My second son is now an "Artist-In-Residence."

[ConsAreLiars]

I mentioned in an earlier post praising his talent that he was working the summer at a B&B in the San Juan Islands for one meal and a room in exchange for essentially doing maid and handyman service for a few hours a day.

The couple operating the Kangaroo House B&B ( http://www.kangaroohouse.com/ ) have now asked to him to stay on through the winter for free with that title through the the winter season, although their income stream ends when the B&B is closed, in order to help him do do more work into putting his on plant and herbal healing into a print form that others can share.

Here's his thumbnail/index page on Flikr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnyhayseed/

Here's the slideshow to see many more: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnyhayseed/show/

Here's his most recent addition:



And here's one I took when he introduced me to a small bird preserve on edges of this city. (I'd suggested we would go to Kuboto Gardens and brought no long lenses for bird pix, but I am glad he showed me something new.



(edit to add more since I accidentally hit post instead of preview plus a couple of the usual typos)

[Callalily]

1. Your son's pictures

are just fantastic. There's a shot of a plant that reminds me of some type of filled pasta. Obviously I'm lousy at plant identification.

What a wonderful opportunity the B&B owners have given your son. Certainly a win-win situation.

Some friends of mine are heading out to the Washington State area and I'm sending them the B&B link. Not sure what their plans are out there, but there did say they would make accommodations as they travel.

Thanks for sharing your sons slide show with us.

[ConsAreLiars]

2. Thank you.

Before he Finally left "the nest" after dropping out of HS, he showed me some of the carefully written and well organized notes about many herbs and their uses, lore, distribution, effectiveness, Latin and common names, and had asked us parents to give him for his birthday an obscure book which added still more of that info than the Audubon Society and such sources had already provided. This was a great contrast to my experience when helping him do very flexible homework in HS. There he got to choose the subject within a certain range (did good but a fail as far as anything more than passing one hurdle he had no interest in jumping), but here he chose what really showed his brilliance and dedication and all that (versus what looked a lot like ADD when working on just pointless "stuff" at that time) and really revealed his true love and talent.

I'm totally blown away and delighted by and grateful for the fact that "Jill and Charles" at the Kangaroo House B&B have given him the kind of place and space and incentive to get his incredible knowledge of herbal remedies and plants into a form that can be shared with others.

Regarding that B&B, in addition to being run by organic-artsy types, not unique in that locale, it is both the very top rated in the area (5of5 and the next get 4of5) and listed as a "Best Buy" so your friends might want to book as soon as possible.

Regarding his photography, it his his connection to his subjects that makes the difference. After moving away and when (I think) attending a 2-year program in herbal medicine he asked for a camera as a birthday gift. I found the one he is still using, and when seeing his first efforts, gave him the standard advice about some simple rules that generally help:

Don't center the subject without a good reason.
Let the background provide some context.
Never let the background distract.
Watch out for stray crap on the edges of frame.

Maybe a few more hints, but ever since then the ones he's put up of his Flikr page never get anything less than an OMG, Ooh, Ahh, in the form of a critique from me.

(edit syntax - it's always something)