I’m out. I’m opting out of Meta. I’m opting out of Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and whatever else I can. This is likely no surprise to anyone who has known me over the years. Facebook hasn’t been a “good” platform in a decade, honestly. Perhaps I sound a bit boomer-ish, despite my elder millennial status, but I stand by my statement. I’ve had a love/hate relationship (largely on the hate side) with the platform, and have only truly kept my account because of my professional life. I still, honestly, have to keep at least minimal contact for business via the platforms until I can get customers to follow me to another…

Decided to tackle the annual Birbfest art challenge this year. I love birds, and it seemed like a fantastic way to stretch myself a bit in drawing this year. I don’t know that I’ll draw every single bird this month – it’s my busy season at the yarn shop, and also I’m just slower in general this time of year, but so far I’ve managed 5 birds (will likely draw today’s later this afternoon). The Lady Ross’s Turaco – the big blue one – was a challenge, especially in trying to nail the vibrant color of the bird in my reference photo. The Piping Plover looked, at face value, pretty…

I don’t have any goals yet for 2025. For the last week I’ve been trying to muster up any sort of enthusiasm or energy for the new year. Maybe it’s my age and life experience, maybe it’s just that collectively 2020-2024 feels like this alternate universe we’ve somehow found our way into, maybe it’s that end of year this year means facing reality that my dream business, while still open, still isn’t generating any real profit 4 years in…. I just can’t be excited this year. I’ve sat down and tried to do my usual end-of-year recap, introspection, and planning. I’ve tried to think of what goals I’d like to…

Anxiety still hasn’t subsided from last week. I’ve moved into the phase where I’m deep cleaning the house and making things, probably from a lack of a better way to process all these feelings, emotions, and fear. This week I’ve been comfort baking and going through the kitchen and pantry and clearing out old canned foods to reclaim the jars, making note of what we have left, what I need to start restocking, etc. We’re low on one of my favorite Thanksgiving staples, the Apple Cranberry Jam from Food in Jars, so I dug out the canning pot this morning and whipped up a half batch to bring out here…

I don’t know about you, but I’m a mess of post-election feelings right now. So, I’m sorting them out as best as I can with some good old fashioned isolating and digging deep with the journaling and art creating. The social media apps were all removed from my phone – likely temporary, though I often daydream of it becoming a permanent situation – to reduce the onslaught of information, complaints, and overwhelming sadness being shoved at me from all angles. I’ve never been one to shy away from sharing my feelings and what makes me human, but right now, I’m finding that I’m feeling very vulnerable and downright unsafe in…

I woke up grumpy this morning. Why? Because the calendar says November now. Because this, ultimately, means that I now have to jump from enjoying autumn and Halloween and all the best things about this time of year and into the frenzy of bullshit that is holiday marketing, shopping, decorating, wrapping, and everything else. It was bad enough when I was just a normal person with a normal job and all I had to worry about was the idiotic ads and emails pushing me to buy, buy, buy. But now, as a retailer myself (though not a typical one, anyway), there’s the push on another front to sell, sell, sell…

Do you write morning pages? I remember reading about them in some bullet journaling communities a while back, which I then discovered were linked back to The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. The Artist’s Way is a multi-week exercise for creative types, which I’ve attempted off-and-on over the last few years. I struggled a bit with the exercises overall, but the morning pages have relatively stuck for me. Not every morning, mind you, but I’ve found they’re fantastic for those days that I try to settle in to get some work done and then struggle to focus, or think of what I even need to do, or just have too…

I spent time since my last post working on profile sketches. My side profiles have been, historically, pretty damn awful. I’m not saying that to be down and deprecating on myself – it’s just what any artist goes through. You suck at something until you practice and you stop sucking. I decided to dedicate some time to really kind of learning more on it – figuring out proportions better, trying to figure out why my faces all looked so flat, etc. And wouldn’t you know it, something just clicked and it made sense so much more. (I haven’t practiced since this, though, so I’m not sure that the breakthrough really…

This paper is definitely not meant for paint, but is handling it a lot better than I thought it would. I’m not as practiced with acrylic painting/blending/layering, but I don’t think I did too terrible overall. I’m trying something new, now that school is back in session for the kiddo, and trying to wean myself off social media in favor of things that are more productive, constructive, or creative. So this morning, instead of getting onto my laptop to check email and wind up scrolling for far too long, I spent about 2 hours total sketching out and then painting this. And then I went off to clean the living…

The other day, I made myself a cup of tea at work. I was out of coffee, feeling run down and coughing, and really needed something warm to soothe my throat. While still August and technically summer, there’s a crisp-ness in the air that always lets me know fall is on the way, and a cup of tea sounded suddenly like the most enticing thing in the world. Anyway, I tried some acrylic paint in this cheap Rae Dunn branded sketchbook I picked up on clearance at TJMaxx. I greatly dislike the Rae Dunn style/brand and find the single word style emblazoned on every damn piece insufferable, but I couldn’t…