The Balance of Art and Life

I struggle with balancing art and life. I feel like I'm walking a tight rope and if either side (art or life) gets off balance everything will come tumbling down. Being a SAHM, I often get caught up with the list of daily tasks to be tackled, and believe me there are plenty of them.  On those days, I get frustrated...not being able to find a chunk of time to get something done for me. Quite often I feel guilty because I get so preoccupied with the art in my mind that I have a hard time concentrating on what I'm suppose to be doing, like helping kids with homework or making dinner. My mind is busy trying to figure out how I can sneak back into my studio to get just a little more done. In my heart, I just want to sit in my studio and forget everything around me and just work. However, being so left brained, if there are messes around the house, laundry to do, or papers piling up, I have a hard concentrating on the creating part. Things need to be in order before I can fully let myself go.

This journal page is on a background I created a while ago. I liked this circus performer image and glued down decorative papers to journal on. When I decided to journal about balance, I was quite pleased with how this background fit my topic. Is it a coincidence that things work out like that?

Inspired Again...Thank You Artful Blogging

Now that the latest issue of Arful Blogging has arrived in mailboxes all over the world, how many blogs are experiencing a higher number of posts than usual? I know mine is. With every uplifting story, every beautiful photo, every carefully selected word my heart beats faster with delight and inspiration by these lovely ladies sharing their wisdom and passion. Pam Carriker made the point that Short and Sweet gets the job done and I couldn't agree with her more. I find myself skipping over blog posts that are too long and I need to keep that in mind when I'm crafting my own. I struggle with expressing my feeling in words. I want this blog to chronicle more of what I feel and experience everyday in this life...this is my story, told by me. I want to find that quiet whisper within me and give her a voice.

My Cooking Club Gals

These wonderful ladies are my Cooking Club friends (I'm the one in the vertical stripes). We gather once a month, everyone brings a theme related menu item and we share a delicious meal together. The club turned out to be more popular than I thought it would and we all look forward to getting together to wine, dine and share stories about life and motherhood. The original idea was to technically challenge ourselves in the kitchen and try new recipes we wouldn't normally make for our families (some of us have picky eaters). However, many of my friends are not what I would call the cooking type. Their idea of cooking is to open the Trader Joe's package and serve. So the premise of expanding our culinary expertise and sharing recipes has gone by the wayside in exchange for a fun evening with great girlfriends and great food.

The photo above was our Halloween theme complete with costumes. Below we have Mini Mummy Pizzas and Creepy Cornbread. I brought the Pumpkin Cornbread and it really wasn't creepy...I hope!

There's Nothing Wrong with Cute...Right?

Many artists that I have recently discovered, create art that I would describe as "cute," "sweet" or even "fun." I love and admire their work. They blanket the pages of mixed media publications, book, and blogs, so obviously they are loved by many. Yet, when I create art that looks "cute" somehow it just seems juvenile to me. The gremlins in my head tell me that I have to paint landscapes, portraits or something serious to be an artist. I know that's not true, but have you ever tried to reason with a gremlin? I'm not going to rule out "cute" as a word that describes my style, but I do think it's too soon to tell.

The paintings above were created on 12x12 inch panels of plywood. I played with light modeling paste over decorative papers, but when the modeling paste dried, the papers looked foggy underneath. So I just played with acrylic paints, little paper, glitter, ink and charcoal. These were more of the random pieces I created for my calendar project that I scrapped.