Finding my style

I'm struggling.  In lots of areas.  But one area in particular is my art.

I'm fairly decent at copying other styles but I don't really know what my own style is.  I've been trying to find it for years.  I keep experimenting but can't find what truly feels right for me.  I know I just have to keep going, keep painting, keep drawing, but I'm being overrun by artwork that no one will buy and I don't have the wall space for it!

If I had the time I would actually take an art lesson.  I've never been formally trained or even taken an art class.  I've done my own research of artists and styles.  I love going to art museums and I've been to some of the best in the world - El Prado in Madrid, Parc Guell in Barcelona, and Louvre in Paris.  I've been to "off the beaten path" places like Montmartre in Paris, La Rambla in Barcelona, Art on the Lake in Guntersville, Alabama, City Museum in St. Louis.  I love them all.  But I can't seem to find my own "voice" in my art.

I guess my reason for writing about my struggle is to help myself figure it out.  I love bright colors but I also love black and white.  I paint flowers because I can't grow them!  I paint little birds in different colors because I think they are cute.  I've done collages of places I've been using realia and mixed media (I actually enjoy this style).  I paint owls because I was a Chi Omega and each time I paint one I reminisce about the good times my sorority sisters and I shared.  I paint quotes because I like words.  But I find myself still just imitating something I saw on Pinterest or Etsy.  I want my own style.

I'm a little folk art but given time and patience, neither of which I possess, I could do landscapes or portraits.  I've tried those and they aren't really my favorite.  I like painting common, everyday things like pictures of fruits, flowers, birds, crosses. 

I have other interests, like writing, refashioning clothes, and home decor, but I feel like these hobbies hold me back from my art.  I want to incorporate it all.  Maybe a clothing line or home furnishings featuring my own quotes and images in a style all my own?  But there's the problem again.  A style all my own. 

Guess I'll keep working on it.

Inspiration

My students have really surprised me.  They seem genuinely interested in the fact that I write blogs!  It's amusing to me.  But I don't know why.  I would have been inspired or interested if I had known my high school teacher was a writer. 

It's neat, I guess.  I enjoy my job, but more and more each day I am wanting to write.  All. Day. Long.  It consumes my thoughts.  Sometimes I don't want to do anything else.  It's hard.  So I keep working my blog and writing my daily stories in the hopes that the right person will read it and like it and maybe want to publish one of the stories.  Or all of them, as a collection.  I don't know.  I just write because I feel it's what I have to do.  It would be nice to get paid for it but that's not why I do it.

I am looking forward to fall break from school so that maybe with the extra time to focus on the words, I can write some better literature, perhaps finish a few more chapters of my novel, complete more of the children's books I've written, and work on my devotional book that I began several years ago.  Lots of unfinished projects but there's hope. 

It's funny how I'm supposed to be the one inspiring the students and motivating them to reach their dreams but they are doing that for me.  I find so much inspiration in seeing the seniors working hard to complete scholarship applications and apply for college.  Just seeing them go after their goals makes me want to keep working on mine. 

I'm not ready to put my life on cruise control until retirement.  I can't.  I'm nowhere near prepared for that and I don't want to be.  I'm determined to be a semi-famous author, at least to the point of replacing my teaching salary one day when retirement is near.  Until then, I will keep teaching all day and writing late at night.  I will continue to motivate students to reach their goals and I hope they will continue to inspire me to reach mine.

This post dedicated to my 2014-2015 1st and 6th period Spanish 2 classes.  Muchisimas gracias!

All signs point to writing

I've been reading a lot lately.  It's summer and that's what I like to do during my break from school.  Plus, if you read my last post, you know that we don't have cable anymore.  So that gives me more free time to...read.

Most of the books I read this summer have been making me think, more than I usually do, about really pursuing my dream of being an author.  Not only that, but the speakers I've heard at our traditional back-to-school workshops have also had a profound impact on me and the way I'm thinking.  I've been praying for God to put the right people in my path and He's done it.

So, after I get my bills paid (again, see last post), I plan to fully pursue finishing up my payment to the publisher who currently has my second children's book ready to go.  My goal is to have this one out by November so I can publish my next book, a devotional type book, by December 2015. 

See, I have a plan.  And, although things are hard for my family right now, I can see that all signs are pointing to writing.  I've been wanting to blog more lately.  I've started writing a fiction novel!  I still have a plastic bin full of stories and illustrations.  It's in my blood.  It's in my heart.  And I am finally being still long enough to listen to God.  He's answering my prayers, slowly and steadily. 

Be blessed!