Ever Changing

Yep.  It was time to clean up the old blog banner.  Hard to believe that my first banner looked like this:

 And I looked like this:

Well, actually I don"t look so different except for the fact that my hair above was chin length and now it's below shoulder blades!  Still got that groovy chair in the studio too!

As I was saying in previous posts here and on the 52 canvases blog there has been a deep nudging in my heart to make some changes.  To admit where I need to go on this career path of mine.  And here's the final decision.  I am skilled at many things artsy wise.  I LOVE to sew and make jewelry.  And I love to teach.  And paint.  But one can not do it all.  And by having a blog banner that said....scattering joy through paint.fabric.metal, well it was making me feel over extended to the max.   I felt I HAD to make things in all those sections or else I was a big fat failure.  So guess what?  I removed those labels.  Whew.  I feel better now.   hahaha...seems pretty silly perhaps that I was letting a few words hold me back.  Right?  But words are important players in our lives and you know it.  I am sure you've said, "I can't...." at some point in your life.  Words different yes from what was in my blog banner.  But words that have indeed held you back from discovering something amazing about yourself.  I have a deep love for painting and sharing this love with others.  So plain and simple.  It is now my focus.  Will I sew some?...yes.  Will I make jewelry?...yes.  But it will not define me as an artist.  It will not be something I spend what tiny studio time I have on.  I will not let my bank account be affected by it.  (Although ironically enough I made a huge order from China last week to make jewelry for the upcoming Micro love show...I look forward to putting it all together then telling Vero it's my last jewelry show.) 

I had a wise person tell me one time in my booth that if you have too many focuses in your work, something will ALWAYS loose out.  And so true.  At my last Dunwoody show I had a tiny amount of jewelry compared to years before.  And in return, I sold like 50 paintings!  Because my clients weren't getting bogged down in the $40 jewelry aisle.  I'll still make fun stuff from my art like I-phone cases and framed tiles.   But right now I need to focus on my painting.  And teaching painting.  Because it is something I love more than anything.  I intend to scatter my joy one brush stroke at a time......just as my new header says.  I like the new banner....it may need a little more tweaking.  I learn something new in photoshop every time I try a new banner.  I'm pretty tickled with this one though!  Funny thing, my last banner didn't even have a painting sample in it!  What?  I know!

So there it is....oh and the whole site is a little cleaner now.  And hopefully you can navigate it easier.  It feels good to get this done.  Now I think I'll go paint something in the yellow studio.  It's a perfect Sunday afternoon for it, no?