Where Is My Mind?

(that's the name of a pretty cool Pixies song by the way.)

If you're following my blog, you probably noticed I haven't been posting as much lately since I was spending soooo much of my time training for a triathlon. My first one has come and gone (and I had a blast) and I'm doing another one on Saturday, but by now I've sort of settled into the routine of being able to do at least one activity (swimming, biking, or running, some strength training) daily and also finding ways to squeeze in a normal life as well (working, dog walking, cooking and eating like a normal person, preparing for a move in a couple months, etc.)

But where's the art?

That seems to be the one aspect that's been difficult to fit in.

I mean, it's there. In my head. It always is! I even started a few new little paintings a month ago. (Or maybe more, I don't know, but I blogged about it.) And then this past weekend I had my first art show of the year, which reminded me how much I do like creating art and I found a lot of inspiration looking at all the other artists' wonderful work and meeting new people who seem to enjoy mine.

So I've got ideas and I like creating art-- jump in! Hop to it!

Unfortunately for about 12 hours a day, the inside of my head looks something like this:


This is..... when I'm working. When I'm walking the dog. When I'm watching TV (due to certain current living arrangements there will be less of that). When I'm driving. When I'm taking a shower. When I'm eating cereal. When I'm working. When I'm having my coffee. When I'm in the grocery store looking at all the beautiful colorful produce. When I'm working.
Did I mention when I'm working??? Staring at a computer for a lot of the day thinking about what I'd rather be doing.

I guess by the time I actually HAVE time for the art, I've been thinking about it so much it already feels like I've been doing it, so it's a little hard to get motivated.

And when I have a million+ things on my mind related to the art, sometimes it's tough to know where to begin!!!

I should lay this mental mess out in an organized list.
We all just loooove lists, don't we?? We have our list for groceries, errands we need to run, bills we need to pay. Sometimes our lists have sub-lists. And... sometimes we lose our list and aimlessly mill around WalMart like a zombie, walking soooooo sloooooowly right in the middle of the damn aisle, taking up the entire walkway, completely oblivious to those around us... We forgot we just went in for toothpaste and envelopes and end up walking out out somehow having spent $159.74.

And no toothpaste or envelopes.

WTF!

But here's how the list should look, if I did lay it all out. Somehow.
- Enter receipts into tax document
- Enter receipts and income from gallery & art show into business spreadsheet
- Contact the nice people who were interested in ordering some of my work at the art show
- Start the commission piece a friend (who I don't get to see too often) requested from me a while ago (he said there was no hurry)
- Start the commission piece a friend asked me to do for his or her spouse's upcoming birthday
- Start the piece I've been wanting to do as a gift for a friend
- Take the recycling to the drop-off center, or at least down to the garage, since it's taking up a ton of room in the office/studio
- Finish painting some of those bug boxes I was creating
- Finish painting the frames I salvaged from my mom's house
- Fill said frames
- List some of the bug boxes and little framed art on Etsy, open my store again.
- Finish my caterpillars triptych!
- Scan in my sunflowers painting
- After I figure out which bug(s) I'm going to put on it, and where- I'm thinking a lady bug and/or a grasshopper?
- Make prints of the sunflowers painting
- Go to Staples and restock on cards, I'm sold out of like half my designs
- Drop off my old computer monitor at Staples for donation
- Restock my ink and order more mats
- Order some of ProPanels' hanging hooks so I don't have to damage my panels anymore
- Frame some more of my original 30 bugs in 30 days

And of course, ideas for new art:
- Leaves with white or very pale blue backgrounds
- Hibiscus
- More butterfly drawings....

Ummm. As you can see, not only does this list require a lot of time, but also money. Which I don't have. Or maybe I do, but I don't want to spend it. I know it takes money to make money, and if I'm ever going to be successful with my art I need to take it seriously which includes occasional investments in it. Plus I shouldn't feel guilty about ordering a few things that I NEED because my family gave me $ for my birthday last year to order art-show-display-stuff and guess what? I never ordered it. But now that I'm working less, I have a lot of guilt about spending money if I don't need something, which is another reason a lot of the art stuff has slid to the back burner.

It's so hard finding a balance!