the native trees of Canada

Forgive me for showing up a date late in your inbox. Yesterday was nuts.

It was the 2026 Trout Parade, which is one of my favorite days of the year. I feel hungover from too much delight.

As if that wasn’t enough excitement, I also received a special delivery. Can you guess what it is?

The delivery driver called me RIGHT in the middle of Trout Parade to let me know he was 5 minutes out from my house. I needed bike home to meet him. I was so bummed to miss the rest of Trout Parade.

But… I continue to be in the universe’s good graces.

I live on a relatively busy street with two lanes of fast-moving traffic. I was stressed about how we’d get this big wooden crate off the back of a huge truck and into my garage.

At the exact moment that the driver threw on his flashers and threw down his lift gate, the Trout Parade marched through my intersection, completely cutting off car traffic.

I got to watch the beautiful Trout Parade from afar while we unloaded this crate in the middle of a peaceful street:

By the time the tail end of Trout Parade marched through the intersection, the friendly delivery driver had wheeled the crate into my garage and continued on his merry way. The whole thing took about 7 minutes. I got back on my bike and caught up with the parade.

Everything is aces.

Here are three things I loved this week:

A dozen or so people sent this to me this week, so I know I’m doing something right. (Skunk cabbage is my favorite spring ephemeral.)

I’m taking a painting class with Lindsay Stripling right now, and this week we talked about color. She showed our class some of Jeff Cheung’s work as an example of a playful and unified approach to color, form, and composition. I love his work so much, I’m so glad I learned about him.

My friend Eliza works in publishing and has sent me so many books over the years (thank you, Eliza!).

My favorite book she ever sent was Leanne Shapton’s Swimming Studies, back in 2012.

I was completely smitten with the combination of short vignettes sharing her personal history and memories of swimming, interspersed with her beautiful, abstract paintings, illustrations, and photographs of pools she’d swam in, the bathing suits she’d worn, the smells of swimming, and portraits of her swim teammates.

I recently bought Shapton’s book The Native Trees of Canada, expecting something similar, but it’s totally different–entirely visual, and gorgeous. Shapton purchased an old, dry reference guide called The Native Trees of Canada, and she reinterpreted the original book’s scientifically accurate black and white botanical line drawings into vibrant, abstract, and colorful paintings using ink and house paint:

I made this flyer on Wednesday:

Have you, though?

Other things:

• Save the date! On Thursday, July 2nd. Josh of Directangle Press and I are hosting a release party for my art book, Quilt Study. We’ll have the books for sale and on display, and some other fun things going on. We’re finalizing details now, but it’ll be in Burlington or Winooski, in the evening–stay tuned! It’ll be cute!

• I was on Vermont Edition last week, and they just shared this clip from the segment. You can listen to the full segment here.

Thanks for being here!

Christine Tyler Hill

Website: christinetylerhill.com

Email: cth@christinetylerhill.com