I grew up on a tiny island off the mainland of Virginia’s Eastern Shore- part of the Delmarva Peninsula. Heather Deitch and I went through grammar school together. I have fond memories of sleepovers at her house where her mother would always make us delicious blondie brownies called Caramel Cuts. We spent the day sitting outside talking, walking along the dock, her teaching me short songs on the piano and painting with watercolors on her sun porch. Her younger brother would be running around the house.

Now her little brother is all grown up with a family of his own. Christopher and his wife, Ursula, commissioned me to paint his two little girls with their dog. I used watercolors, a nod to my memories with his family.