Drawing, 365 Daily Projects, Forming Habits and A Question

Many people make New Year's resolutions, or from this day forward lifestyle changes that have varying degrees of success. If you follow me anywhere, you know I've been drawing birds. Almost every day this year, one on every page of my calendar. And here I am in the last quarter of the year. Very soon, I will have to purchase a 2014 datebook. Now I won't lie, it is incredibly satisfying to see a drawing on every page of this book. The idea of not drawing something everyday is kind of sad and weird. I may continue. Not sure if I will continue with the singular purpose of songbirds, but who knows?

This little project started as an attempt to learn to draw birds. I definitely feel that my drawing has improved, but there is still room for growth. It has also led to some re-occuring characters, that may lead to other projects. Usually in the morning before I get dressed and start my day, I have my cup of tea and draw a bird, or an outline of a bird to ink in throughout my day. This is now a habit, and a good one. Kind of like a good diet or exercise that you trained yourself to do over time. It takes time to form good habits.

Have you done an everyday project for a continuous span of time? What impact did it have and did you hesitate to end it?

So here are the calendar drawings so far: 2013 Calendar Pages on Flickr
I actually have some original bird drawings for sale in my etsy shop with a complete list here:  Bonus Birds on Flickr if you see one that you are interested in, let me know.

Crossover: Tying Drawing and Embroidery Together

This is a work in progress, and it is taking a long time. But one's life work hopefully does take a long time. I have told you quite a bit about my Calendar Project, and I have a lot to say about craft when it comes to me attempting to translate what is in my head into a tangible thing. This began in music school with hours of practice to be able to produce the sound I wanted on demand. Same with fashion: from idea, to 2-d to 3-d with movement, flattering to the particular figure, and drawing the eye in a line away from and to..

So what does drawing have to do with sewing? It has to do with me wanting to execute that blurry vision in my head that needs to be in physical form. A bird on a corset. Drawn in thread.

I had no intention of writing today, I was just going to keep pecking away at these projects that are new, but feel like I've been working on forever until I came across my friend Diane's invitation to write about exploration for Tara Swiger's Exploration Party, and this was exactly what I am working on, but quietly in the background in hopes that it will be done sooner than later. I have ideas. I just feel the need to get them out the way I picture them in my head, or better than the blurry vision in my head. This means trying out new things to expand the possibilities for the best crafted and pleasantly unexpected outcome I can get. 

sometimes you f*ck up

sometimes you are drawing along, and the drawing is nearly perfect and then you f*ck it up.

there is a pause and moment of did i really do that?
and it is in ink, and there is no going back.
so if you are like me, you cannot crumple up and toss out what was a perfectly good drawing that you spent over two hours on.
how to fix it?
it isn't something that can be inked over, so you just have to embrace it, and let the weird ideas just leak out of your head..
and then start over on a new one.

in all i drew this poor nuthatch three times on sunday.

Calendar Project: Drawing A Bird A Day 6 Months In

Starting from the beginning of this year, I gave myself a challenge to improve my drawing skills by drawing something on every single date page of my calendar. To keep myself in check, I posted each drawing to Instagram. The reasoning behind this is that I want to do elaborate embroideries on corsets, and in order to be able to stitch the images I want to, I have to be able to draw. Now I could do this through trial and error on corsets, but it would be slow and expensive. My aim here is to develop a skill and a style in as short amount of time as possible.

I have come quite a ways from my first pages. I love to show people these first pages when people tell me that I am a natural talent for this. No, actually, it is all about practice and persistence. Everything I've ever made is the result of all the pieces I've made before; through trial and error and just doing. Over and over and over. The first month was a real struggle. There were many days where I had to draw on three pages to catch up. It wasn't very fun, and the drawings were way more loose and scribbly than I would have liked them to be. But I kept drawing, because each drawing led to the next where I could look at my mistakes from the previous day and fix them.

I also felt that it was important to show people the pages of my calendar as it fills up. You can see each page mostly in order compiled here on Flickr.

From a little ways in when I started to be able to people have been asking if these would ever be for sale, and the answer at first was no, because the birds are contained on the lined pages of my calendar along with my appointments, lists, client phone numbers, passcodes, quotes and bits about the weather.

Somewhere in May I started doing extra drawings. These drawings are now for sale. They are labeled as "Bonus Birds" on Instagram, and I put all I've done so far together in an album here. They are all black ink on white paper (the photos are low quality on purpose). If you are interested in any in particular they are $50. each: first come, first served. Send me an email with a link to the drawing you are interested in. I will be making more Bonus Birds so keep an eye out for them at least for the rest of the year. Please note that I update my Instagram in real time, and Flickr gets updated in chunks when I remember to do it.

So I made it half-way through the year; I've used up four entire pens. I will continue through the end of the year, and who knows what's next or where this will lead? I may or may not do much else with these birds; I have no intention of a career change at the moment. But as long as I feel like doing the drawings, I will.  I am kind of used to having a drawing on every passed page of my calendar; it pleases me.