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For hundreds of years, when many of Quebec’s families were rural, large and poor, sugaring off — the process of collecting sap from the trees and turning it into syrup — was a necessity, providing an inexpensive supply of sugar for the entire year.

About half a mile from the cabin stood the sugar maple grove to which this energetic provider went to tap the trees, collect the sap and finally boil the same until the “sugaring off.”

"Sugaring off," as the boiling down of the sap is called, is quite an event.

This un assuming collection of portraits, snap shots of sugaring off, cutting ice, cats, dogs and family parties quietly grows on the reader.

Some 600 people milled through the gallery, gaping at the artist and at such old favorites among her oils as The Old Oaken Bucket, Frosty Morning and Sugaring Off.