Tuesday, 4 February 2014

29 faces Day 4

As I began my day this morning, my thoughts turned to who I should attempt to draw today, several people I admire floated in, and back out of my thoughts, and slowly, as my day progressed and I got busy, I realised I still had to draw a face. I was feeling uncomfortable about this and  I was already beginning to get anxious about the outcome of a drawing I hadn't even started!

A valuable technique I learnt on the creative spark course which I really enjoyed was blind contour drawing, it really helped "free me up". So, with this in mind, I thought I would go in the style of Picasso and his line drawings.  I really enjoyed the process, holding the pencil very loosely, I flowed with the lines and really sensed a joy within the lines, and I wonder if this is how Picasso felt when he created these simple, but energetic drawings. 





There is always more than one way to approach art and this is demonstrated in the  inspirational TED talk by Phil Hansen "embrace the shake"


Monday, 3 February 2014

29 Faces Day 3



"I'm Thirty-Six Years Old. I'm Just Getting Started"




Can you guess who she is?

Sunday, 2 February 2014

29 Faces Day 2

Today I found myself pencil sketching a musical hero of mine, Mike Scott. I first saw Mike Scott play live with his band The Waterboys in 1986 and I have been in a 28 year old love affair with him and his music since. I dreamt about him in the early hours of this morning and decided to attempt a pencil sketch of him from a photo which was taken in either '86 or '87.

I don't normally sketch faces as I feel I'm not very good at it, however, I have always "wished" that I could draw faces. Joining the 29 faces challenge seemed a good opportunity to stop "wishing" and start "doing", after all, practice makes perfect, right?

Here is the photo I used for reference:



Sunday, 19 January 2014

Clutter busting and cleansing

I've had a busy week or so back on the decluttering wagon and I even created a facebook page called The White Space Project to document my activities and encourage fellow declutterers (is that a word?) to post pictures of their clutter busting activities.  I took all of my decluttered items to my local animal sanctuary to sell in their shop:



I'm reading a lovely book at the moment called Soul Space which is about creating a home that is free of clutter, full of beauty and inspired by you. The author writes " by using your belongings as a concrete way to investigate and understand your feelings and attachments, you will expose and then begin to break down old patterns, literally "making room" for your new, more evolved self."

I had a clutter hot spot in my sitting room, built in shelves which stored some of our cd's and dvd's.  I have been storing cd's  in this unit for approx 14 years, many of the cd's I don't listen to anymore as I can listen to musically digitally through our Sonos System.  Was this space representing my more evolved self? No. It was time to pack the cd's away and put them into storage.

Here is how the space looked as a storage unit:

Post declutter:






And breathe............

I really enjoy walking into my sitting room and seeing this decluttered space, it feels very light and spacious and represents me, my move evolved self!

On the subject of evolving, I wondered if I could evolve some of my food habits, my diet isn't too bad but it does have alot of sugar and carbohydrates in it.  I participated in a 3 day sugar cleanse at the start of this week which was a freebie offered by Persephone Brown called Kicking Sugar's Sweet Ass. For the first 2 days we stayed away from :



Nothing white:: no potatoes, no grains, no flours (sweet potatoes ok) 
No beans (high starch)
No Alcohol













Persephone advised to stay off caffeine during the cleanse and to up our fluid intake (minimum of 3.2 pints water). This also included many more "bathroom stops!"

This was much harder than I anticipated, by the end of day 1 I was craving a cup of tea and a glass of white wine! I had a splitting headache, I was grumpy, tired  and I felt deprived. 
Day 2 - see day 1
Day 3 - see day 1 & 2 but without the grumpiness but extreme tiredness

Day 4 - an opportunity to "get back to normal" only I didn't! There had been a shift in my thinking, it no longer felt like something I "had to do" it now felt like something I could choose to do.

Day 5 - still sticking with it but brought caffeine back in with the odd cup of  Earl Grey tea.

Day 6 & 7 - week-end and I've had carbs and sugar and white wine (which just didn't taste the same). I tried a piece of fruit cake and that didn't taste the same either.

Day 8 - that's tomorrow and I will be back on the cleanse as I felt much better for it.

Sunday, 5 January 2014

2014 Guiding Word


I like to make New Year Resolutions and yet like so many, I'm not so great at keeping them. Instead, I have started to choose words or a mantra to set the tone for my forthcoming year. For the year 2013 I chose the words Peace, Space and Brave. Out of that combination, space really showed up for me.  It was something I was craving for on a physical level and it showed up by quite an intensive year of decluttering, which in turn created space and peace within me on an emotional/spiritual level.  The consequence of this led to me brave by being able to release/let go of some issues, situations I had been holding onto.

As I was playing with and trying on word combinations for this year, I found that space didn't want to leave me and I didn't want to leave it.  My guiding theme or mantra for 2014 is:

White Space Project



White space for me feels like a space in which to rest, to feel at ease with, it feels uncluttered and reflective. 

The White Space Project has already begun, I feel it found me in the latter stages of last year when I started to remodel my kitchen (that is another blog post!).  Today my white space started with more decluttering and I filled a bag with 10 items ready to be taken to the Charity Shop tomorrow. My intention is to be able to decluttter 10 items a day for the next 365 days.

Decluttered items ready for donation

A cluttered pen pot holder

uncluttered spacious pen pot holder

What about you? Do you keep New Years Resolutions or are you guided by a word or theme?

Saturday, 4 January 2014

4th January 2014






A late afternoon walk under a glorious sky
Clouds illuminated by a winter's sun
A picture so big, painted by nature herself 
Surrounded by your beauty, I easily lose myself
 

Friday, 3 January 2014

3rd January 2014


Holly Green
Smooth and shiny
Adorned with beads of red
Branches cross, gently touching
A silent exchange, one of you turns to look the other way
An interlude of yuletime colour 
I praise and applaud your performance during this cold January day. 




Thursday, 2 January 2014

2nd January 2014







Red berries, silent and still
Red berries, bathing in sunlight on my windowsill
Red berries, you wear a wooden heart 
Red berries, you capture my grieving heart
Red berries, you are my pause in a busy day 
Red berries, I weave you into a small stone
Red berries, you remind me I am not alone