Five Fun Things
Elliott has been working on the most epic multiple page Christmas list for months. You can see part of it here. It brings him wild amounts of joy to work on. Every time something pings in his brain he must write it down on the list. It makes me think about how much joy anticipation can bring. How he’s really been savoring this season by dreaming. The length and breadth of the list is sort of overwhelming to me and feels sort of audacious to ask for everything you’ve ever wanted. But I’m also inspired by it. I can see clearly how making the list is a gift. How much fun it is to imagine your life with all the new things even if you don’t get all the things. I think I’m going to write an epic list for myself to enjoy.
I feel like I’ve run out of podcasts. I don’t know how this is possible, but it feels true. So I started just searching for podcasts for people that I love to see if they have been interviewed anywhere. I started off with Louise Lockhart, a talented illustrator who is the artist behind the treasures of the printed peanut and came across this interview. I fell even more deeply in love with her work listening to her talk about this life she has crafted. It was delightful! You can listen here.
I’ve been enjoying tending to things lately. Like mending and caring for objects, trying to make them last. I stripped our sheet set inspired by clean tok. I also used this cleaning technique to bring my white Chuck Taylors back to life.
I’ve been thinking about how I should spend my time, how to make a business, how to make art and money and what I want to do with my life. The internet tells me I need to “niche down”, do one thing and do it well but that sounds soooo boooooring. And I feel incapable of doing it. I kind of want to change my instagram name from haleyharmondraws to haleylivesherlife and just post stuff that I like that has added value to my life and share my enthusiasm for nonsense. Which is honestly more what my instagram page looks like than a collection of drawings. If you don’t know what you’re doing with your life either give me a thumbs up.
There are still some portraits left in my shop if you’re into that sort of thing.
Thanks for reading. You are great and I’m so glad you’re here.
Love your newsletter, Haley!
I was just telling my husband today that one of the things I liked about growing up incredibly poor 😂in rural VT is that my stepfather had many jobs simultaneously. He’d cut wood and was an actual lumberjack and tree man and also drove timber trucks, he’d build houses. He built the cabin I grew up in with his friends in exchanged work labor for not very much money in the late 80s. In his mind, if he was not actively making money for the family in some fashion, he was wasting time. He is also one of those types that cannot be idle. I e tried not to focus solely on money but I’m trying to save radically and I have goals so money *is* on my mind. And instead of seeming like a “hustle,” I am for myself- being a mom and counting that as labor too, and also my art in a way, or it’s time away from the other things and hard to carve out, at least. I’m just trying to maintain productivity, even if it is not money-making.
Anyway- I think it’s kind of cool to have an ever evolving amount of pots on the fire!
My parents “retired” to AZ but he’s driving for Pink Jeep tours out of Sedona. He’s an interesting guy.