By chance I had an inexpensive A5 notebook that was exactly the right size for '14 days of Mindful Drawing', plus space for my own notes. I am the kind of person who doesn't always enjoy working with colour, but when I do, I like it to be REALLY colourful and bright. And so I started these classes with my black Micron pens and I enjoyed all of Mel's really cool ideas for a Shape Library. As the lessons progressed, and I was reassured about not having to do absolutely straight lines, or lines that were exactly the same distance apart, it was very freeing. I had drawn some of these doodly shapes and lines before, but was never very good at accuracy, so I enjoyed drawing these and making my notes (based on Mel's teachings) as I went along! 'Embrace the imperfection' became my mantra.

Moving towards Shape Fills was really good fun - and being able to create a simple stencil from 80gsm paper, or a triangle from masking tape (why didn't I think of that! - ha ha!) was a bit of a game changer for me.

On we went with Stripe patterns, Straight and Curved line patterns and my own creativity started to enjoy being fed and nurtured, and as a result of finding more time to do this, my brain started coming up with new ideas too. Speaking of 'brain', I realised that mine is not very good at 'pivoting' and 'mirroring' a pattern - to be honest, I still struggle with left and right - so my Grid pattern came a bit unstuck, but I had another go at a more simple one later and allowed myself more time to complete each section.

And then it was time to do patterns that Radiated, and Overlapped - and my silver & gold pens started coming out, which is always a good sign! I often tried to either reproduce Mel's patterns, or do a variation on her ideas, and by now my creativity was really ramping up. The Tempeh Colour Sticks started coming out to play - huge fun!

More Overlapping, more Tempeh colour ...

And next was Organic and Coloured Lines, and this was where my creativity and relaxation started to take over. Those organic circles, that remind me of bubbles, and the organic lines that remind me of water waves, or tree bark - I couldn't stop 😀 The more fun I had, the more I relaxed, and the more I wanted to do it again. Finding 30 minutes or less was becoming an easier habit to create. I still can't do it every day, but now my pens and watercolour call to me, and I get antsy if I can't pick up a pen and doodle something, anything! And this course has given me loads of ideas for a quick doodle session ... or a longer one if I have more time.

And Mel has provided a LOT of ideas and prompts in this course - it's been really wonderful to complete. I loved that nothing had to be perfectly straight if you didn't want it to be. Of course, you can measure out the placement and size of your patterns if you want to, but in my inexpensive A5 notebook, I just let the muse take me where it wanted, and no rulers were harmed during the making of these patterns. And I was pleasantly surprised how much more accurate my line drawing had become over the 2 months that I took to complete this course. Practice most definitely makes progress!

Thank you again Mel for a course that went well beyond my expectations, and helped me to find those minutes of mindfulness to slow down and smell the roses, or acrylic pens and paper in my case. I will definitely be back for more of your courses!