These days things are always busy and I never find time to post things to my blog. Here's a rare moment of free time in which I can take a few of these images crowding up my desktop and put them up here to share with others!

A couple of months ago, I had the pleasure of speaking with Andrew Guilbert of Avenue Magazine. I really liked discovering his enthusiasm for the wide range of creative happenings that are going on around this town. I'm afraid I talked his ear off a bit about all the stuff that I am excited about in my neck of the woods (there is just so much... don't get me started! But do check out the upcoming Inglewood Night Market on Friday, July 10th!).

We also talked about graphic recording, with the idea that readers of Avenue Magazine might be interested to find out more about this cool and strange job description that has somehow ended up being mine. I wasn't exactly sure what the outcome of our conversation would look like, so imagine my surprise when I heard that it showed up in this month's edition of Avenue. (Thanks, Andrew!!)

Hence my attempt to actually put a few new pictures up on this site, in case readers actually head over here to take a look at what this is all about. You can find out more about graphic recording here. This blog is the place I try to post pictures of whatever I'm currently working on or wondering about. In 2015, I've been fortunate to have had so many opportunities to work on cool projects, that there's been very little time for me to post anything. So here's a "catch-up" post with pictures from a few recent projects, to give you some idea of what graphic recording is all about - at least in my version of this practice. If you'd like to learn about this from the official source, I'd recommend checking out the International Forum of Visual Practitioners. They are holding their annual conference in Austin, Texas, in about a week! I won't be able to make it there this time around, but check it out - there might still be room for you there!

The copyright for all of the pictures of the work I did for the organizations mentioned below, is owned by the organizations (as listed in the section titles). That's how it works: after I draw it at your event, it is now yours to keep! Thanks to all of these organizations for allowing me the permission to use the images here, in order to let some of those Avenue readers have a glimpse of some local graphic recording.

And apologies that these online images are really too small to do justice to the detail in the original images. You can also take a look at my photo gallery, in which there are a few more close-ups from past projects.

You can learn more about this totally exciting urban initiative here. Suffice to say this was one of the most fun - and challenging - projects I've worked on. Each of the pictures below is actually about 32x40" and was drawn in real time at sessions that were about three hours long. I coloured them in afterwards. Stay tuned for more pictures from the next charrette, which are still at the printers'!

I drew these pictures at an enormous public engagement event in Edmonton a couple of months back. Now I am excited to see what happens with all these great suggestions from future users of this facility!

I loved collaborating with Campus Calgary/Open Minds, an organization that brings local students into real-life "classrooms" such as City Hall, the Zoo, the Inglewood Bird Sanctuary, Canada Olympic Park and other cool places. This picture shows the pencils that always seem to end up in my hair clip. I've done it for years and now I can't stop.

Some people don't realize how important volunteer organizations like Community Associations can be. This group is doing amazing stuff to support CAs, and wants to spread the word! I hope this picture will help to communicate that. You can learn more about the FCC here (on their quite lovely website).

I had a lot of fun working in Banff at the annual conference of the International Association of Facilitators (North America). I am not a facilitator, but in this line of work, I am always crossing paths with event facilitators. This is a pretty fascinating line of work, too. Diane MacDonald of Diane MacDonald & Associates Inc. invited me to partner with her for a workshop at the conference, and here's one of the things that came out of that!

The AMA, based in Edmonton, hosted a really interesting and thought-provoking summit on the subject of making museums more relevant and accessible to Albertans - or really, coming up with ways to let Albertans find out more about how amazing, relevant and accessible our museums already are!

And this list wouldn't be complete if I didn't mention Andrew Sibbald Elementary School in Lake Bonavista. Its whole community welcomed me as a very new artist in residence and worked with me from January till June 2015 to help come up with ways we could use graphic recording as a tool to capture what learning looks like. I think we ended up with some good results. Here's a graphic recording that reflects what some of the teachers had to say about what makes their school special. Thanks, Andrew Sibbald!!

I was delighted to attend the second annual Mayor's Lunch for Arts Champions last week.

This celebration of the arts in Calgary happened for the first time in February 2013 (I went with the find it team - some amazing volunteers from Inglewood & Ramsay who are currently hard at work getting ready for the 2014 Inglewood Night Markets). Here's my post about last year's Lunch.

The Mayor's Lunch happens at the BMO Centre on the Calgary Stampede grounds. Before the lunch began, everyone mingled around in the lobby enjoying performances by a bunch of youthful Calgary artists.

This summer hasn't really afforded much time for blogging. With a lot of family stuff to look after (including a baby who still isn't interested in sleeping longer than about 4 hours at a stretch), and helping organize the find it Inglewood Night Markets, it's been pretty busy. But I just realized I haven't even posted any pictures from my most recent graphic recording projects. They have all been fun! So here's my attempt at playing catch-up!

In some ideal world (or at least in a world in which I was getting 6 hours of sleep every night), I'd write a whole lot more about the background stories, the amazing people, and the interesting anecdotes that arose from each of these individual projects. But for now these brief snippets will have to do!

I only just realized that the above picture is the only picture I have from this event. I'd better dig up some more!

I was really honoured to be invited by local videographer Michelle Sykes to lead a workshop about graphic recording for the participants of a very unique initiative: Studio C's "Empact." Studio C is a unique integrated Community Art and Resource Centre – a venue where artists with and without disabilities achieve collaboration, inspiration and immersion within Calgary’s art community. (Here's a stop-motion video of the creation of the mural outside their front door... I really like it.)

In the workshop I helped with, we talked about job interview strategies. This was the graphic recording I made from the participants' conversation. Thanks to Michelle for the pics of me in action!

It seemed a bit crazy for me to make a graphic recording of his talk, which also featured his own hand-drawn visuals. "This is very meta," is how he put it. Indeed. But so fun!

Last of all... here are some pictures from the Chic Geek's second Speak Geek event at cool local venue The Uncommons. I had the opportunity to draw some pictures for this innovative group earlier this year (pictures here).

One of the most interesting parts of this evening for me was the chance to hear a talk by Mary Anne Moser of Beakerhead - an outrageously ambitious and brilliant festival taking place in Calgary this September. I'm particularly excited about this year's festival because my find it colleagues and I will be collaborating with the Beakerhead team and bringing one of their incredible spectacles to our last Inglewood Night Market of 2014 on Friday, September 12th. Just what kind of spectacle, exactly? Oh, just a giant flaming robot octopus... EL PULPO MECANICO. Yes, you read that right ! ! ! Now that we're all caught up, I'll be posting more about that soon... stay tuned!

And cue the baby waking up. All for now!

I haven't posted anything in a while, so I thought I'd put up this "sneak preview" of my most recent collaboration, with yet another truly awesome group.

I will quote their website: "The Early Child Development Mapping Project (ECMap) was contracted by Alberta Education for a five-year period to conduct research on early childhood development in Alberta and build community coalitions to respond to local needs. ECMap is part of the Government of Alberta's Early Child Development (ECD) Mapping Initiative, which will use the research results to support communities and families in ensuring that all children have the best possible start in life."

Since my real job these days (when I'm not drawing pictures) is parenting, you can imagine that the work these inspiring people have been doing hits pretty close to home for me. (Yes, I am nursing a baby while I type this!)

Not only have they been compiling data about Alberta's children, these folks have also been tirelessly (and creatively!!) providing resources to parents and communities in order to help the children of this province thrive. I attended their two-day Spring Gathering in Edmonton a couple of weeks back, and one of the things we did was collect some of the inspiring stories about local projects onto an enormous map. I actually stood on a stepladder to draw the top parts. Here are a couple of pictures from that event.

And here's just one story from a community on the map: a very cool-sounding lady in Calgary's North East (she sounds like what my German host mother used to call a "Power-Frau") operates a preschool in her home, for children whose families don't have the resources (transportation, time, cultural familiarity, etc.) to get them to school. This sounds like a pretty fabulous home-grown initiative to me.

I am looking forward to writing more about this group, since (as I've written elsewhere - here, for example) Early Child Development is uppermost in my mind just about all the time! But things have been too busy and now I'm in Edmonton again to draw some more pictures tomorrow for another interesting group of movers and shakers. Stay tuned!

I live in Calgary. But when I was invited, a few months back, to contribute some graphic recording to a City of Edmonton initiative, I was really pleased to do so - and not only because it meant I'd be able to count on free babysitting from my in-laws. (That's my baby under the "welcome" sign!)

I was actually excited to learn about Evolving Infill, a City-led "collaborative project that is aiming to create an Infill Action Plan to shape the City’s plan to advance Infill." Infill housing is happening, whether people like it or not (and not just in Edmonton). The City of Edmonton is hosting a conversation between citizens from every different side of the story, gathering up as much information as possible from real people, in order to make the process better for everyone.

That's my short version of what the Evolving Infill team is doing - but you can find out much more about it on their website.

I happen to love this kind of project. I love civic engagement (one word: VoteKit!!!), and I love good urban design that makes for walkable and multi-generational neighbourhoods (if you actually make it through this whole post, you'll see a comic strip I wrote on this subject a while back - from which, a little snippet here). And, well, I love eavesdropping on interesting conversations.

And I have to say, speaking as a Calgarian who came to love Calgary by the long way around (here's a bit on that subject, in this post about Calgary books), I kind of love Edmonton, too.

I mean, it's cold, it's got a layout that's more messed-up than you'd think would be possible considering it's on a grid, it's full of all these passionate small-L (and big-L, I guess) liberal thinking artsy unpretentious educated culture-loving citizens, it's famous for its potholes, there's that insane bridge, and it's got the best Indian food outside of Bradford, UK (although its most beloved local dish is apparently the green onion cake). What's not to love?

Throughout the four days I've spent so far with Edmonton's Infill Action Collaborative (of whom more below), I found myself wishing I knew more about the nuances of Edmonton's city scene. A lot of what I heard sounds like what's going on in Calgary, too (although, interestingly enough, there are some big differences - for example, in Calgary there's still this ongoing debate about legalizing secondary suites (here's a passionate contribution to the debate by blogger Mike Morrison), whereas in Edmonton, these are accepted fare).

Anyway - here's my fly-on-the-wall view of this very cool Edmonton project.

In "Step 1" of Evolving Infill (last year), project leaders gathered "infill stories" from citizens. Right now they're in the middle of "Step 2," and here's what their website says about that:

That's City Planner Jeff Chase up there, speaking to the Infill Action Collaborative at their first workshop. Next, everyone introduced themselves, and while they were at it, mentioned their favourite kitchen utensil. I managed to catch most of them!

Dave Robertson, by the way, who's the principal at Calgary's Mistri Consulting, is leading these workshops, and he is the person who invited me to collaborate with him in doing so. Thanks Dave!

By the end of our second workshop, the group had worked through a lot of information. Here's Dave (above) leading a discussion about all of the stuff on the posters you can see behind him! Group participants discussed various "infill stories" (some that they came up with themselves, and others that had been contributed by Edmontonians during "Step 1" of the project).

They talked about challenges and obstacles for the infill process - from many points of view (i.e. speaking as neighbours, developers, realtors, architects, planners, builders, you name it!)

Oh, and another point of view that was pretty important in these discussions was that of "Community League" members. I had no idea that these neighbourhood organizations, which in Calgary are known as "Community Associations," are called "Leagues" in Edmonton.

I couldn't stop thinking of "The Adventure of the Red-Headed (Community) League" - ha ha.

Anyway, the group worked through infill stories, challenges and obstacles to the current process, and also listed their hopes and aspirations for the infill system. Plus, they drafted eight statements that they felt summed up what was happening in Edmonton infill currently. And all of this went on to a poster - details below.

I really love sketchnotes. As a total aside, I recently took a look at some other great sketchnotes by Dave Wittekind from Chicago. And take a look at these truly amazing sketchnotes by Vancouver-based Brad Ovenell-Carter! If you can believe it, I'm actually supposed to do a graphic recording of a talk he'll be giving in Calgary in May (at the InnovateWest Conference). Um, just a little intimidating!!!

But now, back to Evolving Infill for a few pictures from our amazing venue: the former McKay Avenue School in downtown Edmonton, which now houses the Edmonton Public Schools Archives & Museum.

Notes about the photos below: The golden-doored elevator reminded me of the elevator in the Calgary Public Building (there's a photo of it in this post). The pink couch was in the "powder room!" And what's with the painting in the hinged frame? Is it just so you can slide the picture into the frame? Or is it so that you can hide some classified document in there? (Shades of "The Secret Adversary.")

On my way to one workshop I listened to some glorious organ music on the radio (thanks, CKUA) and was delighted to find an actual organ at the venue when I arrived. The placard says it was donated by the grandson of William F. Puffer, Member of the erstwhile Alberta Provincial Parliament. I looked him up just because I liked his name (I liked the organ, too) - sounds like he was quite a progressive fellow. Ah, so much Edmonton history, so little time!

At the third workshop, the Infill Action Collaborative spent a lot of time in breakout groups coming up with strategies for supporting the evolution of established neighbourhoods through infill development.

Here is something else I noticed while drawing all these folks: almost all the women were wearing scarves. It seemed as though every time I turned around to draw someone, I'd see another scarf! And this was the case, not only on the three different days I worked with this group, but with all the women at the Infill Action Review (coming up below). What's the deal, Edmonton women? I know it's cold in your city (and yes, it was kinda chilly in the McKay Avenue School, too), but what about cardigans, turtlenecks, shawls? I have been to other cold cities, but I didn't notice anything like this.

Is the scarf a ubiquitous Edmonton winter fashion element I just didn't know about? A civic statement that says "Edmonton" just like the green onion cake? I'm kind of intrigued.

Anyway, here is the poster that came out of the group presentations about infill strategies.

By now, I was getting into the routine of these Evolving Infill workshops. My Edmonton day started with a drive downtown from my in-laws' home in the distant suburbs. These drives confirmed for me (yet again) an apparent fact about the Edmonton radio scene: namely, that CKUA is an oasis in a desert of heavy metal and dance mixes. Just sayin'.

The Infill Action Initiative organizers promised back at the beginning of the first workshop: "All of the work we're doing, we'll be sharing with the public!" And they have certainly kept their word. On March 22nd, they hosted a public event - the Infill Action Review - inviting Edmontonians to come in and see what they've been doing.

As before, the event was held at the wonderful McKay Avenue School building. I was too busy drawing during the event to take any pictures of the participants, or of the really great visuals the organizing team brought along to show what they've been up to.

Here's Kim of Dialogue Partners welcoming everyone to the event. (Notice: she too is wearing a scarf! See what I mean?!)

Participants sat around tables and talked about different aspects of the Edmonton infill situation. And I walked around with an easel listening in on their conversation. Here's what I came up with:

Now what? The Infill Action Collaborative is meeting again in April, and I'll be there to record what they come up with. After that, the project organizers will be working with all this material to (in their words) "develop an Infill Action Plan that identifies actions and priorities and serves as a road map for the City's work to support more new housing in established communities." That sounds great!

I'll put up pictures from the last workshop in April. For now, here's an insight that really resonated with me:

Here's to more workshops like this! Thanks for inviting me along for the ride, Evolving Infill team! (pictured above, with me: City of Edmonton Planners Jeff Chase, Lisa Larson and Yvonne Pronovost)

As it happens, I have some strong opinions about the importance of supporting community-friendly inner-city developments such as good infill housing. Here's a comic strip I wrote for my community newsletter last year on the subject. And if this piques your interest, here's a blog post I wrote that takes this subject a bit further (i.e. it's a rant). Ok - all for now!

The Chic Geek - which just celebrated its first birthday - is already well-known in Calgary for its tech-themed events such as Ladies Learning Code. But last week they launched a new event for 2014: a speaker series called Speak Geek.

Last week's inaugural event was less about tech and more about women telling stories of "Challenging their Comfort Zones." We listened to Janie Fontaine of JanieJewels (and of Dragon's Den fame); Student Energy founder Kali Taylor; Social Venture Partners Executive Connector Karen Whiteman; and Calgary businesswoman and Startup Weekend superstar Anette Ceraficki. All of their stories were inspiring, thoughtful, and funny. But you can find a much better recap of the evening's highlights on the Chic Geek blog (which where I found the excellent photo that I've shamelessly included here).

I also got to meet quite a few chic geeks who I'm pretty sure have inspiring stories of their own, including Chic Geek founder Kylie Toh and Speak Geek mastermind Fazilah Shariff. I think I want to find out more. And there's no question I could always use some "education, engagement and empowerment" when it comes to my own little business. Maybe I could be a chic geek too! You can see I've come a long way from my days (well, nights) as a solitary nocturnal artist!

Anyway, this is about the pictures, so here you go!

Close-up pictures of the four speakers' talks...

And some random close-up images from the poster.

And here are some drawings from four breakout groups holding Q & A's with the evening's four speakers, which took place after their talks.

As I've written elsewhere (here, for example), I used to get out a lot more. I used to go out at night, eat in restaurants, listen to live music, even leave town! Having children has changed a lot of that stuff quite a bit. I shouldn't sayI don't get around much anymore - it's just that I get around to a lot more playgrounds than night clubs. And I've loved the new places being a mostly-stay-at-home mom has taken me. I've seen a side of this city that I never saw before I was a parent.

One of the only things I miss is the chance to spend more time in Calgary's grown-up "playgrounds." So when theTEDxCalgary team invited me to come and draw some pictures at their event at theCalgary Zoo a couple of weeks ago, of course I jumped at the chance.

What is TED? I think the first time I heard about it was when I watched Naheed Nenshi's popular TEDxCalgary talk online in 2010 (back before he was Calgary's Mayor). TED describes itself on its website thus: "TED is a nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out in 1984 as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader. ...TED conferences bring together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes or less)."

So what is "TEDx"? The TEDx website says: "The TEDx program is designed to give communities, organizations and individuals the opportunity to stimulate dialogue through TED-like experiences at the local level. TEDx events are fully planned and coordinated independently, on a community-by-community basis."

So there you have it. Check out the amazing independent planners and coordinators on the TEDxCalgary volunteer team. And now take a look at my notes about what they cooked up for a handful of lucky Calgarians in January 2014!

("A Hole is To Dig" was my contribution, by the way. As I've mentioned elsewhere (here, for example), I usually don't read grown-up books!)

Anyway, I went around and talked with people about how they'd finish those sentences, and here are some of the things they said:

I loved listening to Canadian legend Robert Bateman speak, not just about how he paints the wilderness, but about important it is to let children interact with the wild world out there, rather than bring them up surrounded by screens. On that note - a total aside, I confess - here's something with a screen that was recently voted the worst toy of the year. You tell 'em, Mr. Bateman!

Next, Barbara Coloroso's very affecting talk about how something as common as schoolyard bullying can set the stage for bigger problems. Ms. Coloroso spoke about her work at schools in Rwanda helping to nurture a new society in the wake of that country's1994 genocide. The "1, 2, 3" points that I recorded in the image below (if I remember correctly) are the conditions she listed as necessary for a society to get itself into something as terrible as genocide.

Somewhere in there we were also treated to a video put together by TEDx team member Chris Hsiung. Here it is: "Meet the Human Race." (I'm not sure why my screen shows an image that's a few minutes into the video, but if you click on "play," it should start at the beginning.) The images in this video were beautiful and powerful! But even better, I loved the music!

Here's an aside. TEDx curator Rahim Sajan impressed upon participants the idea that they weren't just there to soak up the information in the talks; rather, the TEDx material was meant to get participants interacting, asking questions, starting conversations, and coming away with some new opportunities for friendship, collaboration, and learning. I think Chris Hsiung's video was the "trailhead" that set me off into a particular wilderness adventure just now:

When I went to Chris's website to put up the link to his video, I took a look at a few of the other projects that his company, Hidden Story Productions, has worked on. One thing I noticed was that Chris put together the video for the song written and performed by Amy Thiessen during Mayor Nenshi's first campaign. That's a video many Calgarians (including myself) watched. Then I noticed that there was a project called "Soul of the City Neighbour Grant Proposal." (By the way, these grants are still available, and if your neighbourhood group would like to apply for one, you should - check out the information here!) Looks like Chris is proposing to document the stories of the grant recipients. (And, from what I can see, it looks like he'd do an awesome job!).

But what I also realized was that I'd met Chris before, one year ago, when I did some graphic recording for Calgary Economic Development's "Soul of the City" series. It was really early in the morning and I hadn't had any coffee - I think that must be why I didn't instantly recognize Chris at TEDx (that, and the fact that he was busy taking pictures and I was busy drawing and there wasn't really any time to talk). It turns out Chris is the person who made the sped-up video of me graphically recording the Soul of the City talks. I have pointed so many people to this video, and I never knew who made it! Hooray for TEDx solving this mystery for me. I will have to send Chris a note. But first I have to finish this blog!

Above: something I drew while listening to the TEDx talks. (Yes. I can listen and draw at the same time!)

Then it was time for lunch, and here are some of the pictures I drew while listening to folks around the table (click on them to enlarge).

I couldn't stay for the afternoon's talks, but before I left, I put all the pictures I drew up on a blackboard for everyone to see when they came out of the auditorium!

And now one more note. I really love drawing pictures amidst crowds of engaged, smart, motivated people - it's so inspiring. But sometimes when I come home to a house full of diapers and train tracks, it is a bit hard to switch gears (as depicted at the end of this post from last year's Mayor's Lunch for Arts Champions). In this case, though, my 5-yr-old son helped me through the transition by welcoming me home with this message: