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1:12 am | kitchen. Felt like making something around 11:45. Still making something.

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1:19 am | kitchen. And this is where I stop for the night. Pleasantly surprised with how the hair is coming. (I’m responding to the “draw a song” art journal prompt I saw online, using Feels Like Forever by Lacey Sturm.)

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2:00 am | bedroom. Tweet – “1:58 am seems like a good time to buy the @Smiling_Mind book right? Yup. Now to use the app and go to sleep.”
I did not end up using the app before I went to sleep, but I did almost also buy the November Project book… I restrained myself.

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10:17 am | Perkins. Sam and I went to Perkins to plan practice, because my Starbucks card reload failed during the upgrade to #Crybucks Rewards. Starbucks is refunding it, but why would I go to Starbucks with it not resolved? So, Perkins. And these delightful crepe things filled with strawberries and cream cheese.

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12:23 pm | Kitchen. I should really just start saying office instead of kitchen. I started the process of checking off many things from my to-do list with “file taxes”. As you may recall, they’ve been done since March 12… Submitted.

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3:39 pm | Kitchen. After filing my taxes and scheduling my tooth extraction (being a grown up is AWESOME. Like I wrote the other day, I’ve got a cavity in a wisdom tooth so it gets to get pulled out. Which is better than getting it filled, really.) I got a 20 minute dance workout on. Except I did it wrong and ended with a peak heart rate… Poor music choices (actually due to the song linked above)…
Anyways, yeah, I then did another grown up activity and did some work, which involved writing a blog post about why warming up and cooling down is important, and how despite having a degree in kinesiology I’m not smart sometimes.

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6:54 pm | Special O. Sometimes, we play games like Capture the Chicken that the parents are more intense about it than the kids (it does get the athletes stoked though..!). Yes, this guy is also my sport medicine doctor. 😉

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 9:31 pm | kitchen. 4 things checked off the month’s to-do list today.

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9:49 pm | kitchen. This is my buddy Guide Dog Murray, aka Steve’s guide dog. You should vote for him in the Guide Dogs for the Blind photo contest. He’s raised $25 so far, because he’s cute (and because humans are nice).

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11:00 pm | kitchen. I had a bath, and then put on clean socks… except I have no idea why there is red on this clean sock or what it is… Obviously I was like whatever and did not like, put other socks on or anything. Maybe it’s from that string anklet I’ve got on, but I’ve had that on for, like, months.

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11:34 pm | kitchen. Classic. Cookies and milk. (There was another cookie but you don’t expect me to, like, save them both to take a picture of, right?)

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12:38 am | kitchen. Technically no longer the 12th. But still within 24 hours and back to creating stuff. Because it’s like, therapeutic or something.

The oldish new thing is to go to these events where an artist teaches you how to paint a picture, and drink adult beverages.

Except I don’t drink, so I went to one of these events on Saturday night and learned to paint a thing. It was also a fundraiser so I went and learned to paint a thing for a good cause (or so my cousin Alyssa can be sent away on dance competiton trips. One or the other, or both.)

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We signed in, flipped our canvases around (to claim them), and then waited for the fun to start. Then we flipped our canvases back the right way.

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Note my non-alcoholic $2.50 iced tea beside my canvas there. Also I thought I was totally going to need more red eventually, but nope. Then we had to promise to not say that our thing sucked at any point. Which just meant that my cousin Jenn and I quietly discussed our perceived suck-ness at the break. 😉 (I said perceived suck-ness. It’s subjective, just like art, it’s fiiiine. We did it quietly at break and whatever.)

https://i0.wp.com/farm2.staticflickr.com/1612/25939363420_abb17ecac3.jpg?resize=375%2C500&ssl=1This was not my favourite picture I could have painted, but I guess that just means they’ll sell me on another event, right? This is the artist’s.

I was mildly confident going in, except for I think I’m more confident (and do better, even, possibly) when I can actually self-depreciate a little bit. It’s like, motivating-ish. Self-depreciation, and other related things, were against the “oath” we took before we started painting. Which mostly meant I had to be quiet about it. I am okay with making fun of myself, it does not bother me. There must be research supporting this!

Anyways.

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Phase one, sky. I intended to take a picture every time we were forced to stop for instructions, except—typical—i did not always listen to that instruction.

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Phase two: Grass. Here’s the part where I started hating on my grass. I mean, I was partly more engrossed in painting the sky all pretty than I was listening to the grass tutorial.
I mean, I listened but then I returned to painting sky. Jungle grass is what I ended up with here. So, I started hating on my grass out of earshot of the instructor who would surely tell me it looks fiiiine like Alyssa and my aunt did.

Alyssa and I also pretended we knew things about art before we started. Which, nope not really.

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Phase three: And then there were flowers. Also later on the artist told us that taking a picture would make our paintings look better if we weren’t happy with them. So, I mean, yeah, maybe my grass looks better after having taken a picture of it?  Or that could be that I did a bunch of touching up with black and white and stuff in there.

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Mine, the sample, and the instructional piece. In retrospect (aka 10 minutes after painting the orange in), bigger clouds would have been excellent.

I thought I’d have some good, introspective things to say here when I decided, pre-painting, that I was writing a blog post on this—something self-expression-y or therapeutic or whatever. Like when I went to thermea or when I started creating things on purpose last year. Instead, I found this a bit of a challenge and that I was rather hyperfocused, which in some situations is good, and others it is extremely frustrating and difficult—last night was the latter, I think. Like, I legitimately missed the how to paint the flower instruction (which ended up totally okay) beyond “Start with a V” because I was still working on the grass (I copied Alyssa, it was cool). So, I do think that aspect—which can vary on a day to day basis—might have detracted from the experience a bit. (And maybe I should do my next Paint Nite without my ADHD meds—except I might still hyperfocus anyways. Also I didn’t intend for this to wind up being about ADHD either. It just truly does affect everything.

With that, I’ll end this with an after-the-fact realization that in life, we’re all creating the same thing, but they’re all going to turn out differently because we are who we are. Or something.

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(Photo cred to my aunt, Linda)

That’s the Paint Nite nugget of wisdom. Maybe the “drink creatively” slogan is what leads to the insight—or, at least more creative acceptance ;). (Not that I’m going to start now.) 

 

PS. Yes, I did sign my painting with a Sharpie once I got home.

I’m not a resolutionist for the simple reason is that I don’t think resolutions help to build habits. People get off to a great start or a bad start and often that sets the tone for the year—at some point, I read on Forbes.com that only 8% of people accomplish their new years resolutions. And I’d probably definitely be in the 92% that doesn’t. (Look, I’m not being a defeatist here, just honest.)

Simplicity.

Simplicity is the intention here. Akin to the final notes of 2015’s soundtrack, here’s what I’m aiming to accomplish in 2016—even if that takes me the next 362 days to sort-of get right.

1) Write with my hands more. 
I picked up a couple unlined Moleskines on sale at Home Outfitters on Boxing Day. Since January 1, I’ve been trying to write daily, even if just a few lines (or, not lines. I’m hoping to be freed by the totally blank pages. 

Not that I consistently write on lines or anything. Overrated.

2) Read 40 books.
It’s a little more realistic than 75. In progress—new for 2016—Freak the Mighty by Rodman Philbrick and an advance review copy of a book called Millersville by Brendan Detzner.

3) That self-care/mindfulness/exercise/wellness thing.

4) Create.
Even if that’s just colouring, or writing more (even typing). In some fashion, I want to aim to write (non-work-things) for 20 minutes a day—at least. Goes back to the “just start” thing.

5) Engage more on Twitter.
Sometimes it seems like it’s counter productive to have a goal to engage more with people on social media, but you know what? I think I engaged a lot less that year, and realized repeatedly how much I missed it. So, the Twitter part of my heart is getting some focus. 🙂

That’s it.

Keeping it simple—God knows I’ll complicate stuff in other ways. Let’s go.