What’s on my (old) walls: Bathroom and Bedroom

Finally finishing up this series (I’ve got one more post coming, in addition to this) and it almost makes me a little sad because saying goodbye to our old apartment and our first home together is at last happening. That being said, looking through these photos and thinking about the space is more happy than sad - this was a place of great joy. Today’s roundup includes the art and things in our old bedroom and bathroom!

Our old apartment was a 1 bed, 1 bath and our bedroom was huge (pretty much the same size as our living room). At first this was a bit tricky to decorate - but over time the space evolved to suit our needs and the large amounts of wall space made for perfect clusters of art + photos. Here’s an example, a petite gallery wall over Matt’s old ‘office’. Two square prints - Light of the World the coziest lamp print and Floral Study no.1 are flanked by an at-home embroidery hoop and a couple special pictures of us. Lastly we have this small art print that we got as a gift with order from Santa Clara Design hung on a wooden clip board from January Jane Shop. 

Above our bed we had just two things, one is a this beautiful iridescent, glass crucifix that Matt had bought me on a trip to Rome he took while we were dating and a photo from a pre-wedding celebration. The moment was captured by my good friend (and amazing photographer) and it was truly a perfect snapshot. My siblings were singing an old jazz song and sigh - yeah - can’t really explain the feeling it gives me.

Opposite our bed lived our dresser and beside that were these two prints (pictured right), a classic Klimt print and a canvas wrapped Divine Mercy image. The latter was a gift from my uncle who is a priest and it’s my favourite rendering of Divine Mercy.

Above the bathroom door -

we have a framed mini print of one of the earliest Michelangelo paintings. I saw this at the Kimbell in Dallas, and found it so inspiring that he painted it at such a young age. Matt loved it too! The painting is titled, “The Torment of St. Anthony” and it almost reminds me of a clipping from a comic book or graphic novel.

This is the last space I’ll cover today - the three bigger bathroom pieces. To the far right we have this vintage wooden frame with what looks like a print of an etching (?) I don’t love love the image itself but I do like the contrast it provides and I think it’s good to mix in monochromatic art once in awhile. Next to that we have one of my favourite pieces - this bear in the bathtub print and next to that we have flowers from my bridal bouquet! These five were the ones that happened to dry the best (I need some help with the flower drying process, welp) and the colours and composition work so well together!

PS - the embroidery hoop hanging in the bedroom was the result of many many sick days. It was a therapeutic and pretty way to pass time while I was couch bound - 10/10 recommend if you are looking for something similar, there are kits everywhere online!

To do, the next right thing -

I think sometimes when you feel lost it’s really easy to get caught up in angst and frustration of not knowing the bigger picture. It’s hard to be motivated when you can’t quite tell where you’re going or how you’re moving forward. A long time ago I decided to try and make my life subject to what God’s will for my life may be. There has been some hesitation in totally giving myself up to that because forfeiting control and living in faith in very real ways is scary and can be quite humbling.

If you look at the world around you and see how unpredictable life can be it becomes easier to relinquish control, because so little in our lives are actually controllable. This became true for me when I started having unpredictable and devastating anaphylactic reactions at the age of 18. But still, in a society where there is relative peace, grasping at what control I do have is very tempting. And holding tightly, white knuckled to whatever of it I have is a weakness of mine. It’s a weakness and also a trap, a trap to being totally free. But I desire freedom, and I want to be holy so that I can love God and love others in the best way, I want to be able to say at the end of my life that it was all so full and so beautiful. Up to this point I can say that confidently.

There have been a few instances over the last few years where the answer to several questions has been unclear to me. And certainly where I have been unable to see the bigger picture, there’s a particular area of my life that I feel like has been confused and where I feel like I have been working toward a fruitless end. While I want to keep the specifics private, I think that feeling of working towards a fruitless end is something most of us experience at some point. But I still feel called to give it time and energy, at least as of today, I still feel like I’m meant to put effort - time and energy to this area of my life. But it’s very hard for me to be motivated to do so and this is where the philosophy of the ‘next right thing’ has been instrumental and very helpful.

Doing the ‘next right thing’, even when you can’t see the bigger picture results in small acts of faith, small acts of trust that the efforts put there will not be wasted. And even if there’s no peace in the general direction there are small amounts of peace and clarity in the ‘next right thing’. Years ago I read a book called Poustinia, and the author of the book, Catherine Doherty has a philosophy that really resonated with me and continues to help me in this way of the ‘next right thing’, so finally I’ll leave you with one of her quotes. I hope it helps you get through your day, even if your day consists of seemingly mindless tasks and even when you can’t quite see the other end of what you’re struggling with.

“The duty of the moment is what you should be doing at any given time, in whatever place God has put you. You may not have Christ in a homeless person at your door, but you may have a little child. If you have a child, your duty of the moment may be to change a dirty diaper. So you do it. But you don’t just change that diaper, you change it to the best of your ability, with such great love for both God and that child… There are all kinds of good Catholic things you can do, but whatever they are, you have to realize that there is always the duty of the moment to be done. And it must be done, because the duty of the moment is the duty of God.” - Catherine Doherty

What’s on my walls: Kitchen

Our kitchen serves us so well - both of us love cooking and baking and having people over. My mom has a talent for feeding people and loving them through food and she has definitely passed that on. A well loved kitchen table is often the home of so many wonderful conversations and I am a happy recipient of those. I am actually writing this on the tail-end of a slow Sunday morning at our own kitchen table and the small hum of a waffle brunch and clean dishes has a melody that carries through the rest of the day. And, that’s the magic of a well-used kitchen, isn’t it? So let me show you what we kept up on our kitchen walls and tell you why these things are important to me, to us.

Maybe it helps a bit to situate our kitchen in the context of our apartment. We have a one (plus den-ish) apartment that is fairly well laid out. Our kitchen and living room certainly overlap and so I consider the start of the kitchen the end of our Ikea bookcase and the end of it to be where our small hallway leading to our den/entryway begins. So here, beside that bookcase we have two calendars. A birthday calendar, gifted to us by my sister-in-law and a regular Alice-In-Wonderland calendar (because I’ve always admired the illustrations). Matt and I, our communities - both near and far - are very important to us and having both kinds of calendars enables us to keep track of everything and everyone without losing our minds, haha. I think having a calendar also helps you be very intentional with your time! Ironically, I am also someone who doesn’t love accounting for everything and enjoys a bit of spontaneity so we’ll see how long the calendars last in our family life once we are a bit more settled.

On the other side of the kitchen we have this wall - the open door in this photo leads to the bedroom and above that we have this crucifix that Matt found at a local antique/thrift store. We have crucifixes above most of our doors but this one is particularly well situated to a mid-day glanced prayer. Beside that we have a wedding memento, the night sky above the area we were in the day we got married. This was actually originally supposed to be our guest book but never arrived in time. Thinking ahead, I still think it would be cool to get the signatures of those in our life who matter most and who were at the wedding or who wished to be at the wedding, and those close friends we met and/or got to know after the fact. Lastly we have a bulletin board largely with things that make us smile + laugh - funny photos and letters from friends. We also keep scraps that catch our eye - there’s a delightful vintage book-page, an exchange between Piglet and Pooh that goes as follows: “‘When you wake up in the morning, Pooh…what’s the first thing you say to yourself?’ ‘What’s for breakfast’ said Pooh. ‘What do you say, Piglet?’ ‘I say, I wonder what’s going to happen exciting today?’ said Piglet. Pooh nodded thoughtfully. ‘It’s the same thing,’ he said.” (- makes me smile so!)

On the wall next to the bookcase where the kitchen counter meets the wall we store our mugs! I highly recommend vertical mug storage for cramped cabinets and while I don’t have a photo of our actual mug rack I do have a photo of what’s above it. Various teas, and also this art print - A Street at Night by John Atkinson Grimshaw. It’s hard for me to describe why I love this painting so much - I was on a walk with Matt yesterday and we were discussing this one neighbourhood that we walk by regularly to get to our hiking location. It’s a cute neighbourhood but it almost feels desolate, a little dead. This painting gives me the opposite feeling - it is so vibrant and full of life and the smudginess, the softness coupled with the warm light adds a touch of mystery and magic. I think it’s important to surround yourself with things that inspire you creatively and things that you hope to imitate in some way. This art print is one of those things for me. Grimshaw’s work in general has that sense and I really recommend it (though some of his art can come across a little haunting).

These are the last two pieces of note on the kitchen walls. These two art prints hang above our pots and pans, strainers and tea towels. Two botanical illustrations, the one that’s not my own art is done by another artist whose work I admire, Minnie Small. This pomegranate print is done by her and the one next to it, the one of culinary herbs is done by me! You can find that print here.

So that’s the tour of my kitchen. We move so soon and while our new apartment will be bigger, I’m not quite sure about the size of the kitchen. I hope you’ve enjoyed this read and that it inspires you to place some pieces in your kitchen. I think having spaces we love and enjoy allows us to use them more frequently and so by making your kitchen a cozy and beautiful space I promise you you are more likely to cook!

*please note, all underlined items are linked

What’s on my walls : Living Room

Hey! I’m an artist and unsurprisingly, I think art is important. I think it helps us define our humanity and turns what would otherwise be similarly grey boxes with wood, carpet or tile floors into something unique, something surprising. It shows our preferences, our tastes and gives others an inside into what matters most to us. It is, in my opinion one of the best forms of self-expression and even though it is a ‘non-essential’, I want to make the argument that art, is in fact, essential.

I am artist and I am also a sentimental soul. This idea to show you what are on my walls happens to coincide with getting ready to move! From the first home that Matthew and I shared, the home we lovingly put together by piecing together furniture (quite literally) from Ikea, and our favourite thrifty antique store. Where we carefully considered and chose photos and art to grace these walls. It works out then to document this space so I, and my sentimental self, can look back affectionately on these photos in 5, 10 hopefully 20 years.

Without further ado, welcome to my living room!

The largest amount of free wall space exists on this side of the living room, and we split up the wall into three parts. Here’s the first! We have my Verso L'alto print a print of the painting “the Monk by the Sea” by Caspar David Friedrich and then two things I can’t link, a photo from our Wedding Mass at the time of consecration and a postcard from a few, lovely days spent in Savannah.

For the second section we have this great hanger of all things that we received for our wedding! On it we have plentiful polaroids of our favourite people (these are so great because you can change them out and you actually have a space to display your polaroid pictures and look at them!), a few museum postcards of our favourite images from the Kimbell in Dallas, this clever JPII print from Santa Clara design and lastly our wedding cake topper! Our cake topper was an illustration of the two of us made by yours truly and I love that it has a place in our home (this may actually be the sample illustration and not the real thing, #whoops).

This is the last space where we have art in our living room. The first piece is a canvas line-art illustration of Union Station that I did when I first moved to the Austin area from the GTA. I love trains, I think they are so romantic, and I have spent way too much time in them as a result of being a commuter back when I lived in the Toronto area. Parts of Union were always so pretty and made my sentimental heart soar, and when I moved I wanted to bring both that feeling, and a part of that place with me. I think the line-art style of Quentin Blake is perfect for capturing these sensibilities and so here we are! I thought about selling it, or making a print of it, and maybe I still will one day but for now it hangs in a prized place and brings me back to dusk and dawn in a pretty, old train station.

Finally, we have a print of Cezanne’s Man in a Blue Smock. Why? The summer before Matt and I got married we went and explored the Kimbell, we both loved this painting, especially the painting style, we ended up chatting about it for longer than you’d think and dreaming about our first home together. And so, when the time came, my now-husband bought a print and it reminds us of that wonderful memory and in that story exists, I think at least in a subtle way, the value of great art. It makes you feel something, something that my measly words can’t quite express.

So that’s it! Thank you for taking the time to step through this cozy space with me. My hope, my goal really with sharing these personal spaces with you is to encourage you to fill your home with beauty and art, with personal items that matter to you and your family, and once you’ve done that to share that with others. I do think when we do so we are exercising a special kind of agency - one that helps us get in touch with who we are in a very special way.

*please note, all underlined items are linked

To love and be loved - for love of community

I always remember my parents stretching themselves. In a culture of self-preservation, the act of stretching yourself is so counterintuitive to the things that people tell us will make us 'whole'. I love indulging, living out slow mornings and long afternoons, painting my nails and taking time for myself. And while I do think all of these things are important, stretching myself for love of relationship, investing in relationship is something I am so glad my parents taught me.

We are constantly faced with choices and with contradicting priorities. We are pressed with an abundance of options and conflicting guidance, and it is in the face of being able to choose others over ourselves - to give them our time, our energy, our efforts - that our capacity to love, and, honestly, to be loved, grows. I don't think this means that we must be super vulnerable with everyone in our lives. Not everyone is meant to be in our lives equally. But I do think that this means we should seek out relationships in which we can be vulnerable and nurture them. How do we determine which relationships these are amid the myriad of people we meet and/or are connected to? I try and stick to some wise words my uncle gave me, maybe a decade ago. He said, "Trish, good, healthy relationships, relationships that come from Love are ones that are peaceful, transparent and lifegiving." Does this relationship give me peace? Or, is it a constant source of anxiety? Am I able to be transparent with this person, are they able to be transparent with me? Am I ashamed of the way I treat them/they treat me or do we bring out good in one another? Do we have the freedom to hold one each other accountable, with kindness? And lastly, is this relationship draining, or does it give me life? If these three elements exist, amid imperfect human dynamics I think we are required to give. To give them our time, our energy and our efforts, even when it's inconvenient or slightly uncomfortable. To love.

Mother Teresa once said, "This is the meaning of true love, to give until it hurts." I watched my parents do this, having an open home in the midst of busy schedules when we were all growing up with school, clubs and sports, spending time with whoever walked in the door. I watched my siblings do this, they have both spent countless nights speaking with me into the early morning while I sobbed from whatever ailed me, even if they had exams or work the next day. I watched my best friends do this, to travel and be with me at my wedding in near impossible circumstances, taking countless risks and sacrificing so much money and time (I don't even know how to begin to explain this one, I will never not be grateful). And others sent flowers, gifts, carefully rehearsed speeches and videos, to make us feel that much more loved. Matt and I have experienced this even now, when our car broke down and some of our dearest friends forgot themselves and helped us survive his last week of law school. Self sufficiency is highly overrated, and I only hope the example I have been given by SO many in my life enables me to do the same, to give until it hurts. In watching these living examples, my family, my friends - I have come to the conclusion that this is actually what makes us 'whole', whole and human.

To love and be loved, I don't think you will ever regret investing in the people around you. Even if they aren't around you in a physical sense, those that you can have deep relationship with - invest in, call them, ask them how they are doing, and if you can't do that, then think of them and pray for them. Our capacity to reach out to others changes depending on the circumstances of our lives but in some senses we are always called to be outward, not insular. Some of the important people in my life live hundreds of miles away, but I know they love me and even though I am not always the best communicator I hope they know that I love them. They are people who have sacrificed deeply for me and who I have sacrificed deeply for. They are people who I would be honoured to sacrifice for again.

So practice this, love your community and allow yourself to be loved by your community (that can be just as hard, sometimes harder). Do this, even when it is difficult. And, at the end of it all, sing, in the Scottish tradition "of all the money that e'er I had, I spent it in good company.”

Don’t be afraid to go slow -

Don't let your fear of going slow stop you from going. I am a and have always been a slow person  (something that my siblings and good friends have teased me about for years!!). Honestly, I have found it increasingly difficult to reconcile that slowness in me with the reality of the world. Everything feels so fast-paced and with multi-faceted jobs often requiring our attention in more than one way it can feel impossible to get everything done. Owning this business has changed the way I think about being slow and also developed in me some practical go-tos for managing my time well.

I'm sure you have heard it a million times but small business owners aren't just creatives, they are in charge of marketing, creating, development, production (or figuring out production) and accounting. When I first started this business I was overwhelmed and unable to keep up with everything, actually who am I kidding, I probably still can't quiiiiiite keep up with everything. It was tempting to say that having a small business just isn't compatible with my nature, either I needed to change or I needed to do something else. As doing something else wasn't something I desired or felt called to, I tried very VERY hard to change. I tried to implement productivity systems, to wake up earlier/sleep later and to 'streamline' my processes and while those things were all somewhat helpful I didn't really feel like I was going any faster. This made me feel incredibly discouraged. Over the past few months I have been seriously thinking and praying about this perceived dilemma and grown to recognize that the truth is: going slow is better than not going at all and in some ways going slow can and is more valuable than going quickly (particularly if it is in your nature). So, if you are a slow person like me, I think my biggest recommendation is to stop trying to speed yourself up - instead - embrace the slowness and the advantages that come with it. You will no longer be wasting precious time and energy on "shoulda, coulda, woulda" and in doing so be more productive and probably more intentional.

Without further ado here are some practical tips that have helped me, as someone who is afraid to go slow but also can't help it:

• Take a break from consuming and allow yourself to work and be in silence

• I write this as a I have a Spotify playlist on, one titled "music for a workday" mind you, but STILL. I recently heard someone talking about how we no longer have natural breaks in our day that are just totally silent, most of us choose to fill our breaks, our walks, our working time with some sort of music, TV show, social media or podcast. As someone who needs space to process information I think this constant consumption has slowed an already slow person and so I am trying to put my phone away, my TV off and set my mind on my task totally and completely. Please note, I am doing this very, very imperfectly.

• Pray and set aside intentional time to process your thoughts

• I think we were all made differently and allowing myself breaks to connect to God and who God made me has become more and more essential to my understanding of my call, my work and my life. It has also allowed me to accept myself more deeply, especially those parts that sometimes feel incompatible with running a successful business. Please note, they are not actually incompatible.

• Understand your working habits and capitalize on your own efforts

• Daily to-do lists are not my thing. I thought they were for a long time, and then the lists would pile up, and the frown lines in my face were getting deeper and deeper as I realized that I would always underestimate how long a task takes me. For me, I overestimate how many things I can get done in a day but underestimate how many things I can get done in a week and so I've started making weekly to-do's and the frown lines are lessening. I have one of my best friends to thank for that change (Katrina you are the best). Please note, maybe weekly to-do lists are a terrible idea for you, the point is figure out the way YOU work best and structure your life around that reality. Instead of trying to change who you are to fit a productivity system, change productivity systems to fit who you are.

Being late to the party - dealing with real disappointment and hope

Awhile ago I posted something on Instagram that detailed, a little, the adventure that led me to my current career. And this blog post is to follow up a little on that and talk about something that I don't think is discussed enough. Disappointment. Almost any story that follows someone who has been supremely successful, whether it be an actor, athlete or businessperson has an element of "at some point you just have to follow your dream and go for it." And  there is most certainly a time and a place to talk about all of those things. But for everyone who 'makes it' there are hundreds if not thousands people who don't, and what about them? Are their lives any less valuable? What about those that didn't get to pursue their dream, or quite simply weren't lucky - how do we live our lives if our dreams have not become reality (especially if we really believed they would become so)?

Disappointment is so real, there are so many people, myself included, who have to - at some point in their lives -  look themselves in the mirror and admit that life did not turn out the way that they expected. That, in some sense or another, they are disappointed in what their life has become. This may seem like a very cynical way of looking at life but really, I think it is very freeing. When I left politics to become an artist I was incredibly disappointed in myself and the life I had ahead of me. I was always successful, in a worldly sense, and I prided myself on pushing myself to impact the world in the largest way possible, to use my gifts to deliver the type of change that I thought was 'worthy' (by some strange benchmark that I had long ago established - what is worthy anyway?). Suddenly, I was no longer successful (in a material way), I had to give up my dream because I just couldn’t sustain the lifestyle that would give me the freedom to pursue that profession. I just wasn’t healthy enough. And then I started to blame myself for pushing myself too young - I burned out early I said, this is not how this was supposed to go. But, what if, what if it was how it was supposed to go?

Our lives do not lose any meaning whatsoever if we do not achieve what we think we are supposed to achieve. That is a lesson that is important to learn and one I am still learning. I don't think this lesson in disappointment is segregated to our professional lives either, for me that was the case, but for others, maybe even for you, it may be disappointment in a personal sense, either by failing to reach personal milestones or failures in relationship, or maybe there is disappointment with regards to your physical or mental health. I think when these failures and disappointments stare us in the face there is a great temptation to run away. To pretend these things don't exist and to escape the pain. While I think there is a place for dulling the pain in our lives, it is never the best way. Instead, it is best to stare straight on, to mourn what has been lost and to look ahead with real hope.

Hope is not easy but hope is very much worth it, hope is very much 'worthy'.