On Creative Flow & Balance

Creativity is manic with high highs and low lows. It's like balance. With both, there are times when you're closer to the Utopian of perfect balance or perfect creative flow and then, with no work necessary on your part, you're suddenly further away again, sometimes so far away that you can't even remember what it felt or looked or smelled like. You just know you want it back. Life seems to be a dance of working toward balance. The artistic life seems to be a dance of working toward creative flow.

I've received numerous emails over the past few weeks celebrating the creative energy and output currently going on in my studio. Yes. I'm certainly celebrating too and even as I am, I know that it will not remain forever. It's something to enjoy, to embrace, to be grateful for while it flows and something to work back toward when it ebbs. With all my years of creativity, this is something I know for sure just as...

... I know that I am the most creatively energized when I have a goal or when I'm learning something new and right now - with incorporating the learning from the workshop into creative everyday wear and the goal of making purses for the two upcoming shows - I have both. When things aren't going well, new learning and a significant goal are the two touchstones I'll come back to.

Yesterday was one of those days when things took forever. Simple statements like all it needs is a handle and a closure equate to hours of trial and error and experimentation. Above I spray painted a button copper and then rubbed it with purple and then painted it with glaze. Below...

... I painted the handle. Again. In the copper color, it was too garish. Rubbing it with purple and then gloss helped significantly. The actual color is less pink than this picture looks and these wooden...

... beads are less blue and more of a deep purple like the picture below which shows the true color of the purple fabric as well. The beads were painted and glazed and then used to cover...

... the fold of the handle around the D ring. Underneath the ends are stitched together. In the picture above, the glaze is drying because I put it on after the handle was finished - naturally - because that's when you'll think of it on a day that's not going as smoothly as you'd like it to be.

Binding is a lot faster than satin stitch around the edge of a purse BUT... I didn't have the right color of binding and I did have the right color of thread and so thread was the answer. This purse will have the painted handle and a strap. It has a schoolbag satchel-ish shape. I'm debating if the braided cording is too narrow and if so, what will work. Perhaps the answer will appear while I'm cleaning house today.

The island is still not finished. We put the base together Tuesday night and the drawers last night and it's sitting in place with the larger countertop unsecured while we debate how much to trim it down. At first, it looked massive - so massive that I wasn't sure I even wanted it - but after two days of seeing it in that space, we've adjusted. Once the top is trimmed to size, it needs a light stain and finishing with a two part resin for a glossy, easy clean, surface. Bare wood doesn't appeal to me and my son hates the feel of it and if there's ever to be a hope of him wiping the counter - LOL - it needs finishing.

I did arrange a lesson yesterday for the cover stitch machine. Unfortunately, it wasn't hugely informative. What was covered I'd already learned from online videos and what I wanted to know - like how to use the binding foot - she didn't know. It's not really a lesson when we're both reading the instructions and can't make it work BUT... I did learn enough to put together the t-shirt scraps in the way I was thinking. That may be tomorrow if cleaning and then sewing the handles works out - although I have four men expecting lasagna for dinner so cooking needs to happen - and if not, it'll definitely be the first task - after the crotch curve on the Marcy pants- of next week. Interesting how I'd intended to spend four days on these purses and now it's been seven. Yes, that is exactly how the flow of creativity changes.

Talk soon - Myrna

Grateful - that I am mature enough to be patient with tasks I want done and realize that other things can actually be more important than what I want right now.