procrastination in action

this is what happens when you start cleaning in the studio, I guess.  you came across some brilliantly colored and textured old backgrounds that have the beginnings of a sketch (this time of an elephant), and decide to play instead.

see the top portion of this painting?  thats how all of this was.  red/orange textured paint and a simple sketch that I needed to figure out.  I love his energy!

found a 'before the before' shot. close to how it started today

and I just looked up his meaning here and am floored again with how animal energy comes to me when I need it.  I was looking at the painting, searching for it's title.  and the words "at ease" came to me.  the background leaves nothing to be at ease about, but he is standing sure of himself, grazing on what is around him with his trunk at his mouth.  he does not seem troubled or tense about what is going on around him at all.

the article says ;

Do you have a long, hard journey in front of you and need strength to make it through? Are you taking care of friends or family during tough times and need support? Elephant, as a Spirit, Totem, and Power Animal, can help! Elephant teaches how to nourish the mind, body, and spirit, so you are strong during trying times.

just floored.

so, he will be titled "At Ease"

Elephant teaches how to use what is around to nourish us, to listen to the guidance of the Elders so we remain calm and sure footed when times are difficult.   this is the way to help our tribe.

time to meditate on this totem coming to me at this time.

until later,

Jenny

The Weary Lightworker, a new painting

I've been in a creative mood lately it seems, which fits me fine!  a bit of dabbling in paint after a bit of dabbling in the garden has been very soothing lately.  my soul needs a break from all the heavy stuff, and this painting is a reflection of that.

per usual, I started with a pose I liked via unsplash.com and used it for body position and shadow reference.  I was also inspired by a class by Lucy Cooke in Lets Face It 2020 where she created a "Modern Matisse".  I knew I wanted to try my hand at a bit more pattern, more background to my painting, but I wanted it also in a style more my own.

this was the pose I was drawn to for this class.

(forgive the placement issue, blogger has changed the format and I'm not used to it yet.  not sure it will do everything I wish it to)

I sketched out the pose;

added some bold color;

then I found a painting by Matisse that felt good to me and found some colors

then to start painting!

and at this point, and for the rest of the painting I wondered "what have I done!?"

The Weary Lightworker 

8/6/2020 Jenny gabrenas
her crown is askew as she takes a rest. she reflects on how to continue her work, as she loves this world so deeply.

I fiddled way too much with the feet/legs that aren't even close to the center of attention.  everything else seemed ok, but those non-important (and off the canvas of the original photo) feet really threw me for a loop.  I finally am to the point of aquiescense with the appendages, and might be finished with the effort of fiddling with such unimportant details.   the problem is they are all I see right now.  

so, I now turn my attention to the things I like about this painting;

I adore the message.  she is me.  I love the world and it's inhabitants.  I wish to help spread the light to all souls in order to help rise above the chaos, but I am so very weary.  I will take my time to rest when I am overwhelmed by things, adjust my crown and get back to it.  

I love her sweet little face and her crooked crown, symbolizing my humanness.  my faults that are present because I am here on earth and have forgotten what my spirit knows.

I love the textures in the background and the pink peeking through.  I love the white and pink chair.  I love the folds in her clothes.  I love her hair.

so, there are many aspects of this work that I really can appreciate, so I will keep my focus on those.  and, thats exactly how I can keep my calm during my difficult times.  I will focus on the good.  what do I like?  what is good here, now?  where is the pretty color, where is my joy?

I hope this painting gives you some joy, something to focus on, something that can inspire you to rest, take a breath and adjust your own crown.

until later,

Jenny

I actually painted!

hey, people!  I do hope you find this in peace and health.  my heart is with the world and all it's people right now.

I've been busy with life stuff; gardening and all the learning involved; canning, and all the learning involved; organizing and purging, and making goals and dreams of how my future is going to look.  and... I've not been painting.

until today!

and I'm thrilled with how she is unfolding to me!

you might recall how she used to look, and the story of her here.

this is her as she looked this morning, waiting for me to help her story unfold;

and her progress;

I wanted to keep her loose and not care about the reference photo or to keep proportions or anything technical like that.  this is play at it's best, and I like the relaxed way I feel when painting without judgement.

I'm not totally finished with her yet.  I'm gonna play with her glasses frames to see how that looks to me.  I had some gold in them that is still showing and I like the glitter.  I also have gold on her earring, so want to bring more in.  but, she's basically there.

updated to show a bit of tending I did the next morning;

"The Adjustment

started as the Virus of 2020 was just beginning, she has come to be a mentor to me.  She tells me to adjust my sails when the wind isn't blowing the direction I wish.  To learn, to grow, and to change my point of view as new things become revealed.  And to hold my rose-colored dreams as sacred and something to always work toward."

stay safe and stay true to you, my sweet friends.

until later,

Jenny

working again

I wrote this post on February 19th hoping to stay on top of the work, and then went back to couch living for a while.  I'm going through more health related stuff, so going with the flow.

I'm working on my newest painting after going back and forth with reference photos.  I have finally decided on a pose and started my first steps.

Sunday, day 1;

I cropped this pose from a photo on unsplash by Atikh Bana

I then made a quick sketch on the canvas just to get used to the pose and placement

since I want a drippy style and layers behind, I went all over the sketch with some bold color 

I then got back to sketching it back in on Monday; day 2 of working

Tuesday I took a day off so day 3 was Wednesday, and I added just a layer of mixed yellows and white, spraying with water and taking off some here and there with towel to have the purples show up.  now I can work the skin coloring and hair to make sure it looks ok with the background I wanted.

if I have to paint minutes at a time, it will be finished one minute at a time!

I knew this one is to speak about depression and getting back to life and the work I was meant to do in this lifetime.

"Adjustment"

She adjusted her rose colored glasses and went back to work with the good she creates in this world.  she never lets the bad days build up


and there she sits until I'm back to feeling the motivation and energy.

until later,
Jenny

easy art journalling with "365 tarot spells"

I bought this book for my birthday and it came yesterday;

365 tarot spells

creating the magic in each day

by Sasha graham

this book excites me!  I need a nudge to get my head cleared of all the negativity that has been enveloping me lately and I think working with the book can help me relieve some of it through just getting to know my tarot deck in a more intimate way.  not only does this have spells to work with to help in everyday life (ease of travel spell, sound sleep spell...), but it has what is called "connection rituals", where you hold a meditation and find yourself entering the card to see from it's eyes, so to speak.

what I've decided to do first with this book is to create an art journal page for each card in the deck.  there are 78 cards, so this will be a long-term project and I'm not going to hold myself to create each day but take it slow.  I have the perfect journal for this, that was once a tried-and-failed attempt at a hand written Book of Shadows.

it's a pretty, purple, leather-bound with many signatures

I chose the first spread to be for THE SUN, but for each of my other spreads I'll be shuffling the deck to see what energies I'll be working with that day.

letting the image rest while I journal about the card

finishing up the art with some gold for added energies

I found a good reference site called biddytarot.com to learn about tarot, and used it for journalling about the Sun card.  it may be my go-to for each card, I'm not sure yet.  click here to learn what they say about the Sun.

I was rather impressed that I intuitively picked the Sun card to be the first card in the journal.  reading up on it, it has everything I need right now; with going into such a big project, with not knowing where my health is going, with going into a known depressive time of year.  this card lets me know that I have what it takes to get through all my struggles and to shine my radiance into the world like only I can.  in another book I have, "your guide to the tarot" (in this tarot kit),  Janet Berres calls the Sun card "the best card of the deck!

my goal is to just explore things in this journal.  not going for works of art, but to enjoy myself, to experiment with what materials I have and to show what each card means to me in a quick, easy way.  the front portion of this beautiful leather-bound book will be for artwork, and later signatures of the book will hold journalling of tarot spreads and spells I've done.

updated with some added dots for more motion

this should be a great project for the upcoming hibernation months!

until later,

Jenny

an update

hi guys!

I've had some pretty miserable moments lately, and some better ones as well.  the other day I did an oracle card reading for myself and was happy with the results that stated that the illness I'm dealing with was a way to get back to my spirituality and to change the way I saw myself.  doing more self care and standing up for myself these days.  I felt empowered by the reading, and in that feeling I vowed to challenge myself to do a little bit of 'art-stuff' each day in October.  (and then the very next day I was full of rage against the world... you get used to the emotional and physical roller coaster ride that is Lyme disease after a while)

 a not-so-good moment

a better moment

I recently took new photos of the mini Spirit Animal paintings I have available for sale and put them up in my art facebook page.  I'll have to put them here as well.  I think they show the paintings better now, and I've gotten a sale from it.  here are a few:

 "Be Yourself"

 "Sunshine"

SOLD

 "Heart of the Fox"

 "Sure Footed"

 "The Treasure"

"The Wary One"

the album in my facebook art page is HERE, and I'll also try to get them up in my for sale page shortly.

I'm still watching my classes in Let's Face It, and learning while watching even if I'm not up to doing any class work.  although, I've downloaded all the classes to date, I have a bunch of weeks worth of videos and lesson plans cluttering my desktop that need to go into their own folders.  what would be an easy thing to do while downloading has now become a chore.

yesterday I had an appointment with my lyme doctor.  I let her know how frustrated I am; the crazy but controlled anger; the 'out of my body' moments where everything is pretty much... oh well.  I tell you, this is a ride.   we decided on adding another treatment to the regime.  I'm to give myself a little shot twice a week for a month and then see how I'm doing.  this is a peptide treatment, which is supposed to support the immune system.  I'm also on something for the unrelenting nausea.  all in all, though she's pretty happy with how well I'm doing.  my pain level is down, which is huge.  I have had some 'good' days, which is huge.  I was able to help move a table when sweetie and son #4 helped my mother move houses, which is huge.  my doc tells me that being up to a full dose at this point of my treatment is huge.  so, I'm doing good work, it's just overwhelming if you do research on it and are living it.  I do hope this peptide treatment will get me 'over the hump' and let me feel that I'm doing better.  I'm strong and I will fight this to the end!  remission here I come!

I woke up today with an email from society6 that I was paid for a purchase made in august, so that was a lovely surprise!  I went to my page there to check out what was bought, and was amazed that there were 8 more in 'pending' mode!  I was doing an internal Snoopy dance, thats for sure!  hooray for collectors buying from the little businesses for the holidays or for themselves!  I checked my redbubble page, too, just to make sure nothing got by, and I updated my database to show earnings from both shops that I have neglected to update.

and then I decided I had a bit of energy to piddle in the studio for a bit;

just a little art journal page in its beginning stages, but it made me happy to get my fingers messy again!

and I'm done.  wiped out again, but I may have the spoons later on to finish watching this weeks class.  and I'll continue pushing myself to do a little something art-y each day this month.

until later,

Jenny

inching forward

hi there.

I've been in treatment for Lyme disease for a few months now,  and mightily stalled with the creativity.  but a few weeks ago I was given the urge and the motivation to create, so jumped at it for a couple of days.  I found a royalty free image on unsplash.com that matched the feeling I wanted to convey and worked on it slowly, bits at a time.

the painting is a vision of a woman in a pool of water, with lotus blooms around her ("no mud, no lotus").  she's looking up, though still in the murkiness of things.

 first sketching over the initial background feeling

 more drippiness

 getting more color in

my happy place

she's still very much a work in progress, but I'm liking how her face reflects a bit of how I'm feeling while in the midst of treating my Lyme disease.  she's struggling, sad, and yet she's hopeful.  she's strong but vulnerable.  she's kind of all over the place, just as I am.  I'm calling this "Emergence" or "Her Emergence"

since then I've stalled at creating again.  these ebbs and flows are something to make peace with.  to give myself the time I need, without guilt or "I should be...".


I've bought a cheap cane for when I'm wobbly and doing errands with my sweetie or on my own going to the doctors.  this decision was made after going to the cardiologist and parking in the wrong parking lot.  after a dizzy spell in the office I was feeling rather off kilter for the long walk out of the hospital and to my car parked in a distant spot.  I was inching my way down the hall, holding onto the wall for support, when a hospital staff offered his arm to me and, not taking no for an answer, walked me to the elevator, down 2 floors and out the door to my car!  while very appreciative to that gentleman, I dont want that to happen again, so a cane was bought the next weekend on our errand day.  it's helped a lot and I have made it my own with washi tape, cause thats what I do.

I woke up today with notice that someone from Belgium bought one of my fox paintings, ever alert, in my redbubble store!  I so appreciate my collectors, near and far!

you can find the painting here

these days I vacillate between feeling like a wrung out dish rag and feeling 'ok' or even 'good'.  the other day I felt 'good' when sweetie came home and asked me how I was.  I stopped him from getting too enthused by stating that my good isn't the same as it used to be.  its got a whole other definition these days.  but he told me that he will take whatever my 'good' is at the time.  it's a hell of a lot better than 'bad', or 'meh' or a kind of pain that steals my voice altogether.

this morning I had some energy and motivation and a list a mile long of things I'd like to get started with;  the house needs attention.  as happens with chronic illness, it's seen more love in the past;  I was given by my mother some new-to-me baby photos of my oldest boy, winter-orion, and need to scan them and upload them to his facebook memorial page;  I see the holidays approaching and wish to clear out my upstairs catch-all room to bring my easel and paint stuff up there, as I've found it is not healthy in my studio these days.  we need space in the house for family gatherings;  I also wish to continue with my painting I'm working on.  of, course I've used up all my extra momentum with this blog post, so I may be done for the day after hitting 'publish'.

current mood

until later,

Jenny

another painting on paper

last year on mothers day I was down and created flowers.  this year I was too weepy to move off the couch.  today I pulled myself up enough to go to the studio to work on my feelings.  I had a reference photo I wanted to work with, but the feeling wasn't right, so I chose a moodier pose and started.

 two hours in and letting her dry

"she came from the fire"
still in progress

she wears her heart on her sleeve; has walked thru hell, been tampered with, and still cares deeply for others.  but now she tries to protect her tender soul.  the cracks in her heart are mended with gold and make her who she is.  and she is more beautiful because she has loved and been hurt deeply.

working with her has made my heart a little lighter.  she is dark and moody, and thats what needed to be let out of my soul, even for a little while.

until later,

Jenny

a bouquet of joy and an artist show!

mothers day is sometimes lonely and depressing for me, like others, so i decided to go to the studio and just play, not worrying about an outcome until later.  to be in the moment with the color.  let it flow.

i started with a canvas that had been a collection of left over paints from other paintings.  i'd just slap the paint on this guy when i was done with a painting.  i didn't take a 'before' shot of this canvas, but i saw a bouquet in a vase so went with it.

i painted around what i saw

i wanted to play with the abstract, let it be loose.

i loved how it looked here, and i should have stopped.

but then THAT VOICE said "it just looks like circles.  kind of like targets.  it's not enough.  fiddle some more"

so i fiddled some more.  and i did create targets, so that wasn't good.  and i also created mud, and that wasn't good.  but i persevered, and i think the design may be complete...

sitting with it, to see with new eyes

changed some colors, and added some little areas of interest

painting this really helped pick me up out of my doldrums.  art heals!

those who follow me on my personal or my art facebook page have heard the news...  i'm going to be doing a showing of my art at our town library in february!  this is a huge deal for me, as my social anxiety made it a struggle just to talk to the person to get an application and information about a showing.  hell, it was anxiety producing just thinking about any of this.  i have created a major list to be ready for february, and i've gotten a head start with the easier things, like writing information for each painting and a bio for myself.  the paperwork is easy.  now i must varnish and wire a slew of paintings while still creating new original work to show and 'fixing' older paintings so they are ready for company.  this also means my klimt inspired painting is on the back burner, but thats no problem.  so, yay me!  i did a hard thing! and it's going to get harder!  

yay me... ? 

it's a good thing.  thats my mantra these days.  this will be a big opportunity for me to be brave, and good will come out of it for that braveness.

until later,

jenny