Crush County

One year ago, I posted about this little book I picked up on my birthday during a trip to San Francisco. This week, we’re both one year older, which means I’ve made it to the end of the book. 365 sketches in 365 days (sort of…but I’ll get to that).

So, how did it go? Most of all, quickly. Flipping through the pages, I can’t believe it’s already been a year. When I was standing at the cash register of that store in San Francisco holding the book, the idea of doing one sketch every single day for a year seemed very daunting. Looking back, it’s embarrassing to think I felt that way. Filling this book, silly as it may seem, is one of the best things I’ve done for myself as an artist in a long time.

In part, that’s because it reminded me of how I used to draw when I was a kid; how I saw a masterpiece in every blank piece of paper, how I’d attack the page with anything I could get my hands on, and how I did it without stressing about the outcome. Knowing there was another empty space to fill each day forced me to be less precious about it all, and reminded me to simply enjoy creating something, instead of worrying about creating something perfect.

But my biggest takeaway is something I already knew, yet never actually put into practice, and it goes a little something like this: there ain’t nothin’ to it but to do it. I churned out 30 new drawings a month, for 12 months. I don’t know about anyone else, but that’s pretty great for me. There are periods of my life where I didn’t get out 30 drawings in one year (sadly). By just sitting down each day and doing, I have almost four hundred more drawings under my belt now than I did at this time last year. Just move the pencil, and stuff gets created. It can’t get more simple than that.

Here are a few parameters I gave myself at the onset of this project:

• No work-related stuff. I create artwork every day, but most of it is for work. This had to be just for me.
• Finish one sketch every day. When I walked away from it, it would be done  - no noodling it afterwards.
• No make-ups. Each sketch had to be done on its own day, or the spot would remain blank.
• No stress. Whatever happened on the page, good or bad, would be ok.
• No digital sketches. I wanted to get back to working with some real stuff like I did when I was younger.
• Experiment.
• Have fun.

After the first few months, I eventually broke, adjusted, or discarded virtually every one of these rules. I stressed over bad sketches, I walked away from half-finished drawings and came back to them later, I pasted up a few digital drawings, and I used a handful of pages for a work-related project. Ultimately, I decided it didn’t matter – I was drawing every day, so the purpose was fulfilled regardless.

And, yes, I did one make-up drawing. When all was said and done, I missed two days: my wedding anniversary, and Christmas Eve. My anniversary came only a week into the book, so I cut myself some slack and drew two drawings the next day. For the December 24th slot, well, I spent the evening assembling a kitchen set for my little girl to play with on Christmas morning, and the day got away from me. Totally worth it.

I’ve rambled a lot here, so let’s get to the final sketch dump from this book. Thanks for following!

I thought I’d use tonight’s daily sketch to let my Instagram and Twitter peeps in on some news from my world. I’ve got a lot of awesome (very awesome) things coming up that I can’t wait to share, but right now one thing has me more excited than anything else. So, here ya go, daily sketch 363. Consider it an announcement that my life is about to become twice as awesome.

Up until around October, I was doing monthly round-ups of my One Sketch A Day drawings here on the blog. I was aiming for 12 posts all grouped neatly by month, because these are the sort of things I obsess over, but toward the end of the year, for a variety of reasons, I fell off. The sketch pile grew daily, and as each week passed, it became increasingly harder to go back and catch up.

And now, hey, it’s April, and this month marks the end of this year-long endeavor, which I’m finding somewhat hard to believe. I’m under two weeks away from wrapping it up, but before we get there, here’s a sampling of, oh, the last six months or so. See you at the finish line!

My daughter is a little over a year and a half old. She’s been a ninja turtle fan for the majority of her life, and the theme song to the new series is her jam. We watched it together (several times) before bed the other night, and I recorded it. Her smile at the end gets me every time.