Art Gallery’s Christmas Arts and Crafts Market offers cool gifts

Let the Art Gallery’s Christmas Arts and Crafts Market help you this Christmas shopping season. 

Last Christmas there was one person on my gift-buying list who was a particular challenge. I wanted something fun but without a hefty price tag, to be honest. I was doing errands one afternoon when the Christmas Market sign at the Art Gallery/Visitor Info Centre building caught my eye. I made a quick detour and came out a few minutes later with a huge smile on my face.

I found the most funky handmade magnet that included local driftwood. The recipient was absolutely thrilled and I was pleased to give a gift that was so genuinely well received.

The Christmas Market is now open Monday through Saturday from 10am to 5:00pm until Christmas Eve. Enjoy late shopping until 9:00pm on Saturday, November 28 as part of the Downtown Starlight Shopping evening.
They’re located at 1235 Shoppers Row, in the Tyee Plaza, right beside the spiffy new Spirit Square. Call 250-287-2261 or visit online at www.crartgallery.ca.

When you shop at the Gallery‛s Christmas Arts & Crafts Market  you get a classy handcrafted gift that reflects
our local arts and culture community. You support not only your local artisans but Art Gallery programs too. You can’t beat that for value!

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Capture life through local lens

The course I took as part of my journalism program laid the groundwork for my interest in photography.  Armed with an ancient Pentax K 1000 that  was supplied by the school and which weighed almost as much as my knapsack, I launched myself into a different world. I learned about shutter speed, depth of field (something I’d still have trouble explaining to somebody!) as well as how to develop black and white pictures. During that school year I spent a lot of time with a much more experienced photographer. That summer he gave me my own camera, an Olympus OM 10. It was used but I didn’t care. We went to Central Park, Stanley Park, Gastown, Chinatown, Granville Island, anywhere in the Lower Mainland, to take pictures. Throughout the years that followed I used my camera to capture Christmas and Easter celebrations, other family events, and the outdoors, particularly flowers and plants.

Fast forward to March 2008. I was preparing for a trip to Denver, Colorado, for a journal writing conference. Not only was this a chance to be surrounded by fellow journal-writers, I’d also have the chance to meet people I’d known on-line  for more than a decade through an email writing group. It promised to be a reunion with friends I’d never met face to face. I was determined to capture as much as I could with my camera.

Until I decided to travel to the US, I’d resisted digital cameras. They seemed too fancy for me. I felt comfortable with my friend the Olympus. But after using a friend’s Canon, I changed my tune. It was simple to operate and I loved the immediacy of the picture. So I took the plunge. I bought  myself a digital camera that I promptly named Hortense. By the time I left on my adventure, I knew more or less what I was doing. I had an amazing time and I have the pictures to look back on with a smile.

But you don’t have to travel far to capture your life. What you photograph is a snapshot (!) of what is important to you, what you value in your life.  My regular photography hangouts won’t surprise you if you’re a regular reader:

* Discovery Pier, especially when the water brings seaweed and kelp close enough to zoom in on;

* Cedar School. I love the colors of the playground equipment and the arrangment of the giant tires;

* The Pier Street Farmer’s Market. From the produce to the people to the entertainment and the dogs, there’s a profusion of pictures waiting.

* Discovery Passage. Our local waterway’s personality is always changing and omnipresent.

Grabbing your camera is also a way to capture local history. Love it or hate it, the construction of Spirit Square has already changed the look of Campbell River. Same with Wal-Mart. Ever since work began in Tyee Plaza, I regularly carry Hortense with me when I’m going downtown and seize that day’s action.

I still might not “get” depth of field but at this point, I’m not sure it matters.

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Kids can capture Campbell River with summer photo project

Are you ready to run screaming from your backyard if you hear “I’m bored, there’s nothing to do” one more time? If you’re in desperate need of a way to keep the kids occupied, think about photography. Give ‘em a disposable camera or the family digital (if you’re feeling brave or if they know how to use it better than you do)  and let ‘em loose. There’s still enough summer left to make this a worthwhile and fun endeavor.

Choose an ongoing project such as the construction of the Spirit Square and let them track its progress. Images captured week by week as it begins to take shape will give your kids a unique keepsake. I’ve taken some pictures since construction started and although I don’t take my camera on a field trip every day, even the occasional ones I do get are already capturing a moment in our community’s history.  

Make sure your kids keep an eye out for machinery. Even better, go on the weekend when you don’t have to worry about trucks arriving and leaving the work site.

Here are some ideas where your kids can get some cool pictures:

* Dick Murphy Park at Tyee Spit (where’s there a keen playground)

* Centennial Park on Alder Street (home of the outdoor pool, a perennial favorite at this time of year)

* Beaver Lodge Lands

* Kingfisher Trail across from Haig-Brown House on the Gold River Highway, aka Highway 19A

* The ERT Road. If you wait for another week or so, you can incorporate blackberry picking with picture taking

* Nunn’s Creek Park

* And don’t forget what’s photo-worthy close to home. What about the dogs or cats who live on your street? Does someone have a trampoline that’s a gathering spot for local kids? A family veggie garden is an ever changing place right now too. Speaking from personal experience, zucchini not quite ready to be picked one day are ready to attack the next. Same with tomatoes.

Once the pictures are printed, look for ways to display them that won’t cost a lot. Scrap books will give lots of room if they want to add decorations to the pages. Encourage them to write about each picture but don’t make it too much like school or it will be their turn to run screaming from the yard.

Your kids will be the only ones who head back to school with a photo essay to show “what I did this summer”.

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