new paintings, new studio, new website!

I have recently been reading interviews from different women, and there is always a question near the end of the interview that goes:  I wish someone had told me___________________ about motherhood.  I love reading the different answers to this question, and the other day found myself thinking about what I might put in that blank.  And, are you ready for this?  I think I've decided:

I wish someone would have told me that taking care of a baby would be the easy part of motherhood.  Learning/remembering how to take care of yourself once you become a mother is the thing that takes some practice.

Deep, right?  Haha.  Well, it's true.  I have been so pleasantly surprised at how natural it feels to meet the demands of a tiny person.  I mean, yes, being a mother is hard.  But not nearly as hard as I expected.   Also, it's really awesome, which usually makes you forget that it's hard.  But remembering that I need to take care of myself?  That's hard.  And easy to forget about.  Sometimes I find myself looking down at my fingernails wondering who exactly is in charge of trimming those ragged things (it's me, by the way).

Something that makes me feel like I'm taking care of myself (besides cutting my nails on a regular basis) is making the time to paint.  And the weirdest thing has been happening!  I've found that being a mother makes me a better artist.  And that being an artist makes me a better mother.  Pretty tidy, huh?  Shoot, I love symbiosis (is that considered symbiosis?  I'll check later.).

I've been a painter without being a mom, and it seemed like I could never find a good groove.  But now that I have small (but consistent!) windows to paint, I am enormously productive.  And I've also tried mothering without making time for art.  I get awfully restless.

We recently moved my studio into Gesso's old room (oh yes, he needs to be properly put to bed each night or else he goes and drools all over my couches), and we did some wall painting and shelf hanging.  Since then, I have been painting like crazy!

I have piles of cloud paintings, and a growing pile of food paintings (which I have been calling my "snack paintings"), and they are taking over my studio.

 

I also buckled down and finally (finally!) created a website.  It's super simple, but I'm really proud of it.  I hope you hop over to take a look.  I've also put a link on my sidebar (click the cloud painting, yo!). 

I have some exciting things in the works to hopefully find new homes for all of these paintings.  I am so not a business woman.  At all.  But I am trying to be brave and figure out how to make this work.  Deep breath.

skyscapes

Last March I started painting again. 

 After experiencing my first northwest winter and not seeing much besides fog or heavy fog for way too long, I couldn't help myself when Spring came and the sun and puffy clouds came out with it.  I have sooo many pictures of the clouds from last spring!  It's really funny for me to look back on them again -- it was like I was afraid it wasn't going to last for long and I had to capture it or something.  I was obsessed and so so happy to see the sky again!  

Here is just one of the sky pictures I snapped ^^^  Can't you just feel how everything is so happy the sun is out?!

And then I ordered a bunch of square foot birch panels (Evan was super thrilled I wasn't going to make him build them for me!) and got to work.  I decided that I wanted to just practice and get comfortable with painting clouds.  So there wasn't really any pressure or anything.  And I just painted over them if I wasn't happy with how they turned out. 

And now I'm done!  haha.  I have no idea what I'm going to do with a whole pile of cloud paintings, but I'm so glad I just kept painting clouds over and over again, I learned so much!

I did six paintings at a time, and would squeeze in 30 minute painting sessions during naptime or whenever I had a spare second (for the record, it is not a good idea to paint when the baby is awake!).  

At first I really hated whenever I had to paint the land, because I just wanted to paint clouds ya know!  And then I got to be okay with it.  But I really would rather paint the sky.

This one is my personal favorite and it's for Harvey.  My mom wrote each of her kids lullaby's, and I thought I could give my babies their own paintings.  It has a really sappy love note written on the back.  I hope he keeps it forever.

Happy Spring!

wildflower waiting

During the week before Harvey was born I got SUPER DUPER grouchy.  I swear everyone was asking me ridiculous questions that I didn't have the answer to (when's that baby going to come out? or my favorite, did you have your baby yet?  said to my face).   It was getting really hard for me to be patient and field these questions all day long.  So I decided that I was going to focus on something other then my still pregnant self.  I was going to draw one wildflower a day until I gave birth.

It turned out to be a really good idea.  And it helped me be just a little less snarky.

I'd been toying with the idea of doing a desert wildflower series, and this was the push I needed to get started.

Let me introduce you to:



Vetch

Desert Stickweed

Desert Paintbrush

 Globe Mallow.

And then I had a baby :)

Not sure when I'll start up again.  I sort of have a different project in mind, and we all know I can only focus on one thing at a time...

p.s. there are only 3 things you should say to a pregnant lady

unfinished business

I have quite a long list of things to get done before January 9th.  Mostly they are quite practical and rational, ya know, nesting-putting-my-house-in-order type of things.   But replacing invasive-species Toadflax in the wildflower series was at the top of the list.  The Toadflax was one of the first wildflowers I drew and Evan tried to tell me that it was actually a weed and not a Rocky Mountain Wildflower, but I am really quite stubborn and wanted to draw it anyway (it's pretty!).  So I did. 

 Fast forward to two summers ago and everytime we would go to the mountains there would be big posters of Toadflax with a big "x" through it, telling people to KILL it if they saw it.  

oh.  

So whenever I sent off a package to Wild Hands, I quietly left that flower out of the mix.  

This is a Wallflower.  And it's a wildflower, NOT a weed.

 I have been wanting to start a new art project, but I knew I had to finish up this business first.

Check!

framed

I used my Christmas present money to get some frames for these lovely paintings we picked up in Ethiopia (we lived there for a semester while Evan completed his graduate research).  I love them so much and would find myself cringing whenever I would open my studio cabinet and witness them collecting dust on a dark shelf.  They are so beautiful and a little bit fragile (they are painted on some kind of animal skin and when bent,  it cracks the paint.  Eek!), so I am glad they have a proper place to live now.

This one is my favorite.  A rather contemplative Daniel in the Lions Den.

And Jesus washing the Apostles feet.

details of note: 

the afros on the Apostles and the large Ethiopian eyes on everyone, including the lions :)

the BIG news

No, I'm not pregnant (that's what everybody thinks these days whenever I say I have big news.  maybe I need to lay off the chocolate?).  But I am about to drop off a super heavy package at the post office full of my wildflowers.  They are headed to Wild Hands in Jackson, WY, and I couldn't be more excited! 

This past week has been a little crazy, what with trying to find the perfect paper to use (80 lb. recycled linen was the winner) and researching 'flower trivia' to go on the back of each print (because everyone should know that rubbing Larkspur seeds in your hair kills lice).  But we figured it out!  Evan is a pro at problem solving, which was good, because when I am faced with a problem, all I really feel like doing is crying.   I am so happy with how they turned out, and let's be honest, maybe my favorite part of all was finally putting my 'H' tape to good use :)

my little secret

A year ago last Spring, I put away my paints and brushes after a few very terrible paintings.  I wasn't sure if I'd ever feel like painting again.  In hindsight, I can now see that I had been putting too much pressure on myself and it was messing with my head.  And so I did other things and other projects, anything to keep myself away form those evil paints!  

Shortly after I finished the flower wall, I decided it was time to give painting another chance.

And so I carried Big Brooke up from the basement and began to paint.

Let me say this: painting is not at all like riding a bike!  I was so rusty!

I told a very small, select group of people about my little secret, my painting-again-secret.  Because I didn't want any of that pressure to create a masterpiece creeping into my brain again.   

And I think my secret idea worked!  Yes, it was both hard and frustrating to be painting again, but more than all of that, it was fun.  And dare I say it, fulfilling.  I had missed painting!  Which were the most surprising emotions of all.

And the next time I decide to pick up painting after a years absence, I must remember to start on something smaller--my poor (weak) wrists almost fell off!

p.s. listening to this helped me not be so scared.  It is incredibly insightful.

Lately, it seemed that whenever I would get a hankering for some sketchbook time, I would go look for my supplies and usually my sketchbook + pencils were buried under all my other 'works in progress' in the studio.  So I would get discouraged and grab a popsicle instead.  It was very inefficient.  

So in an effort to make sketching more accessible, I whipped up this little buddy.  Which keeps everything close by (why didn't I think to add a slot for chocolate?!), and safe from the black hole that is my desk.

I debated for way too long on whether to add a button/velcro/ribbon closure, and in the end I finally decided to keep it how it was, folder-style.  Which seems like the right decision.

Now I must get going--it's time to sketch!

Greetings from Sweatshop HollyHox

Oh hi there!  It's nice to see you.  I have been hiding out in my studio with my feet positioned directly above the air-conditioning vent (summer has arrived!  and it's hot!  and our lawn looks like a piece of burnt toast!), drawing a Lilac. 

This was a commission I picked up while visiting my family in Utah, and since we're headed back down there this weekend, I needed to be speedy about the whole project.  And so our house has been temporarily turned into a sweatshop.

p.s. I secretly LOVE production work.  I love cutting, taping, sealing...I could go on and on.  *sigh* I find it highly relaxing.

And now this tower of Lilacs is headed to a large family gathering of sorts, which makes me very glad. I  love that I get to play a little part in family memory making (even if I don't even know them!).

Okay, back to my vent (my feet are getting warm).

Wall Flowers

I started these wildflower drawings shortly after moving here last Spring.  I didn't know anyone, didn't have a job, or a puppy, a husband to hang out with all day, or really anything to do.  It was weird.  And so one windy afternoon, I drew a Lupine.  And I felt much better.

Twelve wildflowers later, and this place feels more like home every day.  I've met so many wonderful people, I have a puppy (!!!), and I've almost fully adjusted to Evan being gone to work all day (He's kind of my favorite person ever, so I like him to be around all of the time.  We are still trying to figure out a way for him to not work at all, but I'm afraid we might get hungry...)  And as I was lying in bed the other morning, still a little fuzzy in the brain, I had the most wonderful thought: these flowers are my metaphor for blooming where I'm planted.  Not that I'm claiming to have fully bloomed here (I still don't even have a cowboy hat!).

And now that this 'series' is finally complete, I am excited to put away my pencils for a while and move onto something else.  I'll let you know when I know what it is :)

Montana Poetry Slam (dunk)

Last night I went to my very first poetry slam.  It was pretty intense--so many verbs and adjectives flying around!

Montana's Poet Laureate (Henry Real Bird) was there and he wore a cowboy hat.  Which made me very glad.

And okay, as much as Evan and I love poetry, the real reason we were there was to show some support for my paintings.  You see, they had a bit of a 'coming out' party and we wanted to make sure everyone was nice to them (they were).  I had Evan take these paparazzi shots of Mr. Fork and Mrs. Spoon because I was too chicken.

Once upon a time,

there was a seed (metaphorically speaking).

It grew up and bloomed and turned into a Scarlet Gilia.

The End.