No Art For Me....

The last 2 days have been spent entirely on the computer. I enjoy doing this but since I am completely unschooled in computers the learning curve is steep and slow. I compare it to working a 5000 piece jigsaw puzzle, only a little more fun and rewarding. When I am done with a jigsaw puzzle - (an annual family Christmas tradition)- all I have is a puzzle put together. When I am done with my computer adventures I have actually learned stuff I can use again - much better. SO what have I learned? I learned how to get my paintings on eBay and link to them from my blog, learned about widgets, blog rolling, sort of learned what chicklets are but I'm still not sure of the difference between widgets and chicklets for certain. I learned about feed burning and put a feed burner on my site and a feed reader on my computer and transferred all of my favorite blogs from my bookmark folder to the feed burner and figured out how to work it - WOW - does that make things easier and FAST too! This is all working toward driving traffic to my site since I can't really be successful at selling my work online if no one can find it. I looked at a tone of other artists sites to try to learn how seemingly more successful artists are doing it. I compared a dozen or so "on line gallery" sites, like ArtSpan and Yessy and Imagekind etc. I have decided to get accounts on Yessy and also one other one whose name escapes me at this moment. I think I will try them for a year or so and see what kind of response I get.

I reviewed the first month of "2008-The Year of Self Discipline and Will Power" and made some good discoveries. This is a little of what I learned: I have made a few small improvements. I forgot most of what I was trying to accomplish. I need to review at least weekly and not monthly. I need to set measurable and definable goals. I can't know progress in anything if I don't have start and finish lines. I still have a lot of work to do but I am encouraged. And yes - I am proud of myself for taking on this task for this year and for trying to make some improvements. No self-condemnation allowed this year. One of my goals is to become more interesting...uh, can someone tell me where is the start and finish line for that one is?

I am seriously in need of some painting time - but there is so much going on this month - I am down to 2 weeks to get new hardwoods installed on the first floor, new carpeting upstairs, paint the house inside-the entire first floor and stairwell and upstairs hall, get moldings installed, pack and prepare for 2 weeks in Egypt and return home to guests staying with us, who will arrive the day before we get back! Then it will be into March! This is all fun stuff too - but I am really feeling the NEED to make some art, and as Martha Stewart would say - "that's a good thing."