Howdy, ya'll!
It's a gorgeous Saturday morning here in Southeast Michigan, something we haven't seen in what feels like AGES!!!
It's so interesting what sunshine and longer days does for a soul, isn't it?
I feel SO much better now that the long winter is over (for the most part... the forcast is for Tuesday here in SE MI tobe 39 degrees for a high and 24 degrees for a low!)... YIKES!
OK, on to business... I thought I'd show you a little of the things I have been working on here lately...
First of all, I'm taking an Oprah class from Dr. Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection, here is this week's "Weekly Intention":
Here's my journal work for this week:
(I'm really struggling with not being judgemental of this... it's not something I spent a lot of time on, obviously, and now I wish I had!)
Here's my "Playlist", my interpretation of Dr. Stuart Brown's list of what constitutes "play", and then my list of what I like to do that is "play" to me:
This class has helped to remind me of how fulfilling it was for me to be making SOMETHING pretty much every day, and how much I enjoyed blogging and ending my posts with "Now, go make something!"... I failed to take my own advice and as a result, just haven't felt like myself... (as my dad would joke, "I'm not exactly sure WHO I felt like, but it wasn't me!")... so, though the demands of grad school are at times seemingly overwhelming, I have realized I NEED to carve out time for PLAY... even if I have to schedule it like an appointment... for my mental health and overall well being, it is as important as any doctor appointment or exercise, or frankly, for me, eating...
MY SOUL NEEDS PLAYTIME!!!
SO, I've been drawing:
(This is a contour drawing of the top of an armoire in my bedroom)
This is done in an Evernote journal... does anyone out there understand how this is supposed to be used? I just haven't taken the time to figure it out... I'm starting to feel old... I need a teenager to just show me once and I'll be fine!) :D
This is a drawing of some of the gorgeous pattern work chosen for the Sochi Olympics... I thought their graphics were just gorgeous and when I dove a little deeper, to learn more about the designs, I learned there were representations of different sub-cultures in Russia, each with their own unique artforms... and I think the designs were charming and beautiful and SO well done!!! I just LOVED the colors and the patterns the way they were used to "brand" the Sochi Olympics!
Do you remember how beautiful and colorful the patterns were?
(CreditChang W. Lee/The New York Times)
What I'd give for some of the swag these kids are wearing!!! Hmmm... maybe I need to peruse ebay and see if anyone is selling any of their Sochi Olympic garb! :D
A map of Russia from the official site for the clothing and Olympic swag... HOW cool is this!!!
These are some class notes from a workshop I took with Peter Thornton, someone I'd wanted to learn from for ages, and he is just a wonderful teacher with a wealth of knowledge and skill, self-deprecating and funny and very warm and human! We spent a lot of time discussing and examining the concept of CoNtRaSt in our artwork and also spent a lot of time looking at, and studying the letters of Adolf Bernd, this is a link to a Google search I did of images, it is amazing!!!
adolf bernd painted letters
Here is a beautiful example of one of Adolf Bernd's painted letters... the detail is AMAZING, all done in watercolor, the shades of which are just SO beautiful!...
I hope you've taken some time recently to fill up your creative well, and if you haven't, WHY NOT?!?
I'd LOVE to hear from you if you've had the same sort of challenges and how you've done what you needed to do to take care of yourself!
THANK YOU for stopping by and taking the time to read this post, take good care!
Now, GO MAKE SOMETHING!!!
(And be sure to have FUN!)
