Kel's Space

Handmade Pledge, Artist's Way, Life

I cannot believe how fast time is flying. Life is sure not as calm as I thought it would be, but as the deadlines come and go in preparation for this school inspection, my work-life balance will jiggle back to my aim of a half-day a week and occasional supply days. Over the past ten days though, I went to meet my Mum in Vienna which was wonderful, but I had to take work which was irritating, because that was not the plan! I got back late Friday and worked for the most part of Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and today. It was the sort of work I enjoy though, and I just kept putting one foot in front of the other and crossing things off the list. And now it is done, and I am so relieved. I just hope it goes well. Tomorrow is the big paperwork inspection and then the actual inspection week is in January.

Kat - I finally found those advent candle balls in Vienna! So happy!

I am in week 6 of The Artist's Way (yes, it has taken me 8 or 9 weeks to get there!). This week is all about abundance. With a beautifully serendipity-tabulous sense of timing, my in-laws transferred some money for a Christmas present. So I have been busy choosing an abundance of these:

Yay! Until now I have had the 1oz bottles and loved them. Now that they are getting low though, I find myself not painting, or being over careful. I was tempted to buy more 1oz bottles, but I remembered the lesson of abundance and accepted the gift (both from my in-laws and from the universe) and ordered 4oz bottles in a variety of good colours for mixing.

And the update on the hand-made Christmas... my lovely listening husband assures me that there is not a cable, battery or plug on any of my presents, and he is working to a theme that fits in with our values and dreams for a simpler life. I have bought two lovely presents from etsy, have 3 to make (at the moment), have arranged consumable/non-clutter presents for two other people, and am making crochet flower brooches for someone else to give as presents, not too shoddy, eh? How are you doing with yours?

Reading deprivation? Are you mad?

Too too funny. I am currently doing The Artist's Way as you may know. I quite like the morning pages, although I do miss them out occasionally and moan a LOT about doing them sometimes. Also I find that they are getting slower to do and I expected them to get faster! I miss them when I don't do them and I am prepared to get up earlier to do them, and if you know me in person, I don't get up earlier for ANYTHING.

I just finished week 3, so apparently I have recovered a sense of safety, a sense of identity and a sense of integrity. Nope, make that a sense of power. You would think that I would remember something like a sense of power, wouldn't you? It's this week that I am supposed to recover a sense of integrity. But. But. BUT! As part of that, we are supposed to experience reading deprivation for a week. I read that last night, all set to start this morning, "yeah I thought, no problem" there might be one or two little unavoidable things for work, but nothing over 5 minutes. I am such a liar! I didn't realise how much I read during the day, and I don't mean steadily working through an amazing book (I do that too of course) but randomly picking up bits of the Sunday paper, compulsively checking email, and I couldn't stay away from my blog reader, I had to catch up after being away all last week. And the postman brought an Amazon order. So. Well. Can I start tomorrow?

I do think following the Artist's Way is already having a benefit though. I am making more art this month then I usually would in a month, excluding obvious things like books in my artist book class.  I finally opened my Etsy store, which I have been whinging about doing for about 6 months! There may only be 3 things in it, but it's a start! So we shall see. I'd love to hear from anyone following The Artist's Way at the moment, or veterans. I had a look at their community, but I don't really have the mental energy for another community, ya know?

Away in the north

I am in Shetland at the moment. It is my in-laws golden anniversary, so we have come up to be with them. I am very happy that we did, because as their other children can't be here. I am scanning in their old slides and restoring them for an anniversary present. It is lovely work as I get to see old family memories and hear the stories. Slow work too though. I am looking forward to relaxing, feeling brisk air on my face, smelling the sea, shopping the picturesque high street in town. I am planning to buy nice hand-dyed Shetland wool for making crocheted flowers.

I am starting week 3 of the Artist's Way and am still enjoying it. I spent two weeks on week 2 which was all about identity; that is a big issue for me so well worth taking the extra time on. Reading the chapter for week 3 surprisingly brought tears to my eyes at one point. She was discussing how people develop detachment as a defence mechanism and it just struck a deep chord with me. I got a flash of me in hurt defensive mode and flashbacks to a younger me and it was all a bit of a revelation.

The Artist's Way

I don't know when The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron first crossed my radar. Once it did though, it kept crossing. I am a big believer in serendipity and if something keeps crossing my path makes me pay attention. The final straws that made me say "Okay, I'm listening!" were finding it in Port Townsend on my way to Artfest, and then at Artfest, a few people who listened to me explain where I am in my journey said emphatically "You need to read The Artist's Way". It took me a while to get hold of the book because of my suitcase being full (!) and then stockist problems here in the UK. I got the workbook too because I found the workbook for Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards very useful. This one not so much, because I could do it all in my morning page journal. However I will use it and go back to it to complete exercises that I didn't do the first time round.
(note from the ed. you all don't know how LONG this has taken to write, it has been open on the laptop since last night! Man, it's hard working with these flighty artist types.)