not at all.  We argue quite a bit, but do
we love each other -- yes. To the moon and back."

Have a loving your life day.

So glad we got to see the last day of Eleanor Lowden’s solo show

Twilight Sky
Acrylic
Eleanor Lowden ©

Steven and I hurried over to Leslie Grove Gallery today to see Eleanor Lowden’s
solo show on the last day of the exhibition. Her work is beautiful, vibrant,
cheerful, and moving.

We had a wonderful conversation with Eleanor, and I got to watch her paint a
 beautiful, small landscape.  It was a treat to see how she painted,
 and that she could keep a conversation going at the same time. Impressive.

If you don’t know her work, check it out on her website. If you do know
her work, it sounds like she has lots of shows coming up, so do yourself a
favour and see her beautiful work in person.

Have a loving your life day!

Happy Monthaversary plus a belated Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day celebration!

 

Lucky Shamrocks

acrylic on birch,

5 x 5 inches

 Barbara Muir © 2012

SOLD ♥

Me and my sweetheart Steven, with some 

Valentine's Day bluebirds
(These photos were taken at
the Louvre by a friend who
lives in Paris.)

It was a pretty great Monthaversary of our first date today. We celebrated
Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day with the family.  The most fun. 
The younger family members collaborated with a neighbour to create
comedy routine, after comedy routine -- and had us laughing all afternoon.

Now it's movie night, so we will talk again tomorrow. I hope you also had

a wonderful day.  If you're wondering why we're celebrating these things

now -- it's because it was when we could get together.  Simple -- and fun!

Have a loving your life day!

The love of tulips

 

Spring tulips

Three versions in acrylic on

watercolour paper

Barbara Muir © 

Today was another great day painting from the model. I'm still not ready to show
you.  The exciting and challenging thing about working on a large painting is
that you keep moving back, and looking at it from a distance, and seeing 
things differently and changing it.  A friend told me not to overthink.

I know what that means, but frequently with a portrait painting, overthinking it
is what saves it.  The painting has to express the subject.  Sometimes 
that takes work.

I love these tulip paintings, and they seem right as I'm painting a woman in a red
dress.  So beautiful.

Have a loving your life day!

Happy Spring

 

Cloud Magic

Acrylic on canvas

4 x 6 feet 

Barbara Muir © 2018

The first day of spring makes me think of my mother who loved the changing of

the seasons -- especially spring and summer.  She loved walking and swimming.

She would be massively shocked at the state of the world now--not that the
world was not in chaos when she was alive.  It just seems more so.

My solo show opening April 5 and on view at The Heliconian Club, 35
Hazelton Ave., Toronto for the month of April, is about celebration. In

fact it's called The Art of Celebration. So my art in the exhibition
features the things in the world -- people, landscapes, still life
that make me happy. Everyone I know now is worried, or anxious
about the news -- so this show will be an escape. All cheerful.

A wonderful painter, Mitchell Johnson is having a few shows in the next
month, and one is of giant paintings in his super style.  This painting is

so far my most giant painting without combining canvasses, and I may
show a couple of the combination paintings too.  

I wish my mother was alive to come to my show.  I think she would be
happy for me.  I am slowly working on a large portrait for the show, and
the model comes again tomorrow.  As soon as it's finished, the
organizing, labelling, packing will begin.  I am so proud of all the

artists I know who do this all the time.  Hats off to you -- it's a big

deal.

Have a loving your life day.