UFOs

While cleaning out and preparing our room for painting (walls this time) I have come across some UFOs (un-finished objects) leaning against my wall in a pile and have lined them up committing to finishing them soon.

Fairies in the kitchen???

Working on another design for an apron...this time for a real little person...rather than just one at heart.

Homework

Then I worked some more the next week, working on loosening up more and more and just getting used to playing as the process and quelling those naughty, bad inner voices....

Then in the same morning at class I was given another exercise where I  had to paint a picture as a child would - not worrying about the outcome or what other people thought and include a number of things...and do it really quickly.......oh such a hard thing to just let go and enjoy the process and not worry what other people though and especially not listen to those wicked internal voices that said 'oh cack' etc etc ETC ETC ETC, to everything I did on the paper.

Added rough maggies at home, then in class had to change things, paint over things, move things etc (also something I have struggled with  as I tend to get too precious with things in my painting being too scared  to make any changes incase I muck things up more).

I wanted to put 2 big magpies in the foreground so mucked around in my journal trying to get out of my head what a magpie looked like.  I must say...I did watch more closely the magenpies (Gerald Durrell called them that when he was a child in 'My Family and other Animals' and the name has kind of stuck in our household!) on the side of roads etc when I was driving into town etc.

This was the homework I worked on after my yummy art class (a couple of weeks ago now cos I am so slow still with this blogging) where I had to paint a landscape with 4 mountains, 3 birds, 4 trees, 3 clouds etc, etc,etc.  Another requirement being that I wasn't to reference anything...it had to be completely out of my head! EEEEEEK- definitely something I really struggle with in my art!

It started as an learning exercise

I hadn't ever crocheted granny squares until latish last year; in fact I hadn't crocheted for so long it was like a past life thing. I had played around a little with cotton and tiny crochet hooks many long years ago and only knew this because I found a couple of unfinished doileys...but couldn't remember how or when I did them or any of the stitches etc , and then when I looked at a crochet pattern it was looking at a foreign language. I had a couple of ideas for my Etsy and decided I needed someone who could knit or crochet to either show me how, or even do it for me. I had nine colors of wool that I really liked and started to play... I made a granny square or 2 using 3 colors then I wondered how many different combinations I could make out of those 9 colors with each square having 3 colors only. I worked out that there were 84 combinations and in each of these, the 3 colors could be in 6 different positions so that added up to 504 squares. So I thought, just for fun, I would try to make them all and just plodded away here and there in little spaces of time throughout the days, weeks etc...and amazingly by Christmas time I had done all 504 of them...I have so frequently started things and not completed them so I seriously surprised myself with getting them all done!!! Now I am going to make it into a blanket...again bit by bit in small snippets of time here and there throughout the days and weeks etc and see when I can finish it.
Yesterday I took the squares over to Mum and Dad's place as they don't have children at home or pets, and I lay all 504 squares out on their lounge-room floor to work out where they should all go. Then my wonderful Mum and I put them back in their box in labeled order ready for me to systematically crochet them together.

old faves

I was searching through my old artwork and found some paintings and drawings of my bears...a safe place as I knew them so well and still do but now I am trying to spread my wings, branch out and feel safe painting/drawing ....anything...who knows what?! Oh dear the watercolor came up here way darker than in the real!!! :(