Blind Contour Drawing: The Breakfast of Champions

Today I acted and drew and homeworked and clerked and very little else.

I did blind contour drawings of my hands and shoes whilst camped out at a coffee shop. The hands were kind of ridiculously successful, considering that I can barely draw whilst looking at my paper, let alone while diligently ignoring it. The shoes kept ending up as some kind of bow/whale hybrid (now dubbed the "whaelbow") but whatever. No one likes shoe drawings anyways.

Now I'm going to pretend to knit a row and then go to bed, so that tomorrow I can do it all again!

A bit of a ramble

For the last two days I managed to finish the ball of yarn I'm on and that's about it. I can't wait until finals are over.

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That last but was quickly written after a nap, when I assumed I would be going straight to bed for the night. Of course, insomnia wins again and I am up, puttering around, making tea, editing blogs.

Wednesday was excellent. As well as the first day of Hanukkah, it was my day off. I spent it with a friend, at first running errands (doctors office, county courthouse, etc) but then mostly wandering around downtown. I love downtown- it epitomizes to me the city of Gainesville. We went to a hipster coffee shop and giggled for a bit (I am fully aware of my many hipster qualities, which may set me apart from most hipsters. You know, like an alcoholic and a recovering alcoholic. At least I acknowledge who I am, even if its a bit shameful.) and I broke out my knitting (it seemed appropriate). I ended up finishing the ball of yarn I was working on- I thought the tail was long enough to give me an extra row but 3/4s of the way through I ran out. Instead of undoing the row I just shoved it into my purse and went off to the farmers market. Our farmers market has gotten much bigger over the past few years- it used to be mostly produce, dairy and canned goods (jam, honey, etc) but now there seem to be many more craftsmen selling their wares. I talked to a man who weaves palm leaves (fairly common in the south) and my friend was overcome with the urge to buy handmade wooden earrings. (I fear going back next week, as it will probably be the death of my bank account.) Then we ran off to her family's candle lighting and I ate entirely too many latkes.

As for the knitting- I undid that row today, and have come to the realization that however I unknit puts the stitches on backwards, making it extremely annoying to knit. It corrects itself in the next row of course, but in that moment I am very irritated with myself for not being able to recognize on sight how stitches should hang. Now I'm on a new ball of yarn and cursing my lack of foresight.

A side note- a few weeks ago I decided I needed a sketchbook, and I think it has been the best decision I have made creatively in a very long time. I don't really draw (though that will change with the coming semester) but it has been an excellent receptacle for my (extremely) lofty ideas and horrid concept sketches. Mostly it has served as a bit of a confidence booster for me- for a while I felt like I did not have many creative ideas, or if I did they were half formed. Having a dedicated space to record them has gone a long way not only to developing these ideas but just to reminding me that I do in fact generate them. Now, whether these ideas are decent or even viable is an entire other matter, but we'll take this one step at a time.

New goal: Sell something I've crafted by a year from now.