Next Phase

A comical optical illusion

As you can see, I am large with child.  Well, getting larger by the week with this creature that insists on growing and growing and growing (which is a good thing as this is what should be happening).

I haven’t blogged about this next phase yet, and in fact, I have hardly blogged at all as I hardly know what to write about anymore.  Do I write about this and what it’s doing to my life or do I carry on as if nothing happened.  Seems a shame to not mention the impending life that is about to rock our world – the world of Jimmy, Cassandra and their two unsuspecting dogs Josey and Seal.

It is interesting what other artists have to say about becoming a parent and what that has done to their lives.  I have spoken to two gallery owners/artists about this new adventure.  One has suggested that I just be a mother, don’t even worry about the creativity.  Enjoy all the moments that you can because they grow up so fast and before you know it they are living on the other side of the world and God knows when you’ll see them again.  Oh.  Some of that could be MY parents’ experience of what I’ve done to them.  Another artist said that the bursts of creativity she had whilst she was a new mum took her art in an entirely new direction – one that she was excited about and others had commented.  She said it was because you get these small small bites of time and what you create is very spontaneous.  I have to say, I like the sound of that as I feel my own works are heavy with planning, work and re-working.

I found an online article ‘Will having kids ruin your creative career?‘ which, man, sounds negative or what?!  There is a paragraph in there about a woman that went back to work two weeks after her baby was born.  She works as director for a theatre company in New York and just sort of strapped her baby to her and carried on as if nothing had happened.  Hm.  I somehow don’t think that’s going to be my style and have my own opinions about how healthy that is for both parties involved.  In that, well, it can’t be good for neither.

My plan is…to have no plan.  My work life has certainly slowed down to a pregnant crawl into comfortable sitting positions.  I’ve been getting lazy.  Sleeping in.  Napping.  Snacking every two hours.  I’m in the final stretch now and should certainly not feel guilty about all this glorious downtime.  I am still making work and have three more original prints to create before I disappear for a month or two.  Or three or four.

I’m just wondering, though, what kind of parents are we going to be?  So far we have gathered for the new addition to the unit: two hand knitted hats, two small plush bunnies and a print of two bears and a robin.  It certainly won’t be short of beautiful things to look at.