Day 1:

I usually wash my palette after I finish a painting. Sometimes it's nice to leave the paint and try to use up every last bit, but the act of washing my palettes is always energizing to me. I realized that every palette I own was covered in old paint (some older than others). So, I washed them all.

It feels good!

Day 2:

I was swatching some new watercolor paints, a fun granulating set from Holbein and decided to paint my creativity map.

I painted splotches of color and once it was dry wrote with a micron pen. 

Here it is beside the one I did in class:

Day 3:

My word came to me this morning while I was writing in my journal and watching the birds at the birdfeeders. Later, when I had the time to play in my sketchbook, I made a page to honor it.

Day 4:

I spent a little bit of time reorganizing some of my books and hope to have more time another day soon to go through some of them, reminding myself of ideas I want to try. I also brought out this sketchbook:

It's a studio journal where I keep track of ideas and write about projects, future projects and things I'm learning. I read through everything I'd written and letting ideas percolate and later I'm going to write a master list of project ideas.

Day 5:

Lots of ideas for this one, but I ended up making a page in one of my sketchbooks opposite the word nurture from the other day: "let yourself do things that don't work."

I also added a few more birds to my nurture page.

Day 6:

I took a walk in the woods.

and I wrote about it on my blog.

Day 7:

I have to admit that making time for artist dates is something I always struggle with. There are always so many other important things to do. And sometimes when it's busy (like it is now), I'm too tired to embark on an adventure. But adventuring can be tiny. Like cuddling up under a blanket with garden books and dreaming of future garden projects. Which is what I did for yesterday's artist date. I have other things on my list and I'm promising myself I'll get to them. But I also know that tiny pockets of time spent nurturing my creativity and my dreams is just as important.