2015 February Desktop calendars

2015 February desktop - Flowers

The Flowers desktop is a watercolour painting, calendar format was done on the iPad using Procreate.

Sad Panda - 2015 February desktop

Sad Panda is for those soggy wet February days.  Inspired by me standing at the bus stop one day after work and the bus was delayed for over an hour.   The reason given by the bus supervisor was that they lost the bus.  Seriously.

Knitting is like second nature to me.  I can almost knit in my sleep because I've been knitting for a very long time.  I've had a LOT of practice knitting.  You need to do something a lot in order to not suck at it.  I know that about my painting and drawing.  Opus has issued a challenge...28 Days of Practice challenge and I'm going to do it!

I'm so excited about this I started yesterday.  I mean, if I'm serious about this, why wait?  :)

Sunflower - watercolour and ink 5"x7"

A stapler

Jan 9 - stapler 

In everything I know about any craft form, It's always practice makes perfect.  The hardest thing for me is to put my pen on the paper and start.

I've been following the blog of France Belleville-Van Stone - Wagonized and read her book, Sketch! a few times over now. One thing that stuck with me is that you don't need a lot of time, a few minutes here and there. Blocks of time so tiny that it's not worthwhile for me to pull my knitting out of my bag.

So, instead of eating at my desk and working through lunch, I still eat at my desk but use the time to draw what's in front of me. And according to France, if I draw the same thing over and over again, that's ok. If I don't finish the drawing in the time, that's ok too.  I've drawn a lot of staplers this week. They're still not great but at least the last drawing looks like a stapler.

2015...one year, 52 weeks, 365 new possibilities.

365 new possibilities

I've never been a big fan of New Year's resolutions having broken many within the first week.  I do like looking back on the old year and reflect back and think about what I would like to do differently for the new year.  It feels like the past five years have been transition years for me. The latter part of 2014 has been more so with son finishing school and husband retiring. It feels like it's time to look at the next stage of my life.

Top 10 highlights and game changers for me:

• Husband retired in September 2014.  His job was so hard on him physically.  He went back and forth on this but it was the best thing for him and us.  

• Son finished university this December.  Convocation ceremonies will be in June 2015 but he's all done!

• Son got a job right away in his chosen field with his first application!  The interview process was tough but he got the job just right before Christmas.  He starts in January.

• Taking the Watercolour painting class. I was nervous about it but I'm glad I did it. It was a small class (3 of us) and we all became friends. Although the classes are over now, we will still get together to paint. 

• A close coworker passed away end of January 2014.  She was 46.  She was was having stomach pains but she came in on the weekend to finish up something to meet a deadline.  She pretty much left the office, drove herself to the hospital and passed away a week later.  She had pre-existing medical issues that she neglected because she didn't have time.  That was a wake-up call for me.

• Another coworker whom I've known for 27 years passed away two weeks before his 60th birthday.  He was going to retire and spend more time with his family.  

• My boss telling me that although I'm a valued member of the team, the important ones are the ones who are flight risk.  On the bright side, at least he was honest about it. I don't feel bad about planning my early retirement. People leave because it's not worth it, not because the work is hard. 

• I was told I'm pre-diabetic. It's not serious but it made me take a hard look at my habits and lifestyle.  

• My crafts and hobbies are really important to me.  I stuck to my plan to create something everyday. 

• I can draw!  After 50+ years of thinking I can't draw and one needs talent to do so, I learned that it comes with practice. I'm never going to be Michelangelo but I'm ok with that.  

Looking at a new year is like looking at a bag of raw fleece...think of the possibilities.