Doodling to the Rescue

In case you're wondering (and why wouldn't you be), yes I'm still in a creative limbo. That colourful new butterfly hasn't quite emerged yet. I'm playing more with paints, sketching with pens and dabbling in all sorts of arty pastimes. Some I'm sharing, most have been only for my eyes. And I know, one day I'll wake up and a Eureka moment will happen. That next direction will emerge and evolve.

It's just that it's a tad frustrating at the moment. Experimenting and playing is fun but requires a certain degree of patience. I have all these ideas I'm playing with but they haven't yet merged into something desirable yet. It's like I've figured out the ingredients for making a cake but I'm still lacking a recipe. 

A few weeks back, I played around with paints in one of my art journals and admittedly, it started off okay. But then I kept adding layer upon layer of paint to it and it soon careered at an alarming downhill rate. Finally, in an attempt to rescue it, I added a a coat of white distress stain which sealed its gloomy fate. I was left with a spread that had an unexpected and unpleasant glossy sheen to it. I threw my hands up in despair and hid it away from good, decent, respectable people.

However, the other day, I opened up the journal again and came across the spread, which until then, I had blanked from my memory. This time though, I hoped I could revive it. I grabbed a couple of Sharpies markers, opened the windows for ventilation, put on some music and came away with this...

Yes I know you're thinking to yourself..oooh he's done a ********* but you're wrong. In fact, it's a doodle. It's what I used to do when I was a wee lad and I should have been studying for exams. Or how I'd relieve the boredom of a particularly dry history lesson. Most of my teachers at one time or another would tick me off for doodling in the margins of my books. And if you're as old as the hills, like me, you probably had to cover your school books with plain brown paper. These too, temptingly, were a wonderful blank canvas to doodle on. 

And it's how I turned around the blue and white glossy mess of a spread I'd created. By covering it almost entirely in black ink. Not in one go mind. I've picked it up and put it down throughout the day. Adding a little here and there, until it was completely covered. 

Okay so I haven't crafted yet! But the weekend's only just begun. That pile of patterned paper, sat in the corner of my room, may yet get to have that thick layer of gathered dust blown off it.

But for now, night all and sweet dreams.

Pxx