During February I took my time to get painting, I’ll admit. I told myself I’d get back to it as soon as January was over, but as I mentioned before, the motivation hasn’t quite followed. Nonetheless, I’m getting pretty good at sitting myself down in the chair and telling myself to work just for a little bit. I’ve heard it advised a few times — most recently in a book on making a creative living — to just spend a specified, manageable amount of time each day (say, half an hour) doing your creative thing. If, after half an hour, you want to stop, then let yourself stop, but often that initial push is enough to get “in the zone” and want to keep going even after that half hour. I’ve been doing some version of this practice for awhile now, and more often than not I do keep working past the time limit I set for myself — but when I don’t, I walk away without feeling guilty. (Now if I could just get the hang of time-blocking my whole week…)
Anyway, this is basically how I’ve gotten myself to paint the things I did in February, which were mainly (or maybe exclusively) the example paintings for the two new “PIY” kits I’ve launched.
I have been still doing a lot of drawing and sketching — some of which I’ve shared here, and some of which isn’t ready to be shared just yet. These are two of the example paintings for my landscape kit. I do have ideas for 2-3 more painting kits, though, and they continue to be one of my most successful products on Etsy.
Speaking of Etsy, I did work with my colleague (who also works at a local print shop) on developing some of my alcohol ink paintings into covers for travel journals. He brought me some proofs and they were lovely, so I stitched up a few with drawing paper, and he’s going to make some more for me with general-purpose paper inside. The drawing versions are up on Etsy now, and the others will be up soon. Here’s what they look like:
So, a little late, that’s what I was up to in February. I have some content planned for my next few posts, so you should be hearing from me more regularly through the month of March, including some wedding updates!
Fairy Tree Studios 