Sat in the studio in my sun warmed studio life listening to Johnny Flynn, life couldn't feel much better. This week has been sun drenched and energy drenched as the Solstice has worked its magic. I really feel a part of nature, fuelled by the heat and light and elated with it; a complete contrast to how I feel in winter. I've used that energy in the worst way possible! I have completed all my accounting! Two studio moves last year had left my finances in complete disarray but now I am back on top and very ready for some creative time.
When not at the kitchen table doing paper work, it has been a week very much about gardens as everything around me makes the most of life. The allotment is exploding, the polytunnel astounds me with its fervour, producing radishes, yellow beetroot and purple basil. My plot outside the studio is giving us lettuce and cabbage, purple podded peas and rich-red chard. Eating has become a pleasurable concoction of fresh tastes and colours. At the weekend we were invited to the Weleda gardens and took great pleasure from their healing, peaceful powers. I want to bottle these days!
The weekend ebbed and flowed between sunshine and showers, tea and cake, delightful, heart warming conversations with artists, friends and visitors. Oh, I wish there were more days like these!
On the 15th and 16th June I will be taking part in a Secret Craft Fair in Loughborough. It will be the joyful union of gardening, art and craft at the open garden of Janet Currie. She will be proudly opening her garden for the first time as part of the NGS Open Gardens and will be the only garden in Loughborough to have received that accolade. Janet and partner Pete Mosley have got used to visitors being impressed by their home and garden when they host their regular Refectory Table events. So now it's your turn to enjoy it too.
I will be selling a range of garden inspired originals, prints, new decorative tiles and cards. You can read more about the event, here, and in an interview I did with Janet Currie, here.
A Slow Spring
Love and Life
Since moving in to my studio at the bottom of the garden, some of my work has been inspired by my home surroundings and my love of growing things. Looking out on to the garden watching the chickens and the birds go about their daily rituals and routines, I am inspired to keep on with mine. It really has been a slow spring but now my garden is glorying in its greenness.
What's it all about? This life; what is it for? Where am I going on this journey?
I ask myself questions about life, and love and spirituality and creativity and the answers I find are translated in to the themes of my work. I like to take the time to think and reflect. Grandma's death reminded me that I love to write. I love to write letters, and to receive them and to have those deeper conversations on life and who we are, who each of us are as unique beings.
I recently attended a Refectory Table course called 'Telling your story'. It gave me time to think about who I am and where I am going....in a creative business development way. As with the previous course I attended there, I hadn't realised how much I'd be looking myself in the face. Pete Mosley's expertise as a creative mentor meant that I finished the day with a clear view of who I am and what makes me tick.
So what is that? My creativity is a huge part of me, and carries itself in to each and every part of my life, my home, family, garden, cooking, making. But, I like the stillness in the gaps between the business of life. I like simplicity.
I put together a basket of 'me'. In it there is my knitting, a diary, an ipod shuffle with meditation music on, a writing pad. Given a half hour to myself I get something out of here, knit or write a letter and feel put back in touch with myself, and with that peace within.
That peace within I try to carry in to my work. In the simple things I find my muse. Celebrating the shared wonder of love and light, beauty, home and family and the transience of it all.
I have no idea what happened to September!! There we were enjoying the summer holidays and suddenly we're knocking on October's door and collecting fallen leaves on the way to school. It's been a veritable whirlwind of highs and lows. Wirksworth Festival was great; great art, great people, great sales. I felt in touch with myself and loved talking to people and living my creative life. Then there was the reality check. The following weekend I had the Melbourne Festival but with a busy week in between, and a poorly child to contend with, I hit the buffers half way through the weekend and ended up in bed ill. My hero? David. He stood in for me with a smile and promoted me really well and made some good sales!
My plan was to use these events as a chance to assess what was working for me and where I want to go. As part of that plan, I attended a one day 'Creative Business Away Day' at The Refectory Table. It was really worthwhile. It has thrown lots up in the air and I am still waiting for the pieces to fall back in to place but ideas that I had had rumbling in the back of my head came to the fore and I was given some valuable methods for assessing and reassessing my business. The upshot is I don't want to do anymore than I am doing but I want to take time to focus on each area of my business and achieve my potential. So this week I've been curling up with 'Make Your Creativity Pay' and a big notebook. I'm also trying to be smart enough to use my smart phone for all my social media but I'm not sure I've got what it takes!
So, the studio build goes on and I'm clearing out my current studio and finding homes for unwanted things. I feel that I'm bubbling with ideas across all areas of my life. My youngest started school this month and I'm relishing the extra time but my to-do list is long. It's three years since I started my business and it feels like the right time to take stock and make a plan of where I am going. I'll let you know when I've had my epiphany.
I've been enjoying some 'Me' time and a bit of introspection. Life can seem a bit tangled and I've been trying to pull out the threads and re focus on goals, both personal and business. I've had my head in a couple of books that have really raised my positive energy.
'Never not a lovely moon' is an insightful visual essay by Caroline McHugh. Subtitled 'The art of being yourself' it's a celebration of all people and the uniqueness of each and everyone. Looking deeper I delved in to 'Instructions for Happiness and Success'. Running a business, a home and a family, it's become a default mechanism to always be worrying about what needs doing next and waiting for things to go wrong! I've been reprogramming this negativity and feeling so much more positive.
I've felt a bit lost with my creative goals. To address this, I've booked myself on a course with Pete Mosley and Janet Currie who run The Refectory Table. Hoping that they can help me plan out the next stage of my business and creative development. I've also been remembering the power of sleep. My self care package has seen me getting to bed early, going swimming, eating more healthily and taking a break from drinking alcohol. I feel like a new woman!
