Maria Montreuil: wife, mother, illustrator

According to her mother, Maria Montreuil has been “drawing from the time she could pick up a pencil,” and from there, her passion for art has steadily grown.

Montreuil was born and raised near St. Paul, Minnesota. She graduated from Woodbury High School in 2006 and married her husband, Drew, on July 2, 2011.

Many will be familiar with Drew, who has lived in Groton most of his life and is the area’s renowned founder and owner of flxweather.com, known for its honest, accurate, accessible, no-hype local weather forecasts for the Finger Lakes area since 2006. But not as many know all that Maria has accomplished in her life.

The oldest of eight children, Maria said she grew up not doing much besides drawing and dreaming of someday becoming an illustrator.

“I was that student always doodling in the margins of my papers in high school,” Maria said. “Almost all my electives were art classes, and I always liked drawing animals — either real or cartoon-like.”

Throughout high school, Maria said she would pore over websites about how to become an illustrator and even took a few animation classes at a local community college.

“I had looked into animation colleges, but I had tendonitis, so was afraid I wouldn’t be able to do it,” Maria said. “Instead, I worked at a grocery store and was a swimming instructor at the YMCA. I taught myself how to do that from library books, took an assessment test and passed it.”

A pivotal point in both their lives was when Maria was a senior in high school and Drew was a junior. Both were involved in a website forum, Narniaweb.com, and quickly became online friends.

Over the next three years, their friendship grew and deepened, but they had never met one another in person.

“We did speak on the phone a few times, but we messaged a lot on Yahoo Messenger back then and had very deep conversations,” Maria said. “We finally met in August 2009 when Drew came to Minnesota to visit.”

Although it was not Drew’s premeditated plan when he embarked on his journey to visit Maria, he ended up proposing to her 48 hours after his arrival. She said, “Yes!”

“We were both pretty surprised by it, but our parents were not!” Maria said. “That Black Friday, I bought us both webcams for Christmas so we could finally see each other when we talked.”

Almost two years later, they were married in Minnesota and Drew brought his bride back to Groton.

Maria started out working at the M&T Bank in Ithaca as a teller for about a year, but then their first son, Peter, was born in December 2012, so she became a stay-at-home mom. Joey followed in September 2014, then Todd in October 2017 and Nicholas in May 2020.

In the midst of having and raising the four boys and caring for a dog and two cats, Maria began making goat’s milk soaps and lotions.

“It started out as something I did for Christmas gifts and for our own use because it’s better for sensitive skin,” Maria said. “But then we decided to make a business out of it.”

In 2015, they applied for the Village of Groton Microenterprise Assistance Program grant and received it. They purchased two goats to have their own supply of milk.

For the next seven years, Maria was an entrepreneur of “Ye Olde Goat Cart,” with help from Drew. By the end of that time, they had built the herd to eight goats and added chickens and two more dogs to the mix.

At that point, they realized that the business was not really profitable — financially or timewise — particularly since Maria had also begun homeschooling their children in early 2021 because the pandemic made online learning very challenging for them.

Throughout all of her other interests and responsibilities, Maria never stopped drawing.

“At one point, a friend of mine, Mitchell T. Jacobs, commissioned me to illustrate the cover of his book, ‘Black Wolf,’ and then I did at least three more for him,” Maria said.

Maria had also been drawing pet portraits for people and some pieces of art for Three Huskies Brewing in Canandaigua, New York, yet she also managed to continue to work on her own art pieces — all while operating Ye Olde Goat Cart and everything else.

“I began to feel very emotional because I was so busy,” Maria said. “And pulled in the direction of my dream of illustrating.”

While perusing Facebook, Maria came across a free week of classes with Storyteller Academy, so she signed up and took them. She learned so much about character design that she signed up for another month.

Along with her online classes, Maria had also become involved with some business groups on Facebook, which led to the culmination of her dream.

“I got connected with an author in Louisiana, Catherine Self, who had written a children’s book about sloths and Christmas, and she had lost her illustrator,” Maria said. “So, she commissioned me to do it.”

Maria even inspired the title of the book, “A Very Sloth Christmas,” because she had emailed some illustrations to Self with those very words as a subject line in her email, which Self loved and adopted as the title immediately.

Now, if you look for the book, you won’t see “Maria Montreuil” as the illustrator because she has a pen name, “Heather Foxwood.”

As it happens, Drew has been writing a middle-school-aged fantasy novel for the past seven years, which he plans to publish, and when he does, he will go by the name “Todd Foxwood” to distinguish his novel writing from his weatherman persona.

“I wanted us to have the same last name in the publishing world,” Maria explained. “So, I made one up too.”

Going forward, Maria is working on sketches to illustrate Drew’s book and taking more classes on illustrating to perfect her craft. Her next dream is to illustrate a book for Waxwing Books.

“I thank Catherine for giving me the confidence that I could actually do this,” Maria said. “I want my kids to know you don’t have to stop learning when you’re out of school. You’re never too old to learn, and if you don’t think you have the skills to do what your dream is, there is so much available on the internet — you can learn it!”

Groton on the Inside appears every week in Tompkins Weekly. Submit story ideas to editorial@VizellaMedia.com or text or call Linda at (607) 227-4922.

In brief:

Sons of the American Legion pizza party

The Sons of the American Legion Squadron 800 invites its members to the first annual Member Appreciation Pizza Party from 7 to 9 p.m. Friday, Dec. 9 at the Groton American Legion Post 800 on Main Street.

The purpose of the party is to meet other members, get updated member information and have fun. Members and one guest are invited. Pizza and wings will be served, along with one free drink for each member and their guest.

Library needs knitters

The Groton Public Library has a need that might appeal to some. Its director, Sara Knobel, is looking for volunteers who knit and crochet hats, scarves or mittens for the library to give away to Groton community members.

Knobel will gladly receive these items already made, or you may volunteer to make them with yarn from the library. All sizes are needed, infant through adult.

Call (607) 898-5055 or email director@grotonpubliclibrary.org for more information or to volunteer to knit.

Town parking restrictions

Just a reminder that the parking of vehicles is prohibited on all town highway rights-of-way within the town of Groton between the hours of 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. from Nov. 1 to May 1 of each year. Violators will be subject to a fine, and vehicles may be towed at owner’s expense.