November and a lil bit of December 2025 blog | writing and drawing

JUST MAKE ART

In November I spent a few days forcing myself to make art to get out of (another) art rut. I tried various things: drawing digitally, making loose ink drawings of animals, catching up on pages in my travel sketchbook, doodling while watching Age of Imprisonment vods, and painting things in watercolour with black backgrounds. It felt great to be making things again.

~A painting~

I then went on to continue the black-background theme by painting a @stillustrations.club prompt with gouache on black paper, inspired by @kiaraintheforest’s incredible paintings. It was tricky getting the colours to look opaque enough - do people mix gesso or some other medium with their paint to make the colours solid enough?? - but I enjoyed experimenting with a medium I haven’t touched in a long time.

The Boat House Gallery

At the start of November I was preparing more stock to go to The Boat House Gallery in Monmouth for the festive period. I packaged up a lot of sticker sheets, made some second-hand sketchbooks and bound some kraft-cover sketchbooks and ‘Draw Outside’ zine/sketchbooks. I took them in to the shop…then, the next day, horrific flooding hit Monmouth. It was heartbreaking seeing all the shops underwater - especially the beautiful handmade art that got ruined in The Boat House’s two shops. For a long time I thought my stuff had been ruined in the flood, so I really feel for those whose artwork did get ruined. By some miracle my stuff wasn’t touched, which I am so incredibly grateful for. Jenny and the team from The Boat House is currently holding a bid for a painting that got ruined in the flood (but still looks amazing) to raise money for all those that lost their work, so if you’re in the area make sure to visit the shop and make a bid, or simply support the artists by buying something!

Gotta Write Fast

As well as art-ing, I was writing my fiction novel(s) for the second half of the month after a bit of a break. I decided to start editing my first book (splitting it into two books because omg there are too many words) which required a load of planning and tweaking of the story, which I find really fun to do - until I get a lil too focused on outlining and forget that I should probably start actually writing now... I am now going from chapter to chapter making both minor and major changes and edits.

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Artist Alley

At the end of November and start of Decemeber I was preparing for my FINAL market (for a while): Worcester Artist Alley in collaboration with Speak Volumes! Festival. I designed some new silly stickers that many people connected with. Thank you to those that stopped by my stall and gave lovely compliments about my work.

That is the last market I will be applying to for a little while until I feel ready! I want to focus on bigger projects as well as explore what it is I wish to do/say with my art more, as I’m not particularly happy with the stuff I’m making at the moment. I've still got so much of my current stock, though, so I'm definitely not stopping markets forever!!! I'm going to work on making my online shop a place people visit more often while I'm not seeing them face-to-face :)

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Aaaaaand this will be my final monthly blog! I don't plan to continue these in 2026. For December I will do what I did last year, where I look back at what I achieved this year and think about what my goals for next year are. December so far has been a very bad time for me so I think I need to do this to bring some positivity in. One goal is going to be to get back to making YouTube videos, but less about the stuff I get up to and more about stuff that might help others (for example, I'm writing a script for how to try getting yourself out of an art rut). I may try writing up blog versions of the vids depending on the kind of advice or topic I talk about, but I can't promise anything!!

If you're one of the few people to have read even one of these blog posts, thank you for being here! I hope 2025 treated you well and that 2026 will be better if not!!!

Consider supporting me and my work by going over to my Etsy shop and having a browse if you like zines, stickers and prints mostly based around nature and travelling. You will also find my pet portrait commissions there! letsgetartyshop.etsy.com <3