Still Painting...

...but we're getting closer to the day when we lay our tired paint brushes down and unroll our yoga mats.

One day I'll have a picture of someone doing something besides painting, but today is not that day.

My dad came home from a business trip just in time to pick up a roller.  Then he left again.  Hmmmm....

Annie, the cutting-in queen, is at the top of the ladder, and the top of my gratitude list this week.

All four walls have paint on them now.

Today my husband, Rob, was busy doing some minor repairs, adding trim and building shelves.  He'll be back tomorrow for more of the same.

I've almost got the ceiling painted.  There is just one small corner left.  I've used all my balance and backbending skills standing on a ladder, bending way back and reaching out with the long painting pole for that last little bit of ceiling...

I could have climbed down and moved the ladder, but what good are all those mad yoga skills if you don't use them, right?

Now I'm off to stare at the "supermoon."  Between the big, gorgeous moon and the spring equinox, the energy is crazy.  If you've got something to manifest, catch this wave.  Stuff is going to be busting out all over the the place soon.  Can you feel it?

Still Playing with Paint

I can't get enough of acrylic paint. I'm like a kid with the cardboard box some new toy came in. I want to keep playing with the paint to see what else I can turn it into.

Lucky for me that the Inside Out e-course gives me lots of excuses to pull out the paint brushes.

Last week, while I was in the throws of collage-making, my desk got a bit messy. Alright, it was more than a bit messy. (The word "disaster" was thrown around.) I had cut out many, many pictures and words, but not all of them made it into the finished collages. Some just didn't fit into the theme, some took up too much room on the page and there were some that, when I looked at them again, I couldn't remember why I'd cut them out in the first place. These leftovers were in a disorderly pile on one side of my desk.

One particular image really appealed to me, but it was large and didn't seem to fit in anywhere. It was in the leftover pile, which was slowly getting spread around my desk as other things were stacked on top of it. I guess I was meant to do something with it, because that picture kept finding its way into my hand. It seemed that every time I looked for a different piece of paper I ended up holding this particular image. It stuck to everything I picked up.

Today we were supposed to paint intuitively. My intuition told me to use that magazine clipping. Then it wouldn't be free to jump into my hand anymore.

I glued it down to a page in my visual journal, then painted on it. I let it dry, then I painted more. And so on. And here's what I got:

Nobody's surprised that it has a yoga theme, right?

Oh, and after a week of coughing every time I tried anything except sitting-upright-on-the-couch-inhaling-Vicks-asana, I was finally able to get on my mat. Overjoyed at being there, I played. I put myself through obnoxious sequences (that I would never ask my students to do, in case any of them are reading this) and laughed when I fell over. I did handstands against the wall with poor alignment. I flipped my down dog into wild thing just because I can. It felt great to get my asana in gear again.

Related articles

• Playtime with Paint (truenorthyogini.blogspot.com)

Playtime with Paint

With all the things I try to fit into my life, playtime usually gets left off the schedule. Time to play never seemed like a priority. But the Inside Out e-course gives homework, and the homework feels an awful lot like play.

After the first week, my visual journal has fewer blank pages. My favorite journal project was putting paint on pages, using any method I wanted. My friend, Anne, gave me some acrylic paints to use - lots of gorgeous, bright colors. I didn't use any brushes. The paint went on with the edge of a piece of cardboard,


a sheet of plastic wrap



and some yarn.


I had fun creating my painted pages. Since I have never painted, I got to approach the project with a beginner's mind, free of any expectations. That attitude makes yoga fun, too. Sometimes I take my practice too seriously and care too much about what asanas I can do and, worse, which asanas I can't do.

Looking at the splashes and streaks of color, I'm reminded that what I can't do is just an opportunity to try something new. I feel very satisfied with the results of my painting play. It makes me smile.