“Consider” 6×6, oil on canvas
A 5k is 3.1 miles. I like to think of my January as a 5k, and if so, we’ve just crossed mile three and can sprint to the finish. Or laboriously drag ourselves with whatever energy we have left across the line.
I’m somewhere in between.
Today’s painting is a little figure study done with a brush. I wanted to zoom out of my birds-in- the- wilderness-of-their-hair series and simplify.
And so here we are. All but done. If you’ve been doing this 31 day practice with me, I want to encourage you to do a few things. First, measure your success in as many ways as you can, and make an actual list (see the start of mine below). Two, put all your pieces from the month in one place. There’s a free app called “gandr” that allows you to easily and quickly make a collage of your images. If you’ve been writing, consider putting all your entries into the same document. Even if there’s not 31, I’d be willing to bet there’s more than enough.
My Success List (first draft):
1. Further developed a series I’ve been hooked on
2. Worked a lot with a brush which I haven’t done in quite some time
3. Bought myself new brushes when I realized the old crusty ones weren’t cutting it
4. Painted all small paintings instead of getting overwhelmed with the larger ones that were definitely beckoning me
5. Explored oil on paper– something I’ve said I would do for years now
6. Connected with others in the 31
7. Sometimes painted when I didn’t feel like it
8. Painted extra when I did feel like it so I could take breaks when I needed them
9. Took lots of breaks
10. Painted a mini canvas before one of my weddings started
11. Waited before posting some pieces that needed revision
12. Threw a couple in the trash that were making me pull my hair out
13. Wrote long blog posts
14. Wrote super short blog posts
15. Discovered new poetry
16. Listened to good advice
17. Took notes while running (really proud of this one)
18. Bought all my canvases before January started
19. Experimented with acrylic paint
Who knows, maybe be tomorrow my list will be 31 items long. In the meantime, I’d love to see your list and hear how you are measuring success.
I’ve been wanting to do the collage of my photos and see if I notice any patterns emerge but haven’t gotten around to it. I’ll look to see if gandr is available for Android.
I would love to see your collage! If you’ve got all the images on your phone, it will take less than two minutes.