Pig Heaven

Trying to draw pigs at Pigs Peace Sanctuary in Stanwood yesterday was a challenge and a joy. What a wonderful place! The sanctuary is home to 190 rescued pigs, a horse, llama, a couple of goats, lots of barn cats and a very passionate and hardworking lover of pigs named Judy Woods, director and founder of the nonprofit.

The property was a dairy farm in a former life. The setting is amazingly beautiful and pastoral - straight out of a storybook.  It is a happy place for pigs - many of which had some not-so-happy beginnings - coming from laboratories, hoarders, zoos and a myriad of inhumane situations. Many of the pigs had never touched grass before arriving at the sanctuary. Thirty of them are regular farm pigs and the rest are pot-bellied pigs.

Some pigs have a talent for modeling work and some don't. Charlotte is a natural. A real ambassador for Pigs Peace, she obliged us by taking a long contented nap in the wood chips right next to the fence where we could get a good look at her and barely moved. 

Charlotte's Nap

 I thought Charlotte was the only sketch I had to post, but today I decided to see if I could salvage some of my "partial pig" ink drawings that I abandoned when the subject changed positions. I added some color and kind of liked the results. 

Otis eats an apple

I was intrigued by some of the pigs' golden eyelashes.
Pigs have great eyelashes.

I loved this place. I hope we can help Judy and the pigs by allowing them to use images of the sketches we did there for cards or in some way to support marketing and fundraising efforts. You will definitely see some of these sketches at our upcoming exhibit at the Bayview Cash Store's farm show, "When Your Plow is a Paintbrush II" opening Friday, Sept. 5.