LACMA & The Tar Pits: ROW80 Check-In

February, how did we get here already??

JANUARY (5th) - March (26th) ROW80 GOALS:
Part A (Creativity & Social Media)
1. 1-2 blog posts per week (Ideally: 1 ROW80 post, 1 crafts-based post).
2. Do something creative every day.  Doodles still count.
4. Social Media: Check in with all of my accounts/communities every week.
5. Catch up with/update blog & Facebook photo galleries.

Part B (Catching up with life):
1. Exercise--Ideal goal: 3x3x3 (3 sets of 3 exercises for 3+ days). 
Bare minimum: 1 set of stretches.  Get outside on weekends.2. Get my finances in order.  Also, address insurance, taxes and a new budget ASAP (however vague).
3. Decluttering, and re-organizing/re-claiming my room.
4. Aim for having my 100th post in May (my 2-year marker for the blog!). At least try...

So where were we?

On Thursday night, I was moaning on Twitter about not having enough energy to blog, and one of my writing-buddies goaded me to finish up a draft and post a blog about wanting to blog but being drained.  So she helped me tick off that box!  (Thank you!) Overall creativity is still down as I adjust to a new routine.  However, all week there have been lovely rain clouds and sunsets, and as I drove home Friday evening, I got to drive towards a rainbow.  All of its colors were visible in distinct bands, from purple to red.

Saturday was a very nice day.  January 31st is "Museums Free-For-All" Day in Los Angeles, so some of us got together and went to "Museum Square" for a day of wandering around the Page Museum/La Brea Tar Pits and the LA County Museum of Art (LACMA). 

The Page Museum:

 

 

We saw a very wide range of dead animal skeletons (kind of morbid, but extremely well-preserved).  These 404 dire wolf sculls and several hundred eagle leg bones represent a fraction of the museum's collection of each:

 

"Pit 91," a tar pit that is still being excavated.  There are little flags marking bones from different kinds of animal remains.

 

Then we took a break to stroll along an entire block of food trucks to choose our lunches (I chose a falafel wrap over fish tacos or pupusas--a tough decision--and I also grabbed a lavender milk tea with mini-boba). 

The air was cool and cloudy, and the LACMA had a wonderfully broad range of artwork, both 2-dimensional and sculptural (a light piece and some inches-thick paintings we saw could qualify as both). 

These are Matisse portraits of one woman, Jeannette, as he pares her down further and further:

Two musician sculptures:

 

Some more of the paintings and sculptures that caught my attention.  You'll notice that my interest is usually sculptural:

 

 

 

An installation piece representing smoke fills up a large, sunken, indoor courtyard:

The Japanese Pavilion's architecture could be an installation piece all by itself, but it also housed some beautiful kimonos, swords, and scrolls. 

 

I took several dozen grainy pictures, got some fresh air, and hung out with nice people and a sweet little dog.  So it was a good day.  The nice things about museums is that the art can give you inspiration, and also trigger thought-connections that you might not have otherwise had.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today (Sunday) has thus far been pretty quiet.  I reviewed my 2014 plushie sales in preparation for taxes (and learned a lot about the California Sales Tax form).  It was neat to see that I've had 18 sales since I started developing my plushie prototypes in December 2012, 13 of them this year alone!

Some friends have been over this afternoon, designing characters for a game in the warm, sunny living room.  We've had 60-70 degrees this weekend, so the windows are open and letting in a breeze.  I need to catch up on some crafting, and I still need to finish going over last year's expenses, but I think that the change in routine yesterday really did recharge some mental batteries and emotional states.  So here's hoping that that feeling lasts.  My head has been all over the place this year.

 

I continue to stretch when I am already sore--before would be better.  And I have started doing a couple short meditation sessions during the week, in the hopes that it will help me stay calm and positive when I'm tired and veering towards low spirits, which has been happening fairly often.  Some of my stretches are a bit meditative anyway, but I'm making a more conscious decision to be in that headspace.  I hope to use some of the energy from the museum day towards projects of my own.