Are we there yet?

With much of the US (and the rest of the world) either “social distancing” or “sheltering in place,” all you extroverts and work-outside-your home folks must be going crazy. While my day-to-day life hasn’t changed that much (I admit I miss the library), I can certainly sympathize with the frustrations of having your schedule turned upside down, and having to fill hours of the day productively rather than stewing and worrying uselessly. Yes, of course, you can binge watch TV or movies, or read, but here are a few more simple pleasures and everyday adventures for while you’re sheltering at home:

Bake something. Blow the dust off your bread machine (do people still have those? I do!), mix up a batch of your family’s favorite cookies, or use up the over-ripe bananas in banana bread. I find baking very calming, not to mention yummy.

Take a walk in nature. Obviously, you should only do this if you can do it safely, but there really is something so uplifting about getting some fresh air and sunlight. (Plus, you probably need the exercise—see first suggestion.) 

Take an online art class. Laure Ferlita’s online watercolor classes are fun, accessible, and reasonably priced. She just launched a new one last week, Spring Wreath. (No affiliation except friendship!)

Doodle with Mo Willems, Kennedy Center Education Artist-in-Residence. Primarily aimed at kids, but still fun for adults! As he says, “You might be isolated, but you’re not alone. You are an art maker. Let’s make some art together.”

Watch and listen to the Berlin Philharmonic in their digital concert hall, free for 30 days, if you register by March 31. So soothing.

Participate in the Modern Mrs. Darcy Stay At Home Book Tour. The first event was today, but there’s one every day this week, and if you can’t join live, there will be replays available. Learn about it here.

Fill your mind with positive, encouraging, and uplifting things, like:

This post, by Dani DiPirro of Positively Present.

This interview with author Rebecca Solnit. Her book A Paradise Built in Hell, “describes how in the aftermath of natural and man-made disasters…human beings tend to respond by banding together, not tearing apart.”

No doubt this is a hard and scary time. Let’s get through it together. Share the things that are helping you in the comments below!

Our continuing travels in Maine…

After Acadia and Bar Harbor, we began a leisurely drive down the Maine coast. I had made a list of places that sounded interesting, and we decided to explore what took our fancy, deciding where to stop for the night on the fly, since we didn’t know exactly where we’d be when it was time to find a place to stay. We were between the tourist seasons of summer and “leaf peeping,” so it wasn’t too crowded. If you want to stay somewhere special or if you go during a busier time of year, it would be better to make plans ahead of time, but this worked fine for finding a place just to sleep for the night. We had a couple rooms that were just OK, but mostly every place we stayed had something nice about it, whether it was a tasty breakfast, a pretty view, or even an adorable puppy in the office.

We started with the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland. The Farnsworth focuses on American art from the 18^th century to the present, with a special focus on artists who have lived and worked in Maine. These include artists like Winslow Homer, Edward Hopper, and Georgia O’Keeffe, in addition to works by the Wyeth family: N.C. Wyeth, Andrew Wyeth, and James (“Jamie”) Wyeth.

I especially enjoyed the special exhibitions, “Andrew Wyeth: Witches Ghosts and Mischief”, and “Jamie Wyeth: Untoward Occurrences and Other Things.” 

On recommendation of some people we met at the tire repair shop—because of course we had to have a little adversity on our trip—we ate lunch at Café Miranda, an adorable little place just a few streets away from the museum. My husband had a late breakfast, but I had the “Fabulous Bowl of Meat,” which was actually…Thai lettuce wraps. And delicious.

Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens

Thus fortified, we meandered down to Boothbay to visit the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens. As I mentioned on Instagram, we may not have seen many colorful fall leaves, but we made up for that in displays of flowers. We saw gorgeous flowers everywhere, but, of course, the botanical gardens were exceptional.

The garden opened in 2007 after 16 years of planning, and is the largest botanical garden in New England. Seventeen of its 295 acres feature plants native to Maine as well as other plants suited to northern coastal conditions.

The children’s garden area was especially fun:

I enjoy Beatrix Potter’s children’s tales with their detailed and charming illustrations, but after reading a biography of her a few years ago (Linda Lear’s excellent Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature, see links below), my respect and admiration for her grew until she became one of my heroes. In honor of her birthday yesterday, I want to share with you a little of what could be called “The Tale of Beatrix Potter.”

Once upon a time...Helen Beatrix Potter was born 150 years ago on July 28, 1866 in London. She was educated at home by governesses, as was the custom for girls of her social class. She and her younger brother, Bertram, kept a number of pets in the schoolroom, including rabbits, a hedgehog, mice, and bats. She observed these pets closely, sketched them, and wrote stories about them. During family holidays in Scotland and the English Lake District, she explored freely, spending hours observing and sketching what she saw. From 1881 to 1897 she kept a journal (in a code that wasn’t cracked until 1958) where she wrote down her observations.

She loved the study of natural history: archaeology, geology, entomology, and especially mycology, the study of fungi. Scottish Naturalist Charles McIntosh encouraged her to make her fungi drawings more technically accurate, and her studies resulted in a scientific paper on how fungi spores reproduce. Fungi expert George Massee delivered that paper on her behalf at a meeting of the Linnean Society, where women couldn’t even attend the meetings, let alone read papers. (Though I’m not enamored of mushrooms myself, I always think of her when an interesting one pops up in my yard.)

Her earliest published works included greeting card designs and illustrations for the publisher Hildesheimer & Faulkner. Her work on other people’s stories made her long to publish her own, so she adapted one of her earliest stories she’d created for a picture letter sent to the son of one of her old governesses. In 1901, Beatrix published The Tale of Peter Rabbit herself after several publishers turned her down. After seeing the success of the book, in 1902, the publishing firm of Frederick Warne & Co. decided they would publish it after all, if Beatrix would redo her black and white illustrations in color. After that, she wrote two or three little books a year, until 1930 when the last one, The Tale of Little Pig Robinson, came out.

“Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what's inside you, to make your soul grow.”

 —Kurt Vonnegut

Saturday I completed my 31 Days of Sketching challenge—and I’m proud to say I didn’t miss a day! On most days I spent at least 15 minutes sketching and/or painting, and there were only a couple of days that I scraped together a few minutes and a few pencil strokes just so I could say I’d sketched. Winter Interrupted came at a good time and helped me add watercolor sketches to my sketchbook. I posted all my sketches on Flickr. (Belle of Belle, Book, and Candle took up the challenge as well, and you can see her sketches here.)

I wanted to become more comfortable sketching, and to make it more a part of my life instead of just done every now and then. I’m still not as comfortable as I’d like, and I did find that I didn’t experiment as much as I would have if I weren’t posting my sketches publicly.  Of course, I could have chosen not to post, but that felt like cheating. This tells me that I still care too much what others think. I don’t like to share my mistakes or what I think will be perceived as not very good. I will continue sketching, though probably not every day. I have several ideas for more sketchbook pages from Winter Interrupted, as well as (ahem) pages I want to complete from our New England trip a year and a half ago.

The month-long challenge seems to work well for me. It’s both finite and concrete; long enough to see progress, but short enough not to be overwhelming or boring. These challenges keep me focused when my natural tendency is to be easily distracted by new and shiny ideas or projects. So what’s next? I’m leaning towards a horsemanship challenge for the month of February. I’m off to a poor start because I did nothing horse-related yesterday—but I could still pick it up today. Do I need that concrete, I-will-do-this-every-day structure? I suspect yes. I could easily do a horsey thing every day, whether it’s play with Tank, finally watch the horsemanship DVDs gathering dust in my bedroom, or delve into the books, articles and internet research on horse topics that I seldom seem to have time to get into. There is tack to clean, or ground work exercises to try, and, of course, February is a lovely month for riding. I’d love to see my riding and horsemanship skills take a big leap forward.

Friday I returned from Laure Ferlita’s artist’s beach holiday, Winter Interrupted. Along with a suitcase full of dirty laundry and sand in my shoes, I came home with new friends, new sketches and great memories. Eight of us spent four days sharpening our sketching-on-location skills at various places in the St. Petersburg, FL, area. Each day we had a new destination: John’s Pass, Clearwater Marine Aquarium, the beach itself, and Sunken Gardens. Laure offered instruction and demos, then turned us loose to sketch. Most of us had never met in person, but had taken online classes together and/or connected through our private class blog. It didn’t take us long to bond, and we ended up spending a good deal of our free time together, too.

Some general observations on this adventure:

Sharing benefits everyone. One of my favorite things was when we shared our sketchbooks after each session. Each person’s take was different—even when two people sketched the same thing, the results were different—the hand of the artist in action. One day we also shared all the items in our sketching kits—so much fun to see each person’s favorite pencil/pen/sketchbook/palette, and we all jotted down tools we want to get our hands on.

“Bad sketching days” happen. I had one when I felt overwhelmed and just “off.” I didn’t like any of my sketches, but I made myself sketch anyway. The next day was better, and I can always go back and sketch from photos if I want a better representation of what we saw that day.

I love sketching palm trees! I added them to several pages, even when they weren’t part of the lesson.

Palm tree practice--my favorite is the one in the middle

Sketching in ink can be fun. My mechanical pencil ran out of lead at Sunken Gardens and I was forced to sketch with a pen—something Laure encourages but I hadn’t yet tried this trip. I’m not confident in my drawing skills and the pencil served as a security blanket. And you know what? I had the most fun sketching that day, and that page is my favorite page from the trip. (I can hear Laure laughing from across town.)

Art instruction is great, but being inspired by fellow artists is even better. Each woman on the trip had something besides her art to bring to the group. I came away energized and eager to make my life even better than it already is. Getaways like this help us to pay more attention to our own wants and needs, and to open up to new people in a way we wouldn’t during our normal, everyday interactions with others. (Thank you Laure, Cheryl, Claire, Clare, Patti, Susan and Terry!)

I’m still working on my pages—and will be for a while—so I can draw out the pleasure of the experience. I’m grateful to have had the chance to escape my everyday routine and add some art adventure to my life!

When was your last getaway? Are you planning one soon?

As I mentioned in “Hello Sketchbook, My Old Friend,” I’ve been taking Laure Ferlita’s An Imaginary Visit to a Past Vacation class. Not for the first time, I noticed I’m learning more in art class than simply how to sketch—I’m learning lessons that easily expand beyond the art studio. As in art, so in life:

Preparation makes everything easier… Laure encouraged us to do thumbnails (quick sketches in a junk journal to figure out placement of images and lettering).  Before starting a sketch, I made sure I had my palette, full waterbrushes, paper towels and tissues, my color chart, my reference photos, and a scrap piece of watercolor paper if I needed a quick color check. Once I started, I didn’t want to have to stop to hunt something down. This is also a good way to approach new projects and experiences: figure out what resources you need to have before you get started so that you can proceed smoothly.

…but sooner or later, I have to start. I sometimes let myself get stuck in preparation mode, forever putting off action. Facing a blank page in my sketchbook feels remarkably like facing decisions or starting major projects. Once that first mark hits the page—or I take that first action—I usually relax and can continue without too much fuss and bother.

I’m often my harshest critic. I was pretty happy with my sketches in this class, but in previous classes, I have been frankly embarrassed to share my work. I could see only the flaws in it, how it wasn’t what I wanted it to be, and how (I felt) it wasn’t as good as everyone else’s. My fellow classmates always found something good to say, and ways to encourage me not to give up. When I comment on my classmates’ art, I always look for something specific that I like about it, and I can always find it. I should be so generous with myself! I have a feeling my art isn’t the only area where I’m much harder on myself than is necessary.

As always, I had a great time in Laure’s class, and was able to take away more than just the beginnings of a new sketchbook. I still have one more assignment to complete, so excuse me while I get ready, get started, and ease up on myself. 

*with apologies to Simon and Garfunkel

I’m signed up to take another one of Laure Ferlita’s classes and looking forward to breaking in a new sketchbook! I just completed filling the pages of a sketchbook for the first time—though, truthfully, a few of the pages aren’t done. I can’t decide whether to go back and finish them, or just leave them as is. Whatever I decide, I’m not waiting to start a new sketchbook. I’ve got this one, and I’m playing with a color chart to get to know the paper. I think I’ll use photos from our New England anniversary trip for the class.

Everyday adventure, here I come.

Have you had any adventures lately?

With Monday’s post in mind, here’s a quote on art that can be applied to life, too (just replace the word “art” with the word “life”):

“Sometimes, there is no such thing as a tutorial for the art we see. There is investigation. There is practice. There is appreciation. There is study. There is emulation. There is more study. There is more practice. There is searching for what's inside us. And if we are lucky, there is art. There is no easy tutorial for a process that blends all of that which could take the course of several years.

“There is no true short cut to art.”

—Jenny Doh, Crescendoh.com

So many times our lives feel like they’ve been reduced to a to-do list we’re forever trying to finish. We tear through our weeks, striving to find a balance between doing and being, giving to others and taking care of ourselves. Even a happy life can be reduced to a black-and-white list of things accomplished. What if we think of life in a different way? What if we think about our days as blank canvases, waiting for us to paint them? What if we turn our lives into an art form, picturing each of our activities as a color?

Most of us spend a good deal of time working for the benefit of others, or to support ourselves financially. Even if we don’t especially enjoy our jobs, there is beauty in them, in the benefits they bring to us and others. We can think of them as the base color of our canvases, and picture those hours painted a favorite color. Our free time gives us a chance to add accent colors to our base color.

Just as each artist has her own vision for her art, each person will have her own vision for her life’s canvas: some people will want theirs primarily filled with one color, and others will want a canvas splashed with multiple colors. Some will gleefully spatter their canvases with bright tones, while others will choose a more muted, serene palette.  I like variety, so I’m happiest when my paintings have multiple colors. My ideal canvas would have plenty of purple and blue, the colors I associate with reading and writing. I’d also have strokes of red for physical activity, green for working for my family, even some yellow for doing nothing. (I’m not sure how a literal painting like this would look, but my imaginary painting looks great!)

At the end of each day, when we look at our finished canvases, what do we notice? Is our free time primarily filled with things we value? Have we let too much work take over? Or too much mindless entertainment? What about self-care, or acts of kindness? Do they appear? What does a week of canvases look like? A month? A year?

We are the artists of our own lives—why don’t we paint some masterpieces? (For more parallels between art and life, see “Artful Living: Applying the Five Es”.)

If your day was a painting, what colors would you fill your canvas with, and what would they represent?

Lately I’ve been living with someone who has nothing good to say about me, who takes every opportunity to put me down and tell me I’m not good enough. In fact, she’s kind of a witch.

She’s my inner critic.

When I put pen to paper, she’s right there with “helpful” comments about how boring and bland my words are, and her most cutting criticism is that I have nothing to say. This criticism becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and suddenly I don’t have anything to say. No words come. I sit staring at my blank page, bereft of ideas, frustrated that my writing time is slipping away with nothing to show for itself.

My inner critic has nothing constructive to say. She (my inner critic is a she) only tries to shut me down. Nothing I do is ever good enough, and I am not even close to being “good enough.” If she has good intentions, she’s going about it all wrong.

You don’t have to be a writer, artist or “creative” person to suffer from an inner critic. You may have one who trashes your appearance, athletic ability, intelligence, childrearing, housekeeping, or level of hospitality. When an area of life is important to you, you may find you have a small—or large—inner voice criticizing you. Your inner critic may try to keep you from doing what you want, or it may lash out when you’ve been human and made an error.

Frankly, I’m tired of my inner critic’s B.S. I don’t need any inner voices tearing me down. If she has nothing helpful to say, she can just shut up. I don’t let real people talk to me like that—why do I let her get away with it? Here are four things I’m doing to shut up my inner critic:

I hope you don’t have such a vicious voice living inside your head, but if you do, try one or more of the above techniques to silence her. You don’t have to put up with that!

Do you have an inner critic? How do you silence him or her?

I recently completed Laure Ferlita’s online art class, An Imaginary Trip to Greece, an experience that qualifies as both a simple pleasure and an everyday adventure. One of the main focuses of her classes is learning how to quickly capture a scene on location where conditions can change quickly, you can be interrupted, etc. One tool Laure stresses in class is the “five Es”—concepts that help us figure out what we want to sketch and how we can make each sketch uniquely our own. The Five Es are: Evaluate, Eliminate, Edit, Exaggerate, and Embellish. Always on the lookout for principles that could be useful in living a happier, more artful life, it occurs to me that the five Es could be quite usefull:

Evaluate. Just as an artist evaluates his or her subject to find its most pleasing aspect or determine what is sketchable in the time available, you can evaluate your life to see how it's running. What feels good and bad, how you’re measuring up to your standards, how you’re progressing toward your goals. Taking stock of the who, what, when, where and why of life. In stopping to evaluate, you bring awareness to your life instead of drifting (or charging) around mindlessly.

Eliminate. On location, once you’ve chosen your subject, you want to eliminate anything that doesn’t significantly add to the sketch. You simply won’t have time to get every detail down on paper, so choose your details wisely. In the same way, life is short! After you evaluate it, you might decide you have some things to get rid of. Maybe literally, like that closet of items you want to donate to charity or a stack of old magazines and catalogs you’ll never get around to reading. Maybe it’s a chore or other commitment that has outlived its usefulness. It might even be a person who drags you down every time you’re together. What can you get rid of to make your life better?

Edit. In sketching and life, once you’ve decided what you want to focus on and what you want to eliminate, what’s left? Maybe you don’t want to eliminate something all together, but you can pare it down or simplify it.

Exaggerate. In class, Laure advises students to “use your creative license to exaggerate the elements to make it a great piece of art.” In sketching, that might mean darkening the values, or adjusting the direction of the light hitting your subject to make a more interesting composition. To translate this into life, choose to focus on, encourage and support the positive.

Embelish. The fun part! In art, this is where you add your own style to your sketch. In life, this is where you find ways to make it more beautiful—buy the fresh flowers, eat the chocolate, go see that movie, play, concert or sporting event that interests you. Life should be more than a list of chores and responsibilities.

Just as Laure’s five Es make sketching on location easier and more fun by giving me a framework to help me choose a subject and execute a sketch, using the five Es as a framework for living helps me feel like an artist in my own life. (And thank you to Laure for introducing me to these principles in art and in life!)

Do you have any principles that help you lead a happier, more artful life?