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Gratitude Friday is a weekly ritual I started in order to focus on all the small and big positive things that happened during my week. I invite you to join me, you’ll see how much being thankful can change your life. If you want to know more about it, read my introduction post.

Hello beautiful you !

November, here it begins… Only two months away from a new year. Only two months to finish 2012. Can’t believe it, actually. I know it is cliché to say how fast the year went by, but right now this is how I feel. But I may come back to it more in depth later.

This week, I am thankful for:

• Sharing my Art Studio with another artist.
• Getting things done. It feels good to have this sensation of accomplishment.
• The paintings I am creating for each of my daughters. They are both almost finished, can’t wait to gift them with it and see their reactions.
• Anu, who helps me so much in being a better me and in growing my business in a mindful way so I don’t lose myself.
• Discussions with Paola.
• My husband’s honesty. and support. and love.
• The inspiration my daughters are on a daily basis, each in very different ways than the other.
• Audiobooks I can get or download from our Public Library.
• The «Sugar and Spice» Art retreat happening next June, that should be the first retreat I attend.
• The two custom paintings I am working on, which is very exciting (and makes me a bit nervous but don’t tell).
• Being more and more comfortable about the business side of the «I am an artist» thing. I won’t sell something I did but don’t love. I am finding my way…

If you wrote your Gratitude Friday on your blog, don’t forget to enter your NAME and URL below so I’m notified and can come to read you (you can also join by commenting this post):
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The amazing Leah is doing it again this year ! She is inviting us to create something everyday during the month of November, and share it somehow. I am not sure I will blog everyday, but we’ll see where it goes 🙂

Today, I was working on the two paintings I am (secretely) doing for both my daughters. They are always asking «Can I have this painting you created, pleaaaaaaaaaaase ??» and I say no most of the time because they are meant to be sold.
So I decided to do custom paintings for them to hang in their bedrooms.

I am trying to capture who they are and how I see them. Pouring love through these.

Here is a sneak peek of the one I am creating for Koala (my 5 ½ yo). She loves doing ballet, she dances all.the.time. She is the creative one, always dancing, singing or drawing.

Inspired by Elise Blaha, I wanted to simply share bits and pieces of what is currently happening in my Universe.

Currently, around here, I am..:

Listening to a bit of everything. I love discovering new songs (secret sharing: most of the songs I discover come from tv shows I watch or friends telling me «check this out, you should like it !», which I adore). I recommend to you the new album from p!nk called «The Truth About Love», it’s amazing (in my opinion).  While I am typing those words, my «a bit of everything» playlist is playing «All I need» by Christina Aguilera, it is a balad about her son.

Eating the Krave cereals for breakfast with lactose free milk. Just because it reminds me my Middle School years.

Playing with what I have in my stash of art supplies. It is no secret that I kind of am an Art Supply hoarder, just loving new stuff to play and experiment with. But I am stopping myself as I can because it is a lot of money, and so I decided to try to use what I forgot I had around and see what happens.

Watching «The Mentalist». Cheridoo and I love this kind of show. And we needed to catch up so had to watch from the very beginning. Love love love it.

Loving having my neighbor over everyday this week to paint along with me in my Creative Hollow. She just has to cross the gate that separate our back spaces and knock on the back door, it’s just amazing !

Reading «The Hobbit» because the movie will soon be released and I’ve never read the book. with some of our neighbors we are having «The Lord of the rings» movie nights !

Needing to define the diet that would be best for me, for my weight loss goal and for my fibromyalgia. It is way harder than I would like it to be. But I’ll get there.

Digging being inside when the rain is pouring, listening to it falling on the roof.

Feeling tired because of a not-so-good night of sleep, which results in a bad fibro day. But could be worse. I’m also feeling happy it’s Samhain today, because we have our little family rituals on that special night of the year.

Thinking of my family members who passed away, recently and long ago. Honoring their time with us.

Creating on wood panels instead of stretched canvas is so neat. I love the feel of it, I love the hardness of it. I am working on two very cool custom paintings, doing some research and preliminary sketches (more about that very soon).

Accepting that all can not be perfect, and that is ok.

Wondering if my «Secret Project» will be well received by you.

Snapping everyday moments. Some will end up in our Project Life-ish albums, some won’t. But that is fine.

Dreaming of making this other HUGE secret project come true. Scheming.

I try to be in my studio five days a week. I know have about 6 hours these days to just do what I want without being interrupted.
It changes everything. I’m sure you Moms out there can relate: when the kids finally go to school full time, your life is changed 😉

But working from home can make you feel lonely sometimes. And even if I appreciate being on my own, I love sharing my Studio with another artist.
My friend Melissa comes over when she can, and this week my neighbor is coming over ! I’m sharing my techniques and we are creating along.
Having another artist’s energy, witnessing the “ah ah-s” but also the frustration that comes too sometimes is just priceless…

The amazing Julie Prichard reminded me of a current issue we have, us who have a Facebook page.  You can read her blogpost «the ugly truth about facebook» by clicking.

Facebook is very clever about how to push us to spend money if we want to actually be seen by the people who are liking our fanpage. But as a small business, trying to have the head about the waterline, it is not in my budget right now to spend between $5-20 for EACH of my status update to be seen by you.

I have published it on my personal Facebook page, knowing that if I was posting it on my fanpage, only 10% would see it anyway. But I am pasting it here too, because this is important:

ATTENTION! Facebook now requires page administrators to pay to promote their updates if we want our content to be seen by our fans. If we do not pay to promote our posts, only about 10% of the fans receive the updates on the Facebook home page feed.

To keep RECEIVING ALL POSTS FROM US you have to hover the mouse on the “Like” button near our name. In the drop-down menu select “ADD TO INTEREST LISTS”. Then create an interest list (and make a name for your favorite sites). When you select that interest list you will see ALL of our posts and you won’t miss anything important!

 We recommend that you follow the above instructions for ANY Facebook page you care about, so you can continue seeing all the posts from the pages you love.

 Thanks for your help, and please share this with your friends! 

If you want to stay in touch via my page, that I update everyday, often several time a day, please take 2 minutes of your time to make sure you are seeing my statuses.
I really appreciate it. Thank you.

And if you are not a fan yet, you can still «like» my page anytime. It is right here: http://www.facebook.com/InnerVoices.net

ATTENTION! Facebook now requires page administrators to pay to promote their updates if we want our content to be seen by our fans. If we do not pay to promote our posts, only about 10% of the fans receive the updates on the Facebook home page feed.

To keep RECEIVING ALL POSTS FROM US you have to hover the mouse on the “Like” button near our name. In the drop-down menu select “ADD TO INTEREST LISTS”. Then create an interest list (and make a name for your favorite sites). When you select that interest list you will see ALL of our posts and you won’t miss anything important!

We recommend that you follow the above instructions for ANY Facebook page you care about, so you can continue seeing all the posts from the pages you love.

Thanks for your help, and please share this with your friends!