bone

I'm not throwing you a bone - I would never throw you a bone... If you're here and you're reading this - I appreciate you way more than you'll ever know! This is a bone for me... To remind myself that this is a place I like to hang out. To show some movement, even if it's corner-of-the-eye stuff. Because I want to be here more than I am, and I promised myself to keep a candle burning. Seeing that I'm still unable - but trying! - to make it a blazing home fire... ;)

After all that hard stuff, I'm not home quite yet - never mind the blazing fire! I'm not everywhere I want to be. I'm still figuring stuff out. Finding out about what's important to me, and how to make it all fit into my life is hard, hard work. And it takes a strong stomach. I feel queasy, some days, but I'm working on it ;)

And I've been busy. That, too. I've been designing Christmas cards to sell - printed them, dropped them off, to see a few actually sell! - and I drew and painted the above, sort of commissioned! I came up with an idea, showed the initial sketch to my lovely neighbours - who wanted to buy some of my Christmas cards to send to their business clients! - and they paid me to finish it :D

I've got so much to say about - making art to sell. Much of it is philosophical, some of it is about the hard work involved, and most of it is - about me, I guess. Whether I'm ready, to go there and put myself into it and behind it all. Whether it's worth the effort. Whether I actually love it enough. If I'll ever be able to really feel proud - from my toes. But that's another blog post. If I ever find the time ;)

It's interesting to find myself here - with these questions - after promising myself my art is for exploration and for soulwork. For finding the me inside this life. Until it's for something else. I had no idea something else was around the corner when I promised myself to be mindful about it all. But then again - these Christmas cards, this commissioned piece - maybe that's it, maybe that's all. & maybe - perfectly maybe - it's all okay, whatever is next. But I need to get my head to rest around that. And that's the hard part, right now.

So here, in this moment, this is it. Corner-of-the-eye movement, like I promised myself. Just to prove I'm still around. I was here, this morning. Not for long, admittedly, but I did show up!

character

I'm going to share myself as a chair.

I knew you didn't see that one coming :D

Pikaland Make Your Mark assignment # 5, finished about a month ago.

Draw the chair you think you are, artistically. I think I made it more about me in general, but that's okay. I'm okay with that. It's fascinating either way, and I was surprised at what came up & out! 

Me as a chair: black & white as instructed for part one - brutal honesty as a personal touch.

Part 2: chair, coloured. Yes. It's quite possible you recognise this chair. Three drawings in one week, people, it was hard work! So I cut a corner. But only a little one. And one that's quite fitting, when you think of it ;)

And finally, my chair against a background without white. I love this one. It involved watercolour, photoshop, micron pen drawing, more watercolour, some gouache and coloured pencils, more photoshop, actual printing, cutting and pasting (the cushion), lettering and scanning! It was an exercise in getting out of my comfortzone, while still ending up with an illustration that's me - both in style and punchline :) 

On a different note, my wrist is still not back to what it should be. I know what's wrong with it - stress, from my head into my shoulder muscles, down into my wrist to settle there. I've had it before, but never this long or quite this severe, and it's been getting me down and optimistic, pessimistic and back up again. I've discovered that I need my wrist for pretty much everything I love to do, as well as for everything I sort of have to do, like cleaning and chopping veggies. While it really is no hardship not to be able to cook healthy family meals or chase dust bunnies for a while - it is a b**ch not to be able to fill all that lovely downtime with all the things I complain I never have time to do more of... Ouch.

I am when I write, when I draw and paint, and when I blog, read blogs + comment and spend time on Facebook being amazed, amused and touched. I am not so much when I can't. It's a lesson. A big, overwhelming one. One that leaves me kicking and screaming until I tell myself it will pass when I stop fighting it. Do I believe that, to the core? I do. I have to. Because this is what I reinvented myself to be when I started cleaning out my closets back in 2010. And I really don't think I've got the stomach to go back in! Sorry for the dramatics. Just thought I'd let you know where I am these days. While I'm there. I have absolutely no intention to stay here, much longer!

Anything you're ready to kick to the curb?! I'd love the perspective right now!

public

It's been about 5 months since I did this and promised myself I'd do more of it... And it's not like I hadn't been thinking about it. But drawing & painting outside is one of the contradictions in my life. As in - I want to, I really do! The abundance of inspiration! The practise! The freedom, too!

& then there is the Fear. The Fear of Doing It. I want to say, I really don't know what it is!, because I could comfortably hide behind that ;) But I do know. It's the idea of looking stupid. The fear of people coming over to see what I'm doing, and them walking away thinking - oh my gosh, she thinks she can draw?!

But the want and the need won, this weekend :) I bought an outdoor watercolour box out of my first earnings (YAY!!), and sat down to sketch and paint on a freezing beach and in the freezing woods on Friday! Hardly anyone there, so it was a great place to start ;)

And since it was so cool - I mean, it really felt great, not to have to wait to break out the paints till we got home - I plucked up the courage to take my stuff to Artis Zoo again yesterday, and do some more public displays of creativity there :)

Of course I'm not completely comfortable with the whole thing quite yet, nor completely happy with what came out of it - but I did it, and that's what matters :) Practise. I need practise. And who knows? I might actually get some ;) Today we're  off and out again, and my paints will travel along. To bring the stuff is always the first step, courage will & does follow, slowly but for sure :)

What's your fear? What are you facing up to? I'd love to hear!

energy

I got commissioned by my lovely & amazing acupuncturist (if you're local and tempted, contact me for her phone number :D) to design a card she could send as a birthday card to everyone on her client list this year! She left me - beyond - free, all she could give me to go with is 'yin yang' and her favourite colours, black and white :) 

This is the design she chose, and it was incidentally the one that came most from my heart. Tulips are her favourite flowers, and I didn't actually know that :) Payment? The rest of the year treatment for free!! That's a lot of money, but it feels like much more than that - the flow of energy in giving what you love to do in exchange for what you love to get :) An amazing experience!!

Day 21

Oh my gosh! Proud for persevering far outside my comfortzone! I don't do faces! Let alone large, center piece faces! You can see why ;) But this happened, and I stuck with it. And as if that's not enough, I'm publishing it, here. Sorry folks ;)

Today's gratitude is for regaining my footing after weeks of being lost, somewhere... I'm not all there, quite yet, but I'm on my way ;) I'm grateful for being able to call myself again on something without freaking out, screeching 'FAILURE!!' This was a battle going on on the inside, mostly. Outward (outside) appearance; calm and composed, for the most part.

Yesterday I caught myself thinking vicious thoughts. About other people, and myself too, eventually. The kind of stuff that really doesn't help. And it's hard to shut up that voice, but I made a start. Drawing this helped. I'm listening to Ingrid Michaelson this morning, and that helps too:

I could write my name at the age of three
and I don't need anyone to cut my meat for me
I'm a big girl now, see my big-girl-shoes
It'll take more than just a breeze to make me fall overboard...

That bit. Not the rest. Unless it's me, because I am always trying to catch myself. Hard work, that. But always rewarding, if I stand still long enough to feel grateful & thank myself ;)

Thank yourself today. For something! It really does feel good!

Day 13

This was scary! I'd wanted to try drawing outside, in a public space for ages, but I just wasn't brave enough. Yet. Today, I brought my art journal and some not much used supplies (crayons and felt tips) to Artis Zoo. I wasn't sure they were going to leave the bag I carried, but bringing them made me feel good :)

Until we got to the Butterfly Pavilion, where it's nice and tropical, and I could sit down on the floor. This is not necessarily what I wanted to draw - I would have prefered to draw an animal, but this was the spot we chose to sit, so this was the stuff that ended up in my journal :) I brought paper for Squirt too, and we sat drawing together, which was awesome! It was cool to hear people whisper that it was a great idea!

I'm totally impressed with myself :) I'll be doing more of this! I'm grateful that today I plucked up courage and drew in a public space, with unfamiliar media & a subject I wouldn't have picked naturally. I stepped outside my comfort zone in a big way, and it was amazing! I really needed something like this right now :)

nurture

Who knew nurture was such a fertile word? :)

ritualistically

ahead

That's the change-of-address card I designed, stuck to a journal page that was so out of my comfort zone, it kept me from doing anything creative for days! Until I decided it would do nicely as a background :)

'Ontpolderen' basically translates to 'depoldering'. For the purpose of the card, it means 'getting out of the polder'. Although it also means, colloquially, to stop endless debating. And to flood previously poldered land - but that's just coincidence ;) It's a fine polder, it really is; even when pretty much everyone who doesn't live here thinks otherwise. It's been a good place to live for the past 11 years. So much has happened here... Lots I've dwelt upon over the past months, and lots I'll be dealing with when we're gone and relative quiet surrounds us again.

We're going back to 'old land'. Get our feet dry. The green gables are typical of the place we're moving to. Quite coincidentally, it's the same municipality I was born in and where I spent the first 13 years of my life! It sort of, a little bit, feels like going back to my roots. I hope it'll prove to be a good choice in the end. Scary stuff. All of it!

We got the keys and signed our lives away last Monday, and we'll seriously start working on the place next week. Busy times ahead! I might pop up here in between, I'm not quite sure how everything will fall into place. I'm just sure that it will, fall into place, and that I'll come up the other side. To breathe!

scary

That is not our car. & it won't be, any time soon ;)
And this is a bad photo, plucked off the internet.
But provided all the paperwork clears, this will be our house come November! & hopefully a home soon after that!

We will finally be all grown up, mortgaged to the hilt...
Oh my... Oh my!