Gosh, lately it seems like there’s a lot going on and not much going on all at the same time. Isn’t life funny like that?

I’ve been stealing pockets of quiet time to make bits of new art; this ‘believe’ piece came out in a couple chunks over the weekend. Painted the lettering, the baby woke up. Sketched in some details, the baby woke up. Hubby took the baby to the grocery store, ahhhhhh. Quiet, uninterrupted time to finish it up.

I don’t typically use these colors, and I’m really liking the change. I’m sort-of obsessed with dark backgrounds at the moment.

I give myself a really hard time about my work; a voice inside me tells me it should mean something. It’s not unique enough. Everyone is hand lettering. Everyone draws and paints flowers. Do I really need to add yet another decorative ‘believe’ image to the world, I mean come on! There are like 3 million of them already.

But then another voice says: isn’t the point of all this to just have fun? To feel good? To make something that I’m going to like looking at?

And the answer to that, my friends (in my humble opinion), is YES. Yes yes yes, the point is fun, happiness, feeling good.

Right now, I believe in this:

Being a mama is rocking my world. He is scooting, he has 6 teeth, he is eating food (he loves green smoothies, be still my heart!), he is a crazy little chatterbox, he is trying so hard to crawl, he is still not at all a good sleeper (though he did trick us a couple weeks ago and sleep through the night 3 times… but it didn’t last. Sigh) …. I am so blessed.

I know I need to be gentle with myself work-wise. Because he will only a baby once, and it’s going so fast already. I don’t want to look back and wish I’d worked less and spent more time with him. I want to actually spend the time with him. I am really lucky that I get to stay home with him AND work at home, too. It’s hard, yes, but I’m so glad it’s this way.

But speaking of work, I believe in this:

I’m going to make an oracle deck with these animals, you know! I’ve painted over 70 of them so far. 70! You can see all of the ones I’ve created so far on my Instagram feed. I’m really digging this project. A little creating each day is adding up to a lot, and it feels exciting. I’m not usually one for long-term projects that take months and months to complete, but this one feels fun. I tend to rush and want to just get things done, but I can’t do that now, so this project is teaching me a lot about patience, timing, letting go, trusting.

Ah, the letting go and trusting. Why is that so difficult?

This happened recently:

Sweet cousins! We took a quick trip to Colorado to see my family a few weeks ago; my first solo trip with the babe. It was a big success. These two, my babe and my sister’s babe, are just two days apart, isn’t that wild?

Here are some more nap time doodles….

It felt lame and unimportant at the time, but then I turned them into a pretty, happy little ladybug pattern:

And I remembered (again) that the point of this is just to have fun and to make things that make me happy. Isn’t that enough, really?

Why do we do that to ourselves? Be so mean and judge-y, I mean?

I need constant reminders that it’s ok to be right where I am. I am always finding myself wishing my reality was different somehow than it is; when really, I think if I just accepted my world (let go, trust) and was truly grateful for it, it would radically alter my life. Why do I worry so much? Compare so much? Do you do this, too?

Moments like these remind me what’s really important:

How is he big enough already to ride on shoulders? Time is flying, and I don’t want to waste it wishing I was somewhere else. I want to be right here.