retro

Today’s art challenge was “Dream World”. I’d probably scare people if I tried to draw the dreams I actually remember, either with my accuracy of the nightmarish ones, or with my terrible luck with proportions needed for the other ones. I’ve had some really strange and crazy dreams in my lifetime!

One day, I was feeling bleh…blah…meh…and decided to just draw. I just wanted to do something productive that made me smile. So I drew retro martians and a peacock’s head and a huge peacock feather. I put the pencil drawing away and never really had any intention of doing anything else with it. Ha! Life has it’s little curve balls, doesn’t it? It fit today’s challenge so I inked over the pencil lines, added the teapot, drops and splash, the small feathers, and the stars. I colored it in with soft chalk pastels. It’s been a very long time since I worked with pastels and it was really great to use them again. In the photo edit, I used Pixlr Express to crop it, added a frame that made it look like an old picture, and then put a gritty retro poster overlay over that. It muted the colors a bit but I like the misty sort of dreamy feel it gave off as a photo. I’m keeping it like that. And if you like it, too, you can stop by my deviantART account to purchase a print. Or download a digital copy for your personal use only. I try to offer as many of my photos and artworks as digital downloads as I can because I know the economy sucks. It might be like shooting myself in the foot. Who knows? Anyway, on with the photo!

“Peacock Dreams, Martian Scenes, And The Teapot Drips” – by Me! Click here to go to my deviantART page.

How many of us look forward to Saturday? I wonder… I never stop working, really, even when I’m not working at a “job” outside my home. Homemaking is a full time job in itself. If I could be a full time homemaker, I would happily do so. I enjoy taking care of my family and making sure their needs at home are being met. I enjoy having a home that is ready for visitors (or nearly so) whenever they drop in unexpectedly. When I’m working at my part time job, that isn’t always the case. Even though I do set up plans and schedules, there are only so many hours in a day and each home chore takes time. Thankfully, our kids are old enough to take care of some of the chores and I thank God our kids are good helpers 90% of the time. I have to wonder if this is a result of the years that I /was/ able to stay home full time but whatever the case, I’m thankful for the happy result. Do any of you have kids that are good helpers? Be sure to let them know you appreciate what they do.

Even in the midst of the myriad things I have to do, I must remind myself that time spent with my children is super-important. Yesterday, I even went so far as to write on my laptop the words, “When they want to talk, listen. The written word will stay, but the child will continue to grow.” I often get caught up in my work and reading to the exclusion of other things so those words, written where they are, will remind me that it’s more than OK to stop for a few moments to listen to what my kids want me to hear. Making memories with them, having meaningful conversations with them, even having silly conversations with them, I want to partake in all of those things! And I want my kids to have a happy childhood, learning to be content with what we have along the way.

I hope you all have an enjoyable weekend!