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?

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I don't believe it's been 10 days!

I am so sorry. I can see in the stats that you have been loyally checking. And I appreciate it, I honestly do. I've been in a bad place, really frustrated at work (especially given that I am supposed to have stepped away from it, it is on my mind alot and in the knot in my stomach just too often and I am too close to tears too often), stalled in The Artist's Way, and frustrated by the clutter and mess. Those of you that know me in real life know that when I am down I burrow into my den and lick my wounds. It is really only in my 30s that I learned that your friends are desperate to help you out in these times, and they have, I am so grateful to those that are angry on my behalf and have given me stern talkings to and made me laugh as appropriate. I've been in the reading deprivation week of The Artist's Way for two weeks now (the first week did not go well!) and so I haven't been able to consult all my wise gurus in the creative blogging community. I have learned so much from you over the past months and I am so grateful for your existence in the real and the cyber world. Friends, and time, and morning pages have all played their part and I am feeling brighter. So here is something to make you smile, isn't this just the cutest face? Or do you not see it? I wonder, it's so hard to imagine how differently we each might view the world.

Oh and my Moo cards came and I love love love them, I did a kind of rainbow theme with the photos I used and I am so pleased. (Is it weird that I used 50 photos so I have two of each, because I don't think I can part with them all at first?) Also I ordered the Basic Grey Figgy Pudding card kit, just to get the mojo flowing in a Christmasly direction, and they are so pretty, if not at all my original work.  See it is so much better when the postmen aren't on strike!

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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?

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