Abandoned Projects Project*

 Does every creative person have a pile of projects that were started but never finished tucked away in some unseen corner (or many corners)? Maybe it’s just a sign of a mind that’s always churning with ideas or with enthusiasm for the next new thing. Or maybe it’s undiagnosed ADHD, I don’t know. All I know for sure is that I recently decided I wanted to tackle the monumental task of cleaning and organizing my art and craft supplies and in doing so I came across several projects of that sort of my own. 

There’s a simultaneous feeling of both excited discovery and disappointment in myself whenever this happens. It’s one part “oh wow, I forgot about this one, can’t wait to get back to it!” and one part “damn, it’s been 3 years, Stephanie, where is your ability to see things through?” I think, overall, it’s better for my mental health to entertain the former sentiment and let go of the latter.

Regardless, I made a decision that I was going to make good on all my former starts and give them finishes. As an added bonus, doing so would give me content for both this blog and my Instagram account, which is something I’m giving in to lately and trying to view as just another creative endeavor.

I started by making a list of everything begun but not yet finished. I needed to decide whether I was going to include everything or if I would fully abandon some things that I knew didn’t really interest me anymore. I also needed to decide what constitutes “abandoned.” Does it have to have been actually started to be counted as abandoned? Or could the project have only lived in my head as an intention? What about things that aren’t really project projects, but would probably be more accurately regarded as tasks? Frankly, the answer to all of those questions was, “Include it all.” The more the merrier. 

So, what have I done so far? I stitched up a little hole that was in the side of my dog’s candy corn chew toy. That thing had been sitting on my shelf for a couple of years, I think, waiting for me to get around to it. And now, when seen next to the other two candy corn chew toys that came in the same package, one of them is noticeably cleaner and fluffier, from lack of dog mouth. So, that’s nice.

I also finished crocheting a scarf that I had started years ago and could barely remember beginning. Now, do I have a need for a scarf, living as I do, in the desert? Do I have a need for a scarf that is stitched completely in half double crochet, using chunky yarn that gives the scarf little to no drape, in unmatching color blocks that have no rhyme or reason to them? No, I do not. Will I most likely donate that scarf in the near future, all the while kidding myself that anyone would actually want it? Yes. But, I finished it, didn’t I?

In addition to those projects, I finished knitting a dishcloth (which will actually be used and I like it), made a tiny embroidered cherries bottlecap magnet (lives on the fridge where I can frequently admire it), and I finally finished mending a pair of fingerless gloves that I first knitted for my oldest 13 years ago (did a terrible job, but those will be sent off to Colorado to their original owner very soon).

Oh, and I keep forgetting this one, and I don't know why, but I also cut up an old tablecloth (that was originally a hand-me-down and went through an iteration as a curtain) and turned it into some cloth napkins. This one had me pulling out my sewing machine, which I hadn't touched since 2020, so that was nice.

All in all, this abandoned projects project has been really great for me. It feels like one small area of my life that I can grab the reins on and have some control over. It feels like a clearing out of both physical and mental clutter and that feels really good. 

Anyway, 6 projects down and however many to go!

*we are ignoring the fact that I haven't posted a blog post since January

Hello Neglected Blog!

 I think it's traditional to say how long it's been since you last posted whenever there's a long period between posts. It's been more than a year. I would apologize, but why?

I want to focus this entry on my art goals for the year and how things are going with that so far (one month in). But first, just to touch base with the last post I made, I am still in college at ASU (Online). I'm currently taking a Spanish class and a Creative Writing (non-fiction, sadly) class. I am on track to graduate at the end of this year, as long as the classes I need/want are available when I need them to be. So that's that.

For better or for worse I've kind of attached my art goals to Instagram posting. See, I've slacked off on posting to Instagram regularly every since I started back at school. Partly because school was keeping me busy but also because when it came to Instagram, I just wasn't feeling it. It felt like a losing game in too many ways. But I'm not entirely ready to give up on it, so I decided to try to rebuild things. But this time I want to make sure that my account firmly establishes itself as an art account, not just an embroidery art account. There's so much else I want to explore. I knew I couldn't keep up with posting consistently unless I planned things out in advance, so I decided to map out my posting schedule a month in advance. 

And in order to have art to post about, I made a modest goal of one hoop art piece, one block print, and one illustration (digital or otherwise) per month. I've also decided to document my efforts to create a daily or semi-daily sketchbook habit by making sure to fill in one page or spread per week (a bit each day or so) and then post the result. And I want to invest a little bit more in stickers this year because I love stickers, because I only have three available, and because they're an easy, inexpensive way to purchase art. And, lastly, I want to blog here more regularly (potentially putting it on Substack as well for email subscribing purposes).

So, how's it going so far? Pretty good! Here's my first hoop, which went up in my shop earlier this month.

I made this hoop because I wanted to play around with wavy, swirly lines. I made a hoop a while back in pink and yellow that I really loved. It, too, had lots of lovely swirly lines. I called it Pink Lemonade and put it in my shop, but there came a time when I was feeling discouraged and disheartened by the whole idea of having an online shop to sell my art in. I wrote this about it last year:

"I also struggled with whether or not to re-open my shop. In the end, I decided that I like selling pieces to people who appreciate them. That's a good feeling! So, I re-opened it, but with a few changes. One, I did not re-activate every piece. I started thinking about some of them and realized that I want to keep them. There are a few of my embroidery pieces that I love so much I don't know if I'm every going to feel okay with letting them go. So, onto my walls they will go and maybe someday I'll make new pieces that are similar that I am willing to part with."

The Pink Lemonade piece was one that I decided to keep. And I have since realized that it might not be so much that there are pieces that I love too much to let go of (although that can definitely be a factor for some), but that I had not been giving myself enough of an opportunity to just sit with my own art and appreciate it. I would make it and list it and stick it in a drawer to keep it safe until it sold. Sometimes I just want to admire my own work, you know? So, some of those things that I pulled from the shop might eventually come back, but actually the Pink Lemonade piece I am keeping. I just really wanted to explore some of the same things that had made me love it so much and I think I really did that with this new piece, even adding some new elements and explorations. For instance, I love, love, love the two-tone fabric background. The colors on this piece are so pleasing to me. Here's Pink Lemonade, by the way.

As for block-printing, I am still very much in the learning phase. I carved up some pink stuff and printed a few pages and overall it was not really that successful except in that I learned from my mistakes. I hope.

My illustration for January is this guy:

Overall I'm pleased with him, but I do think there are things I would do differently if I drew him over again. 

As for the sketchbook venture, it's going great! I've managed to draw almost every single day in January and have filled up four pages (two spreads). The drawings are by no means perfect, but that's not really the point. The point is to create a more regular habit of drawing and it's working, so I am pleased. 

As for the stickers, I did order some. I only bought a few because I don't have a ton of money to invest in this. The plan is to just get sample size orders every month or two to build up some inventory. I opted for this design, but as of this writing, they have not yet arrived.

And that's about it! I'm hoping to write here a couple of times per month instead of just once, but my Spanish class this session is kicking my butt. I did not anticipate the sheer amount of time it was going to take to get all the work done. I will be glad when it's done, but also, I have to take two more Spanish classes before I graduate. 

HaikuCat in 2024

You know those personality tests that will ask you a question and you're supposed to tick a circle that says "agree" or "strongly agree" or "strongly disagree" or whatever and like half of the questions are about how you make decisions? In terms of "do you think things through and use logic" or "do you tend to go on gut feeling"? 25 different ways to ask basically that. I always thought that I tended toward the logic/think things through side. It's only really in the last year or so that I've realized that's not true. I make virtually all of my major decisions based on feeling. (Turns out I was mistaking overthinking for careful planning and well-thought out decisions. Apparently those are not the same thing.)

This is how I ended up making the decision in the summer of 2023 to go back to school (online, via ASU) and finish getting my bachelor's degree. It's not that the idea had never occurred to me before then, but up to that point, whenever I thought about it, it was this back-and-forth, should-I-or-shouldn't-I, endless pros and cons list and I'd never get anywhere. But when things lined up just so and it felt right, I took the necessary steps and got things moving. One week I had no real thought of going back to school, and the next week I was enrolled for Fall, transfer credits pending.

One of the things that really nudged my gut feeling into action was that I was feeling super burnt out with HaikuCat. I felt like I wasn't getting the hang of building a small business, even with my very modest goals. I felt resentful of the way Instagram seemed to be pulling me to share my art in a very particular way that didn't necessarily line up what I felt was my own artistic flow. 

So, I put my shop on vacation mode and focused on my classwork, posting to IG only a handful of times, finishing only one embroidery hoop art piece, and not really much else, art-wise. It's just what I needed to do and without really thinking about it in the forefront of my mind, I guess my thoughts about HaikuCat have been percolating around in there, under the surface. Toward the end of the year, they bubbled up, as a feeling. And I tentatively knew what I wanted to do.

Mostly? Not a lot different. I am still working on that degree so that's my main focus, as it should be. And I am still homeschooling my two youngest, so in terms of priority that is at the top as well. But I am once again feeling the pull to make art and to share that art, so that's what I'm going to do, as much as I can with the time that I have. 

It is such a hard thing to allow the making of art to exist as its own separate thing, in and of itself, driven from what comes out of my mind, and not influenced by the sharing part. The looking at the metrics part. The need to increase the numbers (followers, likes, engagement, etc.) part. Being away (mostly) from Instagram has, I think, helped me to get to a place where I can approach it a little more mindfully and authentically. And if it turns out that the negative social media feelings start creeping back in, I feel like it will be fine to step back again and regain my footing. Instagram and this blog are the only places I share my artwork for the time being, and I don't have any plans to change that. It's enough.

As for what I want to do, creatively speaking, it's really the same as it ever was; I'm just hoping to get better at it. Draw more and improve my skills. Embroidery art, when I feel the pull to do that, preferably by challenging myself and pushing my own boundaries. And writing. I have some writing goals I want to make happen this year and I'll talk about them more at a later date. And dabble. Sewing? Yes. Knitting and crochet? Yes. Painting? Alcohol ink markers? Paint pens? Printmaking? Yes, yes, yes, yes. There's so much out there and so much I'd like to try.

I also struggled with whether or not to re-open my shop. In the end, I decided that I like selling pieces to people who appreciate them. That's a good feeling! So, I re-opened it, but with a few changes. One, I did not re-activate every piece. I started thinking about some of them and realized that I want to keep them. There are a few of my embroidery pieces that I love so much I don't know if I'm every going to feel okay with letting them go. So, onto my walls they will go and maybe someday I'll make new pieces that are similar that I am willing to part with. Two, I removed all of my patterns. I have always been ambivalent about making them, so I decided to not have them available. I'm not totally sure what I'll do with them in the future, but for now, they can wait in the wings. 

I've simplified everything having to do with HaikuCat, and for now, it's just this blog and my IG account as the forward-facing parts of my art practice. And my Etsy shop, into which I hope to add a few things every so often, as I finish them up. We'll see how things go.

Anyway, here's a photo of a doodle-style picture I finished up recently. It felt so good to just let loose and let the markers flow as they wanted to. There's nothing pre-determined here. Just making marks.

 

Making the Best of a Failure

 Here we are nearing the end of May with everything warming up and my morning walks becoming more challenging because I can’t seem to get motivated enough to get out early enough to beat the heat. It is rapidly approaching the time of year in which I hibernate for months on end, reveling in the invention of air conditioning. So, how has my May gone, creatively speaking?

Let’s see. Illustration-wise I had a plan to create four full mermaid illustrations using a #mermay prompt list in Instagram and following the same plan I used for the iPad illustration I made and shared in last month’s blog entry. I would start it on a Sunday, work on it bit by bit through the week and hopefully finish it up within the week. And it worked! Well, it worked for two weeks and then I kind of dropped the ball. But, I do think it’s still a good way to approach creating a routine where where illustration/drawing practice is concerned. The combination of the scheduling detailed above and a challenge with a prompt from Instagram can, I think, really help to make my drawing practice more habitual and even though I’ve dropped the ball for the last two weeks, there’s no reason it can’t be picked right back up again. Here are the illustrations I came up with.

I’m really proud of this one. I began with the same basic idea as the sketch that I made last year that eventually became a sequined, stumpwork mermaid embroidery hoop art piece (see below), with the idea that this one might eventually become a model for another one of those. We’ll have to see about that, but the illustration itself, I really like. There are so many things I have yet to learn. I want to work more on shading and perspective and anatomy. But, oh how I love drawing swirly mermaid hair and I love the colors here.

This one, too, I’m very pleased with. I tried to create an actual scene, with motion and interaction between the characters—something that tells a story. I hope I did a decent job. I also went for thicker, darker linework, which I think gives it a more simplistic feel. And I think I’m getting better at drawing hands, so that’s nice.

Also, I had a new sticker made, which I haven’t done in quite a long time. I very much want to expand my sticker offerings, so I am making a commitment to set aside some money from each sale I get to invest in that as I come up with new designs. This one is made from my Airhead design (I showed you the hoop in last month’s blog entry and it has since sold).

And in embroidery news, for much of May I was working on my woven picot sunflower piece. This was/is a re-do of an older piece that sold (see below). I always wanted to give it another go, but with a second row of petals.

It had been a sufficiently long enough time that I forgot how tedious making woven picot flower petals was. But I have to say, my woven picot skills improved a lot over the first hoop.

You might look at that and wonder why it has no hoop. Well, here’s the thing. I had this totally brilliant idea that I was going to put some words on this piece, but the words would be hidden underneath the petals. So good! So brilliant! So, off to the internet I went in search of quotes about sunflowers. And I found the perfect quote: “If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.” It was attributed to Francis Hodgson Burnett and said to be in The Secret Garden. Not specifically about sunflowers, but it fit so perfectly! The message I was writing was hidden under the petals! It was secret! You had to look the right way to see it! 

The only problem was—that quote is not from the book, it’s from the movie. Could I have still used it? Eh. Maybe. I didn’t really want to stitch a quote from a forgettable 1993 movie I had never seen, to be honest. And I had already begun the stitching and written the words where they needed to be using a Frixion erasable pen. I could have pulled the stitches and erased the pen marks and found a new quote, yes. However, I have made a decision to *only* ever use Frixion heat-erasable pens when I will be fully covering the marks with stitching. These pens absolutely erase with the application of heat (I use a hair dryer), but they aren’t reliable in keeping the marks invisible. I have some pieces in which the marks came back after a while and I simply didn’t want to risk it.

So I made the decision to cut the sunflower out. I have tentative plans for this cut-out sunflower. It might be that I simply create another hoop with the same or different background fabric and transplant it to its new home. Or maybe I’ll make it a little bit extra. I haven’t fully decided. We shall see.

I’m glad to be taking the disappointment and failure that came from relying on the internet for a quote like a doofus and hopefully I will be able to turn that failure into something even better.

If you made it this far, as always, thanks for coming along and here is the newest coupon code for my 10% off in my Etsy shop: IFYOULOOKTHERIGHTWAY

April

 I’m just going to get this blog entry for April in at the very last moment. But that’s fine; I’ve written a blog post every month for three months straight and that’s something.

I saw something recently—a comic? An Instagram reel? I can’t remember—saying that the best part of being an artist is having an existential crisis every single day. I feel that. Wake up. Create some art. Question everything. Repeat.

Okay, creative update. What have I been making? I finished the two Zenheads hoops I talked about in my last blog, and I sold one of them. I also, on a whim, made a 4 inch botanical hoop that matches a couple of others already in my shop in different colors.

In adding these three hoops to my shop, I’ve created a few more “sets.” Some of them are the same design but in different colors (the botanical leaf design hoops and my roller skate Let’s Roll hoops) and some of them are different designs, but a similar theme (I have these three—now two—Zenheads hoops and I also have three Alice In Wonderland themed hoops.) I like the idea of themes and sets and I have always liked the idea of revisiting older designs and remaking them, either the same way, or with a variation. 

I started working on two new hoops this month: one is a revisiting of an older hoop (see?)—a sunflower stitched with woven picot petals to make it 3 dimensional—and the other is an abstract hoop stitched in pinks and yellows.

I am very much enjoying the pink and yellow one. I had prepped it a while back, but I couldn’t decide what to do with it. The colors reminded me of pink lemonade and so at one point I had the idea to attempt a thread painted glass of pink lemonade. That was a pretty daunting idea, so I thought I had settled on just making it a bunch of flowers, all in pinks and yellows, but that isn’t what I found myself doing. Instead I picked up some pink tapestry wool and couched it with yellow embroidery floss in a pleasing, swooshy, wavy line and I was off! I found that I had some variegated cotton perle thread in the perfect colors and I added that and so far this whole hoop has just felt like play and fun and messing around. And that’s, like, the perfect feeling to have when creating art. 

It’s not always achievable though. The sunflower is feeling a bit more tedious. Each petal is very repetitive and a little boring, especially after having done more than a few. Still, I like the piece a lot and I’ve already made one very like it, so I know where it’s going and familiarity is a good thing too.

As for non-embroidery art, I started a Draw This in Your Style challenge (original artist: rachel_winkle) on a Sunday and finished it up yesterday (Thursday). I really like how it turned out and I think I need to incorporate more dtiys challenges into my art routine. I’ve done them before, but even though I tend to save a lot of them to do later, I never seem to get around to it.

So, I can look at this and see many different areas where my skill does not quite meet the place where I want to be. But, at the same time, I also feel very pleased with it. I think what a dtiys challenge offers that’s most valuable is a place to start. So often I open up the iPad and create a blank page and then I’m just sitting there looking at it without any idea of what to do. And sometimes I’ll just start drawing for the sake of drawing, but inevitably, the same old things start flowing out of my head. But to begin from something that someone else has created means starting from an unfamiliar place, which can really jumpstart things and create new patterns in the brain. My version has the essence of the original, but in the end, it doesn’t really look the same at all. I’ll post this along with the original to Instagram sometime in the next week if you want to see a side-by-side, but you can search up the original artist and scroll back a bit in her feed to see hers if you want. 

And speaking of Instagram, I have realized that I very much need to change my relationship with it. I posted every day for 30 days straight and almost every one of those posts was a reel, but I hit a wall and got to a point where I just couldn’t do it anymore. It’s not the first time I’ve had a long streak like that and it’s also not the first time I’ve hit a wall after a certain point and just been unable to continue. So, I really need to pull it back a little and come up with a schedule that feels good, as well as to really ask myself what kind of posts I want to share. Because if I can’t do well with the kind of content I actually want to create, then there is really no point to Instagram at all and I’d do better to put my time and energy into some other way of sharing my art.

Anyway, that’s about it for this month, I think. I have a hoop to wrap up and package and send off to its new home (the rainbow cloudburst pictured in my last entry) and stitches to stitch and art that wants to be made. If you made it this far, thank you! The new coupon code (which is good from the publication of this blog entry until I put up the next one) is: STRAWBERRYLEMONADE

March-ish Update

 March is more than half over and I haven’t updated this blog. Oh well. To keep things positive I will remind myself that I am at least getting to it before March is completely over.

Before I get to what I consider the most important bit, I’m just going to write a bit about what I’ve been doing creatively for the past month or so. I embarked upon a 100 Days Challenge in which I intended to draw a face/portrait every day until I reach 100 faces drawn. There is an official 100 Days Challenge and it happens every year. I began mine on the proper day, but… I don’t want to say I fizzled out, because I do intend to pick it back up, but let’s just say that I have drawn a total of 9 faces and the challenge is currently on day… 26? I think? I never publicized it anywhere because it wasn’t something that I wanted to stress me out if I didn’t have anything I felt comfortable showing off or if I did exactly as I did and dropped the ball a bit. The thing about a dropped ball, though, is that you can pick it right back up. I can keep going until I get to 100 faces drawn and it doesn’t matter if I do it in 100 consecutive days. The point of the exercise, for me, is to improve at drawing faces/portraits and I actually think I am? Maybe? I’ll share some of them once I’ve gotten more under my belt. One thing I continually do not do, though, despite telling myself over and over to do it, is use a reference photo. I don’t know why. I guess it’s mostly laziness and not wanting to deal with that first step of actually finding a reference. So, I still want to add that to the mix.

In stitching news, I finished up another cloudburst hoop, which I was very pleased with. I absolutely love creating floofy, puffy, 3-d textured clouds, so these cloudburst hoops have become a dedicated section in my shop. I will definitely be making more and exploring new ways to make them.

I sketched up two designs to add to my “mindless” hoop/pattern that I wrote about last time. One features a woman’s head kind of opening up as if on hinges, revealing a planet and a shooting star inside, with the text “space case” written above her head. The other one will be called “airhead” and I’ll show you that when I’ve gotten more of it completed. This series of three will be called “Zenheads.”

And the last bit of stitching I have been working on leads right into my most important update. I had been working on (and I finished) this design:

The above is a photo of the second time I stitched this design and it is a bit of an improvement as I tweaked a few things. And I like it, but here is the thing. I created this design and this hoop as a part of my goal of creating 12 patterns this year. And, as it turns out, I had to have a heart-to-heart with myself about making patterns. 

Look, I have expressed a lot of ambivalence about making patterns from the very start. But I have pushed through it and continued on, telling myself that the problem was simply that I didn’t have enough experience with it and that’s why I was feeling a kind of drag and weight when I tried to make them. I figured once I streamlined the process enough—once I had my format down and could simply plug in the correct words or photos, I’d be fine. Well, it turns out that wasn’t the case. 

I was in the middle of writing this Stitch by Stitch pattern and had made some good progress when, a few mornings ago, I woke up with a migraine that laid me out for much of the day. With nothing much else to do, my mind began to circle around some of the things it likes to circle around, a big one being my creativity and my business (and by the way, can I just say how deeply uncomfortable it makes me feel to say “my business”? I feel like such a damn fraud, especially since, as it stands, my “business” doesn’t even really pay for itself). And I felt like I was hitting a wall every time I came up against the pattern question. 

I just don’t think I want to make them. 

I want to focus on making finished pieces, selling them, and improving my art in embroidery and non-embroidery ways. I will acknowledge that there is a small voice that pops up in my head that says, “Maybe you will want to make them later! Don’t rule it out!” (That voice is immediately followed by the voice of my mother saying, “Don’t be so wishy-washy, Stephanie!” I miss my mom so much, but she does live rent free in my head, so there’s that.)

For now, I’ve decided to back away from the pattern making. For the Stitch by Stitch pattern, I plan on offering it on my Ko-fi as a free (pay what you want, but 0 is okay) pattern, with only the transfer design and no instructions. There are a few tricky parts, but I have video of almost all of it that I could link to. And who’s to say that my way of approaching the stitching of each element is the only possible way? (You know, I think this is a huge part of the problem I have with writing patterns in the first place—I feel weird telling people how to do things.) For the series of what I’m calling Zenheads—since one of them already has a pattern, it will feel odd to not make patterns for the following two, but I haven’t really decided whether to make those patterns for purchase or just do as I will do for the Stitch by Stitch pattern and offer them for free. I’ll have to think about that. 

As for the patterns I already have, they will continue to remain available in my shop. I have tweaked the prices of those up and down over the time that I’ve had them, never really figuring out what was best. I’m lowering them all to $5 (4 for the simple one) and they will each have to reach a yearly threshold of sales to stay in the shop (haven’t decided on that number yet).

And in the meantime I am going to focus on the things that I truly want to focus on. At least until I feel like I need to have another heart-to-heart with myself. I do find that my creative journey requires near constant recalibrating when it comes to figuring out my own path, which is kind of a bummer, but I guess that’s just how it is.

Again, if you made it this far, thanks for reading! And if you’d like 10% off in my shop, my new code is: ZENHEADS49

February-ish Update

 Hello! Welcome to what I hope will become a semi-monthly update post!

First, just to get it out of the way, this semi-monthly update post is what I am doing instead of creating an email list. Which is a thing I really intended to do, but somehow wasn’t really feeling enthusiastic about. The bottom line is, my two main purposes for making an email list were to have a semi-regular update/newsletter-ish bit of writing and to have a semi-regular, ever-changing coupon code for my shop. Turns out, I can do both of those things with a blog and I have a blog and so here we are. I’m not taking the email list off the table for the future, though. I may feel differently at some point.

So on to the update bit! We’re a week and a few days into the second month of this new year, so I guess I’ll start by talking about my goals for this year. I try to keep them pretty loose. I am still learning things about myself when it comes to creativity and workflow and one of the things I’ve discovered is that hard and fast deadlines and me are a no go. (Hence why I am saying “semi-regular” about my future blog posts!)

So, I have long wanted to increase the number of embroidery patterns I have on offer. I wrote a bit about this last time I blogged here and I expressed frustration with how to approach pattern-writing. I really want to hit the right balance between too much information and not enough. I’m still working on it, but I do think I’m learning a lot about this process. My goal for the year is to create 12 embroidery patterns. That’s one per month, but I don’t want to push myself to release them in a one per month timeline. If I can end up with 12 more designs in my shop (making a total of 15 + 1 seasonal design) by the end of 2023, I’ll be very happy.

So, to that end, I’ve been working on this design.

This is an update to a hoop I made a couple of years ago (in the top left of the photo below), which I had always liked, but I didn’t like the satin stitch on the face. Some of the areas were too large to do satin stitch without ending up with some of the stitches looking wonky, so I wanted to try it again using long and short stitch. I also wanted to try it without the black outlines, which is something I’ve been trying to experiment with. Outlines are great, but sometimes it feels like I’m using them as a crutch and I’d rather use them as a style choice. So learning to not rely on them feels important.

Of course, as soon as I was done with the green and purple hatted cutie, I wanted to try out some variations and I made a second version, using tapestry wool for her hat and mittens to really up the faux knit look, and I tried a different skin tone and hair color. And, in doing so, it occurred to me that trying things out in different ways is something that I find really appealing! I incorporated the variations into the pattern (which, at the time of this writing is 95% finished), and I feel like I will probably lean into this tendency moving forward as well.

I’ve also created a pattern for a previous design (pictured below) and it’s a very simple one (in terms of stitching), but I’ve always loved this hoop, so it will be cool to have others stitch it if anyone so desires. 

And then I’m working on an embroidery-themed pattern as well. Once I’m finished writing that one, I’ll have three more patterns in the shop, doubling my current number, and I’ll be on track with my goal assuming I get all three done by the end of March.

As for actual hoops embroidered, there’s the previous two Cocoa Girls (that’s the name of the pattern: Cocoa Girl), one private commissioned hoop, and this cloudburst hoop. My goal in this area is to create between 6 and 24 original finished hoops this year for my shop (giving myself a wide range here-from one hoop every two months to 2 per month--as long as I land somewhere in that range, I'll be satisfied). I definitely want to continue to create embroidery art that doesn't have an associated pattern that goes along with it, because I love creating one of a kind pieces too.

My other goal is to make more room in my schedule for the other creative things I want to pursue: drawing, painting, digital art, and writing. I very much want to improve my drawing skills and I’m not going to be able to do that unless I devote some time to to it. I feel like I am forever making this a goal and forever falling short, but… there’s nothing to do but keep trying. So far, I’m finding it pretty hard to do. I have done such a great job of establishing a daily habit where embroidery is concerned and I don’t know why it is so hard to so the same with these other things. That said, I have filled one sketchbook spread and part of another. I’ve messed around with ink and colored pencils. I colored in a previous embroidery design on the iPad. And I wrote a few words, a couple of times. 

One of my potential tricks for trying to develop a habit for more regular drawing/painting/digital art and writing was to try making one day of the week be a Drawing Priority or Writing Priority day. Meaning, I had to open the sketchbook or pull out the paints or set the timer and free-write before I could do anything else creative that day (meaning: embroidery). It did work, for a bit, but I kind of let it go after a few weeks of it. I still think that plan has potential and I might try again.

Well, if you’ve made it this far, I thank you for reading my ramblings about my creative life. I’m placing the coupon code for my shop (10% off anything) below and it will be good until the next time I make a post like this, when I’ll make a new one. Oh, one other thing. One of the other reasons I wanted to have the email list that I am now aborting was that I wanted to give subscribers a head's up about shop updates. Just a day or two in advance to know that things were available, before I would announce it on Instagram. I've since realized that's just another layer of complexity in an already stressful process. I'm forever worrying about how and when I put my stuff in the shop and whether I should do it in groups or one at a time or blah blah blah. So, that part is going to have to go, but just know that, as of the imminent posting of this blog entry, I am on the verge of listing the previously spoken of patterns, the two Cocoa Girl hoops and the cloudburst hoop. 

Coupon Code for 10% off, from now until I next post here:

HOTCHOCOLATEZEN

Thoughts About Creative Enthusiasm

 I was going to get a HaikuCat email list started, but when I went on the website to get it done everything seemed way more complicated than it should be and I don’t really want that on my plate today. Maybe one day I’ll get around to it.

I wanted to talk about a couple of different things, but it centers around creative burnout and feeling obligated, which seems to be what I keep coming back here to write about. I’ll start at the beginning though, and the beginning is really the middle and it’s a middle that seems to happen to me over and over and over again. I was feeling burnt out and depressed and full of doubt about my creativity, about my micro business, about my social media presence, about all of it. And I say it happens over and over because it really seems like I just keep getting to a point where I have to have some sort of reckoning with myself to be able to go on at all. Will this pattern just continue on forever, for the rest of my life? Because it’s exhausting.

Basically, despite knowing that I don’t do very well with a sense of self-imposed obligation in my work, I had been swinging more toward buckling down and focusing on what I thought I should do in order to get my Etsy shop to really take off. My theory has been that if I want to have any chance of having a sustainable business, I’m going to need to create a bigger library of embroidery patterns. One of the main problems I’ve had in the past with making patterns has been being unable to work under self-imposed pressure. But what I wanted to do was create a pattern a month, to see if I could do it. I just knew that I would be setting myself up for failure if I did it the way I had in the past, where I would design, stitch, write the pattern and then release it right as I finished. I knew that having to crank them out once a month was going to create problems and resistance within myself.

So I came up with a plan. I would spend 3 months getting myself 3 months ahead of the game. If I knew I had a backlog of three patterns ready to go, I thought, it would relieve some of the pressure and I would be able to keep designing, stitching, and writing patterns at a variable pace, as long as I was keeping myself somewhat ahead. Sometimes the pattern-writing could be quicker, sometimes slower, and in the times when I was not working on patterns, I could work on finished pieces to sell, things that could maybe be more experimental or complex in their design.

What I found, instead, was that I was still putting off working on patterns. September rolled around and I had one finished design, with two versions stitched. I had not begun writing the pattern and I found myself continually putting it off. Worse than that, every time I came to my creative work, I had to work past this blah, down, sludge of a feeling, which I seemed to have even about non-pattern related work.

Around this time I listened to an episode of a podcast called, “Creative Pep Talk” by Andy J. Pizza. The title of the episode is, “3 Things to do When Nothing is Moving Quick Enough in Your Creative Journey.” One of the things he talked about was not taking on projects that you are not 100% enthusiastic about. Or, rather, not taking on projects because you think you should.  It was a bit of an eye-opener for me. Or, really, reminding me of something I already knew.

I had to ask myself whether I was making patterns because I wanted to or because I thought I should. 

The truth is that the answer is ambiguous for me right now. For sure, there is a certain sense of foot-dragging that happens every time I go to make one. That’s as true for the one I just finished as it was for the first three I wrote. And I think that there are two elements at play here. One: I haven’t really sold a lot of them. I have to believe that if I was selling them consistently and getting some positive feedback from people who enjoyed using them, that I would probably find a lot more enjoyment in creating them. There’s no way to know without it happening though, so my plan to create a larger library of patterns in my shop was a way to try to get to that point.

But the second element had to do with a feeling I was getting when I was writing the patterns. A kind of irritation and annoyance. Well, let me put it this way. When I purchase embroidery patterns I get annoyed with what I feel is excessive hand-holding. This is not to say that I don’t love the patterns that I have bought—it’s just that the part that I find to be most valuable is the design itself. But every pattern boasts of being multiple pages of detailed instructions and photos and to me it always feels like I have to wade through a whole lot of extraneous stuff to get to part I want and the part that I need: the design to transfer, the colors they used, and the stitches they used. My problem was that I wasn’t writing my patterns in the efficient way that I would want patterns to be written for me.

Or, at least, that is a part of the problem that I can definitely identify. So, for my latest pattern I decided to just do it my way. I included the transfer patterns (right at the beginning, because they are the most important part of any pattern), stitch notes instead of a stitching guide (basically a list of the stitches and colors I used), a list of places where one can find tons of tutorials about how to do individual stitches or just get started and learn the basics, and a few close-up photos for reference. Creating the pattern in this way lifted a huge amount of the stress I was carrying off of my shoulders. 

One of the other things I feel about patterns is that they are more interesting when they are a stepping off point. I’d much prefer someone take my design and apply their own sense of creativity to it than to feel like they had to follow a set of instructions and then possibly feel bad if it doesn’t come out looking perfect. Want to try a different color here? A different stitch there? Add or subtract an entire element? Go for it! Have fun!

I do wonder whether my understanding of what people want from an embroidery pattern is fundamentally flawed. Maybe no one wants what I’ve just described. The thing is there’s no way of knowing without just putting it out there and seeing. So that’s what I’ve done. To be completely honest, I don’t know if writing patterns is my thing. But if it’s going to have any chance of being something I’m 100% enthusiastic about, it’s probably going to be patterns written in this way. And, no matter how much I think I should write and release a pattern a month, that’s just not going to happen. I just need to accept that I don’t really work well that way.

Back to creative enthusiasm. I have a long, long list of ideas for things to stitch on my Keep Notes app on my phone. Once I finished up with the pattern, I went to my list and chose the thing that excited me the most and I got started creating a sketch for it. I’ve advanced to the stitching stage and whether or not it ever becomes a streamlined pattern, I can definitely say that I am 100% on board for it.

If you have read this far, I would like to say thank you. I’d like to give you a little coupon, because that is what I was planning on doing with the email list that I don’t have the energy to figure out right now. This will be good for one month and it can be used on anything in my shop for 10% off. 

BLOGGYTHANKYOU

Musings

 I'm writing a blog post because it's been more than 2 months since I have and because I told myself I would write one this month and it's literally the last day for me to do so and I always have liked putting things off until the last minute. But, I have no plan for this and I'm not going to overthink it, so buckle up.

I'm not really sure where to begin this post because I feel like I need to play catch up and write about what kind of artistic pursuits I've been up to since the last time I blogged, but that gets a bit muddled in my head and, really, that's not what I am finding myself drawn toward writing about anyway. I've done plenty, art-wise, in the almost 3 months since I last posted, but what I feel pulled to write has more to do with my feelings surrounding art, so I think that's what I'm going to stick with.

Two posts ago I wrote about how certain feelings can get in the way of my creating. Things like rebelling against my own self-imposed schedules or challenges, or feeling uncomfortable putting myself in the public eye. The thing is none of those things have gone away. There's a constant tug-of-war in my brain, a constant swirl of thoughts that I have to try to untangle just to get to the point where I am creating consistently.

So many things have the potential to create unwanted pressure that then derails something else. This blog was feeling a bit too much like an obligation. I set my standards too high concerning frequency, concerning what I wanted to put in the blog itself, and concerning whether enough people were looking at it for it to feel worthwhile. Some of these standards were not even standards I thought about with top-level consciousness. But the end result was I didn't feel at all excited to do it so I let it go.

And then there's Instagram. I'd say social media as a whole, but I honestly don't have the bandwidth for anything more than Instagram, so I'm talking about just that. It is so easy to fall into this hole of looking at accounts from people who want to "help" you have a successful Instagram account. The accounts with all the hacks and tips and methods for increasing reach, or engagement, or whathaveyou. And some of those people also have YouTube accounts and tons of videos and...inevitably...courses. Courses that usually cost hundreds of dollars. Look, I've never purchased one. I know, intellectually, that they do not have anything that is worth (to me, ymmv) the amount of money that they want me to give them. But I will admit to a little nagging voice in my head that says, "but what if it is?" Paid courses, no. But have I spent way too many minutes of my life looking at various videos, reels, and posts from people who claim to have the knowledge of how to get that sweet, sweet validation in the form of followers, likes, saves, and comments? Yes. Yes, I have. 

It is, inevitably, pointless. Why? Because I don't want to do what they want me to do. Post daily! Mmmmm, no. Okay, then. Don't post daily, but do post consistently! If you can't post every day, try a schedule of weekdays or just M/W/F! Well, that's easier, but frankly, I still occasionally run up against the don't-wanna wall. Interact with people a lot! Leave comments, send direct messages, reply promptly to people who comment on your stuff! Okay, but interacting on a social media platform is still interacting socially and I'm an introvert and that's social energy that I only have a limited supply of. I will still hit a wall and need to retreat. Post reels! Use trending audio! I don't really have a problem with making reels. I even like the idea of making tiny movies every once in a while as an exercise in creativity, but to make reels in the amounts that I'm supposed to in order to increase reach I would quickly burn out. And I loathe trending audio. Scrolling through reels and only reels on Instagram will sour a person real quick on trending audio because you will hear the same 5 second clips over and over and over and over until you want to flush your phone down the toilet. I have no desire to contribute to that cesspool. (Disclaimer: I absolutely have used trending audio. Tell me to get off my high horse.)

What am I getting at here? I feel like I'm getting off course, but this is relevant, I swear. Keep this Instagram stuff in mind; I'll get back to it. 

I recently had a realization that the only way I was going to be able to approach my art in a healthy and enjoyable way was if there wasn't any need attached to it. And by that, I mean monetary need. I have this Etsy shop and I regularly put embroidery-related stuff into it and I have plans about eventually making money from non-embroidery related art stuff, maybe through the Etsy shop, maybe through other avenues, I don't know. I occasionally will make a sale or two and that feels nice, but I am by no means paying any bills with my art. I want to. I want other people to value my art enough that they are willing to pay for it. But so far, I haven't needed for my art to pay the bills. 

Our family has, over all of the years that we have been raising children, and that's a lot now, consistently made choices that have put time and togetherness over money. I stay home with the kids, I homeschool them, and I don't work. This has put us on the edge, financially speaking, most of the time. We've found various ways to bridge the gaps over the years and just before the pandemic, one of them was that Pat (my husband) had a second job. At the beginning of the pandemic, he lost that second source of income, but during those two years there was stimulus money and advance child tax credits that took its place. We were just about coming to the place where something needed to change, income-wise, or we were going to be in trouble. 

And no matter how much I tried to tell myself not to put that feeling of need on my art or my Etsy shop, I think I was. No matter how much I told myself I could go at my own pace, I was still harboring hope that somehow my tiny Etsy shop with only 17 sales in all of its 2 year existence was somehow going to finally take off. All I had to do was put my nose to the grindstone and I could make it happen.

Of course my getting a job was (and is) not off the table, but having my Etsy shop gain even a modicum of success is truly more ideal. Getting a job outside the house would take a large portion of my time and energy, even if it were a part-time job, and it would inevitably cut into my creating time and energy because my homeschooling time and energy are of a higher priority and couldn't be cut into.

Where did this leave me? Even if I was keeping the need feeling as tamped down as I possibly could, ignoring that it was actually there, the truth is that it was still there So I was creating schedules for myself, setting too big, too quick goals, trying to talk myself into doing the things that the Instagram gurus were telling me to do, and pretty much just feeling that there was too much pressure on my art. 

Well, in the past week, Pat has had a couple of interviews, and one job offer, at a higher rate of pay. He took that to his current job and they offered to match that higher rate of pay, and just like that, the pressure is off. I'm not saying this is like life-changing money or anything. But it's a bigger raise than he's gotten, ever, and it's taking us a few steps back from the edge. 

It's allowing me to continue doing what I'm doing with my art, with my embroidery, and with my Etsy shop, but at the pace I feel most comfortable with. (A snail's, frankly.)

And that's where I am now. I've given myself permission (once again) to forget all the numbers. The number of followers on Instagram, the number of visits or views on Etsy. Doesn't matter. Not my business. 

And I do want to write here more often. I'm going to try, but I can't place any parameters on it. I can't give myself any kind of consistency target, and I can't give myself challenges. I've realized it just doesn't work. The best and only way that art (and, by extension, sharing my art) works for me is going with the flow. Of course, there's certainly something to be said for showing up on a consistent basis and practicing regularly, but sometimes there's a flurry of activity and good ideas and excellent outcomes, but sometimes, there's not. So I'm going to let this blog and my Instagram reflect that inconsistency and honor my need to keep some things to myself. 

In conclusion, here is a snail that I recently stitched. I like her very much.

New Supplies

 Artistically speaking, it's been a slow week. There was a birthday and outings and eye doctor appointments and, as such, less art practice. But that is just the nature of life and if I find I have had a week in which I was less able to pick up my art supplies or my needle and thread as often as I would have liked, that just means I'll focus on the week to come. Needless to say I did not fulfill my goal of creating a drawing from reference every day. 

What I did do was purchase a few items to play around with. Firstly, I bought a couple of containers of beads to add to some of my embroidery pieces. The last piece I finished, a colorful planet surrounded by a ring of beads, was hopefully the first piece in a little space-themed series, and I liked using the beads so much I wanted to continue to incorporate them into my designs.

I also bought a set of Prismacolor colored pencils because the only pencils we have in the house are Crayola. Indeed, thinking about it, I'm pretty sure I've never used quality colored pencils before at all and I wanted to try that out. I also bought a Moleskine sketchbook and I doodled a bit with the new pencils on the first page. 

I just stuck to simple things, cute objects with faces and cheeks. Comfort drawing. It was fun, but I did discover that the Prismacolor pencils break very easily. That sent me to Google to see if I could find out why and how to potentially stop that from happening. Don't sharpen too much, make sure the sharpener blade is very sharp, and look for pencils in which the lead is centered is basically what I found. The pencils, despite the breakage issue, lay down color so nice and creamily and I do love them. 

There's something so invigorating about new art supplies. It's so exciting to have something fresh and full of potential for play. And play is so important in art. To be able to tap into that childlike part of yourself that creates without self-judgement, simply because creating is fun. It's exploring, it's play! New supplies tap into that feeling. Too bad I don't have the budget for a constant flow of new supplies because that would really help things in the art-is-play department. 

Goals for this next week: Finish the draw this in your style I started last month (finally!), fill another spread in my Moleskine, draw from reference (ideas for that: roses and bunnies).

Ebb and Flow or...?

 I did not make a post yesterday, Wednesday, as I said I was going to. I am sorry, past-Stephanie, you with your eyes optimistically shining bright, making the naïve assumption that future-Stephanie would be able to stick to a regular posting schedule. I, present-Stephanie, am here to say that, sadly, that probably isn't true.

But I might get close. Today, for instance, is Thursday, and Thursday is just Wednesday plus a few extra hours. 

I also took a three day break from embroidery. And, though I did fulfill the challenge I set for myself last week to draw 7 drawings from reference, I didn't do any sort of art at all yesterday. Every so often I go to do the things I have set out to do, trying to fulfill the goals that I have created for myself (like posting to this blog every Wednesday or drawing or embroidering every day) and a small voice in the back of my head says, "Hm... I don't wanna."

And, actually, I'm trying to honor that little voice, to take it seriously, because the feeling isn't arising for no reason. The real trick is to figure out what the reason is. I thought about it a lot yesterday.

Is it the natural ebb and flow of creation? Sometimes the ideas and work are flowing fast and I feel excited to get to it and I lose myself in it and at other times, I just feel like I need to take a step back. It could be that. 

Or is it that I have an inherent aversion to schedules and when I try to follow them, I'm prone to eventually begin to rebel against them, even if I created them myself? There is absolutely something to that. I have found that I have dueling forces inside of me and one of them is a scheduling/organizing dynamo and the other is a messy, disorganized free spirit. Which means I like to make to-do lists and then toss them out and say, "Screw that!" So, there might be something to that as well.

Or it could be the making-public aspect of this journey. No matter how small my audience is on Instagram or here (or any other platform I choose to experiment with in the future), the fact of the matter is, I am putting my art into the public eye and that is a thing that is uncomfortable for me and probably always will be. I'm certainly more comfortable with it than I was before I started doing it, but I don't think I'll ever get to the point where it just feels natural and easy. Or maybe it will, who knows? One can hope.

I think that little voice and that I-don't-wanna feeling probably pop up due to a combination of all three of these factors (and maybe because of other things I haven't considered), but I really do think it's important to listen to it. Sometimes I'm ready to come back to it right away. Sometimes it takes longer. But there's really no point in trying to force it. 

I'd like to report back on the challenge I set for myself. I did do 7 drawings from reference, but I didn't do them daily, as I had wanted. I did for the first 4 days, skipped days 5 and 6, and made up for it on day 7 by drawing more than what I needed to make up the missed days. I drew a few portraits from photos and a few objects from around the house. The portraits felt very disappointing. I don't think I'm going to show them, despite my intention to be willing to show bad art. (I don't have to show everything, for goodness' sake.) I don't know if I was just out of practice or what. Possibly I wasn't giving myself enough time. 

I will show you a couple of the drawings of objects. This is a LaCroix can and a tiny owl vase that I bought from Target.

I think they turned out fine, if not terribly accurate. I think I got the general idea and I think they are recognizable as what they are supposed to be. A little more time might have resulted in more accurate representations, but I guess that's not what I'm aiming for necessarily. After all, it's a sketchbook sketch. It's practice, it's not meant for a freaking gallery show.

I liked this challenge and I think it was good for me, so I'm going to try to do it again this coming week. One thing I learned was that I need to be mindful of what objects I'm choosing to draw. I'm not going to feel enthusiastic about just any old thing. I'll report back next week to let you know how it went.