A Pacific Northwest scene, with the fiddler, and the shack, and the bikes. It was a lovely July afternoon, after she'd been in the lab all day and I'd been fussing with the coloring book scans. She taught me "Billy in the Low Ground."

We were at the beach after pulling in the seine net, conversing about marine conservation here and in Hawai'i. 

He was staying with us for part of a summer, years ago back when everything was different. My ex took him out for a fishing trip. 

We were at a beach seine, looking for chinook but happy to see the other fish too. Sure, she said, you can do my portrait. So I did.

He is a miller, a thinker, and a conversationalist. We have had extended discussions at times, and there are times where years will go by with no contact. He did some milling for me and we traded some of my wood in payment. I used my share to make baseboard, door, and window trim in my house. While I was there to talk about wood (and lots of other stuff too), I asked him if I could take pictures to paint from. Yes, he said. Awesome!

This cute black and white hoverfly is nosing around some maple flower buds.

It was late winter and he was teaching me how to graft apple scions. They all took! I'm going to make a few modifications on the painting and take a better photograph of it later in the week.