It's the end of the summer, so maybe not the perfect season for a blog post about fun in the front yard - but I just came across this little unposted piece I wrote LAST YEAR (that will give you an indication of what kind of year it's been!).

I was reminded of this work-in-progress story because of a recent Twitter excahnge between Calgary blogger Richard White and former City of Calgary team member Josh White (well, it was a few weeks ago, and I couldn't dig it up when I tried scrolling through old tweets, alas). They were just talking about the oft-forgotten merits of front lawns. Richard also recently posted a new piece along a similar theme, extolling the virtues of the underappreciated front porch.

The original post I'd written last year had been inspired by a piece from Richard White's blog, the Everyday Tourist, written in the summer  of 2015 and entitled "Front Yard Fun???"

Here's an excerpt:

But you can't keep two small boys in a house all day, either. All parents, especially those who reside in small houses like mine, are familiar with this predicament: the kids are getting too rowdy and the house just feels crowded and claustrophobic and you just have to get those kids OUTSIDE! In 2015, this happened pretty much every day, and we just fell into the routine of moving everything outside... but not into the backyard, even though it's quite a bit bigger. Instead, we headed for the front yard.

every day. Often they'd stop to say hi, join in the fun, and even help me keep an eye on things.

4. Also, by staying in the front yard, I was inviting myself to the party that's 23rd Avenue (that's kind of a joke, but when you're stuck inside, even a tiny neighbourhood street inhabited by a few other front-porch-sitters can feel like a party!). When you're spending a lot of time with children, you sometimes crave conversation with other grown-ups, particularly when you're having a challenging summer like the one I was having. In the back yard, I feel more cut off from this kind of opportunity, but in the front yard, it just happens by magic! Random people strolled by, I said hi, and the next thing I knew I was getting free therapy!

Again, I'm kind of joking, but it's kind of true, too. At the risk of wandering too far from "front yard fun," I might as well mention that in the wake of a bunch of family health issues and a new baby, I struggled for almost two years with post-partum depression (I wrote a comic strip about that for the Calgary Comic & Entertainment Expo's 2016 Artbook, which you can see here). For me, this meant that I often couldn't muster the energy to get out the door to the places I knew would cheer me up - visits to friends, places my kids could play happily, etc. But sitting inside with aforementioned rambunctious kids wasn't going to cheer me up, either. That's how the front lawn became an accessible, free and easy solution to my basic need for social support, human interaction, and sunlight. I wrote a comic strip about "How the Playgroup Saved my Life," but maybe I should have  called this little essay, "How the Front Yard Saved my Life." The front yard got me through the summer. And it was fun! 

When I work at different events this days, I often hear about concepts like "integrated neighbourhoods" and "transit oriented development" - the idea that city planning should consider the big picture, instead of designing for a single isolated purpose. Can good planning have a tangible effect on promoting positive mental health? My experience gives that a resounding yes.

When I bought my house in 2004, the front porch was one of its worst features. Later we added a DIY ramp right on top of the stairs to accommodate my two arthritic senior citizen dogs (comic strip about dogs and ramp from the 2014 Ramsay newsletter, here).

When the house was renovated in 2008, a new front porch was a priority. I was slightly freaked out when I arrived home one day to find that the builders had simply removed that central column - they assured me it had just been cosmetic and wasn't actually holding up the roof. (I'm still a bit nervous about that.)

Another challenge with the new porch was that the builders originally replaced the four wide, shallow steps with three steep steps up. I had to ask them to redo the work and recreate the same four steps we'd had before. Having these shallow steps has made a world of difference to the short-legged toddlers and the mobility-challenged grown-ups who have come through our door in the years since.

These days, I'm more efficient with my work materials (thank goodness) and I don't have to buy dozens of new boards all the time. The downside of this is that we haven't been making as many cool forts like the one shown below.

And a couple of years back, my brother borrowed our front lawn to stage a yard sale as part of Ramsay's "Parade of Garage Sales." I know that people who love garage sales are undeterred by unwelcoming back alleys, but for the less hard-core browsers, a front yard set-up like this one just invites you in!

I asked my seven-year-old son about any front-lawn-related memories or ideas, and he responded as follows: "Remember that "OLD HOUSE" walk? People were supposed to walk along and say, "Look, an OLD HOUSE!""

The thrilling event he's remembering (with some bemusement as to the big deal involved in gazing at so-called "OLD HOUSES") is Century Homes, a 2012 initiative that encouraged residents of 100-year-old houses in Calgary to celebrate the history of their homes. In 2014, a Jane's Walk along 23rd Avenue featured many of these homes, as seen below. Yay for OLD HOUSES and their old front lawns!

From 2012 to 2015, I was part of this little team of volunteers who put together a few fun and artsy pop-up events. Our group was called the Vibrant Village Society of Inglewood and Ramsay, and the series of events was called find it. I had to abstain from this truly wonderful volunteering in 2016 because things have just been too busy, but the rest of those guys are still doing amazing stuff (although the website is maybe just a little lacking in recent updates, since that's still supposed to be my job!!)

Anyway, when I think about it, a few of our pop-up events really depended on front lawns.

An audience taking in poetry readings by Rosemary Griebel and Kris Demeanour on front porches at the New Street Spoken Word Safari.

Front lawns were decorated with DIY "chandeliers" for our wintertime Chandelierville walking tour.

But my favourite front- yard story has to be the story of another find it pop-up event, the 23rd Avenue Artwalk and Street Celebration.

I've written about this elsewhere (ok, so I made a whole website for it, which is still linked to my own website since I don't know what else to do with it!) - but I'll just add a little bit more about it, here. This street party was basically a front-lawn extravaganza, which I started dreaming about when I realized that almost all of my neighbours were artsy creative types and that we all had houses with built-in gallery spaces in our front yards. We all put things on our front lawns back in 2012, told a few people about it, and enjoyed a wonderful day of sharing arts, crafts, talents, and friendship. This was my favourite display:

What I really like about the picture above is that the little rectangle of grass in the middle is actually shared by two neighbours, and their display shares the space - the glassblowers' table on one side, Andrew Tarrant's ceramics tent on the other. And yet there isn't any big physical divider between them. It just looks like one big show.

Here are a few more pictures of the ways we took advantage of our front yards that day.

And one last note as I look through the front-yard-related pictures I collected last year in my attempt to write this post, back then: a little comic about the connections that can manifest if you just happen to be in your front yard.

I know the weather's getting colder and you may not feel like putting out the lawn chairs just now... but keep it in mind and try it whenever you feel inspired. And if you're strolling by and you see me on the front lawn, please say hi and share your own front lawn story.

This month's comic for the Ramsay Community Association newsletter. Yes folks, gripping tales of true drama right here on my street!

I just talked with the Calgary Eyeopener about a little project I worked on earlier this year: "City Hall 101." I talked with Calgary Metro, too (here's a link to the article they wrote about this). So I guess I'd better post the comic here. Some of those creative folks at Calgary City Hall had the idea of using comics to draw people's attention to ways ordinary citizens can engage with what's going on. I love the fact that our script used the idea of people showing up to speak in support of a proposed change, rather than against it. People might not realize that that's an option! Anyway, here's the comic. The story isn't really that thrilling, but what IS thrilling to me is the growing interest in comics as a legit form of art and communication. Thanks City of Calgary for the opportunity!

You can also see the comic - a bit bigger, and along with all the relevant City Hall info - on the City of Calgary's website, here.

And If you're really interested in hearing my 8 minutes on the CBC Eyeopener talking about this, here's the audio track. (If you're interested in hearing what I sound like at 6 AM after 4 hours of sleep and one big mug of coffee... you've come to the right place!)

There is this cool organization in my city called Calgary Arts Development, which describes itself as follows:

We are a connector, facilitator, collaborator, champion, supporter, amplifier, investor, catalyst and opportunity-maker.

From that description you can guess that their work doesn't just involve traditional support of the arts, but an active endeavour to share Calgary's creative offerings with people from all walks of life. And that's how I got to be involved in this story, as part of Calgary Arts Development's "Storytelling Project," in which local writer Stephen Hunt talked to a range of creative Calgarians about their personal versions of Calgary's arts development strategy, Living a Creative Life. The story is featured here on the Calgary Arts Development site.

I really like the idea that the city's strategy has room not only for the fine arts, but for regular folks who explore and celebrate their creativity in their own unique ways. That notion struck a chord with me, so when I was invited to draw a picture to go along with the story, that's what I drew.

And by the way, for anyone who's interested, I thought I'd include here the "annotated version." After I drew the picture, I realized I'd put in a really random gathering of creative people (mostly my own family and friends, along with a few others who just happened to cross my mind). Just for fun, I wrote down their names, so here they are! Needless to say, it's not really an accurate cross-section of Calgary's creative population, but it'll do for a start... and I'd love to see your version of this story, too!

I was fortunate to have been invited to do some graphic recording at a workshop that was happening at the Banff Centre recently. That would have been good enough on its own, since it's a venue that really can't be beat. But, even better, this particular event was part of the 2016 TED Summit. Here are some sketchnotes I drew right after my day in Banff. My experience was just a little taste of the amazing things going on during the whole summit, but definitely a delicious one!

It was a pleasure to work with the amazing folks from TED, BMW i and the Banff Centre, who made it so easy for me show up and do my thing.

And thanks to TEDx Kyoto organizer Takayuki Mitsugi for the green tea KitKat!

Here are my notes from the session I worked at:

Back in 2015, local weekly Swerve Magazine published maps of Calgary by local illustrators. Back then (as one of the first things I tried drawing on a computer), I drew a map of my neighbourhood, Ramsay. This time around, with summer in Calgary as the theme, I drew a map of places of explore by transit, along with my 7-year-old transit enthusiast (and hippo-loving toddler, too). Take a look here to find Swerve's summer 2016 illustrated map feature!

This time, I didn't draw the map on my computer (although by this time, I sure have a better handle on how to do that kind of thing, than I did when I attempted that first Swerve map). Instead, I drew it on old-fashioned paper with ink - and here's how the project developed, in case you're interested. This was the first "concept sketch":

Then I figured out how much I'd actually be able to fit into the space and laid things out a bit more realistically (you know I always err on the side of "way too busy" - I'm always trying to cram too much in. Leaving things out is the hardest part!)

Then I drew it all in pencil (a couple of things got changed, but not many) and then I inked it. Here's how it looked before I coloured it in!

For this month's comic strip for my community newsletter, I wrote about some neighbours who are also my friends! Without them and the wonderful child care they were able to provide for our younger son, I don't know how we would have made it through the past two years.

Here's where you can find out more about Maria's dayhome. Highly recommended!!!

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!

Just a quick hello because I haven't written in so long. As I mentioned in the past few posts, I encountered a pretty big setback at the end of April when I bumped my head and got a concussion. I am now feeling much better - ALMOST all better, I hope - and I'm ALMOST caught up on all the work I was supposed to have done back in April (thanks to my wonderful, understanding, accommodating clients who have let me take my time). And thanks to Alberta practitioners Rob and Laurie Benn, and Joleyne Mayers-Jaekel, who were ready to jump in and work on the projects I wasn't able to do myself! That's the kind of thing that is great about having a community of practitioners. I love it!

Anyway, there is so much stuff I'd like to post up here, since, although I haven't been writing a lot, I've still been busy. We'll see how that goes. But for now, just wanted to say hi - I missed you!

Only one month late: May's comic for the Ramsay Community Newsletter, featuring more "Notes from Ramsay School."